A few weeks ago I got the notice of the automobile insurance premiums for the next six month period.  It was several hundred dollars higher than the then current premium.  I thought the insurance company had forgotten my Costco discount  and called them the next day.

It wasn’t a mistake.  They had “reviewed and reassessed” rates for Southern California and determined they were undercharging.  They offered that if the 20-something son drove the old van it would remain the same.  Umm, that wasn’t going to fly since he is making payments on a nice 2009 SUV.

After only one year we were shopping for car insurance again.  This is on top of the health insurance changes going on at work. 

My son recommended AIS (Auto Insurance Specialists) as many of his friends had  gone through them.  I compared their quotes to other online sites and found them competitive and able to show prices between various carriers.

We ended up with Mercury and are paying less than we were previously after discount for moving our condo coverage over.  Let’s hope we don’t have to do the same thing next year.

Have you shopped for car insurance recently?  What advice do you have on finding the best deal?

photo credit: TheTruthAbout… 

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Couple Money interviewed me recently and published the article this past Sunday.  It was a lot of fun and I hope you read the unique questions posed by Elle.  Thanks for the opportunity and my moment of fame!

Winners

@Money_Reasons won a copy of Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover in the week 3 drawing of the one year Blogiversary Giveaway.  This is one personal finance author he’s not had the pleasure of reading yet!

The winner of the Cheerios and American Express Gift Card giveaway is Barb from Diabetic Snacker. Check her site out as she has lots of giveaways running.

Giveaways Still Open

The last two gifts for the blogiversary giveaway are $25 Amazon gift cards.  You still could be a winner so make sure to enter by Saturday.

CSN Stores is sponsoring a $60 gift certificate giveaway good at any one of their more than 200 sites. Enter this one by August 3rd.

Conference News

The Savvy Blogging ladies just announced next year’s conference dates. To celebrate they’re offering 50% off this year’s recordings and materials with the code CHEYENNE. Click here to buy summit materials.

What a bargain for $48.50 but this offer is only good through tomorrow at noon Eastern.  I am an affiliate so I’d appreciate if you use my link.

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I love to read money makeovers in financial magazines and newspaper business sections.  Usually, the story is of somehow struggling to catch up in retirement planning.  The people are often disappointed to learn they have to work longer than planned and give up on some dreams.

This time the story was different.  Carole and Dave did everything right but are reluctant to stop working.  This couple is age 68 and 64 respectively and still work full time, have no debt and own a six bedroom home in California.

Journey to Retirement

The Lutnesses practiced frugality by rarely turning on the air conditioner (despite living in a warm area) and line drying clothes. They drive old cars and use public transportation. 

By living frugally they have saved a nice nest egg and have no debts.But they made one crucial personal finance mistake. 

They forgot to plan retirement. 

What’s Next

In case you don’t click through to the story the financial planner advised the wife retire at the end of year…but only to give her time to get used to the idea.  He advised the husband to retire a few months later when he turns 65.  He’s not reluctant.

Why?  Because he wants them to be able to enjoy the fruits of their labor while they’re still healthy enough to travel. 

Retirement Planning

Their story struck a chord with me because I think people are likely to get so focused on the journey the destination gets lost.  My plan is to retire in 9-10 years and travel with my husband while he’s still able.

We will sell our current home and transition to a one story.  We may also buy a place in Florida for wintering but there’s time to figure that out.

Do you have a plan of when to retire?  Will you sell your home, move or change living situations at all?  Just don’t be afraid to retire.

photo credit: The Rocketeer

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Visit my review page and enter the giveaway for a $60 CSN stores gift certificate good for anything from bedroom furniture sets to dishes. Enter no later than August 3rd!

P.S. A comment here won’t count so check it out….

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Several readers have expressed regret about not being able to attend the Savvy Blogging Summit earlier this month.  Recordings of the session are now available and the keynote by J.D. Roth is a free download! 

Click here to visit Savvy Blogging and check out the sessions for purchase. At $10 each you can pick which ones would be most meaningful to you or get the whole batch of 12 recordings for $97.  I am an affiliate so I’d appreciate if you use my link if interested.

If you missed previous posts, part one included background on the conference and the networking benefits. Part two included highlights from the opening keynote, monetization, community building, design and media sessions.

Media Kit Creation

This session was another one that I was really looking forward to and instructor Melissa Hourigan delivered.  She discussed that the media kit should include:

About You

• Interests
• History
• Credentials/affiliations
• Goals with Blog
• Contact Info

About the Blog

• Tag line
• Mission statement
• Polls
• Video
• Images
• Reviews
• Community/Network

About your Audience

• Demographics (age, sex, income, etc.)
• Online Stats (subscribers, fans, followers)
• Influence (interests, volunteering)
• Inbound Links
• Organic (keywords bringing traffic)

For Advertisers and Paid Media
Include the following:

• Awards and accolades
• Industry conference attendance
• Consistent branding and message
• Graphics, logos, elevator pitch, bio
• PDF or google document for pricing options
• Contact Information
• Advertising options, rates and guidelines
• Review and contest opportunities
• Brands you’ve worked with previously
• Brand and/or reader testimonials

 Photography

This session was taught by David Mejias of David Mejias Photography. He is an example of why you should never judge someone by how they look. I thought what is this young guy going to teach me?

Well, not only is he incredibly talented but he put complex information into easy to understand context. Hopefully, I can do him some justice in sharing tips with you.

Photography is the study of three things: light, color and gesture.    Tips to improve your blog photography include:

• Simplify background
• Everything in the frame should be deliberate
• Use all four sides of the frame
• Develop a point of view (concept, black/white, etc.)

We also learned what all those symbols mean on the camera dial.

SEO Tips and Strategies

 This session ran over because attendees could not get enough and kept asking questions that we all wanted to know the answers to.  Troy Lerner from Booyah Online Advertising led this session. Here’s some of the tidbits I wrote down:

• 2/3 of Google’s algorithm is based on trust of websites
• Links are more important than keywords
• Page title should include keywords
• Content: Body copy supports the title
• Keywords should be in anchor text
• Don’t bother with nofollow (google has a problem with all ads, not just text ads)
• Important text should be at top left of website
• You’ll earn more money with text ad
• Use google webmaster tools
• Website speed is important..but compare to competitors
• Keep posts to 300-600 words in length
• Use google trends for ideas on what to write
• Write guest posts (incoming links are very important)
• Put 2-4 anchor text links in a post

Summary

Other sessions included business law, personal productivity, strategic planning and consulting.  I’ll be diving back into their materials after tackling what I learned in the other sessions.

Taking a chance and applying for this summit was the best thing I could have done for my blog and my growth as a blogger. 

I’ve heard people say if you can take on thing back from a conference and apply it then the conference was worth the money.  This conference gave me dozens of tidbits to apply so the money spent on registration and travel very well spent.

Was anything helpful to you?  What have you learned at a conference that you applied?

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Content © Bucksomeboomer  2009-2010. All Rights Reserved.

“Where the turf meets the surf” is the tag-line for the local Del Mar Race Track. This past week was opening day and as tradition goes, they have a hat contest with some pretty unique (and outrageous) entries.

I have no desire to watch horses (or any animal) race but it’s a unique San Diego event and a nice place for a summer afternoon.  For those with alternate interests Comic-Con is going on in my fair city this weekend.

Editor’s Picks

“Why can’t everybody just get along” seems to the quest of the Amateur Financier as he discusses the the truth about politics.

Deliver Away Debt continues the series on the Debt Destroyer by recommending capturing daily expenses. There’s a lot of good information in this post to help you get on budget.

Remember when Tom Cruise went crazy a few years ago and a lot of us people never thought of him in the same way since?  His antics are mild compared to the new Hollywood bad boy. Single Mom, Rich Mom shares how Mel Gibson blows it…money that is!

Moolanomy shares what we can learn from Santa on saving and giving great gifts. It’s never too early to plan!

Sometimes it’s good to have a refresher and that’s what this list of 9 key financial terms from Money Green Life does. Can you explain what APR means?

Out of Debt Again lost some photos on her digital camera.  She shares how you can retrieve deleted photos with a card recovery program. I need this!

Are you making the right moves for retirement? Use these 5 ways to prepare for a successful retirement from Christian Personal Finance.

Personal Finance Journey recalls one of my favorite shows as a kid. Learn from the financial profiles of Alvin and the Chipmunks. ALVIN!!!!

I’ve shared my experiences with daily deal sites, but this article from Little House in the Valley includes online deal sites I didn’t even know about.

Financial Samurai shares that senior workers outnumber teenage workers for the first time. What an amazing stat. Enjoy the discussion and analysis in the comments.

Carnivals

Yakezie Carnival @ Ultimate Money Blog

photo credit: epitti
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Content © Bucksomeboomer  2009-2010. All Rights Reserved.

The subtitle of a recent AARP article is “Spending is out, simplicity’s in.  Why the nation’s thriftiest people are also the happiest”.   This isn’t a story about middle class people giving up lattes and recreational shopping.

Instead the subjects are members of Jeff Yeager’s miser advisor network surveyed when he wrote The Cheapskate Next Door .  These are people who won’t run the dishwasher because they perceive it wastes water and electricity and wear clothes until they’re threadbare. 

I don’t aspire to live like them but think there’s something to learn from the superfrugal. 

1. Develop income streams.  One man owns a duplex and rents out the second unit.  Two of the couples in the article started and work at their own businesses.

2. Delay Purchases.  One couple won’t buy a major purchase until they’ve saved twice as much as it costs.  I don’t use the same tactic but do have a delay tactic for online shopping by just adding to my Amazon wish list (and closing the broswer).

3. Eat at Home.  Not only does preparing food at home save money but the family ends up spending more time together preparing and eating the meals. 

4. Giving.  A common trait in Yeager’s research was giving to others.  The average amount of income donated among the group was 5%  compared to less than 3% nationally.  Bruce Jackson said, “the more careful I am with my money, the more I can pass on to someone who really needs it”.

I didn’t see where it was proven that these people are happier than others, but does it really matter?  They’re happy with their lifestyle and can teach us all to be better stewards of our money and time.

photo credit: shoothead
 

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The sessions at the Savvy Blogging Summit July 8-10th were incredible.  I learned so much that I want to apply to this blog that it’s taken this long to start to figure out where to begin.  You might notice gradual changes in the next few months as I get through the list.

Last week’s recap included information on the conference, structure and networking. Now, let’s get to the content which I’ve organized by instructor.

Opening Keynote, Building Community and Effective Monetization

J.D. Roth of Get Rich Slowly fame, shared lessons that helped him get to be one of the biggest and most successful personal finance blogs.  If someone with over a million page views a month and 80,000 subscribers speaks, you should listen!

Keynote

I was lucky enough to sit next to J.D. during dinner and found him to be one of the nicest people you’ll ever meet (and no I didn’t elbow anyone out of the way for that seat).  The key points for me from the opening talk were:

• Be yourself on the blog
• Tell stories to engage readers
• Assume no one reads your blog and at the same time assume everyone does
• Improve continuously
• There’s room for everyone is t he blog world
• Have fun

Building Community

 It’s important to leverage existing relationships when building a community.  JD remembered what I told him about the Yakezie Challenge the night before and asked me to share it with the rest of the group.  I was glad to be on the right path in terms of this topic.

Another important point from the session was to be careful in responding to negative comments.  Let other readers do that as it usually makes the writer look bad.  Remember a blog is “not a democracy; it’s a benevolent dictatorship”.

Effective Monetization

JD started off with a quote by David Ogilvy, “Advertising is only evil when it advertises evil things”.  There is nothing wrong with trying to make some money in exchange for providing free content and a lot of hard work.

The most important point to me was to understand your post popular posts and work on effectively monetizing them.   Also the path to earnings is:

Story ? Content ? Links ? Traffic ? Money

You should have heard the buzz with the slide displaying blog earnings from 10 large blogs.  It showed a wide disparity in ad earnings which were dependent on the monetization strategy of each owner.

Design, Reader Usablity and Coding

This area is where I struggle the most it seems as what you see is what I’ve built.    Joy Miller from 5 J’s Design had me furiously writing down notes.

Here’s my to do list just from this session:

• Evaluate site load time
• Use alt and title tags for images
• Create a custom 404 page
• Make header link to home page
• Publish a start here page
• Add seach form (Done: see the pretty Lijit search box)

Bloggers and the News Media

Valerie Hoff is a news anchor at 11 Alive in Atlanta and did a news report for her summit recap.  Her tips on a positive media interaction include:

• Stay on message
• Do homework on the person interviewing you
• Trust your instincts

A fun part of the session was doing mock interviews with Valerie.  She said I did well but I definitely noticed 2-3 things to be aware of next time (thinking positively here).

———-$$$$$———–

I’ll include takeaways from the PR, SEO and Photography sessions in the next post.  Is there anything here that you can use with your blog or business?

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Content © Bucksomeboomer  2009-2010. All Rights Reserved.

When drafting your zero-based budget (you have one, right?) you most likely included discretionary items.  These are the things you could cut out if push came to shove. 

I know my budget isn’t as lean and mean as possible but believe including these extras, some might call them luxuries, help me follow the plan.

Pedicure

During the open-toe shoe months (April through November  in California), spa pedicures are a mainstay in my budget. I figure it’s the price of being able to wear sandals to work.

Visits are stretched out to every six weeks and I patronize a shop where the rate is $21 plus tip.  There are often coupons in the pennysaver but I like going the work of this shop and stopped trying new ones.

Massage

My posture on the computer is horrible resulting in neck and back pain at times.  Massaging out the kinks and knots becomes a necessity at times but I try to nip it in the bud before then.

By taking advantage of daily deals (such as Groupon) it’s possible to save a significant amount of money.  A hour long deep tissue massage probably averages about $75  but a recent daily deal resulted in me getting three massages for a total of $29.  I tip on the regular price each visit.

Smart Phone

Cell phones are a necessity for Mr. Boomer and I because we don’t have a land line at home.  However, the Droid is pure luxury. 

It’s $30 a month that I don’t have to spend although it does save me time.  How?  I’m able to catch up on my reader queue and emails from just about anywhere.  It turns waiting  (at the doctor’s office, etc.) into productive time.

Convenience Foods

Cooking is sometimes the last thing I want to do after a long day in the office or after a business trip.  By including convenience foods in our menu planning we’re able to eat at home more often and not spend money dining out. 

For example picking up a roasted chicken and prepared mashed potatoes at Costco means all we have to do is add a vegetable and we have a delicious, healthy meal with leftovers for less than $4 a person.

Lattes

Every Sunday I get a latte at Starbucks.  This is a reward for staying on track during the week by drinking home-brewed coffee and eating home-made lunches. 

This $4 a week expense keeps me from feeling deprived because I know there’s a prize every seven days and ultimately saves much more money.  If I ate lunch out each workday at $8 a pop that would be 10 times more money.

Travel

This is the largest discretionary item in our budget.  Many people wouldn’t even consider spending money on vacation or travel while paying down debt.  I think some sort of vacation is necessary at least once a year for several reasons.

One is that people need a chance to recharge and change their scenery.  How boring is it to never get a week away from work or your home?  I’ve never heard of people near the end of their life regretting that they traveled or vacationed too much.  We’ve all heard of the reverse.

Having said that, we have changed our vacation plans to save money.  When airfare to Hawaii practically doubled from San Diego this year we changed our vacation plans to a cruise that originated from here.

———-$$$$$———-

I hope you include at least one luxury in your budget.  What is your discretionary item and why?

photo credit: thomaswanhoff

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Content © Bucksomeboomer  2009-2010. All Rights Reserved.

July 18, 2009 was the day of my first blog post and this site. The party started with giveaways earlier in the month but it’s not too late to get in on the celebration.

Cheryl@ MommyPants won the 4 GB thumb drive and Lethea won the first copy of Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. There are three more prizes including Amazon gift cards to come so join in!

Just to help me remember where I was at one year (I’m getting old….) here are some stats:

Posts: 236
Comments: 1,221
Alexa Rank: 104,127
Subscribers: Less than 100

Thanks for reading and please stay tuned for year 2!

Editor Picks

Some of the selected posts this week were from the previous week when I didn’t publish a round-up.  Enjoy!

Len Penzo kicks it off with the 6 Most Valuable Grocery Store Products Known to Man.  I don’t know how he learned all these uses but I’m scared of coke now.

How do you know its the best rate when renting a car?  Use these tips on finding the best price from Car Negotiation Coach.

The Saved Quarter shares 10 things she wants but won’t buy now because she wants an emergency fund more.

For a new look at our lifestyle read Money Help for Christian’s post on 3 things that shocked him in North America.  It will make you think.

MoneyCrush shares how to create subaccounts for an ING account. I need to do this and move my sinking funds over to ING where they will actually earn money!

It’s really not that far until Christmas. Girl with a Red Balloon asks how early is too early to plan?  I start at the first of the year for all gift giving occasions. 

WiseBread shares 50 healthy foods for under a $1 a pound. There’s no reason to not eat healthy!

Because the economic recovery seems to be varied from area to area, Financial Samurai asks if he’s living in a parrallel universe. The comments from people in various parts of the country are very enlightening.

Smart on Money reminds us to keep it simple. Read it for simple finance principles.

Do you know what to do with an  unexpected windfall? Wealth Pilgrim shares strategies to put it to good use instead of blowing it.

Carnivals 

Carnival of Personal Finance @ Funny About Money Carnival of Money Stories: Signs of Summer Edition @ Suburban Dollar

 Yakezie Challenge Link Rodeo – Special Midweek Edition @ Evolution of Wealth

Wealth Artisan University #2 @ Wealth Artisan

Yakezie Thursday @ Financially Poor

Breaking Free of the Cage: Escaping the Rat Race @ Invest it Wisely

Linkworthy: Iphones, Restaurants and Retail Shoppers @ Personal Finance Firewall

photo credit: Pink Sherbet Photography 

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Content © Bucksomeboomer  2009-2010. All Rights Reserved.