Introduction 1
Chapter 1 Setting Up Your Financial Life 3
Your Financial Toolkit 3
Consider Two Checking Accounts 8
The Right Ways to Pay Your Bills 8
Build Your Control Panel 16
Set Up Your Command Center 20
Staying Up-to-Date 22
Your Checklist 25
Chapter 2 Take Charge of Your Spending 27
The 60 Percent Solution 28
The 50/30/20 Plan 31
How Do I Prioritize My Goals? 39
Couples and Money 41
Your Checklist 45
Chapter 3 Get the Most Out of Your Credit Cards 47
If You Carry a Balance 47
How to Find the Best Card(s) 57
Your Checklist 60
Chapter 4 The No-Sweat Guide to Retirement (and other) Investing 61
How to Manage Risk 62
Why Beating the Market Is So Tough 65
The Three Keys to Successful Investing 66
Why Life-Cycle and Target Maturity Funds May Be the Answer 70
Which Account Do I Use? 73
Coordinating Your Approach 75
Getting Help 76
How Much Should I Save for Retirement? 77
Ballpark E$timate® 78
As You Approach Retirement 83
Your Checklist 85
Chapter 5 The Easy Way to Save for College 87
Why 529 College Savings Plans Rock 90
Picking the Right College Savings Plan 92
Prepaid Tuition Plans 93
Your High School Game Plan 95
What to Do If You’re Starting Late 95
Your Checklist 97
Chapter 6 Insurance: Protecting What You Have--And Will Have 99
Auto Insurance 99
Renters Insurance 103
Condo Owners Insurance 104
Homeowners Insurance 104
Umbrella Liability Policies 107
Health Insurance 107
Disability Insurance 109
Life Insurance 110
Your Checklist 115
Chapter 7 Buying Homes and Cars 117
When You’re Ready to Buy a Home 117
The Home-Buying Timeline 119
Picking the Right Mortgage 121
The Smart Way to Buy Cars 128
Why We Overspend on Cars 129
What to Do if You’ve Already Overspent 132
Your Checklist 134
Chapter 8 When You Need Help 135
How to Find a Financial Planner 135
When You Need a Tax Pro 138
Working with an Estate Planning Attorney 141
Your Checklist 144
Chapter 9 Be a Savvy Shopper 145
Sites Worth Paying For 145
Price Comparison Sites 146
Internet Shopping 101 146
Sites to Bookmark 148
Check for Coupons 149
When You’re in the Market for Real Bargains 149
A Word about Price Guarantees 150
How to Be a Savvy Traveler 151
When Things Go Wrong 152
Your Checklist 156
Chapter 10 Changing Your Uneasy Mind 157
“The One Who Dies with the Most Toys Wins” 158
“We’d Be Fine If Our Income Was Just a Little Higher” 159
“I’ll Never Have Enough” 159
“I’m Such a Loser; I’d Be So Much Farther Ahead If I Hadn’t Made So Many Mistakes with Money” 160
“I’ll Never Understand This Money Stuff” 162
“It’s Not My Fault” 162
Money and Your Brain 164
Your Checklist 166
Chapter 11 Setting Goals, Or What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life? 167
Visualizing Your Ideal Life 170
Setting the Timer 170
The End Game 171
What It’s All About 171
Resources and Recommendations 175
The Basics 175
College 175
Couples & Money 176
Credit & Debt 176
Estate Planning 177
Investing 177
Real Estate 178
Retirement 178
Savings Tips 179
Index 181
© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
Today, individuals have to make more financial decisions than ever before. They must keep track of more details, too - about everything from retirement investments to credit cards to health insurance and the penalties for making mistakes just keep on escalating. But there's a solution! In Easy Money, award-winning personal finance columnist Liz Weston introduces the "three pillars" of money simplification --consolidate, automate, and delegate. Learn how to winnow down your choices, streamline financial systems, and select strategies that will work as simply and efficiently as possible. Weston offers up-to-the-minute advice on using technology to alleviate money stress (and warns against the technologies that can put individuals even further behind!) Discover practical tips for reducing paper clutter, getting records under control, and even safeguarding finances against identity theft. Along the way, Weston offers advice for simplifying every aspect of financial life: spending, credit cards, mortgages, college and retirement savings, insurance, estate planning, and a whole lot more.
Liz Pulliam Weston is the most-read personal finance columnist on the Internet, according to Nielsen//NetRatings. She’s also an award-winning, nationally syndicated personal finance columnist who can make the most complex money topics understandable to the average reader. She is the author of the national best-seller Your Credit Score: How to Fix, Improve and Protect the 3-Digit Number that Shapes Your Financial Future and of Deal with Your Debt: The Right Way to Manage Your Bills and Pay Off What You Owe. She also was a contributor to The Experts’ Guide to the Baby Years.
Liz’s columns run twice a week on MSN Money, which reaches more than 12 million readers each month. Millions more read her question-and-answer column “Money Talk,” which appears in newspapers throughout the country, including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Palm Beach Post, the Portland Oregonian, the Newark Star-Ledger, Stars & Stripes, and others.
Liz appears regularly on numerous television and radio programs, including American Public Media’s “Marketplace Money” and NPR’s “Talk of the Nation” and “All Things Considered.” She was for several years a weekly commentator on CNBC’s “Power Lunch” and has been quoted in numerous publications, including Consumer Reports, Real Simple, Family Circle, Men’s Health, Woman’s Day, Parents, Christian Science Monitor, the Associated Press, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe, Forbes.com, and others.
Weston is a graduate of the certified financial planner training program at University of California, Irvine. She can be reached via the “contact Liz” form on her Web site, www.asklizweston.com.
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