The Carnival Of Debt Reduction #68, The FAQ Edition

Welcome to the Carnival of Debt Reduction #68, the FAQ Edition! Do you have questions about how to handle debt and money? Don’t worry, as we have the answers right here at your fingertips, thanks to the great articles that were submitted this week! Without further ado, here’s….

Your Debt Reduction FAQ

1. Why am I in debt?
   Steve at Debt Free tackles the possible reasons behind overspending, where he offers great insights into the irony of the spending cycle that makes one go broke in order to appear well-heeled.
2. Were we really irresponsible or were we just plain ignorant?
   Personal Finance For Students And Fresh Grads analyzes their debt situation in great detail. This post is a must read for its coverage of their situation and its investigation on how they got into debt.

3. Should I save or should I pay off my loans?
   And that is the question. Ask Mr. Credit Card brings you the ultimate debtor’s dilemma: do we put our money in a savings account earning low rates of return or pay down our debt instead? As he says, there are no hard and fast rules as it all depends….
4. Should I save or should I pay off my loans, Part 2?
   Tricia from Blogging Away Debt has actually just faced the real life issue of not owning an emergency fund while juggling bills. She’s met a higher than expected expense that has thrown a monkey wrench on her bill paying strategies. So she’s working on an emergency fund to avoid this scenario in the future.
5. Can I conquer my vanity for the sake of my sanity?
   Andrea at Wise Bread just made a confession about trying to ditch her self-described spoiled rich girl facade. It is a struggle when it’s been a lifestyle for so long — but she’s made some resolutions and is consequently biting the bullet. A wonderful piece.
6. Where’s a good place to learn more about debt and credit?
   Golbguru from Money, Matter and More Musings provides us with an excellent one stop resource for many topics on debt and credit: the Federal Trade Commission. This place is a gold mine of incredibly helpful information that belongs in your bookmarks.
7. When do you want to pay off that new house?
   How about asap? Free Money Finance reports on a new type of loan called “the accelerator loan” that is popular abroad and designed to pay off your mortgage early. It comes with some caveats, but could be worth considering for certain folks.
8. How are my savings doing?
   Bryan C. Fleming is getting a whole bunch of people to follow a healthy savings regimen, which he hopes will eventually create millionaires! It’s a wonderful way to get the support you need to make your saving and investing goals. He’s on day 135 now and going on strong.
9. How can I be a good financial parent?
   Nina at Queercents discusses the premiere of “The L Word”, a Showtime drama, and ties it cleverly to 5 immutable laws of financial parenting. To see how the riches to rags story for one of its characters is going to play out, you need to watch the rest of Season 4.
10. Honey, do you want to talk about it?
    Trent from The Simple Dollar tackles the oftentimes dicey matter of “The Talk”. It is that conversation you have with your spouse about money, which you may desperately want to make but needs to be handled with sensitivity. Here’s how you can do it.
11. How can I earn and keep more money?
    DebraMoorhead.com gives us 9 ways to earn more money, including tips on saving, investing and how to stop spending! It’s a compilation of solid suggestions for dealing with money ranging from changing your attitude to earning more and keeping more.

Thanks to all of you who contributed to this week’s carnival: I tried my best to accommodate all the entries that were submitted, but had to filter out a few that didn’t have a debt or savings angle. I learned quite a few things from your posts and truly enjoyed this hosting process. And for all those who are visiting, may you find the answers here that you are looking for! You can get more debt management goodness at next week’s edition at Debt Hater. Here’s where you can submit your story.

A little note about the numbering of the carnivals — I’ve picked up where the last host left off, which was edition #67. However after checking previous editions and counting them down in the last few weeks, we may be one number off. This may really be edition #69 but I’ll leave it as is unless I hear otherwise from the organizer, MB Hunter.

Thanks for dropping by, and have a great week!

 
< Image Source: E-Dem >

• Stock trades: Free stock trades from Zecco, Cheap stock trades from TradeKing, Stock news and Investment info at INO TV Free, No cost Trend Analysis for stocks
• Earn top returns: FNBO Direct [1.90%], HSBC Direct [1.65%], WTDirect [1.76%], E*Trade Bank [0.95%], ING Direct [.25% to 1.65%]
• Cash bonus: Discover More [$50], American Express [$25], Lending Club [$25]

If you enjoyed this post, you can get free regular updates through our RSS Feed, or you can have our latest posts delivered to your email inbox by supplying your address here. Your address will only be used for this purpose, and you can unsubscribe anytime. Share This: Save to del.icio.us Digg This! Stumble It! Submit to Reddit Email This

Categorized under: Credit, Debt & Loans, Frugality & Budgeting, Money Articles