Productivity Tips, Vested Stock Options, Mutual Fund Reviews @ The Roundup

Personal Finance Reads

• The Simple Dollar: Trent shares his personal productivity tips and I see that we do some of the same things such as keeping a notebook handy for ideas. I also use a daily planner for my activities, exercise to try to wake up in the morning (afternoon exercises wipe me out!) and eat my heartiest meals in the morning.
• Lazy Man and Money: Lazy Man has bought some vested stock options which I gather are from the company he was last employed. I’m not sure if this applies to him but I’ve faced similar scenarios in the past when I’ve left a company and you are required to buy the options they’ve granted you within three months of leaving or else you effectively lose them. Yes, I’ve bought options offered to me before, but they’ve turned out to be worthless in the end.
• Money Smart Life: This post is a warning to a lot of us using the web for business. Like Ben, I’ve also received requests to provide some highly sensitive personal information for tax purposes and have always felt on guard when handling these types of inquiries. When dealing with the possibility of divulging your secure information, always ask questions and sniff out the source before you act.
• Gen X Finance: If you’re in the market to invest in a mutual fund, don’t do so until you read this comprehensive review on mutual funds that covers a choice list of funds including those from The Royce Funds, Janus, Oakmark, Fidelity and T.Rowe Price.
• The Sun’s Financial Diary: Sun does something very interesting — he compares his actively managed funds against their passive index fund counterparts. He presents a table showing the differences in fund performance and fees.
• Consumerism Commentary: What do you think of the prediction that home values will slump 25% to 30% over the next three years? As Charlie Brown would say: AUUUGH!
• Free Money Finance: FMF provides a report on the progress of his net worth and lists some of his financial goals for the year. It looks like he’s on the road to early retirement!
• Mighty Bargain Hunter: Would you rather moonlight for extra money or build a side business to increase your income? Find out what some of the differences are between these two approaches.
• No Credit Needed: NCN talks about some basic ways to get out of debt based on his own personal experience. Nice bonus: it includes a link to a post that illustrates how the debt reduction process works.
• All Financial Matters: A remarkable bit of information here — the cost of cashing checks at payday loan stores is much larger than you think. How about $360,000 (pretax) over your lifetime? One can accumulate this amount by avoiding the cashing of checks, and instead funneling the amount saved into investments.

Additional Readings Around The Web

• Simplify Your Finances @ The Great Money Challenge
• Your Zip Code Could Cost You Money @ Savvy Frugality
• What If @ The Wild Investor
• In your 60’s? Use your financial freedom wisely @ Rocket Finance
• Why Being Frugal Sucks, In The Long Run @ Money Management And You!
• Why I’m Not a Fan of the Tax Rebate @ Smart Easy Money
• Retirement Into A Down Market @ Retirement: A Full Time Job (I agree! )

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