Smart Money Links 4U

Dear Penny, I am a 30-year-old who has built a stable and happy life after growing up in a family that was often unstable emotionally and financially. I love them, but as I become more successful, my family needs more and more of my support.  My sister and her son moved into my father's one-bedroom apartment in July, which is against the lease. I was very against this living situation because it’s way too small for two adults and a rambunctious child. My sister said she had no other options because she has terrible credit, little savings and an eviction. She was laid off for not having child care and is collecting unemployment. My father was struggling to pay for his apartment, as well.  Their relationship has deteriorated. I don’t think they can continue living together. My aunt  co-signed for my father's apartment and says my father can stay in her spare bedroom if he works with her to fix his finances. My aunt has been trying to help me, as she knows I am overwhel...

We all have financial goals we’d like to achieve. Save more money. Get out of debt. Improve our credit scores. But we’ve also seen our well-intentioned resolutions never become reality. The key to setting goals we’ll actually stick to is to make sure they’re SMART: Specific Measurable Attainable Relevant Timely Designing SMART financial goals will help you get where you want to be with your money. Setting Money Goals As SMART Goals Let’s break down each aspect of setting SMART goals. 1. Make Your Goals Specific The more explicit and detailed you can be about your money goals, the better. Use specific numbers. Describe exactly how you’d like to carry out your money mission. For example, it’s too broad to simply say you want to increase your emergency fund . A more specific goal would be: I’d like to increase my emergency fund by $600 over the next six months by auto-drafting $50 from my bimonthly paycheck to my savings account. Being specific gives you a game plan to fo...

We’ve all heard that breakfast is the Most Important Meal. But when it’s 7 a.m., you’ve got hungry kids who need to be fed and out the door and your brain simply can’t deal with constructing another meal — you might easily resort to the usual: cereal & milk or frozen waffles. And by “you,” I mean, “I.” So I turned to nutritionists who offered healthy, cheap breakfast ideas for everyone who is too frazzled to create their own (me!). Cheap Breakfast Ideas and Advice, from Nutritionists Here’s what the experts told us. Why is breakfast important?  “You’re literally breaking a fast and restoring your body with all the nutrients and energy it needs to take on the day,” says Rachel Naar, a registered dietician in New York. What should you always include in your morning meal? Aim to get whole foods and whole grains, Naar says. Plus, you should get a carbohydrate and a protein: You are the most insulin-resistant in the morning, so protein helps with blood sugar stabilization/ gl...

Stress is something we all deal with in varying forms. The past 12 months have tested everyone’s ability to cope with unprecedented stressors, and well, it’s tiring having to adapt to a constantly changing landscape. Meditation is scientifically proven to lower stress levels and help soothe the hamster wheel of thoughts racing through our minds. Best of all, thanks to modern technology, meditation has never been so accessible. You need no equipment, and there are hundreds of free meditation apps and mindfulness apps to assist you in finding your zen. 1. MyLife Meditation: Mindfulness Selected as the Apple App Store’s “App of the Day” in 2020, MyLife Meditation: Mindfulness is a free meditation app that is personalized to how you feel and only asks for a few minutes of your day. According to the app, users were 82% more likely to be less anxious with consistent use of MyLife Meditation: Mindfulness. Sign us up! This free meditation app also offers breathing exercises to catalyze c...

Pretend you invested $10,000 in GameStop stock at 10 a.m. Eastern time Thursday. You would’ve had $2,684 by 11:20 a.m. By 2:10 p.m., you’d have been back in the black with $10,481. By Wall Street’s close at 4 p.m., your $10,000 investment would have come crashing back down to $4,124. By 5:41 p.m., after-hour trading had pushed it back up to $5,645. Regardless of when you’re reading, just know this: All these numbers are already ridiculously outdated. Here’s why GameStop has been on such a wild ride and what you should take away as a regular investor . How Did GameStop Rise 2,500%? The first thing you need to know about GameStop is that it’s been struggling for several years. The retailer buys and sells old video games , which has been tough as gaming has gone digital. COVID-19 only made things worse. As recently as August, those shares that briefly spiked to $469.42 earlier today were trading for less than $5. At their low point during the pandemic, GameStop shares sold for $2.57...

If you’re behind on your rent because of the coronavirus pandemic, you just got extra time to catch up. During his first day in office, President Joe Biden extended an order that bars most landlords from pursuing evictions through the end of March 2021. With millions of people at risk of eviction, housing advocates have argued that a large wave of homelessness could worsen the spread by crowding shelters and forcing people into cramped living spaces. 7 Eviction Moratorium FAQs: What Renters and Landlords Should Know President Donald Trump initially passed the order through the Centers for Disease Control in response back in August. Before Biden ordered the extension, the moratorium was set to end Jan. 31, 2021. We’ve compiled what we know about the latest order into this eviction moratorium FAQ. 1. How do I know if I qualify for the eviction moratorium? To qualify, you’ll have to sign a sworn declaration affirming that: You’ve tried to obtain government assistance for your rent ...

Employers of a certain size, by law, have to offer health insurance to full-time workers. But some employers extend coverage to part-timers, too. The Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, defines “full time” as 30 hours or more per week. That’s right — 30, not 40. “That definitely doesn’t sync up with common usage,” David Frazzini, a partner and health benefits expert at the HR consulting firm Mercer . If you regularly clock 30 hours a week, and if your employer is large enough, they should be providing health insurance, according to the ACA. Some employers market this as a perk but, really, they’re obligated to give it to you. Or they may offer some health benefits to part-timers, but the perks aren’t robust enough to qualify as health insurance. Other companies really do go above and beyond what is required by law. Here are seven big employers that offer part-time jobs with health insurance. 7 Places to Find Part-Time Jobs With Health Insurance These companies offe...

When you hear the term “coaching,” it’s easy to think of the whistle-blowing leader of your child’s little league team or a motivational life coach who pens self-help books. Yet a stream of young professionals are now giving that term new meaning. They are spinning off parts of their businesses — and even creating whole new businesses — on the idea of coaching a specific skill, tool or industry. How did they get started? Where did they find clients? And, perhaps the most perplexing question in the work-for-yourself world, how did they decide what to charge? We talked to three pioneers in the career coaching world about how they got to where they are and what they want to do next. Coaching the Business of Freelance Writing Jenni Gritters and Wudan Yan, The Writers’ Co-op Freelance writers Jenni Gritters and Wudan Yan both got into coaching after a continued flurry of requests for advice. Both have a presence on social media and had written viral articles about their profession...

Some of the links in this post are from our sponsors. We provide you with accurate, reliable information. Learn more about how we make money and select our advertising partners . Are you a billionaire who uses twenty-dollar bills as wallpaper in one of your thirteen and a half bathrooms? Then keep moving along — this tip isn’t for you. But if you actually care about your money, there’s a tool you should use  every single time you shop online. It’s free, it’s mindless and it could save you hundreds of dollars every month. It’s called Capital One Shopping and it’s available as a browser extension on your desktop. You’ll download it once and it will forever be your dedicated money-saving tool. All you have to do is install the highly rated extension and Capital One Shopping gets right to work. Every time you shop at one of your 30,000 favorite stores, it will scour the internet for a lower price. Let’s say you’re looking to buy some headphones on Best Buy’s website. Capital One ...

Some of the links in this post are from our sponsors. We provide you with accurate, reliable information. Learn more about how we make money and select our advertising partners . Americans’ shopping habits have changed profoundly. Thanks to COVID-19, many of us have journeyed way, way deeper into the world of online shopping. Instead of venturing into stores or restaurants or supermarkets, more of us are clicking the “Add to Cart” button from home. Nearly 70% of Americans shop online now, according to a new NRP poll. Of those, more than 90% have bought something from Amazon. Sure, it’s super convenient to have boxes of stuff appear on your doorstep. But no matter what you’re buying online, you’re probably paying too much for it. In many cases, there might be a better deal somewhere else. It just feels like a pain to look for it. Wouldn’t it be useful to get an alert anytime you’re about to overpay? A polite little alert, not an obnoxious one. That’s exactly what a free service call...