I thought I’d take a peak at my Roth IRA and see how it was performing.  My wife and I have four primary retirement funds.  I have a 403b through work, she has a pension plan through her work, and we both have Roth IRAs.  I’d breakdown my investment philosophy thusly:

Pension Plan:  My wife’s plan will provide guaranteed retirement income, so, no real worries here unless she were to change jobs or get sick.

403b: I’m pretty aggressive with my 403b investments.  I invest in a small cap mutual fund, an international growth stock fund, and a REIT.

Roth #1 (My Wife’s):  In this account, we stick to “safe” index-based ETFs.

Roth #2 (My Roth):  In this account, I invest in single stocks, trying to buy stocks that have a dividend and / or appear to be “good values”.

(I’m not an investment professional, and I would NEVER give investment advice.  I’ve read several books on investing, and every time I read a book, I think, “NOW I understand!”.  Then, I read another book and I completely change my mind!  The above breakdown represents what I’m doing TODAY.  By tomorrow, I may change my mind and become more conservative, or, conversely,  I might change my mind and become much more aggressive.  Honestly, my main goal at this point is to save as much as I can, upfront, and learn as I go along.

Here’s the current chart for my Roth IRA, Roth #2:

As you can see, I purchased 60 shares of PEP (Pepsico) in April.  Since then, the price of the shares has gone up, which is always a bonus.  I’ll update this account, and the others, from time to time.

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Welcome to the 88th Edition of the Carnival of Debt Reduction. If you are new here, I’m “NCN” which stands for No Credit Needed. My long-term personal finance goal is to live my life “No Credit Needed”. I’m trying to live my life without ever borrowing money! Before you read any further, take a second to subscribe to No Credit Needed, so that you can keep up with me and my journey. Will I make it? Subscribe and find out!

88th Edition of the Carnival of Debt Reduction:

There are many components of a well-designed debt reduction, but, basically, radical debt reduction comes down to the following things:

Spend Less Than You Earn:

The Frugalist gives us 27 Tips and Tricks for reducing gasoline usage. Remember, the more money that you can “save”, the more money you will have available for debt reduction!

Campus Grotto writes about ways to save money while in college. (I did not attend college, so, I’ll just add that these tips will work for those of you in trade school, high school, or those who might work for a corporation which offers lots of “perks”.)

How To Make A Million Dollars with a post about saving money when dealing with Comcast cable. Personally, we use Dish Network, and if it were not for about four shows, we’d shut the whole thing off and just read books (or personal finance blogs!).

Find New Sources Of Income:

My Two Dollars made mad cash selling stuff on Craig’s list. (I’m a huge fan of eBay, Craig’s list, yard sales, etc. Look around your house… I’ll bet that you have $300 (or more) worth of “junk” just sitting around, ready to be sold! Think “outside of the box”.

Get Motivated:

Prime Time Money with a post about “Man Vs. Debt”. What would YOU do if you HAD to change your personal finances, right NOW!?!

Blogging Away Debt recaps a NY Times about the “credit trap”. Great article, written by John Leland (the same dude who interviewed me a few months ago!)

Everybody Loves Your Money with a big post about banks, credit… tons of stuff! This article spans SEVERAL categories! ELYM, you rock!

Use A Spending Plan And Change Your Habits:

The Wastrel Show writes an article about using a notebook to control spending. (I love it!)

Personal Finance Blog Articles talks about creating as household budget. (I’m a big fan of using a budget to control spending.)

Binary Dollar with ideas about changing your personal finance-related behaviors. It is super important to realize that blaming “circumstances” and “others” can only last so long. Eventually, we must look at the “man in the mirror” and hold HIM responsible for our financial futures.

Beyond Sanity shares 8 ways to survive (and thrive) while getting out of debt. (Might I add, being debt-free ROCKS?!?)

Understand How Credit Works:

Michael Emilio with a post about improving your credit.

My Credit Scores with a single idea about improving your credit.

Money Smart Life with an interesting post about credit card companies… and their honesty! Wowsers! At first I thought, “No WAY!” but, then I read the article, and MSL is correct!

My Credit Scores writes about how to stop “junk mail”. (Hint: If you don’t RECEIVE credit card offers, you are less likely to APPLY for credit cards. Brilliant!)

There you go, several post about saving money, living on a budget, finding motivation, and improving your credit. Normally, the Carnival of Debt Reduction is a bit more “focused”, with posts that are about.. ummm.. debt reduction. But, this week, the articles were a bit more “general” in nature. So, if you are looking for posts that focus more on debt reduction itself, I’ve written a few over the past two years.

10 Ideas About How To Begin

Almost Everything I Know About Debt Reduction

Finally, if you are new to my site, may I suggest checking out the No Credit Needed Network and the No Credit Needed Podcast. Both of those sites work in “connection” with No Credit Needed to keep you informed about debt reduction, debt repayment, frugal living, saving money, and investing for your future. Thanks for stopping by and comments, as always, are welcome!

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I’m a big fan of creating personal finance goals.  I like to create a goal and then break that goal down into manageable micro-goals.  As an example, let’s say that I wanted to save $12,000 (a rather large sum of money) next year.  My initial goal would look like this:

In 2008 I will save $12,000.

I don’t know about you, but saving $12,000 sounds like a pretty big deal to me.  Emotionally, we cannot help but “react” to a big number like $12,000.  You might even say to me, “NCN, I’m BARELY making it, how in the world do you expect me to save $12,000 in a single year?  That’s crazy!”  And, until about 2 years ago, I would have heartily agreed with you.  I would have joined the chorus of people who were “barely making it,” living paycheck-to-paycheck.  But, I found a “secret” way of tricking my “emotions” so that I am PSYCHOLOGICALLY motivated to save money.  In fact, I have found that saving money is simple once you get the hang of it.  Instead of trying to save $12,000 in one year, I try to save $250 per week for 48 weeks.  Now, mathematically, these goals are “equal” but emotionally (psychologically) these goals are worlds apart.  Why?  I have no idea, other than the fact that I can “wrap my mind around” the idea of saving $250 dollars.

Now, let’s take this one step further.  I divide $250 by 5 and create my micro-goal.  My new goal would look like this:

I want to save $50 per day, 5 days a week, for 48 weeks.

See how that works?  I’ve broken down my original goal ($12,000) into a manageable goal ($250 a week) and then into a micro-goal ($50 a day).  As I go through my day, I’m always thinking “How can I save money TODAY, how can I cut costs TODAY, how can I save $50 TODAY?”  My goal has gone from the “abstract” to the “practical”.  The total amount is the same but the thought process is COMPLETELY different.

(This technique works with almost any goal.  Personally, I’m trying to save $48,000 this year.  You may be in the position to save $6000 or $600, depending on your income, family obligations, etc.  The amounts might vary, but the technique is the same.)

Now that I have my micro-goal ($50 per day) I have to figure out ways to actually save $50 per day.  I’ve written several posts about how to save money including:

Saving Money On Groceries and 10 Things That I Do To Save Money.

As for actually depositing the money into my savings account, I schedule weekly withdrawals from my primary checking to my ING Direct savings account.  In stead of spacing my withdrawals out a month at a time, I schedule them weekly.  This helps to keep me accountable and focused on my daily and weekly goals.

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No Credit Needed will be hosting the 88th Edition of the Carnival of Debt Reduction.

Information about the Carnival of Debt Reduction.

Submission Deadline: Sunday, May 22nd, 6PM Eastern

Carnival to be posted: Monday, May 23rd, 9AM Eastern

Direct link to submit an article via Blog Carnival.

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I just received an email from ING Direct with the following information:

From June 1 until July 31, ING Direct will give you 1% cash back for every “signature-based” purchase that you make with your ING Direct Electric Orange MasterCard Debit Card. Limit: $500

I’ve just recently (like YESTERDAY) opened up an Electric Orange from ING DIRECT checking account and I’m excited about this “bonus”. In the past, I’ve mentioned Visa Extras, which gives you rewards for using your debit card. (Check your local bank to see if they participate in the Visa Extras program. I use Wachovia, and Visa Extras is free for debit card holders.)

Both programs require “signature-based” uses of you debit card. What’s that? Basically, any purchase that does not require you to enter your “pin” number is considered a “signature-based” transaction. So, online, in store, mail order, or automatic bill pay transactions would all count as “signature-based”. (Why would they offer cash back when you use the card in this fashion? In most cases, a credit card type transaction costs the bank LESS than a debit card type transaction. Why? I have no idea.)

Click here to go to ING’s site and read the full details.

Click here to read a post I wrote about Visa Extras.

Did you notice the $500 limit? $500 is 1 percent of $50,000! I simply cannot fathom spending $50,000 in 60 days, but I’m sure someone out there will do it.

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