Scott On Money

You’ve seen me talk previously about dragging my credit score down by refinancing opening a slew of credit card accounts and creating huge balances to take advantage of 0% credit offers.

Today I got my credit score again and it popped up more than 15 points. Why? Time. All those accounts that were opened over a 5 month period have aged another month and the scoring model has decided that I’m now a few percentage points less risky as a borrower.

Remember to give yourself a big discount on your car or home loan by paying down credit balances and not opening accounts several months before you plan on getting a loan.

The time factor is huge. About a month. Over fifteen points.

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Wait scratch that.

According to MSN California is ranked 15th among the 50 states for state and local taxes. Not something to get all giddy about. I was truly shocked that the situation is actually worse for 14 other states. Property Taxes here are brutal. So are income taxes. Come to think of it our sales tax is outrageous. Wait, I almost forgot our gas tax is insanely high. Oh well.

Congratulations Maine and New York. I hope you are happy with how the government spends your money.

Take a look at where your state ranks. You might just consider giving yourself a tax break by heading north. If you move to New Hampshire, Delaware or Alaska you just might get a double bonus. If global warming would just really kick in the climate should be much better in all three states!

Posted by Scott at 10:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati

Federal Surplus?

You will not hear it in most other places so listen up. The US ran a surplus of forty billion dollars in January. According to this MarketWatch article this doubles last year's January income.

As the article notes the pain is not over. January’s are big months due to the income tax schedule.

Cutting the deficit is big news. Some other key points you need to know:
- Katrina spending had a huge impact.
- Government spending continues to grow.
- Tax receipts continue to grow without tax increases.

Forty billion. Wow.

Posted by Scott at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati

Buying in bulk is a great way to save big bucks. I tend to purchase a lot of household supplies like paper towels and toilet paper in bulk. I save about 30 cents a roll on paper towels and a dime to a quarter on the toilette paper.

I also buy dish soap, dishwasher soap and hand soap in bulk along with printer paper, sponges and frozen foods.

You’ll notice there is not a lot of food on this list. I don’t cook enough to justify buying most foods in bulk. I have a hard enough time using up all my super market consumables like bread before they go bad.

Be careful with foods. Take into consideration how long they will last and how quickly you might get tired of an old favorite.

I once bought a 5 gallon jar of maraschino cherries. It is hard to remember if they went sour on the shelf or in my mind but I only ate about two pounds of the tasty treats before tossing the massive jar.

Go forth and buy in bulk (when it makes sense).

Posted by Scott at 12:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati

Prosper Raises Loan Servicing Fee

Prosper.com raised their loan servicing fee from 0.5% to 1% on loans with credit grades B or lower.

This change by itself has not caused me to reconsider using Prosper.com but doubling the servicing fee has to figure into my ROI calculations for these higher risk borrowers and will certainly tip a lot of borderline loans into my “do not fund” category.

You can see Prosper’s full fee list here.

Posted by Scott at 10:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati

We frequently hear the advice “You can’t time the market”. The market the advice refers to is the stock market. The idea is that predict the perfect moments to buy and sell stocks is very difficult. But what about other markets? Like the market for bicycles or appliances or cars.

Bankrate.com has an article that goes over many different markets and the best time to be a buyer. You can summarize most of the suggestions as: “buy in the off season”.

Buying in the off season has many advantages beyond price breaks. I have very much enjoyed visits to Boston, Washington D.C., France and Germany during the winter. There was less crowding and better deals all around. Of course you have to deal with the cold and sometimes bad weather.

Even if you find it desirable you may not be able to take advantage of seasonality. If your air conditioning breaks in the summer you might have to deal with it then. If your roof leaks you can’t wait for the summer to fix it.

Read the article and take the time to think ahead to your big purchases over the next 12 months. Taking advantage of seasonality can save you a bundle.

Posted by Scott at 08:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati