I’M RELUCTANT TO ADMIT that HumbleDollar is run using smoke and mirrors. But if someone said that, I’d be hard-pressed to disagree.
I’ve long believed that the principles of sound money management are pretty timeless. What you should be doing with your money this year isn’t a whole lot different from what you should have been doing last year, and the year before that, and the year before that.
This notion is baked into how much of the site operates.

Hello,
I have been reading here for a while, and enjoying the conversations. I am hoping some experts can weigh in here.
I am 58 years old and employed at a nonprofit org. I have recently been promoted and am earning a comfortable amount. I have already maxed out my 403b contributions (403b is the nonprofit equivalent of the 401k).
I asked my employer if we have a Roth IRA contribution option and we don’t.
My question is: can I contribute to a Roth IRA on my own?

I HAVE MY MOTHER to thank for my good savings habits. She opened a savings account in my name when I was a kid. She also made sure I had a Christmas Club savings account every year. I was required to make deposits regularly.
I didn’t mow my neighbor’s lawn, have a newspaper route or sell lemonade on my front lawn. Instead, the money I saved came from the allowance my mother paid me.

The Beatles got it right. If your life has been anything like mine, it’s been a “long, winding road.” It’s undoubtedly been an interesting journey, fraught with more health and relationship hardship than you had planned for. Chastened by the vicissitudes of life, you’re ready to head home and write the last chapter.
Retirement beckons and you’re smug. After all, you saved diligently, invested wisely and amassed a nest egg far in excess of what you had ever dreamed possible.

In May of 1974, I took a trip to Israel, Greece and London with my parents and one of my sisters. I was in sixth grade at the time. Prior to our departure, I gave my parents a hard time about making me go on a trip during the school year. I was unhappy about missing two weeks of school and having to make up all that homework.
I’d collected my assignments for the upcoming two weeks from all my teachers with the exception of my social studies teacher,

I inherited a considerable number of old 25 cent coins, pre-1965 vintage so they have much more value in silver content.  I don’t want to leave the coins to my kids to deal with but is now a good time to sell for cash, trade for gold or silver 1 oz. coins or bars.  Trying to decide if this current trend continues or if the next move is more downward.  Any suggestions???

Hello Everyone,
Although I’ve read a lot about the benefits of maintaining a varied portfolio to reduce risk, I’m not entirely sure how to balance my assets. I now have a combination of stocks, bonds, and cash because I’m relatively new to investing, but I’d like to improve my strategy.
While I’ve heard about a number of strategies, such as the 60/40 rule (60 percent equities and 40 percent bonds) and age-based allocation changes, I’m interested to know what has been most successful for other members of this group.

WHY IS IT THAT GREAT companies don’t always make great investments? This is a conundrum that’s long puzzled investors because it so clearly flies in the face of intuition.
Indeed, today’s market leaders—companies like Apple, Amazon and Microsoft—are impressive businesses, and their stocks have delivered equally impressive performance, so much so that they and their peers have been dubbed the “Magnificent Seven.” The others in this group are Google parent Alphabet, Facebook parent Meta,

ONE SUMMER MORNING in 2023, my husband Warren and I had an ad hoc business meeting over bowls of cereal. He told me, “The pandemic really hurt my in-person speaker’s business. I’m not sure it’s ever going to come back.” Then I mentioned that my freelance-design income had also really slowed down, the result of a lack of marketing and enthusiasm on my part.
Neither of these was a newsflash. But that was the moment we realized this is what retirement looks like for a self-employed couple in their mid-60s.

Happy Friday the 13th, everyone.
They say that one of the best financial decisions you can make, if you’re married, is to stay married. So I figure that gives me just enough of a hook to justify sharing on Humble Dollar why I celebrate today.
I met my wife Rosalinda for the first time…twice. In 1977, I was a 2nd year law student at the University of Texas in Austin. That spring I found myself spending another boring and tedious weekend studying at the UT law library.

I can’t take credit for the headline here. Actually Jonathan wrote it for my section of My Money Journey.  I like it so much I use it on my blog too.
It articulates one word to me – responsibility, in this case financial and related matters.
We talk a lot about financial literacy and the lack thereof, but I don’t see even that as preventing basic prudent decisions about, saving, spending.
My grandson came home from high school yesterday and told his father the teacher in his financial management class told them to always spend on themselves first.

My preference is to book everything far ahead of time—flights, restaurants, hotels, cruises, you name it. I like having stuff to look forward to. For me, anticipating fun events is a big contributor to happiness.
But is this the smartest financial strategy? I’ve taken plenty of trips both internationally and within the U.S. over my lifetime, but I don’t consider myself an expert on money-saving travel. Still, here are some pointers I’ve picked up along the way and by digging around online.

I NEVER PURCHASED long-term-care insurance, even though the personal finance magazine I wrote for in the 1990s often recommended it. To the magazine’s editors, it seemed like another logical step in retirement preparation. I had two reasons to decide against it, however.
First, it seemed a huge expense. We were advised to buy it around age 60, long before any presumed decline. I was younger than that and unprepared to pay hundreds a month for decades when I didn’t know if I’d ever use the coverage.

The new kid’s back in town and he’s a bully. Remember active mutual funds, those dinosaurs of yesteryear? Get ready, because here come actively managed ETFs. In 2019, there were only 350 of those guys but now that number has swelled to over 1,600. More than 400 active ETFs were launched in 2023 and another 200 through June of this year. Remarkably, actively managed ETFs gobbled up over 20% of the asset flow into ETFs by midyear.

THE BEST WAY TO WIN a contest for the largest tomato is to paint a cantaloupe red and hope the judges don’t notice, or so says an old adage.
What does that have to do with managing money? Newspapers and magazines frequently interview mutual fund managers who have beaten their competitors, and perhaps the S&P 500 as well. Fund-management firms will even run ads touting the performance of these funds.
These interviews sometimes prompt me to do my own research.