ON MY FIRST VISIT to Europe, I discovered a different approach to tipping—don’t. I left a euro for a bartender in Ireland and was gently admonished by our guide. I left it anyway. Just couldn’t help myself.

On the Italian island of Capri, to tip or not resulted in a confrontation with a waiter. We were told not to tip. In addition, the bill had a service charge. Was it for the waiter? Apparently not,

THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC has disrupted so many aspects of our lives. I was reminded of that recently at, of all places, a bar in the Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, airport.
My wife and I were returning from our 40th wedding anniversary trip to Charleston, South Carolina, and Sunset Beach, North Carolina. Our evening flight was delayed, so we decided to get a glass of wine at a small kiosk bar in the terminal.
The bartender was a young woman in her early 20s.

OUR LAST SUMMER road trip didn’t exactly go as planned. That ordeal changed my mind about an annual expense I’d been paying without much thought. I gained a new perspective—even if I did learn my lesson the hard way.
On a Saturday morning last summer, Sarah and I woke our kids at 4 a.m. for a predawn drive through the mountains of East Tennessee and across the Carolinas. We were on our way to enjoy the beaches of Hilton Head Island,

MANY YEARS AGO, I read an article that posited that U.S. income inequality is due, in part, to the unwillingness of unemployed and underemployed Americans to move to a new state or city to take a better job.
It mentioned three reasons for this reluctance. First, folks didn’t want to sell their home, which may have decreased in value due to the recession that caused the bad job market in the first place. Second,

I PURCHASED MY FIRST home in 2005. At the time, I was a Major League Baseball prospect with the New York Yankees organization. I had always been taught that homeownership was part of the American dream. Looking back, I’m now much more skeptical.
Purchasing a home on my salary was difficult. Minor leaguers don’t land big contracts like their counterparts in the major leagues. In fact, I had multiple years when I made less than $10,000 as a professional baseball player.

THE MOST GALLING moment came when the notice of a sheriff’s sale was nailed to a tree in our front yard. The message to passersby was all too clear: “Deadbeats live here.”
Except they didn’t. Our house was in foreclosure—but the debts weren’t ours. They belonged to the people we had bought the house from. How did we escape what turned out to be a two-year ordeal? Three words: owner’s title insurance. How did we get caught up in such a mess?

LONG-TERM-CARE insurance and disability insurance can both be part of a comprehensive financial plan. But is it a good idea to have both coverages at the same time, or could one substitute for the other? After all, both policies are designed to help those who are, in some way, infirm.
To answer this question, let’s start with another one: What’s the purpose of insurance? The best use of any type of insurance is to guard against financial disaster.

LIKE MILLIONS OF other Americans, I’m experiencing serious sticker shock when I gas up the car.
Last week, I was filling up my 2019 Ford F-150 and, for the first time ever, the bill topped $100. That was 21 gallons of regular unleaded at $4.85 a gallon.
Shelling out that kind of cash for a tankful of gas is hard enough for working folks. But for those of us who are retired and living on a set income,

MY WIFE AND I RECENTLY took advantage of one of the most valuable tax breaks for the typical American family. The tax code provides a generous exemption on the profit from the sale of a primary home. Although this is widely known, it also—based on my conversations with a variety of people—seems to be widely misunderstood.
The Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 made a major change to the taxation of home sales. Prior to this,

THE HIGHEST CREDIT score possible is 850, and I’ve hit that mark in eight of the past 12 months. In the other four months, I had a score of either 844 or 846 under the credit rating formula created by FICO, formerly called Fair Isaac Corp.
A FICO score between 800 and 850 is considered exceptional and gets you the best rates on loans. A score of 670 or more is considered “good,” but more doors and opportunities are available when your score hits 740,

LIKE MANY PEOPLE who read HumbleDollar, I greatly respect Warren Buffett’s opinions and insights. I’ve even attended Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting in Omaha. Now that it’s broadcast, I reserve the Saturday of the meeting to watch it on the web.
Seeing it from a distance means I miss out on the terrific deals various Berkshire companies offer shareholders who attend in person. By attending virtually, however, I don’t have to navigate the crowds or spend six hours driving to Omaha and another six hours returning home.

WE HAVE A PROBLEM: We may have saved too much for our daughter’s college education.
My wife and I started contributing aggressively to our daughter’s 529 college savings account as soon as she was born. For the first two years, we invested the full amount of the annual gift-tax exclusion, which was then $14,000. Now, the exclusion is at $16,000, but lately we haven’t been saving as much as we used to. The reason: Our early aggressive saving,

IT TOOK MONEY TO resolve my recent health issue—on the surface, a lot of money. But figuring out what it really cost is difficult. Actually, I found it impossible.
Still, being a health benefits nerd, I couldn’t resist looking at the claims processed by Medicare and my Medigap insurance. Trying to understand billed charges, allowable charges and the resulting payments is daunting. I’m guessing most patients wouldn’t even try. Why should they?
My surgery was in the outpatient department but required an overnight stay.

I’VE MOVED SIX TIMES in the last 10 years. Four of those moves involved relocating less than a mile. The most recent move–from Portland, Oregon, to Phoenix, Arizona–required significantly more travel.
As a child, my family changed homes frequently. I attended five different elementary schools between first and fourth grade. I’ve never minded moving. I’m not the type of person who gets attached to a home or a particular location. I’m a firm believer that change is a good thing.

FINANCIAL ADVISORS used to suggest a 20-year planning horizon for retirement. Now, most advisors say to plan for a 30-year retirement. From my own experience, I believe 40 years should be the norm, and 50 years isn’t unreasonable.
If we plan for the longest possible life expectancy, we’ll almost always die with money left over. That’s far better than the alternative—living longer than planned and running out of money.
People who live to 100 are called centenarians.