Happy Thursday everybody! I’m so excited to be hosting the Carnival of Financial Planning today. This is officially my first carnival I’ve ever hosted. Yeah, it’s kind of plain with nothing extra added in, but I’m new to this. Plus, now I have accomplished another one of my goals for 2012—woohoo!

Welcome to the July 6, 2012 Money Management Edition #244 of the Carnival of Financial Planning. This edition is arranged by subject heading, so that you can browse efficiently. Enjoy!

The Skilled Investor, Editor

Budgeting and Economics

Jon the Saver presents How to Survive a Layoff posted at Free Money Wisdom, saying, “Surviving a layoff is no small feat. It takes patience and a long term goal horizon. One needs to always be checking for new jobs and opportunities.”

Dan presents Wall Street Markets posted at Wall Street Stocks, saying, “From the days when front-running involved actual running to the “Victorian Internet era” brought on by telegraphy, we can learn a great deal from looking back at a simpler era.”

Boomer presents Couples Money: Savers Vs. Spenders posted at Boomer & Echo, saying, “The conventional wisdom in relationships is that opposites attract. It seems very common for a compulsive spender to hook up with a compulsive saver.”

Financial Planning

Teacher Man presents Leveraging Your Wealth to Prepare Your Children posted at My University Money, saying, “The first investment I would recommend won’t be popular with many people out there, and that is a private school education. I think I can say with some authority that at this point, on the world stage, the vast majority of North American schools simply cannot measure up.”

Marie at FamilyMoneyValues presents Death and Dying posted at FamilyMoneyValues, saying, “A review of the book: Overcoming the Inheritance Taboo – How to Preserve Relationships and Transfer Possessions by Steven J. Hendlin, Ph. D.”

Corey presents Financial Influence of Government on Young Adults posted at 20s Finances, saying, “I am continually reminded of the many ways that governmental policy affects our finances. While we are encouraged to challenge and question the laws put into place, we are often forced to accept certain regulations that have a direct influence on our lives.”

Kevin presents Finances are Just One Piece of the Puzzle posted at Thousandaire, saying, “You can be responsible financially, but if you don’t take precautions to address disasters then you might not live to enjoy all your money.”

Suba presents Professional Profiles: Angela, the Stay At Home Mom posted at Broke Professionals, saying, “Stay at home mom no more: after four years as a full-time caregiver to her two daughters, this mom is returning to work and hoping to avoid career suicide.”

Don presents Government Wants You on Food Stamps posted at MoneySmartGuides, saying, “A recent story by CNN describes how the US Department of Agriculture is running radio ads encouraging people to sing up for food stamps.”

Aloysa presents Choose ImpulseSave Instead of Impulse Spending posted at My Broken Coin, saying, “It is funny how sometimes something so mundane and boring like saving money can suddenly become fun, creative and even change one’s perspective on spending. No, I am not a reborn saver. I am still an impulsive spender, but something has changed me. Just a little bit.”

Corey presents 3 Ways to Teach Your Kids Financial Responsibility posted at Steadfast Finances, saying, “Find out three simple steps to teach your kids financial responsibility.”

Maria presents Money lessons from unexpected sources: the importance of time posted at The Money Principle, saying, “Two money lessons we can take from teenage vampire fiction: money is necessary but not sufficient and getting rich is easy for immortals.”

Tushar presents Logical Tricks to Find More Money to Save and Invest posted at Start Investing Money, saying, “Logical Tricks to Find More Money to Save and Invest on Start Investing Money. See if you benefit from these logical tricks.”

Income

Squeezer presents When accepting a job offer, consider more than just the salary posted at Personal Finance Success, saying, “When considering or accepting a job offer, more factors than salary should come into play. I once accepted a position because it paid more, and I did not carefully consider the other factors.”

JP presents College degrees Make the Rich, Poor and the Poor, Rich posted at My Family Finances, saying, “A college degree may be risky, but it is also a critical element to income mobility.”

Janet presents 7 Tips for Bootstrapping Your Business posted at Credit, Eh, saying, “The good news is that you can start a business on a shoestring. You just have to know how to booststrap it.”

Invest It Wisely presents Freelancing Revenue Report: My First Three Months in the Trenches posted at Invest It Wisely, saying, “I’m now in my fifth month of entrepreneurship, and things are going well so far. I’m really happy with some areas, and not too happy with some other areas.”

Insurance and Risk

Jason presents An Envious Life – Money & Success Isn’t Always What It Seems posted at Work Save Live, saying, “Money and success isn’t always what it seems, read more to find out what I mean.”

Sally presents Risk and returns posted at Do-It-Yourself Finance, saying, “More conservative portfolio investments have yielded substantially lower investment returns than the returns that riskier investments have delivered. With either lower or higher risk-adjusted market return strategies, you simply cannot have your financial cake and you eat it too.”

Investing

Pierre presents How To Avoid Losing Sleep Over Market Crashes posted at Intelligent Speculator, saying, “What do you do when the market crashes?”

Dividend Growth Investor presents How long does it take to manage a dividend portfolio? posted at Dividend Growth Investor, saying, “Many investors express concerns about the amount of time it would take to keep current on all events in diversified dividend portfolio. In this article I explain how dividend investors can achieve adequate portfolio diversification, while also having a life.”

J.P. presents How To Compare Online Brokers posted at Novel Investor, saying, “Before you make that first deposit, here are a few important things to consider when you compare online brokers.”

TSI presents Morningstar Ratings posted at The Skilled Investor, saying, “Individual investors and their advisors appear to make investment decisions that are heavily influenced by the Morningstar Rating system. Because the stars are very widely used and often misunderstood, these are articles to help investors make more rational decisions about the stars.”

Darwin presents Target Date Funds: Is Convenience Worth the Cost? posted at Darwin’s Money, saying, “Here’s an analysis of whether target date funds are worth the fees.”

Managing Debt

FamilyMoneyValues presents Financial Fables: A Slave for Great Black Bear posted at Family Money Values, saying, “The latest piece from our Financial Fables. A story about handling debt.”

Philip presents Get Help with Medical Bills: Avoid the Medical Debt Monster posted at PT Money Personal Finance, saying, “Offers ideas for being proactive in dealing with medical bills so that you aren’t saddled with excessive debt.”

Real Estate

Ashley presents Saving for Retirement is Like Going on a Road Trip posted at Money Talks Coaching, saying, “What if I woke up one Tuesday morning and decided to take my kids to Disneyland that day? Now, I live in Phoenix.”

A Blinkin presents Tips To Boost Home Office Productivity posted at Funancials, saying, “Its always been a dream of mine to be my own boss and/or work from home, but working from home can be both a blessing and a curse.”

Crystal presents Build a Home Series: Frame, Plumbing, and the First Inspection…Supposedly posted at Budgeting in the Fun Stuff, saying, “The frame for our slab is finally down, the plumbing has been added, and we just had our first inspection. Our house is finally starting to be built!”

Retirement

Glen Craig presents Don’t Let These 4 Things Hold You Back from a Successful Retirement posted at Free From Broke, saying, “Most people look forward to their retirement years. But you have to set yourself up financially in order to have a successful retirement. See 4 things that can hold you back.”

FMF presents Your Money or Your Life, The Crossover Point posted at Free Money Finance, saying, “Today we’re going to cover step #8 from Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence: Revised and Updated for the 21st Century. Last time in this series we created a chart that lists both monthly income and monthly expenses. Each month a point is added for both measures on the chart, with a line then being drawn from point to point to create a line for each. Today, we’re adding another measure to the chart.”

Franklin presents Traditional and Roth IRA  posted at Retirement Planning, saying, “Many taxpayers puzzle over whether to contribute to traditional versus Roth tax-advantaged retirement plans. For most people, contributions to traditional tax-advantaged plans will probably provide a higher net present value over their lifetimes.”

Savings

Jester presents Frugal Bike Challenge For Me and My Son posted at The Ultimate Juggle, saying, “Frugal biking challenge for father and son on the weekends.”

Passive Income Earner presents Family Finance: Property and Vehicle Insurance posted at The Passive Income Earner, saying, “What is Family Finance you may ask? Its a new set of topics for family finances that I will be presenting over time regarding the many financial decisions a family must agree on. Agreeing on spending is one of the behaviours that can enable a family to reach financial success and build wealth.”

TSI presents Hard work and wealth posted at The Skilled Investor, saying, “How much you earn, spend, budget, and save are by far the most dominant determinants of your long-term financial well-being. Self-control in your financial decision-making regarding budgeting and consumption is far more important than clever investing.”

•••••••

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of Carnival of Financial Planning using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Technorati tags: carnival of financial planning, blog carnival.