Month: February 2023

The Top Benefits of Living Below Your Means

Learning how to build habits that can help you spend less and save more is essential for building wealth.

The parking lot attendant worth half a million bucks

In this week’s installment of Get Rich Slowly Theater, we’re going to look at a real-life money boss: Earl Crawley, a parking attendant from Baltimore. Mr. Earl (as he’s known) was profiled on the PBS show MoneyTrack. Here’s a six-minute segment about this super saver:

Mr. Earl has worked as a parking attendant for 44 years — at the same parking lot! He’s never made more than $12 per hour. He’s never earned more than $20,000 in a year, yet he has a net worth over half a million dollars.

Randolph County, Arkansas VA Home Loan Information

Table of Contents What is the VA Loan Limit? How to Apply for a VA Home Loan? What is the Median Home Price? What are the VA Appraisal Fees? Do I need Flood Insurance? How do I learn about Property Taxes? What is the Population? What are the major cities? About Randolph County Veteran Information […]

The post Randolph County, Arkansas VA Home Loan Information appeared first on VA Home Loan Centers.

HelloFresh review: Is a meal delivery service worth it?

“Hey,” Kim said one day last week as she was leaving for work. “There’s a package coming today from one of the doctors I work with. To thank all of his hygienists, he’s sending us a trial of HelloFresh.”

“What’s HelloFresh?” I asked.

“It’s a meal delivery service,” Kim said. “Anyhow, it’d be great if you could bring in the package and put the food in the fridge. And it’d be even greater if you made one of the meals for dinner!”

I kissed her good-bye, then promptly forgot what she had told me. (This is par for the course.)

How Does HelloFresh Work?

That afternoon when I returned from walking the dog, a package from HelloFresh was waiting on the porch. I took it inside to open it. The box contained three brown paper sacks, each with a different meal from HelloFresh.

“Oh yeah,” I thought. “I’m supposed to make dinner from one of these. I wonder what they are.”

I opened the bag labeled Pineapple Poblano Beef Tacos. Inside was an illustrated recipe card and a set of pre-measured ingredients. “Seems simple enough,” I said to the dog. Tahleuqah just looked at me as if I were supposed to feed her. That dog is always ready for food.

When Kim got home from work, I made the tacos. They were amazing. I’m not joking. They were delicious. (The dog agrees.) “You know, I should have taken photos along the way,” I told Kim. “I should write about this at Get Rich Slowly.

“Well, you could always make dinner for us again tomorrow night,” she said. So I did. And this time, I did take pictures.

For round two, the dog and I prepared Sweet-as-Honey Chicken. Here’s the bag and recipe card:

Here are the ingredients from inside the bag and the other side of the recipe card (with actual instructions):

Here’s some of my meal prep:

And here’s the final product:

“You know what my favorite part of this is?” Kim asked as I served her dinner. “It’s that you can use the paper sack to dispose of your trash while you prep the meal.” (I’m kind of messy in the kitchen.) The dog looked hurt. She’s always happy to help us dispose of kitchen trash.

While not quite as delicious as the tacos, the chicken was still very good. And simple. (The HelloFresh recipe cards estimate 20-30 minutes of prep time; for me, that was more like 30-45 minutes. But then I’m always slow in the kitchen.)

How Much Does HelloFresh Cost?

“How much did this cost?” I asked.

“I’m not sure,” she said. “The doctor paid for it. But I think it’s something like $20 per meal. So, since he sent us three meals, that’s about $60 for the week.”

“That seems expensive,” I said. “I should research the numbers.” So, like a good money nerd, that’s exactly what I did.

What Is Escrow?

Escrow is a big part of real estate transactions and protects buyers and sellers during the home purchase process. It also allows homeowners to easily pay their property taxes and insurance premiums. Although it isn’t always required, there are several steps to the escrow process. Here’s what it means to be in escrow and how… View Article

The post What Is Escrow? first appeared on Total Mortgage.

SoFi’s bank charter drives positive outlook, but layoffs hit tech unit

SoFi Technologies said the benefits of its bank charter outweighed home loan and student loan challenges and helped its fourth-quarter performance while it also announced layoffs in its technology unit. The San Francisco-based neobank’s earnings beat analyst expectations, as the company announced product development, new-member growth and balance sheet growth. SoFi’s deposits have grown to … [Read more…]

Busy Week With Big Ticket Data And The Fed

Unlike last week, the present example offers multiple scheduled economic reports that have consistent track records of causing market movement.  Key examples include both ISM reports, ECI, JOLTS, and of course the jobs report on Friday.  The Fed announcement lies smack dab in the middle on Wednesday afternoon where it is all but guaranteed that we’ll see another downshift in the pace of rate hikes (25bps). As for this morning, bonds are off to a slightly weaker start owing primarily to hotter-than-expected inflation data out of Spain.  The following chart shows the relative movement in US, EU, and Spanish bond yields surrounding the announcement at 3am.  It’s the latest tidbit in a large body of evidence for the market’s hypersensitivity to any and all inflation surprises. The chart above has overlaid y axes which set the highs and lows on the same visual level and adjust the y axes accordingly (only the US and Spanish axes are pictured.  The next chart shows how the movement actually compares in terms of outright change (aka “Absolute Change”) from a certain time in the past.

Is the market pivoting ahead of the Fed?

Today’s job report and the bond market reaction to it could be an inflection point where the market gets ahead of the Fed.