Banking
« Previous EntriesANNOUNCEMENT: Smart Money Needs Your Help on Bank Fees
Monday, March 24th, 2008I received the following email this afternoon from Lisa Scherzer at Smart Money:
Hi JLP,
I’m a writer at SmartMoney.com. You helped me over a year ago with a story and I’m hoping you might help again. I’m working on a story this week about the rise in bank fees. Have you had any personal experience with […]
Stop Paying to Cash Your Check and Save $360,000 For Retirement
Thursday, January 24th, 2008How much does it cost to cash a check? A lot more than I thought:
…according to a new Brookings Institution report, as much as $360,000 in pre-tax wealth could be created if the average, full-time unbanked worker invested in the stock market what he will spend over his lifetime paying to cash his paychecks. […]
Will Freezing Subprime Mortgage Rates Help?
Friday, November 30th, 2007I’m skeptical that freezing subprime mortgage rates is the answer to our subprime mortgage mess.
But freezing mortgage rates is exactly what the government and financial institutions are about to do, according to this front page article ($) in today’s Wall Street Journal. Here’s some of the highlights from the article:
Details of the plan, which […]
Wall Street Sure Takes Care of Its Own!
Monday, November 19th, 2007Here’s a question for you:
When Wall Street firms have a bad year, should employees of those firms receive bonuses?
It has been a bad year for shareholders of banks and brokerage firms. Yet, these same firms are going to pay out $38 BILLION in bonuses. According to this Bloomberg.com article, that averages out to […]
GMAC Bank’s Website is Down
Wednesday, September 26th, 2007I haven’t been able to access GMACBank all morning. I wish companies would throw up a “Sorry, we’re experiencing problems” landing page instead of the standard Internet Explorer message that makes it look like the website doesn’t exist.
I remember this happening once before. It’s not a big deal, I just wanted […]
Question of the Day - ATM Usage
Thursday, September 13th, 2007How often do you use an ATM? Do you use ATMs that are not in your bank’s network?
I just saw that Bank of America has raised its ATM fee to $3 for non-customers who use BoA’s ATMs. That seems a little high to me. I’m not a frequent ATM user because I […]
From U.S. News: Five Nasty Credit Card Surprises
Friday, August 31st, 2007It’s been a busy day for a Friday. I have had a ton of interesting stuff to blog about. I’m afraid if I don’t post it today, I’ll forget about it!
Anyhow, my contact at U.S. News & World Report sent me links to three interesting articles regarding credit cards that I thought I […]
GMAC Bank vs. ING Direct
Wednesday, June 13th, 2007I am not an affiliate with any of the companies listed below.
About a year ago I opened a savings account with GMAC Bank. So far the experience has been great. In fact, I can think of anything to complain about, which is good for me because I’m pretty particular. Anyway, I was […]
A “Service” You Don’t Need!
Monday, April 9th, 2007Charles, a reader of this blog sent me an email this weekend with a copy of a letter he received from his bank about a program that will save him thousands of dollars in mortgage interest. You can click on the letter to see a larger version. Sorry about the quality.
The Deal
Instead of […]
Putting Our Finances on Automatic
Saturday, November 4th, 2006One of my personal goals for this year was to get my finances on automatic so that I wouldn’t have to spend a lot of time each month paying my bills. I divided my bills up into three categories:
1. Variable payments - things like gas bill, electric bill, phone bill. The amount […]