Millionaires In the Making

By MoneyBlueBook

I enjoy reading and following the personal financial journeys of individuals. It's the individual that puts the "personal" in personal finance and makes the subjects of money and investing so human and genuine. There is no denying that money is a very essential and pervasive element of our lives. Some people just don't have enough. For others, money is sufficient but the difficulty comes when deciding how to best protect and manage it. Lack of money can cause people to fall into debt, while at the same time it can be the liberating savior to some of life's problems.

CNN's Family Profiles

One of my favorite reads is CNN's Millionaires in the Making series. Every few weeks they provide the profile of a new family or couple, complete with all pertinent and interesting demographic information such as their individual ages, occupations, salaries, and a complete listing of their financial assets and liabilities. The articles even provide a picture of the family or couple being profiled that also frequently includes them with their children.

Maybe I have a natural voyeuristic fascination, but I like to read their profiles and see how I match up. I must commend the couples and families for being so willing to provide their photos and reveal so much personal information about their finances that most people, including myself would normally be sort of reluctant to provide in its complete entirety. Although most personal finance bloggers like to include profile snapshots of their financial situation, many are reluctant to provide photos

By MoneyBlueBook

What a nice lazy Saturday afternoon. I think I will go file my paperwork to obtain a Business Trade Name Certificate.

I have a decent full time job in finance/law and I also write for a few blogs on the side for fun. Although I see blogging as more of a hobby, I think I should start treating it more like mini-business. I could choose to set up the blog business in a variety of ways depending on my choice of business entity. The primary ones are corporations, limited liability companies (LLC), limited partnerships, and limited liability partnerships. Each type has its own advantages and disadvantages in regards to liability protection and taxation benefits. There are even fancier and longer named options such as limited liability limited partnerships. But since it's just me for now and I don't plan on taking on business debt or expanding the business for some time, my current chosen business entity will be that of a sole proprietorship. Besides, right now I don't feel like having to deal with filing LLC Articles of Organization papers or having to pay pricey incorporation fees.

Sole Proprietorships Are Easy To Create

Legally, any one can start up a sole proprietorship. You could set up a cardboard table and start selling lemonade and that would be considered a sole proprietorship business. There are no fancy or extra paperwork to create the business entity other than compliance with any relevant state and local licensing and taxation requirements. Sole proprietorships are considered flow through entities, which means that all

By MoneyBlueBook

What has four letters, starts with the letter "F", and always gets people's attention? No, not that one, the other one.....the answer is the beautiful word of FREE! Read the full article »

By MoneyBlueBook

For the past week, my stock investment portfolio has been taking a massive beating. Many of my Asian emerging market funds that were previously delivering great returns have suffered greatly, along with the rest of the world financial markets. But am I worried? Nope, not the least bit. When I see all the red numbers on CNBC, I just smile. It's a healthy market correction that needs to happen from time to time.

My Funds Have Tanked Before and I've Always Recovered Plus More

In February, my portfolio plummeted almost 10 percent. I was ecstatic. Why? Because when the market dips that much, it signals a very attractive buying opportunity. I know with a long enough investment horizon, historically, the market has always cumulatively trended upwards. I am confident in my belief that every cent I invest now will very likely pay off in spades in the distant future. I see dips as the efficient market at work so I always try to take advantage of every attractive buying opportunity.

In turbulent times, it's best not to mess with your investment portfolio. Some are whispering about the possibility of recession and suggesting that the housing and mortgage-linked credit crisis will drag down the American economy, and in turn pull the rest of the world financial markets down with it. But I urge everyone not to be too hasty or emotionally driven in their financial decisions. Try to stay cool as a cucumber.

Come Out Ahead Of the Market By Continuing to Invest

The single most important thing you can

By MoneyBlueBook

This might be sort of corny, but I've been told that I can be rather charming. When I talk to people I like to get to know them. It doesn't matter who the person is - they could be a janitor or receptionist, I still like to make some light hearted chit chat and humor them with some of my random jokes. I guess some people find it endearing but I just see it as being pleasant.

It is true that people tend to gravitate towards those who are friendly and optimistic. Because positive association is such an appealing quality, people are much more inclined to perform favors for those with sunny dispositions.

Just a few examples will demonstrate to you know what I mean. Most of the time, these situations happen in the most routine, mundane places, but it really comes in handy.

Getting My Bigger Scoop At Sbarro's Pizza

Today at work for lunch, I went to my usual underground eatery and chose to eat at Sbarro's. When it was my turn to order, I turned to the young sales lady and told her what I wanted - spaghetti with meatballs. Now as you know, many of these places tend to give standard portion sizes for both men and women. Now I'm not that big, but I can eat. So as she was filling up the bowl with the standard portion, I flashed a smile and asked politely if she could do me a nice favor and give me a little bit extra. I guess I

By MoneyBlueBook

To my fellow stock market investors, heed my warning as someone who has foolishly traded before on things he read about in an online discussion board. I regrettably did this when I was an investing novice back in college and got hammered big time. If you are a new investor, you should absolutely stay away from stock related discussion boards like the ones you find on Yahoo or Google Finance. Google Finance is not as bad as Yahoo, but both should be avoided like the plague.

It Is All Too Easy To Get Influenced, Especially If You Are a New Investor

If you are a newbie to the stock market, you will likely be more prone to investment temptation and more easily influenced by what you read on these finance discussion boards. But diving deeper into the substance, you will find nothing of redeeming value in these unregulated forums. All you will find are misleading, self motivated comments made by individuals who have a hidden and vested interest to influence the gullible.

On these boards you will find that the vast majority of posters are what the investing community commonly refer to as pumpers and dumpers. Pumpers are people who own shares in the stock being discussed in a particular message board. Their deceptive mission is to spread rumors and fill your head with greed-driven motivation to buy shares in the company to help drive up prices. The more people that fall prey and buy shares, the more long volume there is to force share prices