Living in the City

I think lack of understanding about personal finances is a large source of family problems now a days. Very few people are willing to openly talk about their finances or debts. This, I think lead to financial illiteracy, big time. I realize t his as I was making a research on the different styles of personal financial management. What stucked like a sore thumb to me, was a site called Debtors Anonymous (DA). DA works in much the same way as Alcoholics Anonymous, dealing with people who are essentially compulsive debtors and helping them get over their “addiction”. DA helps debt addicts recover from this malady called overspending. Compulsive spending - is it an illness? I need not talk about its psychological implications here, a professional counsellor would be required to do that. One thing sure though, it needs to be addressed. If you believe you know someone close who is in this difficult life situation, I am sure you will recognize the following lifestyle or pr...

In today’s almost recession-like living conditions, people are seldom able to escape a debt ridden lifestyle. It doesn’t help that oil prices have astoundingly gone up, everything is running into dizzying speeds - gas is skyrocketing, prescription drugs are up, cash is slow, interest rates are up. Time for debt management. I must admit that my own family’s financial struggles have been brought about by many unwise money decisions. We handled our finances recklessly. Fact is, our overindulgent use of credit resources have almost led us to bankruptcy. Our lessons were learned the hard way. We managed to stay afloat by employing certain lifestyle changes. First stop is reduce the use of credit. From three credit cards it was cut down to just one. Less temptation, less unprogrammed purchases. Remember, cards have credit limits. Less cards, less limits. We also learned to use online payment systems regularly so we save on transportation costs. Instead of going to the bank, we ha...