Blog Post of the Week! …Another Great Month edition

Where the hell has the month gone? Well…we’re wrapping up a great January here at TheFreeFinancialAdvisor.

Here’s a list of things we accomplished between FFA and our sister site, Stacking Benjamins:

– We’ve completely redesigned this site. I hope you like the look of our new home. We’ve got more coming in February that I can’t yet disclose, but you’re going to love it!

Maybe not so lovable. “Made with real anis!” doesn’t sell me….for some reason.

– I also redesigned Stacking Benjamins, my personal blog. Now you’ll see pictures on the tops of the posts and the podcast player has been moved to the top.

– We created better written content this month. Now that I have a podcast editor (thank you to Isabella Bianca, our new editor!), I can focus more on the written word. Hopefully you’ve gotten some great tips from our new posts here.

I’m especially proud of:

5 Secrets Auto Insurance Agents Won’t Share

How The Repo Guy Nearly Took My Car

and on Stacking Benjamins:

What To Do When Your Mutual Fund Manager Leaves

21% Interest Rate Credit Card or Build Your Emergency Fund? The Choice is Obvious

Joe’s Top Films of 2013

I hope to do more of these in the future, so you’ll know these two sites are well worth your time every day!

Also – In the past, I had a hell of a time discerning the roles of the two sites. What was the difference between Stacking Benjamins and The Free Financial Advisor? From the beginning, I knew what I wanted to create with SB. I wanted a place that was MY home on the internet and a home for our podcasts. So, on that site, you’ll get my personal point of view with a big dose of “Joe” attached.

But FFA was a different story. When I began SB in the spring, I gave little thought to what FFA was going to become. I realized during January what FFA should be: exactly what the name implies. You’ll get lists of the best activities you should undertake with your money. Lists of the worst mistakes we’ve seen people make. Planning tips while you’re navigating the financial waters.

So, to try and put it succinctly, Stacking Benjamins will be Joe’s quirky thoughts and Free Financial Advisor – Average Joe’s Money Blog will focus on clear tips to manage money better.

Also in January:

– We tweaked the podcast to feature a better introduction sequence, a few more voices on the roundtable, and we added an awesome new contributor, The Evil HR Lady.

– I’ve been experimenting with video, and I’ll have our first Stacking Benjamins video up in February.

– Work has continued on my book. I’m now at 32,000 words, just over halfway to my 60,000 word goal.

– I’ve joined on as a contributor at another awesome site, Daily Capital. You can now find me at American Debt Project once a month and Daily Capital from time to time.

Enough about me, because this post is about you….and the best writing I read on the web this week.

The Blog Post of the Week!

My favorite article of the week comes from Snark Finance and was actually written eight days ago. I know….that should invalidate Mitchell from the grand prize, but in fairness, I missed the post and actually read it yesterday. So, the judges conferred and decided to grant an exception.

I’m sure Mitchell was sweating.

So, why do I like How to Become Creative: Tips!? People often tell me they aren’t creative, but they don’t realize that creativity isn’t something you’re born with….it’s a muscle you can develop. I love Don Hahn’s book on creativity: Brain Storm: Unleashing Your Creative Self, and Austin Kleon’s book Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative
(our affiliate links if you’d like to help the site!). These books say in 60k words what Mitch stresses in a few hundred: work to become creative and soon you’ll have ideas when you least expect it.

So, Mitchell, here’s the deal. Congrats on the award….which is us allowing you to print this and post it on your refrigerator for exactly one week.

You’re welcome.

Other Articles That (to use Mitch’s term, since we’re all about Snark today) Didn’t Suck

I’m so incredibly happy to see our good friend Marvin at Brick By Brick Investing posting again. He featured this week a fantastic in-depth review of why dividend investing can go bad and has a good solution to even out your results: 11 Monthly Dividend Stocks That Let You Sleep Well At Night.

My brother called me this week to ask about purchasing foreclosures. Simon Campbell offers up which states are best to search for some low-cost housing in Looking For Foreclosures? Look In These Three States.

I love this idea at Krantcents about a Countdown Clock. As a guy who spent far too long in a job he liked but didn’t love, I constantly now feel the clock ticking on my life. I agree with him: if we had a clock all the time going in our brain, I bet we’d all accomplish more (or all be on medication for the neurosis it created….).

Here’s something that doesn’t often happen: Cameron at DQYDJ.net deals with the emotional side of paying off debt. Emotions and DQYDJ? Say it ain’t so….. Read: Maintaining a Debt Paydown Strategy.

Greg at Club Thrifty watched a film called Park Avenue and goes all left wing (not really….I just thought it sounded pot-stirry) in Park Avenue and the One Percent. I love his analogies: “I squirrel that shit away like a fat kid hiding Twinkies under his bed.” If I squirrel Twinkies under my bed does that make me fat, too? …just asking…..for a friend….

I’ve been in love with the concept of renting out our bedrooms to travelers, but Cheryl won’t get onboard with this idea….yet. Maybe that’s why I really liked How I Made $1,500 Renting My House To Travelers.

Hello, my name is: 

In the “new to me” department, let’s welcome DebtFreeTejana to our little world of financial bloggers. She’s been blogging seriously since what appears to be October….but this is how long it takes me to actually pay attention. Read: The Cost of Being a Female.

Hope you have an awesome weekend! We’ll see you Monday on the Stacking Benjamins podcast and back here with more fun articles on saving.

A Huge Thanks!

Big thanks to our friend J. Money. He popped our post 21% Credit Card vs. Emergency Fund: The Choice is Obvious on the top of his Rockstar Finance page. Have you heard our interview with J. from Fincon? Check out: How Much Does a Baby Cost?

Finally, a big thanks to Tonya at Budget and the Beach for mentioning Joe’s Top Movies of 2013 on her Big Picture list of reads. Have a great half, Tonya! Remember my mantra: start off slow and then settle into a slower pace….

photo: Greg.Buri