Things I'm Thankful for

Happy Thanksgiving to you. As I await the trip to my grandmothers house for Thanksgiving, I wanted to post some things that I am thankful for today.

1. My wife and 2 kids
2. My 2 dogs
3. Knowing I have eternal life
   
4. Sunshine on Thanksgiving day
5. NewPointe Community Church
6. Being on staff at NewPointe
7. Podcasts
8. Financial Peace
9. 80's music
10. Great home roasted coffee. I'm enjoying a cup right now
11. My bicycle - 3,000 miles on it this year
12. Friends
13. My small group
14. Having an emergency fund
15. Health
    

Saving your Excel spreadsheets as a PDF for "Free"

This is a more technical post from me than normal. But I'm so keyed about this I want to share it. I use Microsoft Excel everyday and I often share or "publish" my results with others. A lot of times all the end user needs to see is the summary spreadsheet or a graph that I have put together for them. They don't need or want all the rows and columns of data.

Today, I came across this tip. For the first time ever, Excel 2007 enables you to save your workbook files directly in a PDF format. All you have to do is download and install the "Excel Microsoft Save as PDF" Add-in program for the Microsoft Web site.

Once installed just click on the "Save as" option and pick pdf. Way cool and a great tool for those who use Excel a lot and want to share and protect their reports.

Your Credit Score for free

As most people know, you have been able to get your credit report from each of the three reporting agencies free once each year. I'm guessing you didn't know that you can now get your credit score free. A credit score is one of the most important components of a consumer's financial profile.

So how do you get this for free? Check out Credit Karma.com. It has recently been featured in the Wall Street Journal and USA today. There's no credit card required and no monthly or sneaky fees.

Here's what Credit Karma states on it's web site. Credit Karma is a completely free pro-consumer service dedicated to demystifying the credit landscape. With our credit simulators, free credit scores, credit advice, and credit score comparisons, our goal is to empower consumers to more actively manage their credit and their financial health.

So, know thy score and be empowered.

These stores are a closing. . . (Gift Cards take 2)

I penned / typed a post on 11/12 warning about giving gift cards this Christmas as a number of well known stores may not be around come the first of the year.

Today I received an email listing out a number of stores as reported by the Securities and Exchange Commission that will not be here next year. Take a look and don't purchase gift cards to these stores.

Ann Taylor closing 117 stores

Eddie Bauer closing 27 stores

Cache will close all stores

Talbots closing down all stores

J. Jill closing all stores

GAP closing 85 stores

Footlocker closing 140 stores

Levitz closing down remaining stores

Bombay closing remaining stores

Zales closing down 82 stores and 105 after January.

Whitehall closing all stores

Piercing Pagoda closing all stores

Disney closing 98 stores and will close more after January.

Macys to close 9 stores after January

Linens and Things closing all stores

Movie Galley Closing all stores

Pacific Sunware closing stores

Pep Boys Closing 33 stores

Sprint/ Nextel closing 133 stores

JC Penney closing a number of stores after January

Ethan Allen closing down 12 stores.

Wilson Leather closing down all stores

Sharper Image closing down all stores

K B Toys closing 356 stores

Loews to close down some stores

Dillard's to close some stores

Is this to much work for 4.5% interest?

I love searching the net and my local newspaper to insure that I'm getting one of the highest rates available for my emergency fund and savings. I'm currently with Emigrant Direct paying 3% and Amtrust Direct paying 2.75%. Both banks are paying much higher rates than any local banks in my area.

So today, while cruising BankRate.com, I came across an ad stating 4.5% on my checking account. Now, I don't typically leave my "savings" in my checking account but at 4.5% I needed to check this out. Addison Avenue Federal Credit Union is the bank paying 4.5%.

There are some hoops you need to jump through each month to get this rate. Here's the hoops:

1. Must use your Debit card for a minimum of 12 purchases a month. (This is how they pay you 4.5% as the fees they are charging the merchants for your debit card transactions cover your interest payments.)
   
2. Set-up direct deposit or one monthly recurring debit.
3. Sign up for electronic statements. No paper.
   

So, is it worth the hassle? I'd say . . . . No for a number of reason.

1. Are you really going to keep track of how many debit card transaction you do each month?
2. The 12 debit card transactions, is this in a calendar month or is it something different like the 15th to the 15th?
3. You're checking account is one of the worst places to keep your savings / excess cash. It will leave and get spent on some impulse purchase.
4. If you're not keeping a large balance in your checking account and I'm saying you shouldn't, then 4.5% on let's say $150 is your average monthly balance, your only talking about $6.75 a year. Skip a few sodas and you'll save that in a month.

Anyway, these are my thoughts on high interest rate checking accounts. Do you agree or not?

Savings with a specific goal in mind. . . .

I'm always on the lookout for great savings rates and opportunities. With Christmas right around the corner, yes it's next month, I'm very thankful Cindy and I started saving for it back in January. I'm never really happy to see that savings allocation go down but hey, that's what we saved it for.

The other day while reading my favorite personal financial magazine, Kiplingers, I came across a short article titled "Christmas Club 2.0". It was touting a web site SmartyPig.com.

Smarty Pig is a free FDIC-insured saving account at Iowa's West Bank, earmarked for a specific goal like Christmas. Really you can use it for anything you want to save for. Why use Smarty Pig? Glad you asked there are some really cool features / benefits here.

1. They are currently paying 3.9%. This is an outstanding rate right now.
2. You can make your savings goal public and friends and family can chip in toward you goal.
3. Smarty Pig has partnered with 25 retailers like Amazon.com and others and if you use a gift card at one of these retailers the retailer kicks in "bonus" of up to 5%.

So pick a goal and get started. Save up and pay cash.

Tuscarawas County Ohio . . . . (Big Deer)

I love Tuscarawas County. This is where I live. I love it most of all for the challenging hills and roads that cut through these hills. But I'll save my biking stories for another day.

Today this short post is about my buddy John Carpenter. John attends NewPointe and he loves to bow hunt. I enjoy listening to his stories about "The big deer" that he didn't have a shot at.
We'll this year he got the "Bull of the woods" This deer is unbelievable. If you are into deer hunting, John's deer is going to be scored this weekend. I'm sure it will end up in the record books.

Congratulations John!

Long term care insurance

I bet you didn't know that November was Long-term care insurance month. If you or your parents are over 55, you'd better start working this coverage into your monthly budget.

In a nutshell, LT care insurance covers things like nursing home stays. The average daily cost right now in a nursing home is $140 a day. That's over $4,000 a month. Ouch!

Do you want to know more about LT care insurance for you or your parents? On November 13th and again on the 21st from 9 AM to 6 PM est the American Association for Long-Term Care Insurance (AALTCI) will answer your questions FREE (one of my favorite words) of charge. Just call 877-547-8471 and ask away. I'll be calling.

Retirement has changed and long-term care insurance needs to be part of your plan.

Gift Cards for Christmas. . . . Bad Idea this year

Normally, I'm a big fan of gift cards. One, they are easy to buy and in my home town, if I purchase the gift card(s) at Giant Eagle, I get $0.10 off a gallon of gas for every $50 spent. Anyway, that's another story. Two, getting a gift card as a gift let's me purchase something I want or need. Then I follow-up with a letter letting the person know what I purchased with their gift card to me.

So with both sides of the gift card transaction being a good deal, why stay away from them this Christmas? Ah, great question. Thus my post.

As we are all well aware, our economy stinks right now and there's big projections that this Christmas shopping season will be a bust for retailers. If this ends up being so, a lot of retailers won't be in business next year.

If you happened to give or received a gift card from a retailer who's no longer in business, your gift card is worth Zero. Think this can't happen? Just last month a local restaurant that was in business for well over 15 years was open for business one day and was closed the next. So it does happen.

So, If you were thinking of getting me a gift card this Christmas, you can just give me cash. (Just kidding.) But stick to the largest of retailers like Amazon.

Mr. Excel. . . . What a resource

I just got off the phone with my buddy and "sounding board" Dave Moore. Among other things, we were talking budgets. (It's that time of year you know.) This lend into a conversation regarding the use of Microsoft Excel and multiple tabbed spreadsheets as part of the budget process. (I love this stuff.)

For me, Excel is right up there with sliced bread. It's a great thing that make my life better. One of the Excel resources I use and just turned Dave onto is Mr. Excel. Mr. Excel, Bill Jelen, is unbelievable in his knowledge of Excel. The tips and tricks I've learned from him has saved me hours and hours of time and that translates into big $$.

A great way to check out Mr. Excel is through Itunes. Bill has a FREE daily video podcast of 2 - 3 minutes in length. If you'd consider yourself an Excel intermediate or advanced user, you've got to check out the podcast. You'll be amazed at the new stuff you learn.

Red Pig Award

Ok, as an accountant some would say I'm not the most creative guy they know. Every once in a while I come up with some pretty creative ideas if I do say so myself. . . . Enter the Red Pig Award.

With the help of my right hand person here at NewPointe, Anita, we purchased a box full of Red piggy banks that I now keep in my office. I'm using these Red pigs to pass out to staff members when they creatively save the church money. (I get to define the word "creative".)

I having lots of fun with the piggy banks by doing two things with them before I hand them out. First, I write a thank you note to the receipieint right on the side of the pig. Thanking them for saving the church $$. Second and probably more fun for them, I put some coin in the bank for them to spend.

Here's a picture of me and Jean Vacha. Jean is our cafe and kitchen team member. She's incredible when it come to food. Jean got the first Red Pig Award becuase she spent a total of only $50 for deserts in the upcoming Married Life Live. That's incredible considering there will be over 300 people in attendnace.

So, what do you think? Is this a creative idea for an accountant or what?

It's budget season

It's one of my favorite times of year at NewPointe. It's budget season. I along with the rest of the staff are putting dollars to the ministry needs of 2009. Please don't get me wrong. Ministry is not about dollars but it does take dollars to do ministry.

One of the major areas of responsibility for me is our budget. Here are a some of the though process I go through in working on our budget.

1. What's our average attendance per month and the average giving per attandee?
   
2. How many Sundays are there per month.
3. Do I see average attendance and giving per attendee staying the same, going up or going down?
4. Where does each ministry stand in terms of our current year's budget and what was actually invested in that ministry year-to-date.
   
5. Do we need additional staff?
6. Do we need to make major repairs that need to be planned for? (resurfacing our parking lot in 2010 $40,000)
7. Each Ministry Director is asked to allocate there financial need on a month-by-month basis and put this information into a spreadsheet I've designed.
8. I combine all spreadsheets into one master budget.
9. The budget is entered into our accounting system. (QuickBooks)
10. I'm able to monitor actual verses budget during the year.