IPhone 6 Vote

Enter for your chance to win a $25 visa card

Peer-to-peer Lending

Ever get to that point in your life where you just need a little boost to your finances? Let Prosper find the right loan for you. Prosper uses a bidding process to get you competitive rates. Click the link and sign up today to get an offer you can't refuse.

Amazon Prime...Not Just Free Shipping

When you hear "Amazon Prime", you think free 2-day shipping but there is so much more. You get unlimited streaming of movies, primetime TV shows and more. And not to mention the free shipping. Amazon is offering a free 30 day trial. If you like it, it's $99 a year, that's less than $9.00 a month to watch unlimited movies, TV series, as well as FREE 2 day shipping. 

Sign up today and try it. I'm pretty sure you will love it.

Cash Back and Coupon Codes!

Getting back to survey sites and cashback shopping. I've definitely been missing my extra cash floating around. So try a few and let me know what you think. What are some of your favorite sites?

Springboard America wants to know what you think! Join Springboard America

Snakes and Snails and Puppy Dog Tails

Mollie & DooDoo Butt

Just when you think you're getting ahead, there always seems to be that day before payday crisis pop up at ya.  Let's back up to the last pay check...my daughter and I come across a dog that had been hit by a car. The two saviors for the day load him up and rush him to the vet (two days before pay day). On the ride to the vet, my daughter realizes that I just took on a financial responsibility that may interfere with her plans of buying a dirt bike. "May interfere?" I ask. How about "most definitely knocked that plan out the window".  After a few minutes of pouting, she realized that this little doggie was much more important than the dirt bike and she would try again with her sales pitch another time.

Walden waiting for surgery

Fast forward to pay day and all the financial arrangements made with the vet. Thankfully, he found it in his heart not to charge me his normal emergency fee and let me pay over the course of two weeks. We survived without the money. The dog, who we named Walden, found his way to a rescue facility that works with permanently injured animals.

Mollie after being bit by snake

Fast forward again to the next pay day (as always, two days before pay day), my own puppy, Mollie, who is a beautiful, 8 month old brindle pitbull, had a run in with a snake and ended up with a swollen leg and enough toxin to make her look like a drunk. Once again, I'm heading to the vet with a deathly ill doggie thinking about how much this one's going to cost. Unfortunately, the vet I used just two weeks before was on vacation so we weren't quite so lucky with the bill. They did let me pay half that day and the balance on payday which was nice, but still no money this week.

Mollie is 100% better and running around like nothing ever happened. Hopefully, she won't stumble on any more snakes.  I think next pay check, I'm going to tell myself not to expect any leftover money and maybe it will just find me instead. All in all, I wouldn't have changed anything. I love those pups!

Making Money with Bee4.biz

Here is my referral link to the Bee4.biz URL shortner and link locker. What this site does is shorten any URL and adds a survey to the link. Once a user completes one of the surveys, the site then continues on to the link you provided. You earn money for active leads as well as referrals. I just joined this site and will keep you updated on any earnings.

Yodlee Yoda Lay He Hoo

Last month, I stumbled across some Personal Financial Management programs and decided I would test them out. Finally, a whole month has passed and I've decided on just one. It worked out great that the day I started was the first day of my new bank statement which means I actually have an entire month's worth of data. I chose three programs to test, Mint.com, Wesabe, and Yodlee's MoneyCenter. Each one of them had benefits over the other, and also a few disappointments. My main reasons for choosing these three to test are (1) they're free, (2) they link to financial institutions without having to import data, and (3) there are no advertisements.

So far, the most functional program is Yodlee's MoneyCenter. I can link to any account that I have online access, except one credit card and they are working on getting it added. I love being able to see all my bank accounts, all my credit cards, my bills, and even my PayPal account on one page. They are grouped by types so I see available cash in one section and my debt in another. One nice feature is the Financial Calendar that shows what bills are due. It makes a big difference seeing your bills in a calendar format versus a list. It gives me a better sense of how much I need to pay when we get paid, or should I say how much money I will have left from my paycheck. The biggest drawback with Yodlee is it is not visually appealing. I know most people don't like all the bells and whistles and the pretty graphics, but I feel if it's possible to make it pretty, then "why not" make it pretty. I guess it's my little way of not feeling so down and out about my debt. Hopefully, Yodlee will work on adding some nice graphics.

The most visually appealing program is Mint.com. I absolutely love the layout, especially the Accounts page. Each account has its own trademark displayed...very professional I think. I love the Spending Trends, it has a very detailed breakdown including how many visits you made to a particular merchant. Made me realize just how often we visit McDonald's. Another great feature is my budget. It is displayed on the Summary page with a bar graph showing how close you are to going over. I bet you can guess that mine is always close to being over. Unfortunately, there are a few drawbacks though...I can't add my mortgage account, a few credit cards and my monthly bills. Another problem I see with Mint.com is the program doesn't allow you to create your own categories, but you can add labels. There are also a few bugs, like duplicate transactions, to be worked out before this program can be useful. Hopefully, Mint.com will make some changes and offer an updated version.

I also tested Wesabe, but unfortunately I never could get the Desktop Launcher to work correctly. Maybe it will work for someone else. I did import my bank data to test it and it had a few neat features, especially the automatic suggestions from other users. But it just didn't help me accomplish what I set out to do this month. Maybe another time.  (Wesabe has closed down since this article was written.)

So for right now, until something bigger and better comes along (oh yeah, and prettier), I will be using Yodlee's MoneyCenter to access all my financial accounts. Now, if I can just find a program that will do all of this and be able to actually use it, like transferring money from one account to the other. That would be the ultimate.