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Jul
07

June Blog Income Earnings for Dorm Room Biz

Written by Chris on July 7, 2008 – 5:00 pm -

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You guessed it..it’s that time of the month again when everyone starts talking about how much money they made from blogging over the past month and any other statistics they wish to share. So, just like I did in the beginning of June when I reviewed the month of May, I will now review the month of June.

For the month of June, I made money blogging the following ways:

  • AdSense - $14.41
  • SponoseredReviews - $38.35
  • CashCrate - $6.65
  • Review Me - $30.00
  • Text Link Ads - $25.06
  • Blogrolled.com - $7.50

In a nice pretty chart, the total of $121.97 looks like this:

ReviewMe.com worked out to almost be this past month’s largest income provider. I had accepted a bunch of smaller reviews (around $10 each) but only managed to complete 3 of them and 1 got canceled before I could make the post. If I had crunched out the another 2 or 3, this amount would have doubled.

The same idea goes with the amount from SponsoredReviews.com, which was the biggest earner. I accepted a few different reviews and applied for others but only 2 were accepted by the advertiser. But, $38.35 is not too bad for writing 2 posts.

The amount that I was not that happy with for the month was my earnings from CashCrate. I personally only completed a survey or two which did not amount to much and the referrals underneath of me earned me about $5.50. If you are looking for an easy way to earn a decent amount of money for an easy task, I highly recommend checking out CashCrate. I have written about it a bunch before as well.

Finally, Blogrolled.com is a new service I signed up for and tested out. The premise of the business is pretty simple - like Text Link Ads and other services, they sell text links on your website. However, unlike other sites where you need to put a widget or code on your site, when Blogrolled sells a link on your site, all you do is add the link to your own blogroll until you are told to remove it (the advertiser cancels).

A couple other facts:


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Posted in Money Management, Website Updates / News | 1 Comment »
Jul
03

Win $50 from SmartyPig Towards Your Savings Goals

Written by Chris on July 3, 2008 – 9:45 am -

After a great interview with Mike and the folks at SmartyPig, they were kind enough to send me a $50 gift card for SmartyPig. As a user of SmartyPig, that would be a great little bonus into my own account and to be put towards my savings goal. However, I thought it would be more fun to give it away to someone who sets up an account at SmartyPig. Now, before you get too excited about winning a free $50, this gift card can only be used at SmartyPig.com to be added into your account and go towards one of your goals.

So, here is how things will work. First, you are going to need an account with SmartyPig. So, head over to www.smartypig.com and sign up for an account and set up a savings goal. Then leave a comment with your email address that you used with your SmartyPig account. This will let me check to see that you set up an account and see what people are saving for. By signing up for an account and leaving a comment here on this post, you will be entered into the contest.

Here are a couple other ways to get more chances to win:

It is as easy as that! The winner be chosen randomly and will be annouced on July 15, 2008. After the contest ends, I’ll contact the winner to get their address and send the gift card off to them!

I look forward to some participation in this contest, and more contests will be coming soon!

So, who wants $50 to save towards their goal?


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Posted in Contests, Money Management | 2 Comments »
Jun
24

Start Your Own Tip Jar!

Written by Chris on June 24, 2008 – 5:00 pm -

About a week or so ago I sold a climbing rope on eBay. The item sold for about $100. The winning bidder sent a money order to me as payment. This is good for a couple reasons, but the main reason that I like receiving money orders for large amounts as opposed to PayPal, is because of the fee’s. I have sold the same rope to other people who paid with PayPal and it cost between $6 - $10 in fees - which cuts into my profits!

So anyway, I cashed the money order on Saturday and shipped out the rope to him. I got home and was thinking about what I was going to do with the $100 cash I now had in my pocket. I like to use cash as opposed to credit/debit cards, just because then I have the feeling of “oh well, I only have this much left, so I probably shouldn’t get that” instead of saying “CHARGE IT!”. I know people will argue with this mentatlity, but I don’t care - everyone has their own ways and systems. Anyway, I decided that I didnt want to keep the $100 on me plus the other cash that I had. So, I had the idea of starting my own tip jar.

Basically, anytime I have extra cash on me that I don’t want to constantly carry around with me, I can put it in the tip jar. Or if I get everything I need to done in a day or accomplish a lot of tasks, I can reward myself wth a tip from my own wallet. This is nice because then when I need a couple extra bucks for lunch I can just grab it out real quick and be on the way. Or, if I don’t touch it for a while, it will add up and all of the sudden be like money I never knew I had. Kind of like a deposit from your paycheck into your retirement account - after a while, you start to not even miss the money that should be there. On Saturday I put in about $30.00 to save for another time. This is going to be a great little stash when the time comes and I need to use it!

On top of being my personal tip jar, I use the same container (an old Nalgene bottle), as my spare change holder. So when it starts to fill up, I’ll cash all the change in and have some nice pocket money to spend on something new. I’ll be saving up for a new LCD widescreen monitor, fyi.

I’m sure many of you throw your coins in a jar or something to keep them all in one place, but what about other cash that you don’t want to carry around with you all the time? Do you tip yourself? Deposit it in the bank? Or just hold onto it and spend it?


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Posted in Money Management, Rants / Random | 3 Comments »
Jun
19

Frugality for College Students – 13 Ways to Save Money While In College

Written by Chris on June 19, 2008 – 2:00 pm -

With so many websites and blogs discussing ways to be frugal and save money in any way you can, such as Get Rich Slowly and No Debt Plan, I started thinking about ways that college students could save money and be more frugal.

When you’re in college you don’t really think too much about saving money or figuring out ways to be more frugal. Its more about pulling out the plastic, saying “charge it”, and having a good time. While there are tons of different ways to save money, here are some of my top ones that I tried to do or wished I had tried to do.

  1. Don’t go to the bar – Of course this only applied is if you are of the drinking age. But if you are, consider not going to the bar and staying at your place and drinking. Getting a case of beer or some liquor is going to be a lot cheaper than going to the bar and paying a few dollars a beer/drink. Invite your friends over and have a party – for the price of a great night at the bar, you can throw a great party at your apartment/house. When I turned 21 years old, my bank account started dropping by going to the bar. You’re friends will nag you for sure to go out with them, and its fine to do once in a while, but if you can, save the money by getting your own beer and chilling at a friends place or your own. You can take it one step further and not drink at all of course.
  2. Don’t have a gym membership – Probably every university has some sort of gym or workout area that, as a student, you can utilize for free. Take advantage of it! There is no point in paying $50+ a month on a gym membership to a place like Gold’s Gym or Balley’s when you can go for free on campus. If you are going to the gym for the benefits of working with a personal trainer, start asking around campus for people to recommend another student to you. I would imagine that you could find someone within the health/foods/nutrition department that is interested in staying fit, working out, and would be willing to help you out. If it makes you feel better, you could offer to pay this person, but obviously not as much as a gym membership! Read more »


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    Posted in Bootstrapping, Money Management | 4 Comments »
Jun
19

Want to consolidate debt?

Written by Chris on June 19, 2008 – 5:00 am -

Credit card debt and other types of debt are a serious problem in the United States. Studies and statistics show that the average household has more than $8,000 in credit card debt. This also shows that 43% of U.S. families spend more than earn - a staggering $1.22 spent for each dollar earned. I am sure you are familiar with someone telling you to “Google it” when you want to search for or know something. That phrase is probably just as popular as “charge it” has become.

So what can you do?
You can start spending less to start off. Spending less on things you don’t really need and paying off more than the minimum payment is a great idea - it should even be required. One of the most recommended solutions to getting out of credit card debt besides seeking a debt consolidator, is to cut up your credit cards and not use them again. Then each month when the bill comes, pay off as much as you can. When your debt is paid off, close your account and cancel the card. Now you won’t be tempted to spend more than you can afford like the other half of the U.S. population.

Another important step to take is to educate yourself as much as possible about debt consolidaion, credit consolidation, saving your money, and how to get out of debt. If you continue to expand your knowledge and learn ways to climb out of the pit of debt, then you can do it. Set up a plan or calendar for when you want your debt to be paid off and have everything settled with a zero balance on it.

Here is another issue - the average person has 3 bank credit cards, 4 retail credit cards, and a debt card. Elimate as many of these as you can to reduce your debt and help your credit score out.

Pay off your bills in full as they arrive if you are going to use a credit card! I know a lot of people like to use their credit cards because of the “rewards” but those rewards are going to be useless to you if you have $5,000 worth of debt and an interest rate of 18.7% and can’t pay off your bill.


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Posted in Money Management | 1 Comment »
May
20

Met with an accountant yesterday; here are some of my thoughts!

Written by Chris on May 20, 2008 – 10:00 am -

Sunday I blogged that I was going to be meeting with an accountant and listed a few questions that I was going to ask him to dive deeper into the realms of setting up a business entity, such as an LLC or a C corp. The basis for the meeting was because with the amount of money that I had been bringing in recently from ebay and my website development business, there was some money that was not being reported as income and instead was just being deposited and not being accounted for. So there were some worries about the possibility of getting audited or having different problems with paying state taxes.

So, I wanted to learn more about my options, discuss my ventures, and see what may be the best idea for me as an entrepreneur. Now, before I go any further, I want to STRESS that this is advice that was given to ME and is specific to my case. That being said, it is always best to get your own advice from a certified professional such as an accountant or lawyer or both! So, with that, I am going to just talk about some of my different options, the answers to some of the questions that I asked, and what the future holds for how I do business. Read more »


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Posted in Blogging, Business Ideas, Entrepreneurship, Money Management, Web Development, Website Updates / News, eBay | 6 Comments »
May
06

Saving Your Income When You Graduate

Written by Chris on May 6, 2008 – 7:57 pm -

Now that I have graduated from college, it is time for me to start saving my money and income a little better than I had been during school. While a student, I was not really paying attention to how much I was spending and how much I was putting on my credit cards. So, now that the reality has set in that I need to watch my money, I have decided to set up some different “accounts” within my savings account.

Basically, as I deposit money into my general savings account, I am going to divide it up in a spreadsheet with how much I want to put towards each different “account” or expense.

As of right now, I have decided to put money towards the following expenses:

  • Rent – As many of you know, moving into an apartment right out of college and not being able to live at home can be a really big expense, especially if you live in a highly populated and growing area such as the DMV (D.C., Maryland, Virginia). Being from outside of Baltimore, and just above Washington D.C., rent is expensive! A two bedroom apartment will cost you easily $1,200 or more. Lucky for me, I am able to live at home with my parents and save my money up, before having to make a big commitment to paying rent. I will be living at home for at least the next 5 months, so I will have an opportunity to save at least $1,000-$1,500 into this account before the possibility comes up to move in with my Fiancé.
  • Honeymoon – I had mentioned before that I got engaged in January of this year, and we have been starting to plan the wedding and work out the different details – reception site, catering, etc etc etc. But, one of the main things that the Groom is responsible for covering is the Honeymoon. We don’t know exactly where we are going to be going, but it is going to be tropical and warm that is for sure! I have been looking at all inclusive resorts such as a Sandals resort, but also want to keep it open enough where we will be able to get out and take some different adventures on our own such as hiking or ziplining through the trees.
  • Car expenses – Owning a car, no matter what kind or how old, is expensive. Besides the rising cost of gas, being prepared for unexpected expenses such as repairs, emergencies, and regular maintenance is extremely important. I do not want to get caught with a bill for say $300 worth of repairs and have to take that money from a different savings account.
  • Vacation/Travel – This travel account is different from the Honeymoon account because I want to be able to have the freedom to travel when I want and make it out to many different cool places – with the only hold back being my full time job. So, when I have the vacation time available, I want to be able to travel and not have to worry about how much we are spending on the trip. Most of my blogging income will be put into this account J
  • Wedding – This account will be for miscellaneous wedding expenses. While my Fiancé’s parents are paying for most of the wedding, we are still going to have some of the bills to pay for. So, I want to be prepared to have enough money saved up to be able to cover some of those things. They will include flowers (my responsibility anyway), covering the costs of inviting extra people if we want, and also gifts for the groomsmen.
  • Gifts/Presents – This is just going to be a miscellaneous account for any gifts or presents that I would need to purchase for different holidays or other occasions.

I know that over the next 2 months, I will not be able to save as much money as I would like into these accounts because I will not have started my full time job yet, but I will be able to save some money into them. However, come the beginning of July when I will have been working at my full time job for a week or so, I will be able to start figuring out how much I will be able to continually put into each account when each paycheck comes.

How am I going to be saving the money?

Most of the expense accounts I will transfer the money from my checking account into my ING account so that I can earn better interest on the money rather than in a normal bank savings account. Yet, some of the money I will just keep in my normal savings account and keep it divided by using the Excel spreadsheet that I am going to develop. This will most likely be the car expense account as well as the gift/presents account. The only reason is that having the money in my bank savings account is quicker to transfer into my checking account then with ING.

Now that school is letting out, how are you going to be saving your money and what for? For those student entrepreneurs out there, the summer is the best time to A) make moves to get your business rolling, B) find a full time or part time job to make you more money on top of your business, and C) save your money as much as possible to be able to fund your business expenses throughout the rest of the year.


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Posted in Money Management | 2 Comments »