Hey there! It’s 2016, and things aren’t looking great. The stock market is in the dumps, the Canadian dollar and oil prices are plummeting, and there’s talk of North Korea having a Hydrogen Bomb. But who cares? As an Indexer, I’m not bothered by the stock market’s ups and downs. However, I’m keeping an eye on the situation in North Korea. But whatever happens, I’m confident that we’ll make it through. Here’s to a fantastic new year for all of us!
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
The New Year brings many opportunities to change or improve things. I have resolved to lose that extra weight I have packed on due to laziness on my part (sloth, gluttony and greed, can’t go wrong when you are working with the 7 deadly sins). As I have said, Debt Makes Me Sick but it is very easy to fall into bad habits as I have learned, and just because you may have achieved your goals, doesn’t mean you can abandon the methodologies that got you there.
The reason why the TFSA is not being used effectively? The name scares people, seriously, that is what the media is now spouting as great financial advice. If it was called Anal Probe it would still be an effective savings vehicle, get over it Canadians. A rose by any other name might smell as sweet.
For football fans like myself or Robb from Boomer & Echo, it will be a great weekend with 4 games this weekend and 4 games next weekend. No doubt there will be a football flavoured article coming out of this weekend as well (Go Vikings!).
My Writings for Week Ending January 8th
It is past Epiphany so you should have your decorations down by now, but remember Valentine’s Day is coming soon too:
Keep some of these great ideas and maybe re-read this on December 27th, 2016, Financial Things to do on Last Day of year.
Maybe a new way to work for 2016, Financial Rules of 3
TD may start asking for royalties, given how many posts I write about them, but if they stopped Rejecting My Mutual Fund Transactions, I might have less to write about.
Yes, more writing about TD on this one as well, more fees, more fun
Lent is on the Horizon
Do you have a lot of foreign income and are wondering what the heck to do about it? Look no further than the Blunt Bean Counter Mark, with The T1135 Form Yet Again! & Hiring The Blunt Bean Counter. Mark has helped me out countless times and he is a man to be trusted. Did you get a special gift you really don't know what to do with? Tom from Canadian Finances wants to help with Tips on Returning Gifts After Christmas, or you could always re-gift?
Continuing his essays on the differences in life between Canada and South of the Border, Mark from 2nd Career Search gives us The U.S. Health Insurance System Sucks, where he points out how good we may have it up here. I am not how sure how well the IRS helps out taxpayers down south however, Marie from Boomer and Echo does point out how helpful our own CRA can be with CRA's My Account: How To Check Your Tax Information Online, everyone who can use this service, should use this service.
Barry from Money We Have points out The Difference Between Mortgage Amortization and Term, which many folks do seem to confuse. Do you know the difference ? I admire Mark from My Own Advisor's honesty regarding his life and predictions and sure enough he comes through with another honest appraisal with 2015 Financial Predictions and Results, how well do you think he did? He really tanked in a stock picking contest though (however, he also is doing just fine with his real investments, so don't worry about his prognostication skills). Has your year started well? If you need some ideas of what to do financially, Million Dollar Journey helps out with Financial Checklist to Start the Year (2016) .
Michael James seems to have started the new year full of vim and vigour, writing three posts this week and capping it with Questions from Financial Hell, a cringe-inspiring essay with questions to make your financial skin crawl.
New Year Payment Bumps
Preet explains that if you get a pay increase every year, shouldn't you bump up your savings numbers too?
2016 Random Thoughts
- December 4th, Loopy Hydro, Loose Money, Disabilities, Advent and #MoneyStories
- December 11th, Advent, TFSA Drops, Negative Interest and #MoneyStories
- December 18th, Star Wars, Christmas Money, Shaw gets Wind and #MoneyStories
- December 30th, Top Canadian Personal Finance Posts for 2015
- January 8th Merry Market Meltdown, TFSA, Wild Card Weekend and #Moneystores
My Twitter feed is where I re-tweet many great articles by some of my featured writers (and make the occasional odd or off color commentary on life (in 140 characters or less)). I am also on reddit, Tumblr, Pinterest , Flipboard, Instagram and other Social Media sites (look for the BigCajunMan userid) as well. If you have social media accounts, don’t forget to vote for my posts (see the nifty dashboard on the bottom of each article, where you can cast your votes).As they say in Quebec, vote early and vote often!
Investors in savings mode cheer for falling prices 🙂 Yes, I cannot predict squat so luckily I don’t do much guesswork when it comes to my investments – some – not much!
Thanks for the mention, enjoy your weekend,
Mark
Stock picking contests are like Fantasy Football, just for fun!
I’m still investing more money in the stock market, so I’m happy about lower prices. Thanks for the mention.
I predicted you’d say that last week (see Twitter discussions for details on that one )