Evolving Personal Finance » psychology
Don’t Sell to Me, Man!
I hate being pitched to by salespeople! The quintessential situation came up for us during our trip to Madison, WI earlier this weekend: the rep at the car rental counter. When we were a bit less informed, we would always waver on whether to buy the rental company’s insurance. I think we even bought it once or twice! Then we figured out that we were doubly covered anyway from our car insurance and by a credit … Read entire article »
Filed under: psychology, spending
Long-Distance Marriage: Communication and Personalities
This is the third installment of our series on financially navigating a long-distance marriage. Please read and comment on the first, second, and fourth installments as well! I asked the couples several questions regarding their money personalities and communication about money and the answers ended up being closely related to one another. 1) Did living apart cause any major money conflicts? 2) How much of your communication time was spent on money, and how did that compare to … Read entire article »
Filed under: marriage, psychology
Don’t Call Them the Top 20%
After Christmas this year, Kyle and I visited my parents’ house for a couple days. The looming fiscal cliff was still all over the news, and I opened the newspaper to an infographic on how the various tax brackets would be impacted by different proposals and so forth. The taxpayers were divided into fifths: the bottom 20%, 2nd 20%, middle 20%, 4th 20%, and top “rich” 20%. Kyle and I fall into the middle 20% … Read entire article »
Filed under: psychology
Can You Change Your Tightwad/Spendthrift Personality?
Last week we discussed a tool used by some researchers to peg people on a tightwad-spendthrift (TW-ST) scale – please take the quiz and share your (and your spouse’s) score on that post! But considering this axis of my money personality made me wonder if people can change their tightwad-spendthrift status. Obviously motivated people can change their behavior. We particularly see this in people going bananas on their debt who go from spending money like water … Read entire article »
Filed under: psychology
How to Cut Your Food Spending – What’s Your Personality?
This is the start of a short series on spending less money on food (here are part 2 and part 3). In considering various strategies I realized that people will likely fall into two camps in terms of how they like to incorporate change: some people prefer abrupt, drastic change and others prefer gradual change. While I tend to shy away from comparisons between financial management and diet/weight management, this is one area where I can’t … Read entire article »
Filed under: choices, food, frugality, personal, psychology
Does Your Class Match Your Income?
My thoughts today might turn out to be offensive to some of my readers. I don’t intend them that way and I don’t have any specific people in mind. I’m just reflecting on my own experiences, observations, stereotypes, and biases. And I haven’t done much research for this either, so it’s certainly possible that you’ll disagree with my assertions. In the process of looking for apartments, Kyle and I toured one complex that isn’t as nice … Read entire article »
Filed under: housing, personal, psychology
How Might Your Spouse’s Love Language Affect Your Finances?
I’m sure that many of you are familiar with Gary Chapman’s theory of the Five Love Languages (affiliate link – thanks for using!). But have you ever considered how your love language and your spouse’s love language might affect your spending habits and career? For those of you who haven’t read any material by Chapman, I’ll briefly summarize the idea: Every person has an emotional “love tank” that can be filled or emptied by their relationships (we’ll … Read entire article »
Filed under: books, marriage, psychology
My Strategy for Market Volatility
2011 was an incredibly volatile year in the stock market. It seems like every day the indices move at least a percent. What’s a long-term, buy-and-hold investor to do? I have heard financial advisors suggest that you only check your portfolio balance once per year to prevent freaking out. I used to check my IRA balance about once per month to record my progress. Now that I listen to APM’s Marketplace daily I always know what’s going on … Read entire article »
Filed under: psychology, stock market
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