There is nothing quite as bonding in my mind than a camping trip, especially when you are not a camping family. Those of you that were raised to camp, those that know all the right ways to do things and all the right things to pack may not know what I am talking about. But I am sure that there are those of you that were not raised up camping that have tried your hand at it like we have that know firsthand what I mean.

Low Cost Camping

My dad did not camp, or have picnics, or swim in public pools. He did not like to rough it, eat with ants or flies, and he did not want to swim in a public pool. I will just leave it like that; I won’t go into his explanation because it is not pretty. He did like to fish so we spent some time at the lake. Mom on the other hand loved to hike, picnic, garden, and generally any outdoor activity.

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The housing market is in recovery, a slow and painful one, but a recovery nonetheless. And no, I’m not saying this because I’ve been obsessing over house prices, builder confidence indexes, construction permits numbers and foreclosure rates (ok, I’ve done that too), but because the hedge funds, where the smart money lies, are moving back into real estate. And I’m trailing behind.

REIT Investment

I decided to get into real estate investing about four months ago – right around Christmas when the budgets and the belts are too tight to really be thinking about investments. Well, I’ve never had a deep pocket anyway so I decided to jump in with whatever I could scoop together and hope for the best.

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On a lazy Sunday afternoon, while SMB was away with her friend, I was looking at the Google Analytics report to research search ranking of my articles. Google Analytics reports the exact search terms used to visit the blog among various other things. One search term caught my attention. It was “I work as a car cleaner how to use my money earn for my future”.

Retirement saving low wage earner

The search term reminded me of the population (extremely poor) for whom we, personal finance bloggers, never write. I can recall two of my posts that may be relevant to the low wage earners, living life under $10,000 a year and live like in 19th Century to be debt free. These articles are of extreme frugality and require you to give up most good things in life to win against all odds.

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It’s almost summer over here in south Florida, I can’t believe days are so hot already. Just a couple of weeks back, I had to wear a sweater while coming back from a late night party. Nonetheless, our garden is enjoying the weather. The seeds I sowed early March was not growing much beyond tiny seedlings till beginning of April. Now they are growing thick and fast

Eggplant Seedlings

We are growing Basil, Cilantro, Eggplants, Tomatoes, Peppers and Lettuce this season. Since we are renting a second floor condo it’s a tough job to grow so many vegetables in a limited 7′ X 12′ space. I have grown vegetables and flowers in our patio since last few years. But, not so many in a single season. It’s kind of self test of my skills in gardening you can say.

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I was going through the Scottrade 6th Annual retirement survey for 2012. Compared to 2011 the trend seemed favorable to what we, the personal finance bloggers, want to see. Americans all across the board started saving more, spending less and the participation in tax deferred accounts increased. Boomers, Gen X are planning actively for their future

Retirement Saving

Scene is still not bright for Gen Yers, on the other hand still have a lot to catch up. Today’s young adults fall in this category, age 18 -28, to be precise. As per the survey, only 63% of working class gen Y hold tax deferred retirement account (employer’s 401(k) or IRAs). Still there’s a ray of hope:

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