Last night I was on my way home and as I passed by gas stations, I could not help notice, LINE UPS of cars at the pump.  I did not connect the dots till later, these people where lined up, possible for 15 minutes to get their last fill of gas before the evil HST hit.

The average car will take 40 liters of gas if it rolls in on empty. At $1 a liter, your 15 minutes of pain will save you a grand total of $3.2. So come to think of it, on an hourly basis that is $12.8/hour not bad, but….

What bugs me the most about this gas thing is, the gas price watchers, they really bug me. That is all they talk about, the price went up, the price went up, they watch the gas price like its the stock market, they go to gas price watch websites. They go to across the street, make an illegal U-Turn to get a savings of 0.1 penny per liter (4 cents on the fill up)… Its a game against the big bad gas companies….

I am all for saving money, saving money is about the most important thing you do for yourself and actually for the economy in general. You have to save, are you listening, YOU HAVE TO SAVE. BUT I am willing to bet some money, that these very people that chase penny’s at the pump go to the Starbucks next to the gas station and get themselves a nice, latte for $5, then go out for lunch everyday and pay $10 etc….

Save money by chasing gas prices is not a savings plan, you need a savings plan for sure. If you decide that your savings plan is one penny a liter, time to rethink your strategy. At least brew your own coffee, make a meal at home, or even better, ride your bike to work, saves you a gym membership and GAS MONEY….

Do you favor a gas station because its a fraction of a penny cheaper than the one next door? Time to fess up!

What are some good, real, practical money management tips out there?

                          

Are you in debt? unable to save? worse yet, have collections companies on you?  Those collection companies are aggressive and nasty. They wont stop short of doing anything to get you to pay them bills. The latest is a Lithuanian firm that hired a witch to hunt debt dodgers. Yes a witch, do you want a witch coming after you? No you don’t.

Now here is some very important advice to live buy.

When in debt, make sure you don’t dig deeper. cut up your credit cards, and pay with cash. Try to buy what you need, put together a MUST have budget and stick to it. HOWEVER make sure that your budget includes the following line item.

PAY YOURSELF FIRST = 10% * Salary.

Make sure you pay yourself. lock that money up, and make sure you at least have savings that will cover 3 month living expense. Once you accumulated your 3 month, starts investing the 10%. Get yourself invested at least in some mutual funds and contribute every paycheck.

Savings and accumulating wealth is extremely important for you, especially if you are a man, why? Well a recent study concluded that “Wealthy men give women more organisms” So I guess its true what they say.
Size does matter, only its the size of the balance in your savings account.

                          

I dont like the Chevy Volt. The car is not yet out and I already dont like it. Especially becuase its a car that is not environmentally friendly. Yes its not environmental firendly becuase somewhere in the US, a giant hunk of coal will be burning to power it. And just because the car does not emit, that does not mean emission has not occurred on its behalf.

What is needed is not Volts, what is needed is no Hummers and Escalates on the road. They are the real problem. They block your view, waste energy and Pollute. Why cant we drive a small car? Why do we all need to be driving monster trucks and vans that drive empty 95% of the time? How does a family of 4 fit in a Honda Civic in Europe but not in the US or Canada?

You see we are obsessed with BIG, somewhere along the line, someone convinced us that SIZE MATTERS. Yes Size matters and as a result we have one of the biggest financial meltdowns.

The average European house is between 900-1000  square feet. That is it. A family of 4 or more lives in it, happily and comfortably. The average family owns 1 compact car. The average family shops for their daily meals. The average family eats a normal food portion.

On the flip side, somehow instead of a coffee and toast, someone convinced us that we need, 2 eggs, 3 sausages, hash browns, toast, coffee, jam, maybe a pancake or 2 to boot, some how we are convinced that we are all lumber jacks and therefore must have a huge breakfast before we go to work.

Somehow instead of a small environmentally firendly car, someone convinced us that we need a 5 liter SUV to drive on our big roads, becuase small cars that do the job on the autobahn in Germany, don’t work on I81.

Somehow instead of a modest size home, someone convinced us that we need a house that is the size of the lot its built on, a 4 bed room, 2500 sqr ft home with an ensuite and walk in closet, and just becuase that is not enough space, we have to finish the basement, and park the car in the drive way becuase our 2 door garage is full.

So what?

Big breakfasts, are not healthy. Big breakfasts are full of fat. Big breakfast make us unproductive. Big breakfast cost more.

Big cars, need more expensive tires. Big cars need more gas. Big cars need more expensive repairs. Big cars pollute. Big cars, cost more.

Big houses, need to be heated and cooled, big houses need furniture, big houses with big closets need to be filled as Daniel Arielle states in his book Predictably Irrational. Savings has an inverse relation to closet space. Big Houses cost more.

And so, big meals, cars, houses, etc… mean only one thing – NO SAVINGS, and that is absolutely dangerous.

In Part 2 – I will discuss the importance of saving on the economy. I will also discuss one of the root causes of the credit crunch, the one thing no one is talking about. Fixing the tax system.