Nickeled and Dimed

Here are links to some of the best personal finance related articles from the past couple weeks:

I found my new favorite blog this week.  It’s called Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist, and it is phenomenal.  Seriously.  I’ve seen the site mentioned on several of my other favorite sites, but finally took the time to check it out last week and spent three straight hours reading her past articles.  While it is not exclusively a personal finance site, it mostly offers career advice (how to find a job, how to keep a job, how to advance in a job, how to figure out what kind of job you want, etc.) and obviously a job is a pretty large part of personal finance.  But it is more than simply a job hunting site.  She offers articles on topics ranging from how to get a great job to why you shouldn’t dodge the recession with grad school to sex.  Seriously, check her out.  Just go about half way down the front page and on the right side you will see a feature where you can just go to a random post.  Click on it and be prepared to be entertained and educated for hours.

JD at Get Rich Slowly, one of my other favorites, wrote a fascinating article on the third stage of personal finance.  In the past three years JD has seen his financial situation go from tens of thousands of dollars of credit card debt, to no debt, a fully funded retirement account and a more than adequate emergency fund.  Now, after a recent death of a close friend, he is asking himself “what now”.  This is a great article for those of you who have moved beyond the basics of personal finance or even for those of you who haven’t and want something to motivate you to keep going.

Ramit at I Will Teach You to Be Rich put out a new video on how to save money on your worst problem areas.  These videos from Ramit offer a nice change of pace from the typical personal finance blog.  I also got a chance to preview his new bookwhich will be coming out in March and from what I read it is excellent.  You can save a few dollars by pre-ordering a copy now at the link above.

Jim at Bargaineering had an inspiring guest post from Jim O’Donnell on doing what you love.  With the events going on at my job this is something I have been thinking about a lot lately.  Am I really happy in my job?  Am I doing something meaningful?  Am I passionate about my job?  These are all things Jim talks about in this great guest post.

Erica at erica.biz has an article up about negotiating to lower your phone and cable bills.  I plan to try these tips out in the next couple weeks with my cable bill and will report back on how will they work.

Check these articles out and let us know what you think.  If you have any other interesting personal finance related articles from the past few weeks feel free to post them in the comments section.