One of my favorite personal finance books of all time is the one that was written by the late Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door (published in 1996). The bestselling book identifies common traits that show up again and again among those who have accumulated wealth. The surprising finding …

While I don’t believe that a bear market is coming, one big lesson from the last two recessions is that it can’t hurt to be prepared. Crashes will always come and go. Whether it’s six months or six years from now, nobody knows. The prospect of me becoming a thousandaire …

You’ve probably heard Dave Ramsey say this many times before, “The borrower is a slave to the lender.” The quote was taken from the scriptures. That’s exactly what I had in mind when I decided to lend my sister $14,000 last summer. Finally, I can ‘enslave’ my annoying sister, who …

I’ve recently started a Facebook group for this blog where members are encouraged to ask any question about money. Out of the blue, one member asked about Bitcoin. In an effort not to monopolize the forum, I waited several hours. But nobody was keen on answering the question. I eventually ended up …

Buy what you know, and stick to companies with good long-term prospects and quality management– are three well-known rules that the famous investor, Warren Buffett, follow when buying stocks. None of these rules I followed when I bought 200 shares of SNAP when it went public last week. The purchase was done …

With Valentine’s Day just a couple of days away, I’m feeling the pressure to come up with something really special for my wife. Traditionally, it would be fresh flowers— a bouquet of red roses to be specific. In the past, I hated buying flowers. I’ve always thought of it as …

Earlier this morning, I’ve sold a mutual fund that I held for 15 long years– Laudus International MarketMasters Fund™ (ticker symbol SWOIX). As the name suggests, the fund invests in shares of companies outside the United States. It falls under Morningstar’s “Foreign Large Growth” category because the fund manager’s focus is …

Along with rebalancing my portfolio, the other thing that I do with my finances before the year ends is updating my household’s end-of-year spreadsheet. It doesn’t have to be overly complex. Mine is very simple and can be done by anyone who is Excel savvy. I’ve been updating the Excel document …

One of the aspects of wealth building is being able to protect what you have accumulated. Even if you are extremely frugal with no debt, wealth that you have worked so hard for your entire life can be lost in various ways, among them: A natural disaster Medical emergency Ugly …

I finally reached the millionth milestone after Republican Donald Trump’s win. This is unexpected because I was expecting a market crash. It’s a testament that one should never time the market. Just a week ago, I jokingly suggested to my coworkers to move all their investments to cash, wait for …