Reminder: Giveaway Ends Tonight
Posted on March 18, 2010 by Him and tagged giveaway, taxes
Do you need something to do this weekend? March Madness what? How about taxes?
Enter to win TurboTax Online Deluxe or Premier by 9:00 PM CDT. Do it. Now.
Too Young for Long-Term Care Insurance?
Posted on March 16, 2010 by Him and tagged insurance
photo: Ilja
The first time that Her and I heard about long-term care (LTC) insurance was about 5 years ago on an episode of Susie Orman. LTC insurance pays for stuff like nursing homes to at home care, depending on the plan. Since then we've always had it in the back of our minds, especially when we thought about how our parents would take care of themselves. For us though, since we were only puppies in our mid-20's then, we didn't give it much thought.
So when Her emailed me one day telling me that her employer is offering a group LTC plan, I was not ready to make a decision about it. Much of the information floating around on LTC assume that people will start shopping for this around the age of 50. We're more than 20 years from that, so are we crazy for making this decision now?
Some Google-fu revealed that premiums for 50 year olds can start at $2400 per year and increases from there. Right now we can choose from one of two plans. In the first, we're being offered premiums that start at $200 per year for adequate coverage of up to $150 per day for a lifetime benefit of $275,000. Every 3 years we're offered the chance to increase the coverage with an accompanying increase in premiums. We can choose to decline, but must wait another 3 years to increase the benefit.
This plan differs from the automatic benefit increase, in which we pay a flat rate premium of about $840 per year for the life of the plan. The upside is that the benefits increase 5% compounded each year. The downside is that this cost for us right now will make achieving some of our other goal a little more difficult.
After reviewing the plans, I think that it wouldn't be a bad idea to sign up. I was looking at the first option to keep the premiums low for now and for an option to increase our coverage, and therefore premiums, over time. At $200 per year, this is an easy expense for us to handle. Heck, we've spent more in one night FOR DINNER.
What do you think? Are we too young to worry about LTC insurance?
TurboTax Deluxe or Premier Giveaway
Posted on March 15, 2010 by Him and tagged giveaway, taxes
Tax day is only a month away, and you haven't done your taxes. Oh nos! What to do?
Well, one thing you can do is enter to win TurboTax Deluxe or TurboTax Premier, both online editions. TurboTax has generously donated a keycode for each of their Online TurboTax Deluxe and Premier Editions that will allow you to file your federal taxes for free (you'll still have to pay to file your state taxes). Here's a handy-dandy comparison chart of the TurboTax products so that you can compare the similarities and differences between the Deluxe and Premier editions.
To be entered for the giveaway, leave a comment stating which version of TurboTax you would like to win, either Deluxe or Premier. Easy, right?
Entries will be accepted until Thursday, March 18, 9:00 PM CDT. I'll close up the comments and choose a winner for each product by printing off the comments and tossing them into a hat and choosing a name.
Good luck!
Finances and Family Review
Posted on February 22, 2010 by Him and tagged family, finances, links, parents
This morning Her and I were featured on the Chicago Public Radio show Eight Forty-Eight. If this is your first time here, welcome! The portion of our interview that was broadcasted included our thoughts on how we deal with the relationship of finances and family. Here are some of the posts that go into more detail on that delicate balance:
I talk about my parents (mom) at length in a few posts:
How Much Do You Tell Your Parents?
My Parents Keep Up With The Jonses
Raise your children to rely on them - Asian Culture And Finances
The situation with Her's parents is nicely summed up in this post: Proactive Parent Protection
...oh, and by the way, we're not debt free...but we do have a positive net worth these days. We don't have any revolving credit card debt, although we do still use them for the rewards but pay them off every month. We also still have about $50,000 of student loans to pay off, but ~$6,500 of that is at a 1.9% APR for life through a generous balance transfer, and the remainder of the balance is a federal loan with a low enough rate that we're not freaking out about it. This is a far cry from the ~$18,000 in credit card debt and ~$130,000 in student loan debt that we had when we started this blog.
Public Radio Superstars, at Least on Monday
Posted on February 19, 2010 by Him and tagged media
Hey guys. Thank you for the response in our last post. Because of that response, and the relatively few people who unsubscribed (the nerve!), we're definitely going to be picking up the activity on this blog.
And remember a few years ago when we did a radio interview with Vocalo, then a fledgling radio station that seemed like an experiment in broadcasting and internet but turned out to be super awesome?
Well, some of that segment will be airing this coming Monday morning, February 22, on the WBEZ radio-news-magazine show 848! We'll be on between 9:05 and 9:20 am CST.
We're super excited because 848 is our favorite radio program to listen to when we're running late for work.
If you want to listen to the original interview in its entirety, check out the archive here.
(Hi Robin!)
More Articles
- Checking In
- Spending More For Kinder Food
- Sizing Up Engagement Rings
- So the Economy is Kind of Crazy
- Australia is on Sale!
- In Which We Put Our Car in a Pothole
- Grocery Store Jewel No Longer Accepting Expired Coupons
- Net Worth, Q1 2009: Once You Go Black, You Can Never Go Back
- I Don't Feel Like an Equal Anymore
- Brrr...My Salary Got Frozen
