February 17th 2008
1. Sell on ebay. This requires some research, but what I do is scour Best Buy and Circuit City (and other such electronics retailers) for great sales, then buy the product and put it on ebay. Best Buy has some great sales where you can get $100 off retail value, sell it on ebay and get a $50-75 profit easily.
2. Join websites that pay you to fill out surveys and do free trials. The ones with high payout are usually trial offers that require a credit card to join, and if you cancel within the trial, you won’t be billed. I’ve made $80 in two months with Cash Crate. You’ll also need an extra email address for all the spam you will get from the surveys.
3. Do laundry for your friends. It costs me $2 to wash and dry one load of clothes, so charge $4 and you make easy money with a few minutes of work.
4. Bring energy drinks and snacks to all-night study sessions in the university center or library and sell them to the different study groups. This works best during finals week.
5. If you’re decent with computers, start a computer maintenance “business”. Post flyers advertising your services around campus. Offer to backup hard drives, clean up and optimize computers, install new memory…Charge half of what it costs to take it to Best Buy.
Posted in Money with 12 comments
January 31st 2008
Surviving College Life has created a list of 50 Ways to Save Money in College. The list is broken down into eight categories that basically covers everything. Here are what I think are the top five tips (with my comments):
19. Use student discounts when you travel. Check with the bus, train, or airline you are using, or use a student travel site like StudentUniverse.com. Don’t limit this to just travel. Most places in a college town have discounts for students. Use them!
22. Reduce your electricity bills: turn off your computer when you’re not using it, turn off lights when you leave the room, unplug appliances you aren’t using. Electricity is my second-highest bill, which I thought was due to my air conditioning. After doing some experimentation, I realized it’s my huge entertainment stations - TV/Playstation and my computer desk. When I turned these things off for a week, my bill was CUT IN HALF.
35. Understand what your credit score is, and keep it healthy! It will help you save money later when you’re looking for low interest rates on car or home loans. Credit is very important for later in life and if you start building it (smartly) now, you will be ahead of your classmates by a long shot. Need help with this? Try Get Rich Slowly.
39. Don’t eat out. It adds up quickly, and if you’re not getting fast food, you have to add a tip. Eating out is one of my vices and I’m working on that. Restaurants are expensive and can be just as unhealthy as McDonald’s. You’re much better off (budget-wise and health-wise) if you cook healthy(-ish) meals on your own.
48. Sign up for freebies with your favorite restaurants. By signing up with Hollywood Video’s newsletter, they send you free movie rental coupons on a regular basis. I use these to supplement my Netflix addiction.
Visit Surviving College Life to read the full article, 50 Ways to Save Money in College.
When in debt, people often think of weird debt help solutions. Usually they resort to loans, and in some cases, mortgages. This issue is frequently faced by individuals who do not use their credit card well and have never believed in investment of any sort.
Posted in Money with 6 comments
January 20th 2008
H&R Block is holding “Ask a Tax Advisor” sessions in honor of National Tax Advice Day 2008. Through January 31, you can have a free session, by email or phone, with an H&R Block tax professional. You’ll be working with someone with more than 8 years of experience and 250 hours of training. This is a great deal and you can get any tax questions answered.
Their website also has helpful calculators and tips.
Click here to get free tax advice with H&R Block. And remember, with H&R Block, you’ve got people.
Before investing in any property, appropriate home work is essential on real estate investing. Not everyone is apt for this. This is why people should learn with reading and interpreting free insurance quotes and work about their home insurance before getting stuck into complicated mortgages matters. Generating mortgage leads should not be their priority.
Posted in Money with 4 comments
January 16th 2008
The new year brings tax season and not all students have to file a return, but some do. If you’re not sure whether you’re included in those who do, you can visit the IRS site to find out. Tax season brings unhappy thoughts into most minds, but when you’re a student, it can be a good thing. Most students aren’t required to pay taxes so anything that was withheld will be refunded to you. Unless you claim exempt on your W2 form at work, taxes are withheld from your paycheck. Some people even fill it out so the IRS takes out more than they should so they can get a bigger refund (this is what I do - I treat it as a savings account because I find it’s hard for me to do it on my own).
Filing isn’t tricky either. Services like TurboTax make things so much easier. If you’ve paid interest on any student loans, you can claim up to $2,500 as a deduction. While this doesn’t help students who don’t have to pay any taxes (like myself), it is helpful for those who do and for those who are out of college.
Preparing your return
- TurboTax, which is made by powerful software company, Intuit, is the leading tax preparation software. The basic edition is $20, but there’s also a free online edition for 1040EZ filers (most common, unless you’re utilizing deductions, you’ll most likely fall under this category).
- IRS eFile - The IRS allows you to prepare and file your tax return electronically.
- H&R Block, Jackson Hewitt, etc. - These tax preparation companies are another alternative to filing for yourself, but if you’re a student, your return isn’t going to be complicated and these places aren’t cheap. Not a good idea for most people.
Filing
- Mail - you mail it off, it’s free, but it can take up to six weeks for your refund
- TurboTax efile with direct deposit - $14.95, can get your refund in 9 days
- IRS FreeFile - if you qualify for FreeFile (made $54,000 or less in 2007), you can file your return electronically with the IRS for free. You can set up direct deposit and get your return in 10 days.
Websites to help you out
One should double check printing of his credit card application before finally submitting it because it may lead to inaccurate credit report. This in turn will unintentionally influence the mortgage leads. Not only will this disrupt your debt management plan, but have a negative impact on your online banking as well.
Posted in Money with 2 comments
December 29th 2007
1. Save up before you spend your money on that new XBox 360…don’t put it on a credit card.
2. Join a credit union or find a bank that offers free student checking accounts
3. Prepare your FAFSA and apply for financial aid with your school
4. Apply for scholarships
5. Don’t buy textbooks unless absolutely necessary, and if you do, be smart about it
6. Learn how to eat on a college student’s budget
7. Make a budget and track your spending
8. Don’t get a credit card unless you can use it responsibly (if you do, don’t apply for more than two because multiple inquiries can hurt your score)
9. Join Netflix instead of renting movies, better yet, watch them online for free (or much cheaper). Even better, rent them at your local library. (Thanks TipDiva)
10. Utilize your school’s gym, computer lab, health clinic and other resources. You already pay for them.
For refinance home mortgage, it is important that you bank thinks your credit card application worthy of it. With the increasing frequency of debt consolidation loans, it is hard to trust one with a creditcard. Also, the bank takes any kind of investment in good regard.
Posted in Money with 7 comments
December 13th 2007
Semesters are coming to a close and it’s time to sell the textbooks you’ll no longer need. Some of them you never needed in the first place. I’ve been researching and found a few different websites that are best shots for my books. The offers from these websites were the highest, but it really takes time and effort to find where you’ll get the most money back.
If the prices given at the above websites aren’t high enough for you, or they don’t want your book, try eBay or, go through the Google search results for sell college textbooks.
Usually when people find their perfect domain amongst homes for sale, they do anything to get it, including loan applications to the bank etc. They even apply for a credit card everywhere in order to borrow cash on it. They do not even have the sense to get an insurance quote first and probably don’t even know about free insurance quotes. If they would have known the bad impact of their credit reports on their future, they would stay within their limits.
Posted in Money with 5 comments
December 12th 2007
That College Kid is a hobby website. It’s not my only, but it is currently my favorite. The purpose of this website is NOT to make money. It’s about the content, the readers and myself. That’s why there’s not ads everywhere. However, I do profit a little. I do have the Text Link Ads InLinks plugin installed on this site, which I think has three or four links throughout the website. I follow a few money-making blogs and know of the different ad systems. I’ve tried sponsored posts before and found one or two per month (between my different sites) is plenty of money for me.
A friend recommend a website called Cash Crate, which I signed up for today. You get paid to complete offers and surveys. Most give you about $1, but there are some (that require a credit card) that pay $10-15. Those offers are the free trials for services like Stamps.com, Netflix and eFax. If you’re a careful person and you can keep track of when the free trial will end and cancel, you won’t be charged for anything. It’s been two days and I’ve made $20 with another $30 pending approval (the websites I completed offers with send notice back to Cash Crate). I’m actually pretty impressed with this service and have been talking to other members who’ve been successfully paid and enjoy the website. If you’re looking for an easy way to make money without a website, Cash Crate is a great place to start.
I’m on the lookout for other survey/offer-completing sites that are similar to Cash Crate and don’t require ridiculous things to get paid. I’ll keep everyone updated.
Usually loans in adult life begin with student loan consolidation. Later there are mortgages, and huge bills on credit cards. The usual debt management solution one comes up with is getting even more loans. Of course, none of this is ever done after going through an insurance quote.
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