By David John Marotta and Beth Anderson Nedelisky
Income-shifting is one of several tax planning tools families have used to lower their tax bill. Historically, parents could save a bundle by transferring highly appreciated investments to their children who are in lower tax brackets. However, this year, Congress has made income-shifting a dream of the past, […]

Loans and credit cards provide great consumer benefits, but as with any form of borrowed money, you’ve got to be careful about how you manage credit. Here are tips for saving money on credit products - in your basic financial affairs, when shopping for new credit, and when using loans and credit cards.
1. Pay your […]

By Shannon Christman
The idea of getting a college education for the sake of learning how to think has become passé. Now, young people see college as an investment, thinking, “If I (or my parents) pay to earn a degree now, I can make more money later.” In many cases, the investment pays off. […]

By Teri Newton
I think almost every week I hear someone who makes over $70k a year mention their wonderful student loan interest tax deduction. It’s time to take a few minutes to educate the masses about the student loan interest. Plain and simple, if you make a good wage you will not qualify for the […]

Knowing the best course of action to take on your student loans is often a difficult maze to work your way through. That is the question from this reader:
I was looking into federal student loan consolidation on a $12,828.19 student loan (now at 7.22% - pretty high).
I was offered 7% after consolidation and it goes […]

By Valerie S. Johnson
You’ve finally done it — earned that coveted diploma. You’re feeling a bit cocky. Your parents are wondering why they had to pay for your expensive education when you already knew everything.
Now it’s time to enter The Real World, the place that you have talked about for years as if […]

Most of those who attend college don’t have their parents paying for it or have a scholarship that pays for a full ride. That means that they are responsible for at least a portion of the cost of going to college. I think a lot of young people would be in a lot […]

If you have kids, one of the issues that you need to consider is what you are going to do about college expenses and if you do decide to save money to pay for college expenses, where is the best place to put that money. That is what this following question from a reader is […]

By Amy L. Fontinelle
In order to justify expensive purchases, many people, including plenty of otherwise very intelligent folks, like to refer to certain types of spending sprees as “investments.” Luckily for me, from the time I was about four years old, my father took any opportunity he could to tell me that anything that loses […]

Sometimes a situation arises when you must make a decision on whether to use money that you had earmarked for a specific event for something other than its intended purpose. These financial decisions can be some of the hardest to make and is one that I recently received from a reader who wanted to […]