Go Out and Play! How to Get Deals on Summer Vacations

It’s summer and that means it’s time for a break! Here’s how to plan ahead to get the best deals and stave off “vacationer’s remorse.”

Did You Know?

This year, Americans will give back an average of three vacation days each.

Are you in need of a vacation but think you can’t afford one? You may want to think again.

While Americans are less likely to take their jobs for granted right now, grinding through month after month of work without a break can exact a price not only from your emotional well-being, but from your productivity on the job as well. It is possible to take a break and still be responsible.

“Time away from work is more important now than ever, and it’s unfortunate that one-third of Americans won’t use all of their vacation days this year,” says Tim MacDonald, general manager of Expedia.com. “Even if you can only get away from work for a few days, there are amazing vacation values and opportunities this year, many within your own area.”

Pin the Tail on the State

If your dates and destination are open-ended, you are in luck. Discount travel websites specialize in finding cheap airfare and hotel rates for those travelers able to book at a moment’s notice. Browse their lists of discounted cities and see which one sounds most exciting. If you are willing to adapt your travel plans to sales that pop up, you’ll maximize your vacation dollar.

In honor of Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday we’ll apply one of his maxims to Homo excursus: “It is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change.” Learn that. Memorize it. Cross-stitch it into your luggage. It applies to every aspect of your vacation (at least). Budget travelers Laura Williams and Melanie Rogers are turning business travel into vacations, with Laura and Melanie meeting their husbands on business trips. For the price of one plane ticket, they get a long weekend at a free hotel in a big city.

The slowing economy is prompting many tourist destinations to lower their rates. “Cities that have a lot of hotel rooms to fill will have the best deals,” says Expedia spokesman Ian Jeffries. “Las Vegas is always a safe bet, as well as Orlando and San Francisco. Even New York hotel rates have dropped 22 percent since last year.” Jeffries also encourages people to book airfare and accommodations together, because websites like Expedia often negotiate special deals with hotels for travelers who do so. “Expedia travelers save an average of $200 by booking together,” he says.

While traveling in the U.S., remember the following:

• Visiting tourist hotspots in their off season will get you 88 percent of the experience for 50 percent of the cost.
• Make a vacation out of visiting friends or family. Think of the $100 dollars a night you’ll be saving on hotels. Sleep on the floor if you have to. 
• Book a room with a kitchen. Find a grocery store and prepare two of your meals each day. A granola bar and a banana make a perfect touring lunch. Drink water.
• If your destination has good public transportation, don’t rent a car. See the city like a local.

 

Consider Driving, Not Flying

Have you ever been at a dinner party and overheard someone say they’d just moved to the area for the skiing/biking/climbing/sailing/insert-your-state’s-most-amazing-recreation-here, and then realized you’d never gotten around to doing it? It is a special kind of guilt

to realize you’ve taken your own state for granted. If you live in Idaho, go whitewater rafting! If you live in Massachusetts, visit to the Salem Witch Museum. Or if you have a default vacation spot that’s close to home, see the other side of it — the side that you’ve never been to because it means spending 40 more minutes in the car.

While their three kids are young, Seth and Melanie Rogers prefer to go on road trips rather than deal with airports and rental cars. “All we need is a hotel with a pool,” Seth says. “Our kids are as happy swimming for three days as they would be at Disneyland.”
To make the most of your in-state vacation:

• Keep all travelers’ interests in mind. That tour of Washington D.C.’s historic monuments can wait until your kids care.
• Road trip with your family or friends who live in your area to defray hotel and gas costs.
• Look for “locals only” discounts on the websites of popular tourist attractions.

KEY FACT: More than half (58 percent) of Americans plan to travel by car in 2009 while 30 percent plan to travel by plane.

Globetrotting

Though you’ll definitely want to plan ahead for international travel, there are still plenty of deals out there for the diligent researcher. Sign up for weekly e-mails from travel sites and airlines. Travelzoo compiles the top 20 travel deals from hundreds of airlines, hotels, and cruise companies each week so you don’t have to spend hours combing the hundreds of travel websites out there. Sign up for the Southwest Ding! program. Each time Southwest has deeply discounted airfare from your preferred airports, you’ll get a “ding” notification on your desktop.

If you’re really spontaneous you can get a last-minute flight from Boston to Heathrow for $181 (for example). Consider the exchange rate. “London and Paris are having some great deals right now, and airfare has dropped to São Paulo and Sydney as well,” Jeffries says. Remember that while a dollar will get you breakfast in Lima, it will get you one-third of a chocolate square in Geneva. He also recommends cruises for those looking to watch their spending because so much of the cost is paid up front that passengers are less likely to outstrip their budget.

Amy Ochoa of Morris Murdock Travel says that while international travel is slowing with the economy, many people are still willing to pay for humanitarian or religious tours. “Travelers are going to be more likely to spend money traveling to somewhere exotic if they feel it is a once in a lifetime opportunity,” Ochoa says.
Tips for expats:

• Some of the best museums and historical landmarks are free and open to the public.
• Do your homework. Pick the brains of friends who have been where you’re going. Ask them what’s worth the price and learn from their mistakes. 
• Look up facts, advice and travel warnings on the U.S. Travel Bureau website (www.travel.state.gov).
• Apply your adaptability generously to foreign culture. Sleep in hostels. Eat the local cuisine. Fly on cheap regional airlines like Ryanair or LAN. Learn a few phrases in Hmong. Use their weird toilets.

In the end, whether you have $10,000 to spend on your summer vacation or $10, have the courage to go somewhere — anywhere. Vacations are a way of marking time, reminding yourself that you are more than your job, more than your house, more than your daily obligations. Even now —maybe more now than ever — you need to get away to maintain your sanity and keep life from getting the best of you.

Let your vacation be therapeutic. A frenetic, expensive vacation can leave you more riled than when you left, so sit an extra half hour over your picnic lunch while you breathe deeply and enjoy the conversation.

Summer Hobbies

You don’t need to leave town to take a vacation. Picking up a new hobby or reviving an old one can be the trick to refreshing yourself. 

Here are a few ideas:

Scooter craze: High schoolers and 20-somethings may be the drivers most people imagine when they think of scooters, but many riders are cruising toward midlife or beyond, says David Hurtado, owner of The Scooter Lounge in Orem, Utah. Hurtado’s shop sells primarily to men and women between 20 and 40 years old, but also gets a good cross section of buyers.

Kitty Smith, part owner of Scooters of Boise in Boise, Idaho, says most of her patrons are around 40 years old, with sales split evenly between men and women. Her oldest rider is an 86-year-old man.

One reason scooters appeal to people from all demographics is because of the vast range of prices available.

Brand-new scooters sell for as low as $1,000 to more than $7,000. Insurance for most scooters is around $100 a year and maintenance costs are similar, Hurtado says. A fill-up costs around $5, with each tank averaging at least 70 miles per gallon.

A mid-priced scooter from a reputable company like Genuine will cost around $3,000, Hurtado says, and should last for several years. Premium brands like Vespa range from $4,200 to $7,000 and are intended to last for 100,000 miles. Unlike some less-expensive scooters, Vespas have an all-metal body, more horsepower, a larger gas tank and higher weight capacity.

“Vespas are the high-class scooters,” Della Corte says. “They’re pretty much the BMWs and Mercedes of the scooter world.”

Fishing: While fishing can turn into an expensive hobby, a simple rod and reel, hooks, sinkers and bobbers can be had for less than $20.

Bass, bluegill, carp and catfish are wonderful at adapting to various environments and can be caught virtually from coast to coast.

Expensive lures are not needed at all and night crawlers (worms) are only $2 or so a dozen. The refrigerator probably holds great baits as well, including cheese, bologna, bread and corn. Also, consider investing in a sturdy raft if you decide to take up fishing seriously.

Your friends may have rafts or fishing boats of their own, but truly avid fishers should have regular access to a boat of their own.
Visit your credit union to find out more about the low rates on RV, boat, real estate, auto or motorcycle loans.

HOW CAN WE HELP?

Setting up a designated savings account for travel can help ease your mind about taking a vacation, and automated transfers from your checking account to your travel account make it easy. Talk to your credit union representative to set up an account that will help you set aside as little as $10 per paycheck so you have money waiting when you want to get away.

Investing Activities for Kids - Motley Fool

By Selena Maranjian

Are you convinced that your kids should start investing? Or that you should be investing for them?

Or maybe you’re considering quietly parking some money in a few stocks or a mutual fund and then forgetting about it.

Think again. 

You can use this opportunity to help your kids learn about investing and the stock market.

Can you really get your kids interested in this stuff? You bet. Here are some activities you and your kids can do together.

Build a mock portfolio

Have your kids make a list of the companies that interest them most. They can get ideas by looking in their closets, in their classrooms, in the mall, on TV, etc.

Look at companies your kids know. Write down the names of 10 to 20 interesting companies, and then record the current stock price of each. Every day, week or month you can check the prices together, see how the stocks are doing, and record the latest prices.

Follow your stocks together

Along with updating the prices periodically, you can scan newspapers, magazines, Fool.com, and other websites for stories about your companies.

Is McDonald’s promoting $0.75 burgers? Will this help the company by bringing in more sales, or will it hurt by decreasing the total profit? And how did the stock market react when it heard of this announcement? Did the stock go up or down?

Consider school subjects other than math as you explore stocks. Investing can relate to most subjects in school and can give kids a bit of a new perspective on their studies. There’s obviously math involved, since they multiply share prices by how many shares they want to buy and perform other calculations with numbers from annual reports. There’s history, too, as they examine how venerable companies like AT&T or Ford got to where they are now.

Start actually investing

Once you’ve become comfortable with the idea of investing in stocks, it’s time to consider buying some shares. You can open a joint brokerage account, with you acting as custodian, but you don’t have to go this far. You can informally “sell” some of your own shares to your child.

For example, if you’re about to buy 100 shares of a particular stock and your child wants to buy a share or two herself, you can just place the order together — and order 101 or 102 shares through your broker. You don’t have to buy round numbers of shares — “odd lots” are okay.

If you do these things, you’ll want to keep a good record of which shares belong to whom. Once your child turns 18, she can open her own account at a brokerage and you can transfer her shares to it.

There’s a lot more to investing, of course, and a lot more that you can do with kids to explore the stock market together. The learning process should prove rewarding — and fun — to both parent and child alike.

Turn Dreams Into Money - Jean Chatzky

Do you ever wish that you could turn your favorite pastime into a full-time job — one that earns you enough money to pay the rent, eat well, maybe even hit J. Crew from time to time? Even though I love what I do, part of me would also love to open a bakery ... or a wine store.

Back when she sat in the cubicle next to mine at “Working Woman” magazine (we were both assistants, answering phones, hoping to land a story in each issue), Laurel Touby simply wanted to throw parties. Fabulous parties for all of her friends in the media industry who — like her — were looking for that next great contact or that next great job. She couldn't afford to buy drinks for all involved, so she told guests to buy their own. Nobody minded. Because that wasn't fabulous enough, she threw on a big pink feather boa.

The venture became mediabistro.com, a popular website where media professionals can find jobs, classes and industry news. Touby just sold the company to Jupitermedia for a whopping $23 million. We caught up recently when I asked her to share a couple of tips to help you forge your own way and turn your interests, whether baking or dancing, into a successful business venture.



Be Confident

Maybe you've never owned a business before and have a lot to learn about foreign concepts like capital and marketing, but the process will be a lot easier because the focus is something you're passionate about.
 

“The big mistake a lot of people make is psyching themselves out and thinking they need more education to get somewhere. Just fake it till you make it. I've seen so many successful entrepreneurs who did a really great job because they winged it, not because they were the most knowledgeable person,” Touby says.

Now that's not to say you don't need a strong, well-thought-out business plan, because you do, but having the confidence to follow your instincts and take a few risks is almost as important. 



Make Like a Sponge

The concept here is pretty simple: Your business is going to be supported by customers, so it makes sense to listen to what they want. Touby says some of the most popular features of mediabistro.com, like the jobs and classes, were spawned from requests made early on by the site's users. As the owner, it's hard to look at your business — your baby — objectively, so suggestions from outside parties are priceless. Soak them up. You can't make everyone happy, but you can sure try. 



Get Some Help

You can launch your business in your bedroom, solo, like Touby did, but once it starts to grow, do yourself a favor and bring in some reinforcements.
 

“There is sometimes a real reluctance to reach out for help, and people tend to wait too long — often until there is a crisis,” explains Mark LeBlanc, author of “Growing Your Business!” 

Face up to the fact that you're not going to be good at everything, and even if you are, you won't have time to do it all well once success sets in. The sooner you surround yourself with a team that can tackle things like the bookkeeping and legal issues, the better off you'll be. 

Consider it an investment instead of just another expense.



Jean Chatzky serves as AOL's official Money Coach. She is the personal finance editor for NBC's “Today Show” and the author of four books. With reporting by Arielle McGowen. 

10 Things You Need to Know About Credit

1. Your Credit Score. Know your credit score but also know what it means. The score is relative, but it is based on a point system where 850 is perfect, 720-749 is good, 660-719 is fair, and 659 and below means there is some repair to do.
   
2. Review your credit score once a year. There are several Web sites that will give you your credit score for free. You are eligible to receive your credit score and history once a year by law.
3. How to use it. Make sure you are using your accounts, but continually paying them down. When you use more than 70 percent of your credit account’s limit, this shows that you need the credit and can be interpreted negatively. When you use your credit often and pay it off, it shows lenders you are responsibly paying back your debts. 
4. What your score means to lenders. Whether or not a lender is going to give you a loan is based on your credit score and history; however, there’s no way of telling how the lender is going to interpret your score and history. They may use several different reports from different credit agencies, or they may base their decision on one alone. In some cases, some lenders have their own rules and qualifications for interpreting credit histories.
5. You have to build credit. No credit is sometimes just as bad as having bad credit. When you’re credit history has nothing on it, lenders have nothing to base their decision on. You’ll need to establish some sort of credit and begin building a responsible history. 
6. Different types of debt. There are two kinds of debt — secured and unsecured. Secured debt is loans you have for items that have collateral like cars, houses and property. If you were to default on your loan the issuer would want to collect the collateral to pay off the debt. Unsecured debt is when you used credit for intangible items like student loans or credit cards. 
7. Pay your bills on time. Roughly 35 percent of your credit score is based on payment history, so paying bills on time creates a strong history. Items such as overdue accounts, collection agencies, charge-offs or bankruptcies can damage your history.
8. Employers often check credit. Banks and lenders aren’t the only ones reviewing your credit history. Many employers will review your credit history as part of your background check when applying for a job. 
9. What to do with unused accounts. When a lender reviews your account they are going to look at account balances in relation to how much credit is available. Closing accounts you do not use removes those available balances from the equation and can actually lower a credit score. 
10. Check for errors on your credit history. Go through your credit report at least once a year and review each item line by line. Some credit report information could be wrong and it could negatively impact your ability to borrow money. Check for errors and if you find any, contact the credit bureau that supplied the information immediately.

Series premiered Tuesday July 7, at 8/7c.

Get an eyeful of Padua High, where the Stratford sisters are new, and life is very different. Meet Kat, Bianca, their over-protective dad and some of the kids they’ll be dealing with this summer, when “10 Things I Hate About You” debuts on ABC Family.

Getting the Home Loan You Need

The downturn of the housing market has at least one silver lining for aspiring home buyers. A market that only a few years ago was tilted firmly in favor of home sellers has now undergone a reversal. In this market, home buyers are definitely in the driver’s seat, and that means that buyers with the credit and down payment they need can negotiate some excellent prices. Savvy home buyers can land some bargains that would have been undreamed of only a few short years ago.

Of course, one of the reasons the housing market is in such disarray is the fact that mortgages have suddenly become more difficult to obtain. At the height of the housing boom, it seemed that any buyer who could sign his name to a loan document was instantly eligible for a huge mortgage, and it was these overly generous lending standards that ultimately led to the collapse we are now living through.

Even though mortgages are now more difficult to come by it is important to keep in mind that home buyers across the country are still buying homes — and still getting the mortgages they need to purchase the homes of their dreams. Many would-be home buyers have been discouraged by the doom and gloom being reported, erroneously believing that it will be impossible to find a mortgage. The truth is that while lending standards are indeed more stringent, qualified home buyers can still expect to get the funding they need to purchase a great home.

The key to getting that mortgage is to be prepared. The days of no money down loans, no income verification loans and other excesses are largely gone. Home buyers these days will need to provide solid information regarding how much they earn, the assets they have and other financial information. Having this information readily available will make the process to secure financing quicker and much less stressful.

Additionally, a good down payment can be very valuable both in terms of landing a mortgage and in terms of providing financial stability. One of the most common scenarios today is the homeowner who owes more than the home is worth. Putting at least 20 percent down can help home buyers avoid this dangerous predicament while enhancing the chances for an affordable mortgage loan at a great rate.

Finally, make sure to develop a good relationship with your lender. Buying a home will most likely be the biggest and most complicated purchase you will ever make, so finding a lender that you trust and that will consider the best financing programs for your circumstances is essential to securing the mortgage for the house of your dreams.