Jake Ludington’s Digital Lifestyle

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I like spending less for the things I need, which means I’m willing to look for a coupon or holdout for a sale before purchasing. When I found an opportunity to reduce the price of my recent refrigerator purchase by $96, it made sense to go for it. This was in addition to an existing offer for free delivery and disposal of my existing fridge. The reason I’m telling you about this is there are discounts available on all kinds of purchases that can easily be added on top of any coupon or sale at stores like Best Buy, Home Depot, Target, and clothing retailers like Old Navy.

The key to increasing your buying power is gift cards. Plastic Jungle is an online service that sells gift cards at a discount from face value, allowing you to instantly get more purchasing power for each dollar spent. When it came time to buy my new fridge, I went to Plastic Jungle, ordered $1600 worth of Best Buy gift cards for $1504 and waited for them to arrive in the mail. I could have used the gift cards for a new HDTV or a computer, but what I needed was a new fridge. Upon arrival, I made my purchase with the gift cards instantly reducing the cost of my new appliance purchase.

Restaurant gift cards seem to offer the biggest discounts at Plastic Jungle, although there are also deals to be had on auto fuel from places like Shell and BP, as well as on hotel and rental cars. As I write this, Plastic Jungle is currently offering a 5% discount on face value for Best Buy gift cards, but a few of the other gift card options rates are better than when I was initially looking, so it literally pays to check back. So before make your next purchase of anything, check Plastic Jungle to see if it can save you money – chances are it will.

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At one point in the past, many people purchased Series E savings bonds for babies or for a rainy day and then forget the purchase was ever made. You can find out if you’re one of those people in just a few seconds by visiting the Treasure Hunt on TreasuryDirect.gov. This is the United States government’s site where you can buy and redeem securities directly from the U.S. Department of the Treasury in paperless electronic form. Recently, the U.S. Treasury has been attempting to track down matured Series E savings bonds, which had maturity dates of 40 years for bonds issued before 1965 and 30 years for bonds issued between 1965-1980. There are also some extended maturity periods for these bonds, but if you don’t know you have them you probably also don’t know if they’ve matured. The major limitation of the Treasure Hunt feature on TreasuryDirect.gov is that it can’t automatically look up Series E savings bonds issued before 1973. Be sure to check the Treasure Hunt to see if you have a bond or two issued and now forgotten.

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After seeing the Cash4Gold.com commercial with MC Hammer and Ed McMahon on the Super Bowl, I’ve seen Cash4Gold Instant Cash for Gold offers numerous times on various Comcast cable television stations. My initial reaction to the ads was why would anyone want to attempt to get cash for gold watches and gold jewelry by sending it through the mail? My next thought was how do people using Cash4Gold get a good deal? As someone who makes a living from an ad supported publication, I pay a great deal of attention to advertising in all mediums, much to the annoyance of my wife and her preference to skip commercials.

It seems likely the timing of the commercials is due to the lousy state of the U.S. economy, but I can also see scenarios where you might simply want to sell your gold jewelry without the hassle of taking it to a pawn shop or trying your hand at an ebay jewelry auction. Maybe you’re a guy who bought some jewelry for a girlfriend and she gave it back when you broke up – it’s not like you can just pass it on to the next girl you meet. I’ve used a similar service, cellforcash.com, to get some money for old cell phones. I didn’t get the same price for my cell phones I’d have gotten if I sold my cell phones on ebay, but I also didn’t have the hassle of dealing with managing the auction, shipping the phone, and then waiting to see if the person on the other end was actually happy with it. Cash4Gold seems like the same convenience for gold items, with a similar trade off cash for convenience.

How do you maximize your return when selling your cash for gold?

The best way to maximize your return with Cash4Gold.com is to read the fine print. When you send in jewelry, their terms and conditions state:

“Except for small diamonds, prices for Jewelry are based solely on the weight of your Jewelry and karat grade contained in your Jewelry, not on its potential value if resold intact.”

What that means to me is if you have precious stones in a jewelry piece, you don’t get paid for them by Cash4Gold, so you either need to accept that or find another way to sell your jewelry. They recommend theestatebuyer.com as an alternative for fine jewelry with precious stones, however, Cash4Gold doesn’t forward your stuff, you have to send it to the right place. Knowing where to sell your stuff makes all the difference in getting the best price.

Another thing to keep in mind is by sending in your jewelry, you are agreeing to sell it for whatever price Cash4Gold determines. In some cases, you might be better off to have them assess your gold before you commit to selling. To do this, according to their terms and conditions, you have to request the quote in writing or by phone at the time you send in your gold. You also have 12 days to send the check back and request your jewelry back, but it seems more proactive to get a quote before you have them send a check rather than jumping through hoops if you change your mind.

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As most of the people who know me already know, I haven’t had a “real job” in years. Instead I’ve been happily helping people solve frustrating computer problems through my blog and email newsletter. This provides a great living, I get to set my own hours, and while there’s a temptation to work more than I should, I also have the advantage of taking a few weeks off when I need to, without significantly impacting my income. In addition to knowing that I’m helping people everyday, I have the added bonus of not being stuck doing the same thing day in and day out. I can

There’s plenty of room for you to do the same thing if you want to. I’m more than happy to provide whatever guidance I can to people who want to strike out on their own. I ran across Rat Race Rebellion this morning, thanks to this Today Show interview with Dr. Danielle Babb, author of Making Money Teaching Online.

Rat Race Rebellion appears to be a great resource for people who are looking for legitimate online work (as in not the get rich quick kind). The spirit of Rat Race Rebellion is in line with 4 Hour Work Week, in that you’re leaving behind the corporate world to pursue something you enjoy on a schedule more fitting with your personal lifestyle. While I think the interview is a little basic in it’s coverage of what you need to do to work from home successfully, Dr. Babb is targeting a specific type of working from home.

If you’re willing to take the get rich slow approach to making money online, here’s a very simplistic formula to join the Rat Race Rebellion:

1) Keep you day job

2) Find a topic you’re passionate about (if you aren’t passionate about the topic don’t bother, you’ll quit).

3) Register a Domain name and find a cheap hosting provider (don’t use hosted services like Wordpress.com or Blogger.com)

4) Post 2-3 things about your topic on the blog every day. Be sure to link to interesting articles and videos you find related to your topic.

5) Post at least 1 video a week showing people how to do something related to your topic.

6) Provide easy ways for people to subscribe to your blog via RSS and email. Feedburner provides some great free tools to get you started.

7) Read other people who are active in niches similar to yours, comment when appropriate on their blogs. You can track them easily using FeedDemon.

8) Study online tips on how to get more traffic to your blog and videos. Implement these tips in a way that fits with your personal goals.

9) Sign up for advertising solutions like Adsense, Commission Junction, Shareasale.com, etc. Implement the advertising on your site.

10) When the advertising revenue from your blog is more than your current job and enough to cover things like health insurance and other perks you currently get from your employer, consider leaving your job and blogging full time. This last step will likely take 2 years to achieve, maybe longer depending on many variables.

Notice I placed advertising at the bottom of this list. While the ad revenue is how you will make money with this approach, it’s far more important to have a solid foundation before you worry about how that foundation will make you money.

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I live in Washington State, where there is no state income tax for people, but I know plenty of people who live in California. If you do have to file your California state taxes, you quite possbly won’t have to pay to do it – for a large section of the California population filing online is free. The full list of qualifications are listed here. If you made it past these you’re likely most of the way there:

You can use CalFile if you:

Were a California resident for the entire year.
Are filing an original tax return for 2007.
Your last name matches our records. (Generally, the last name on our records is the last name you used when you filed your most recent tax return.)

Instructions on filing provide full details about who can use the CalFile service.

Filing Status You can use any filing status you qualify for. Hopefully we’ll see more states bring this stuff online, although it may put a dent in the business of software apps like TaxCut and Turbo Tax.
Dependents You can claim up to 5 dependents.
Amount of Income Your Federal Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) can be up to:
$155,416 for single and married/registered domestic partnership (RDP) filing separately taxpayers
$233,129 for head of household taxpayers
$310,837 for married/RDP filing jointly and qualifying widow(er) taxpayers

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If you live in the U.S. and made a purchase with a debit card or credit card in any other country between February 1, 1996 and November 8, 2006, there’s a good possibility that you qualify for some kind of reimbursement for some amount of reimbursement for a portion of the foreign currency conversion fees charged by your card’s issuing bank.

Here’s what the site says about the charges:

Plaintiffs challenge how the prices of credit and debit/ATM card foreign transactions were set and disclosed, including claims that Visa, MasterCard, their member banks, and Diners Club conspired to set and conceal fees, typically of 1-3% of foreign transactions, and that Visa and MasterCard inflated their base exchange rates before applying these fees. The Defendants include Visa, MasterCard, Diners Club, Bank of America, Bank One/First USA, Chase, Citibank, MBNA, HSBC/Household, and Washington Mutual/Providian. They deny the Plaintiffs’ claims and say they have done nothing wrong, improper, or unlawful.

I know I’ve been to Mexico and China once each during that time frame, along with making several trips to Canada. What I don’t know is if it’s worth digging through old statements and receipts to try and get reimbursed for what likely amounts to only a few dollars. The FAQ says that the issuing bank for each card has to provide me with any statements I don’t currently have in my possession in order to make a claim, but I’m still unclear about whether this is actually “worth” doing.

From the FAQ about reimbursement:

Can I submit estimated yearly foreign transactions for years where my records are either incomplete or I no longer have statements to support my transactions?

First a reminder: Pursuant to the Revised Plan of Administration and Distribution, paragraph 5(f), Exhibit H, to the Stipulation and Agreement of Settlement, the Bank Defendants shall provide, free of charge, your monthly billing statements, if retrievable electronically, to any Settlement Damages Class Member who request these statements to substantiate his or her claim form. If you are a customer of Household/HSBC or Providian/Washington Mutual, you should contact the Settlement Administrator for your electronically retrievable transaction records.

If you decide to file for Refund Option 3 you need to list the amount of foreign transactions by year. If your records remain incomplete and you are unable to obtain them from your bank, you may calculate yearly foreign transactions using estimates. You should calculate these estimates based on reasonable daily or monthly spending, documented, where possible, by a travel journal or some other proof of your travel or your living arrangements outside of the United States. Although you do not need to submit any documentation with your claim form, you should retain the supporting materials, along with a written explanation of the methodology used to determine the estimates listed on your claim form, in case your claim is designated for audit by the Settlement Administrator.

It’s my money and I’m entitled to it, but I have a feeling that the opportunity cost of tracking down my foreign purchases will be greater than the subsequent checks I might get back from various banks. Maybe if I were making weekly trips out of the country. Anybody else seen a reason to chase down this reimbursement?

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