With just a month left in the year now is the time to think about your 2009 tax returns. Here are some inique end of the year tax tips.
– If you feel you’ve earned too much this year ask whoever pays you to defer payments until January 1st. That way you won’t pay taxes on those earnings until April 2011.
– If your wife gives birth bu the end of the month you can claim another dependant this year.
– Business expenses are a great way to lower your tax liability. Stock up now for the next year. Spend a little extra on advertising now and reap the rewards come April. Put the charges on your credit card in Dec and pay it off in Jan with your delayed wages.

In these tough economic times many of us have chosen to cut back on expenses and actually try to budget and save. For many of us this is not an easy task and becomes very hard to accomplish. Becoming a penny pincher does not have to be an exhausting task.  The trick is to start small, start using coupons, only carry a certain amount of cash for specific expenses and don’t use your debit card, buy store brands. Even switching to a more cheaper cell phone plan can alleviate some money worries. Before you know it you’ll feel  inspired to save in bigger better ways!

If you hardly ever watch cable TV you don’t have to stay tied down to a cable or satellite service, you can even ditch the Tivo. There’s a great new way to catch your favorite shows or movies for free.  Hulu.com is a site were you can watch any episode you might of missed or just feel like watching again. You can rent movies from time to time, watch the local news and late night talk shows, hit up the movie theater and your entertainment needs are all set.

The average household in America receives about 15 bills per month. The price of stamps keeps increasing and will soon be 50 cents a stamp. If you mail a payment for each one that’s $90 per year just in stamps alone. Now calculate the expense of envelopes, checks, ink and your valuable time and you could be at a hundred bucks a year average. Then there are the occasional times when your check is lost in the mail and you end up having to pay late fees.

What you can do is save your valuable time and your valuable money by signing up with an account at each of your bills to have them automatically deduct your charges from your bank account. By doing that, you can access your bill details online in your account and also make payments from there. If your cable, phone, electricity provider or other service doesn’t allow you to do this, you can make payments via your bank online too. All major banks have a free online bill pay service where you can make one-time payments or scheduled recurring payments. Another advantage of automatic billing is that you’ll never forget to pay another bill again, so goodbye late fees.

It’s also recommended to stop paper bills. They always send you a bunch of paperwork every month and most of the time you end up throwing the bills away since they’re of no use to you. This way you’ll not only save some extra cash but you’ll help the environment as well.

Finally, if they let you bill the charges to your credit card (without any extra fees) then go for that option instead if your credit card offers you rewards points. Of course it’s recommended you pay off your credit card balance every month so make sure you have enough money in your bank account when it comes time to pay off the household bills charged to your credit card.

Consider a package deal for your internet, cable and telephone service. When you bundle your items up you will always get a better deal than getting the services from different providers. Now that AT&T offers cable they have great deals when you get all your services through them. Even Time Warner Cable has good deals when you bundle your services with them.

You don’t need to get every one of their products to get a good deal, just 2 is good enough. Consider eliminating your home phone if you have a cell phone. Home phones require long distance plans while this is already included in your cell phone. Also consider getting high speed internet service, but you don’t need the extra fast speeds. Stick with the cheapest option, it’s most likely all that you need.

Nowadays airlines will nickle and dime you for the simplest of things. By preparing correctly beforehand you can eliminate these extra charges that add up. If you travel once a year the extra fees charged might add up toan extra 50 bucks a trip. It doesn’t sound like a lot on a vacation that might cost thousands, but every little bit helps.

Almost all airlines charge for extra checked bagged so pack lightly. You probably don’t need to bring soap and tooth paste, a tooth brush, towels, shampoo, etc. Wherever you go there’s a good chance there’s a store that sells these items in small quantities. If a checked bag fee is $25 per bag you can pack lightly and simply buy what you need at your destination for a fraction of $25.

Some airlines charge for water and food on the place. You can pack a snack and eat beforehand, then eat at your destination. Unless you’re on a 5+ hour flight there’s no need to eat on the airplane. Regarding paying extra for a pillow or a blanket, think of it this way. When you go on a roadtrip you’re usually driving and uncomfortable at times, so you can surely handle it on a 2 hour flight sitting down.

Finally there are the $2 curbside check-in fees. By checking in online or at a kiosk you can accomplish the same exact thing. It’s a small fee but if you always do the little things it keeps adding up.

“It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan.”
- Eleanor Roosevelt

People wish a lot, but do they plan just as much? Set small financial goals, make them attainable and stick to them. Don’t set a goal like “This year I’ll get my act together.” Set a goal such as: “This year, I’m going to put $100 of every paycheck into my savings account.” That is a realistic goal. Setting short-term realistic goals is good because it gives you confidence every time you reach them. That confidence gives you the determination to do it again the next paycheck.

Let’s do some quick math..

$100 every 2 weeks in a month is:$200
$200 a month one in a year is: $2,400
Plus $100 in interest earned: $2,500

This means that if you save up just $100 from every check you can take you and your family on a vacation every single year. The only thing left is the hard part, sticking to your goal.

On Thursday, June 26, 2008, bring a gas receipt to any Jack In The Box and they’ll give you 2 free tacos. No purchase is necessary. It seems like everyone is using the rising gas prices to create their own little promotional gimmick.

Cutting down on unnecessary expenses, using coupons, buying things when there’s a special, a discount, a rebate, day after christmas sales. While these things don’t necessarily put more money into your pocket, they allow you to keep more money in your pocket. So in effect, these things directly lead to having more money at the end of the day.

You can always economize. Everything from fixing that leaky faucet, to changing your light bulbs to more efficient ones, to even picking up pennies you find on the floor, the possibilities are endless.

• You get to keep more of your own money for a longer period of time. How is this beneficial? You’ll earn more interest on that money. You’ll have more money to make investments on your business. The credit card company or DMV, etc, won’t have your money for nearly a month.
• You won’t be charged any finance/interest fees. Since you’re bill isn’t technically late, just barely on time, there aren’t any fees or disadvantages to doing this.
• With credit card bills, it will help your credit score or credit rating. When I checked my credit report last, about 5 months ago, I noticed that it showed my credit card “balance carried” amount every month. It would also show as $0. Even though I might have spent a good thousand dollars in a month, since I paid the bill immediately after it became available, it’d show as $0. So creditors would think I never spend a dime on a credit card and might not deem me as credit-worthy in their eyes.

You must have purchased the product within a certain set of dates. You need the UPC label, the receipt, and you need to fill out a form. The most annoying part is cutting out the upc label or trying to make a copy of it. The most difficult part is actually filling out the form. It’s usually very difficult to fill out the form because the lines are so close together and they rarely give you enough space to write.

They also state that if anything on your rebate mailing is wrong, you don’t get a rebate and they won’t even tell you if something’s wrong, they will simply discard your form. Rebates are a good way to save money but you must be willing to do a little work to get some money back.