Me and wifey have decided we no longer have “stuff-itis.” If you walk into our apartment you will quickly realize we have too much “stuff” to even fit in our apartment.

I do not know the statistic but I have heard that Americans spend more on our garbage bags than most countries do on their goods and services.

When you drive around it is baffling to see how many storage units are occupied. We have so much stuff in America that we can’t even cram all of it in our houses that we need to spend more money to have an extra place to put it.

Not for wifey and me; we spent this weekend clearing out our living room of our “stuff.” Its time to either sell or give it away and once again have some open space in our apartment and never get stuff-itis again.

So if you are hanging at the Kakaras household you are free to imagine a big sign with “Everything Must Go” on it.

This year will be different. We will SAVE IN ADVANCE. In your monthly budget set aside enough money so the holiday season won’t be a burden through well into 2009.

The Christmas season is a great time, I think Michael Scott said it best “Christmas is awesome. First of all, you get to spend time with people you love. Secondly, you can go wild at the Christmas party and no one can say anything. Third, you give presents. What’s better than giving presents? And fourth, getting presents. So, four things. Not bad for one day….It’s really the greatest day of all time.”

It quite possibly could be the greatest day of all time, Michael. If you are like me, you like to go all out. And afterwards you end up feeling a lot of pain in your bank account. I never want to go through that and do not want you to go through that ever again. The simple solution is this:

Christmas is 84 days away. So, figure out how much you are going to spend on presents…it’s really easy to do just try it. Then put it in your monthly budget and plan for it, in fact if you put it in an www.ingdirect.com account you could get 3.0% interest until you spend it (e-mail me if you want a $25 referral bonus - chriskakarasblog@gmail.com)

Christmas is not an EMERGENCY. It comes the same time every year. Can you imagine how great it would be to get to enjoy all the great things that come with Christmas AND to not have buyers remorse!

Joe is on a crusade with a huge passion given by God to reach people to meet a physical need in order to then meet a spiritual need. It was so great to hear Joe explain great wisdom with our finances but also including the Gospel because they are connected.

Great thing that I was AMAZED at last night. Joe had everyone in the audience CONVINCED that budgeting was FUN! The segment where he walks through a “broken budget” (spending more than you make) is brilliant. He has the audience call out what changes need to be made. Not only did the audience participate, you would have thought that they were at a comedy show the way they interacted in this segment.

People walked away knowing:

• I-O=EZ Income-Outgo=Exactly Zero (yes it is trademarked…)
• The POWER of Compound Interest
• Their Debt Freedom Date (day they will be debt free)
• Understanding how to spend their money BEFORE the month begins
• and much more including some fun segments like the “payoff spectacular”

Yes below is a picture of Joe’s house where he colors in squares as he pays off his house. What he did was divide the number of squares by the price of the house. As he pays the thing off, he visually gets to see (and teach) house debt leaving his life for good.

Check out www.joesangl.com for more Pay-Off spectaculars like the Car, TV, Truck, & even a Llama (apparently financing Llamas is a big issue in Anderson)

Special thanks for Joe for putting it on. It is well worth your time if you are in the area. Check the newspring website (they are doing several more in the next 2 weeks).

From Hustler:

This is an unofficial deal because it came from a flyer. You can write down the code and apply at the Brick and Mortar Bank because it has been confirmed to work. Just say you lost the flyer or whatever.

Bank of America $100 Bonus

Offer Code: WGSUOISI808

Checking Account Info:

Features
Opening deposit of $25
No monthly maintenance fee when opened online
No minimum balance required
Unlimited check writing
Free Online Banking service with Bill Pay
Check Card with Photo Security® option
Easy and unlimited access to your funds using Bank of America ATMs, Online Banking and Banking by Phone
Overdraft protection available from a linked savings account, line of credit, or credit card
Check Safekeeping
Check Card with Total Security Protection® package

You can choose MyAccess checking and there is no Direct Deposit requirements. Make sure to deposit $25 for the first deposit.

I don’t think you need to be a U of I alumni to qualify.  The $100 will be credited to account within 90 days. As always, call them to make sure you get it just in case. Must be a new customer with no checking accounts closed in last 3 months.

But what is clear, something is going down when you hear very serious rumors that banks (like Wachovia) are flat-lining. That is a scary concept. One that reminds me of the movies depicting what it was like in the great depression and people wanted to get their money out of banks.

Rest assured though. If you have less than $100,000 in your bank account then you are FDIC insured up to that amount. This has always been an imaginary security blanket in my head that I was glad was there but could not see it ever being necessary.

If Wachovia does indeed go under this is a terrible thing so please excuse me if this sounds insensitive, but a part of me is curious how the federal government will give people their money in the event that this occurs.

I currently have an account open with a minimal amount of funds in a bank that is currently in question and want to see how long and how efficient it is getting our money back from FDIC insurance.

Update: Just heard that citibank bought out Wachovia.  I do not have all details but from what I understand this will not effect account holders with Wachovia.   So, this is good news that no one will lose money.  Glad FDIC insurance is there just in case though.