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This isn’t a travel site but I do like to help my readers save money. My goal in helping you is simply so that you have more money to invest in the stock market and retire in luxury. I travel a great deal and here are a few tips that I have picked up to help me save a few dollars when I am rushing to make arrangements.

My first tip is to plan ahead but maybe that isn’t possible. The reality is that the more advanced notice that you have, the easier it will be to get bargains. This is the plus one that I advertise in the title since if you don’t have a choice then you must make a choice (sorry for stealing the Rush lyric but couldn’t resist).

1 – Flexibility

Do you have any flexibility? The more you have the better you will do in finding a deal. If today’s events have caused you to make travel arrangements for today, you will probably be at the mercy of the airlines. If you’re even a little flexible with your travel plans, you may be able to find a deal that doesn’t break the bank.

2 – Update your twitter account and Facebook before you need it

A little bit of preparedness is well advised. One place to start is your Twitter feed and your Facebook account. Accounts like @Airfarewatchdogs and @farecomparedeals are just two of the many that should be in one of your feeds if you’re watching for last-minute deals. In addition, popular travel sites and even some airlines have e-mail lists, twitter feeds, and Facebook pages that send daily, weekly or monthly specials.

3 – Those last minute travel sites actually work

Search the last minute travel sites. Lastminutetravel.com as well as Expedia, Orbit and Travelzoo are places to check. Even if they aren’t the cheapest, you can get an idea of what would be a normal price so you have a basis of comparison. The one less obvious place to look are travel sites that cater to local areas. For example, Airtech.com offers last minute deals to Europe and Hawaii. Sites like this may be harder to find, but the best way to find these sites is sometimes through local connections. The person or group that is insisting you are traveling at the last minute may give you some ideas. It never hurts to ask.

4 – Date of the week matters and so does time of day

It is my observation, the cheapest travel day is Wednesday as most business people leave on Monday or Tuesday and then return home on Thursday afternoon or Friday. Your best bet is to avoid weekend travel which is when most people leave for vacations. Try to leave on a weekday and return on a weekday if possible. Also be flexible with your airport choice. For some travelers, there are multiple airports within a few hours from home. If you can travel to a larger airport where discount carriers have service, you may be able to save a substantial amount of money. Finally, leave late at night, early in the morning, or at noon. Those less desirable travel times have more flexibility in their pricing.

5 – Go by yourself

If you have to travel as a group or family, you are at the mercy of the airlines. Because airlines have reduced their total number of flights in order to keep all planes full, finding a good price for a group is difficult. Flying alone allows you to take advantage of a single last-minute seat that may have come available due to a cancellation or an unsold ticket.

6 – Travel agents can be your best friend

It’s true that travel agents will charge a premium to book your travel for you, but they often have access to discount travel deals that aren’t published online or alternative locations that are not easy to find. This doesn’t just include airline tickets; hotels and rental cars are worth discussing with an agent. The agent will be more helpful though if you have already created a relationship or at least they feel like you are coming back in the future.

7 – Name your price

Sites where you can name a price you’re willing to pay for a hotel, airline ticket or rental car sometimes net consumers fantastic rates at the last minute. Make sure you shop around before bidding so you don’t end up bidding higher than another site’s regular price. Priceline.com is the most common of these but there are others out there – just do a little web searching.

8 – Lower your standards

You may love to book at Delta, United, Westin, Marriott, or Hilton because of the great service that you receive and their loyalty program. However, those loyalty points and extra perks cost money. There is no free lunch. Consider lower budget hotels and airlines if you are in a rush. The reality is that if you are rushing to get somewhere, all you really probably need are clean sheets and towels. That free bottled water and mints on the pillow are nice but may not be affordable in all cases. Prioritize your reason to travel above your desire to add loyalty points and you can surely save a few dollars.

Image from Wiki Media (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lufthansa_Airbus_A320-211_D-AIQT_02.jpg) 

You should try to simplify your finances. You may have several bills to pay each month such as the mortgage/rent, electricity, water, gas, auto insurance, housing or renter insurance, credit card(s), and cell phone. The list goes on and it can be exhausting. Spending all of your time paying bills means that you have little time to worry about investing. You are tired of thinking about money and therefore do not spend time on the part of money that makes money for you – investing.

Too make matters worse, there can even be times when a bill is missed and the payment is late. This can be dangerous for something like the car insurance because one missed payment can mean the insurance will be cancelled.

1. Make electronic payments

Setting up electronic payments means you don’t have to do anything. Your payments will be taken from the bank accounts when they are due and they can never be late. This frees up the time writing checks and mailing these bills every month.

2. Sign up for electronic statements

Receiving paper statements via the mail means keeping track of extra paperwork that has little value. It is simpler to have electronic statements where everything is kept in a convenient place online. The billing company will be happier with this arrangement because they save on administrative costs by not sending out paper.

3. Use online bill pay

Online bill pay with the bank makes it possible to pay the bills online. This makes managing finances simple like in the previous example.

4. Keep a spending budget

Creating a budget helps when you don’t know where their money is going every month. Make a list of all the necessary bills you have to pay so you know you can pay those bills.

5. Cut back on your monthly spend

When creating a budget, you might notice that you have too many different types of bills to pay each month. By itemizing those bills in a budget, you can begin to put some logic into what you are actually buying.

6. Consolidate accounts

Some people have more than one savings account. If all of these savings accounts were under one bank then you can log into that one bank and see all of the accounts in one place. This will making managing money much easier.

7. Take advantage of level pay for utilities

When you set up level pay for your utilities, you know you will be billed around the same amount of money each month. For example, in the summer people tend to use their air conditioning more often. Level bill pay will help keep you from overspending during these months.

8. Give things away

By giving things away, the house is much less cluttered and there are fewer things to manage. You will be surprised that when you simplify parts of your life, other parts become more simplified.

9. Don’t buy or rent a mansion

When purchasing a new home or renting a new apartment, be sure that the dwelling is exactly what will be needed and nothing more or less. This will ensure that the payments will be easily manageable and that the maintenance isn’t overwhelming.

10. Make a list and follow it

Making a change from a disorganized state to a more organized one can take a little time. Before getting started on this project, make a list of your most important goals down to the least and finish each goal before moving on to the next. Setting a time when you would like to have the goal accomplished will ensure that the item gets done and can be crossed off of the list.

What are some of the ways that you have simplified your life? Let me know below in the comments or send me a tweet at @ConfidentInvest.

Image sourced from OpenClipart

Stock buybacks, in which companies take their own shares off the market by buying out the investing public don’t always pay off for shareholders.

Companies must find ways to put their excess cash to use. When the market price of a company’s stock is lower than the “intrinsic value” of its business—the present worth of the cash it will generate in the future—then the company should buy back all the shares it can.

But buybacks are far from an exact science. At their worst, buybacks can be a form of corporate cannibalism. Often the unspoken motive is to use extra cash to boost earnings per share by reducing the number of shares among which the company’s profits are divided. But that can be a slippery slope.

But are investors better off? Imagine two companies, each with $100 in cash and 10 shares of stock. The intrinsic value of each is $10 a share. But the stock market undervalues one company’s shares at $5 apiece and overvalues the other at $20. Each company decides to buy back $10 worth of stock. The undervalued company gets to buy back two shares at $5 each, leaving $90 in assets spread across eight shares. That raises the intrinsic value of each share to $11.25. The overvalued company uses $10 to buy back half a share, leaving the same $90 in assets spread across 9½ shares. That lowers the intrinsic value of each remaining share to $9.47.

So how can you spot a bad buyback? Here is a red flag: If cash is dwindling as buybacks are growing, the firm may be starving future growth to pay off present shareholders. That is fine if you sell into the buyback. But it is bad if you hang onto your shares. Owning a bigger piece of a corporate cannibal may leave you hungry in the long run.