MAKE MONEY ONLINE POSTS: سبتمبر 2017

السبت، 30 سبتمبر 2017

Pa. Dems cry foul over Republican Scott Wagner's comments on natural gas tax

State Democrats are accusing a GOP candidate for governor of conspiring with fellow lawmakers to block a tax on natural gas drilling so it hurts Gov. Tom Wolf's chances of a winning a second term next year.The Morning Call newspaper in Allentown reported Saturday that Republican gubernatorial candidate and state Sen. Scott Wagner, R-York, told a gathering of York County residents last month that he urged Rep. Stan Saylor, R-York, to fight a gas drilling tax proposal because it could [...]

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Hayes wins hotel stay in sweepstakes

Rosemary Hayes of Tobyhanna was recently named as the winner of this year's Great Summer Getaway Giveaway sweepstakes, taking home the Hotel Getaway Prize. The prize includes a three day, two night hotel stay for herself and a guest at a participating Marriott, Wyndham, Hilton or Hyatt hotel anywhere within the 48 contiguous United States. Hayes was randomly selected.

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How to Meet With a Financial Planner Who Won’t Try to Sell You a Thing

Want money advice but not ready to commit to working with a financial planner?

Feel out your top financial issues for free at an upcoming Financial Planning Day event. The event is a collaboration of the Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, the Financial Planning Association, The Foundation for Financial Planning and the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

You can find Financial Planning Day events across the country in October and early November. Certified financial planners volunteer their time to offer short one-on-one financial counseling sessions. There may also be presentations on various personal finance topics you can attend.

“Best of all, there are no strings attached — volunteer financial planners will not sell products or services, give out business cards or take down names,” the program’s website explains.

You will receive a list of volunteers present when you arrive at your local Financial Planning Day event so you can connect with professionals afterward if you choose to. But the ban on volunteers selling or promoting their services takes away the intimidation factor that may prevent some people from attending at all.

How to Make the Most of Free Financial Planning Day

Check out the map to find a free Financial Planning Day event near you and register to save a spot.

The initiative offers several worksheets for attendees to check out before they hed to local events.

The recommended savings fitness worksheets, provided by the U.S. Department of Labor, ask about your financial goals, retirement savings, cash flow and debt reduction status, and provide a financial document checklist that can help you fill out those worksheets.

The Financial Planning Foundation also offers worksheets you can download and fill out before your visit

Don’t see a Financial Planning Day near you? The worksheets above may help you start thinking about your financial goals on your own. Also, check out these resources for low-cost and free financial advice.

Lisa Rowan is a writer and producer at The Penny Hoarder.

This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, one of the largest personal finance websites. We help millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. In 2016, Inc. 500 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the No. 1 fastest-growing private media company in the U.S.

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This is How to Make Extra Money When You Already Work a Full-Time Job

You just got off work.

It was a long day.

Emails. Meetings. Paperwork. Presentations. Co-workers. Coffee. More coffee.

When you work a full-time job, it’s hard to get motivated to do much after a long day. All you want to do is flip your shoes off at the door and kick your feet up on the nearest couch. Netflix doesn’t even have to be on. Let’s just be quiet for a minute.

So when finances start getting tight and bills need to be paid — or maybe you just want some extra money to invest or use toward a much-needed vacation — the mention of a part-time job or side gig probably makes your eyes roll.

No, no, you don’t have the time or energy for that.

But what if a side gig doesn’t have to be so demanding? What if you could sit on the couch and earn some extra money? Or, better yet, make extra money while you’re at work or even while you’re sleeping?

We’ve rounded up a few ways you 9-to-5 folks can make some cash on the side. Nope, it’s not necessarily going to be a ton of money, but at least you’ll be able to stick to that 8 p.m. bedtime.

1. Sit on the Couch and Watch Videos

You won’t earn thousands after your first night of watching these (not always) riveting videos, but it’s kind of fun watching those cents and dollars add up — without having to leave the couch.

Try signing up for InboxDollars. There, you’ll earn cents for views.

You can pick your station. Into sports? Go that route. What about cooking? Watch a how-to video on maple-glazed butternut squash. Yum.

Each less-than-two-minute video earns you a few cents. You’ll also get virtual scratch-off cards, which you can play and earn up to $10.

If you want the complete lowdown on InboxDollars and how to earn even more, well, dollars, we wrote up a review for you.

2. Answer Some Questions From Your Computer

Survey sites are another popular way to bank some extra cash. Again, you won’t come out rolling in dough, but you won’t have to leave your couch.

We’ve written up a list of our favorite (legitimate!) survey sites, but here’s a new one we’ll feature here: It’s called eMiles.

If you’re that 9-to-5 employee who simply wants to save extra money to take a vacation, this is perfect. The site rewards you in points for hotels and flights for doing simple tasks, such as taking surveys.

You can redeem your points for flights with major airlines, such as American Airlines, United and Southwest. If you’re not much of a traveler, you can also use them at Amazon or Starbucks.

By just spending an hour on eMiles, consumers can save $20 to $30 on their next trip, the site claims.

Signing up takes approximately 10 seconds. You’ll just need an email address and to be a U.S. resident. Plus, for a limited time, you can nab bonus points.

3. Rent Your Extra Space (or Couch, If You’re Not Sitting on It)

Have a spare room? Might as well list it on Airbnb and make some money.

If you’re a good host with a desirable space, you could add hundreds — even thousands — of dollars to your savings account with Airbnb.

Taking a few simple steps can make the difference between a great experience and a less-than-satisfactory one.

Here are a few tips:

Make your space available during high-demand times in your area. Think: concerts, conventions and sporting events in your area.
Be a good host, and make sure your place is stocked with the toiletries you’d expect at a hotel — toilet paper, soap and towels.
Be personable. A lot of travelers turn to Airbnb for the personal touch they won’t find at commercial properties.

Here’s the link to sign up as an Airbnb host.

(Hosting laws vary from city to city. Please understand the rules and regulations applicable to your city and listing.)

4. Make a Commitment to the Gym

OK, yes, we’re talking about being lazy after work and doing nothing. But do you know what could make you feel better about life? Working out.

We get it. Forcing yourself to go to the gym before or after work is a challenge. Bring money into the picture, and, well, it might get easier.

HealthyWage is an online program that allows you to place a bet on your weight loss. For example, Angie Richards bet she could lose 40 pounds in six months. She lost 52 and won $1,200.

Unfortunately, the program doesn’t come with a magical diet or sweatless workout routine; you’ll have to figure that part out on your own. But see if that extra cash might motivate you.

For an estimate of how much you could win, go to the HealthyWage Prize Calculator.

5. Extend Your Commute and Give Some Rides

My cohort, Dana Sitar, recently told the story of Paul Pruce. After losing his job, he opted to drive for Lyft and banks about $750 a week.

In some cities, that’s rent.

Signing up to drive for Lyft is super easy; it’s all online. You work when you want, keep a portion of the ride fees and bank 100% of the tips.

If you’re curious to see what you’d make, Lyft has an earnings calculator. Type in how many hours you’d want to work and your city. In my town, I could earn $300 a week for 15 hours of weekend work.

6. Spend Time With Some Good Dogs

If you work a high-stress job, dog-walking or dog-sitting could be the perfect way to decompress during your lunch break or at the end of the day.

You don’t even have to post flyers around your neighborhood. With apps like Rover or DogVacay, you can find pet-owners in your area who need a hand.

You’ll get to set your own rates and your availability. If someone’s too far away? Skip. If you find the cutest dog you’ve ever seen? Sign up!

7. Go on a Grocery Run

The best time to make a grocery run is after work. Grab what you need for dinner that night. In and out. Done.

But you could also make some money out of this weeknight habit.

You’ve got two options:

First, you could sign up to be a Shipt shopper. Folks submit their grocery orders, and you pick them up and deliver them — like Destiny Frith does.

Second, you could simply go about collecting your own groceries and earn money back on certain purchases with Ibotta. Sure, you’re spending money just to make sure money, but use these tips to make the most out of the experience.

You could earn a decent chunk of money on items already in your cart, like 25 cents back on ground beef or $3 back on Bud Light.

Plus, you’ll get a $10 sign-up bonus when you bank that first rebate.

8. Deliver Food Orders

We’re not telling you to go apply to be a Pizza Hut delivery driver. That’d require you to stick to some sort of schedule, and isn’t what you full-timers are about after 5 p.m.

Instead, try signing up to deliver food through UberEats. You pick and choose when you want to make a few runs, like after you’ve had your own dinner and you get that weird spurt of energy.

The nice part is, you don’t have to chat with people — making small talk at the water cooler is enough for one day. Just pick the food up and drop it off.

9. Write Your Heart Out

If you have a knack for writing, you could consider entering the freelancing world, taking projects here and there.

But sometimes even that kind of commitment is a lot to promise after a day of work. Try something more fun: like entering a writing contest.

There are a ton of different contests out there that accept everything from poetry and fiction to fantasy and nonfiction.

Many of these contests are free and come with cash prizes — thousands of dollars in some cases.

We’ve found some of the best writing contests at Write Jobs.

10. Partake in Detective Work to Spice Up Your Evening

Ever heard of mystery shopping?

This is a tool companies might use to secretly check in on how their businesses are running. For example, mystery-shopping company BestMark will pay you to go out and test-drive cars, which means you’ll have to listen to the sales pitch and report back on your experience.

Or there’s Secret Hopper, which says it’ll pay you to grab a drink at your local brewery and rate your experience.

11. Earn $5 By Doing a Potentially Really, Really Random Thing

We don’t love the word “thing,” but in this case, it fits.

Have you heard of Fiverr? It’s an online platform that’ll pay you $5 to complete a task. These tasks — or random things — range from providing unique gift ideas to forming telepathic messages to writing a message on your chest while playing a kazoo.

OK, so sometimes it’s more serious, like drawing a quick logo or writing up a paragraph of content.

Either way, you’ll probably find something you can do. Hey, it’s $5.

12. Capitalize on Your Favorite Creative Hobby

There’s really nothing better than coming home after work and doing what you love, whether it’s painting, woodworking, cross-stitching or jewelry-making.

At a certain point, though, your abode might become overrun with extra crafts — because you can only hang so many of your works on the walls. Why not sell the ones you’re not attached to?

Consider signing up to sell on Etsy, a creative marketplace with millions of buyers. You’ll have to pay 20 cents to list an item, then hand over a 3.5% transaction fee and a 3%-plus-25-cent payment-processing fee. But that’s only a small amount when you get to advertise to all those eyeballs.

And, hey, if you’re not creative, you could always opt to sell supplies on Etsy Studio.

13. Commit to Starting Your Own Business

Let’s count this as a bit of a bonus — a suggestion for those of you who have a ton of energy after work and love committing to big projects.

Why not just start your own freelance business?

Don’t throw yourself to the wolves. Rather, take a free introductory course.

We wrote about three online classes that’ll help you get started, including Learn to be a Bookkeeper. Once you get established, you’ll be able to dictate when, how often and where you work — just like Daniel Honan, who said he grossed about $50,000 in his first year after the program.

So what do you say, full-timers? Earning money on the side of a full-time job doesn’t have to add an extra exhausting layer to your life.

Carson Kohler (@CarsonKohler) is a junior writer at The Penny Hoarder. Currently, her side job is napping (for free), but she aims to start freelance writing soon!

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Staying Ahead of Becoming Obsolete

Over the last several years of writing for The Simple Dollar, I have read literally hundreds of personal finance and investing books, coupled with many books on adjacent topics like personal growth. You would think by now that I would get the message, so why did I just spend the last few hours reading a recent personal finance book?

At my previous job, I wrote somewhere between 100,000 and 200,000 lines of computer code and maintained all of it. The thing was, even in my final months there, I was vigorously rewriting things to improve efficiency and writing completely new test versions of old software using new software methodologies. I spent long afternoons reading books on software development and data mining and algorithms, too.

The reasoning is the same in both cases: I was driven by a fear of becoming obsolete. In my previous job, I didn’t want to find myself in a position where I didn’t understand the latest software development and data mining techniques, even if I didn’t actively use them at work. Similarly, these days, I make a conscious effort to stay abreast of what ideas and changes are growing in the personal finance field, even if they don’t provide a radical shift to my core message of spending less than you earn.

Let’s unpack this a bit.

Why? Many career paths, particularly those that pay well but even in many entry level jobs that don’t pay really well, change rapidly. The days where you could just go to work and do the same thing every day for thirty years is long gone. If you go into work every day with the same exact skillset and same exact set of ideas as the day before, eventually your job is going to change into something that you’re not prepared to handle, and when that happens, you become expendable.

Even worse, if you’re let go from a job and don’t have a skill set that’s relevant for current jobs in your field, you’re going to find a very hard time getting employed again. It’s because you’ve become obsolete.

Of course, you can always recover from that, but it will require a huge investment of time and energy to update your skill set and knowledge, and you’re likely doing it while in a position of unemployment or in a position where you’ve had to get another job in an unrelated area and are devoting a lot of hours in your life to your current job. Some people simply drop out of the workforce entirely at this point.

Becoming obsolete is a real risk in the modern workplace, but it’s something that you can proactively prevent. Here are six ways you can do that.

Strategy #1 – Make Lifelong Learning a Part of Your Job

Part of your normal routine at work should be centered around learning, period. If you are not incorporating some form of learning in your normal routine, if you’re not absorbing new ideas and trying new techniques on a regular basis, you’re either in an extremely entry-level position or you’re on the path to becoming obsolete.

How do you do this, though? Here are some suggestions.

If you’re struggling to come up with any downtime for learning, talk to your employer and find a way to make time. Approach this conversation from the perspective that you’re spending all of your time juggling chainsaws rather than spending some of the time figuring out how to juggle those chainsaws more effectively, which will lead to greater productivity in the long term.

Think about it. If all you’re doing is keeping things barely above water, there’s no way you can ever move into a situation where it’s ever anything more than pure panic mode. The company’s products can’t develop or grow when everything is on the verge of falling apart all the time.

If a company can’t afford even a little space for an employer to improve their skill set, they’re working to make you obsolete. Staying there is going to cause you to eventually fall behind the curve and eventually be unable to easily find new work. You do not want to work there forever, but if you stay, it becomes progressively harder to find a good new position to exit into. So, if your employer isn’t on board with some level of learning, you need to exit the scene.

On the other hand, if you regularly have downtime at work, you’re set. You just need to consciously start using that time for learning new things. Spend a portion of your day devoted to learning, even if it’s just an hour a day or so. Block it off on your schedule. Shut down distractions during that time and devote yourself to reading challenging materials and trying out new techniques.

Where do you even start, though?

Read periodicals and articles related to your field, and dive deep into any regularly-mentioned topics that you don’t have mastery of. For example, let’s say you’re a software developer who does some work in Javascript. You spend some time each day reading, say, StackOverflow, to keep up on things, and you keep seeing people talking about async / await. You kinda understand what it is, but not really. There’s your warning light. It’s time to buckle down, do some reading on what async / await is, and write some test programs for yourself to see it in action.

Let’s say you’re an executive assistant and you spend your time reading general publications related to business administration and your general field so that you can understand what ideas your boss is relaying to you. You might come across an article that talks about strategic meetings, but that’s not really something you’ve done and you’re really not familiar with it. Get familiar with it. Even if it’s not something that really falls in line with what you’re doing now, you can extract ideas from that bigger concept that you can use now, and you’re prepared to handle the concept if you move on to a new position.

Apply what you’re learning. You’ve been reading. That’s good. You’ve been testing out things where you can to see how they work. That’s also good. You’ve been integrating these new ideas into your thinking. That’s great.

Now, it’s time to apply those things, and that leads right into the second and third strategies.

Strategy #2 – Take on Challenging Projects

Many people who become obsolete – or have a fear of becoming obsolete – often have a tendency (and a track record) towards avoiding challenging projects and sticking to familiar things. This tends to pigeonhole people – you become known for one thing and your skills at that one thing become very strong, but what do you do if the need for that one thing goes away at work? What if it falls out of favor in your field?

The truth is that you need to have practical experience on lots of things, and the best way to get that is to get involved with tasks that let you bridge the things you’re already good at with some of those new things. Often, this means getting on board with challenging projects. Here’s how.

Make an effort to get involved with at least some challenging projects and tasks. It’s probably a bad idea to throw yourself completely into things that are outside your current realm of expertise, but it’s a good idea to fill at least some of your plate with tasks that go somewhat beyond what you know. This forces you to translate your self-learning practices from the first strategy into real workplace results.

Your goal should be to fill some of your hours with tasks that are outside of your core skillset. Not all – you’re likely to become overwhelmed and not be able to meet expectations – and not none, because that’s the road to becoming obsolete. You’re targeting some of your work hours.

Don’t shy away just because you don’t know how to do everything right off the bat. It can be very intimidating to take on a work project that includes steps that you’re unsure how to perform. Don’t let that intimidation factor make your decision for you.

Instead, perceive the project as having a few extra steps. Those steps involve learning the skills you need to complete the next step in the project. Perhaps you need to learn a particular API, or maybe you need to understand a particular protocol, or perhaps you simply need to understand the normal procedure for stocking new items.

Whatever it is, don’t resist it. Take it on. Learn how to handle that step, then do it. The thing to remember is that people generally are very forgiving of others who are trying to learn a new task, so you’re likely to get some breathing room and leeway, especially at first. Just simply say, “I haven’t done this part before, and I’m learning. Can you help?” The vast majority of people in life will help, and many will be impressed that you’re trying to learn.

If you’re stuck, stop and learn until you can apply what you’ve learned. Sometimes we’ll take on challenging tasks and discover that we’re in over our heads. The worst move to make here is to keep charging forward, which has a good likelihood of making things worse. The other mistake people often make is to give up. Neither solution is the best one.

The best solution is to put things on pause for a moment and figure out what that next step is. Watch a Youtube video of how to fix that pipe or how to fix this wiring issue or how to diagnose the strange noise. Ask for advice on a programming conundrum on an online forum. Talk to a coworker and see if they have any advice (but don’t simply ask them to do it for you – learn how to do it for yourself).

Strategy #3 – Don’t Resist or Fear Change

Change comes to all workplaces, and people that fear becoming obsolete tend to resist that change. Change means that the skills you once had may not be as useful, and it also means that you may have to learn a few new skills and routines.

Understand that your company has to evolve in order to be successful, and that you have to evolve to keep up with that evolution. Workplace change is going to happen, or else your company is going to eventually go out of business. It is impossible to keep on doing the exact same thing with the exact same tools forever, because the competition will figure out better ways of doing it and they will use that to make lower priced or higher quality products, and customers will move on. That’s reality.

When you resist change, you’re making the case that staying put is more cost-effective in the long run than changing. That’s sometimes the case, but the argument for change is almost always that it will generate more revenue or cost less money in the long run. You have to be prepared to demonstrate that it isn’t true, and if you can’t do that, you’re arguing for something that isn’t what’s best for the organization as a whole so that you can remain comfortable. That’s not a route to a healthy career.

Embrace change, especially when the benefits are clear.

Remember that fighting change is an effective short term strategy, but a disastrous one for the long term. The thing is, many people will still fight changes because they recognize that, in the short term, slowing down change or stopping change is beneficial to them. If they can squeeze another year out of their current skill set, then why not do it?

The problem is that when change does eventually come, not only is that change going to sweep them aside pretty strongly, they’re going to find that their skills are even more outdated than the would have been had they simply embraced the changes when they were first proposed. They sacrificed long term stability for a few extra months of simplicity.

That’s a terrible exchange. Never, ever fight change because change seems harder than staying put. Embrace it now, because it’s easier to change when everyone else is.

Get ahead of change by learning about it and mastering it as soon as you see any hint of it coming. This loops back to the self-learning aspect: if you’re keeping up to date in your field, big changes will probably be part of your knowledge and even part of your skill set before they’re even seriously suggested at work.

If your company decides to switch to the hot new programming methodology, for example, but you’ve already learned about it, you’ve got a leg up. Change will be easy for you and, not only that, you can help others transition and appear to be an incredibly effective employee and even a leader.

Strategy #4 – Take Your Reviews Seriously

Many people fear becoming obsolete because they perceive themselves as already being on shaky ground at work for other reasons. Don’t let that mix of workplace challenges keep you from success. Instead, be proactive about your performance reviews, which provide a great window into your workplace status. Here’s how.

If you don’t have a regular review at work, ask for one. Many positions have a regular review process in which a person can sit down with their employer and assess whether or not that person is meeting the objectives of their job and what they can do to improve. If you don’t have a process like this at work, ask for one. Simply ask for a performance review.

If this seems scary to you, ask yourself why. What could you be doing at work so that this type of review isn’t a scary proposition? The truth is, if a review seems scary, then you’re probably running into fears of becoming obsolete or dealing with other workplace issues, and you should be proactively handling those fears.

Again, if you’re not sure how to proceed, ask your boss for guidance. Very, very few people in the professional world respond negatively if honestly and sincerely ask for help – they’re usually thrilled to help, especially if by doing so they make their workplace better. Having a better employee with a better skill set around is going to make your boss’s life easier, so they’re going to want to help you.

When you have a regular review, ask for suggestions on what you can improve and what upcoming things you can prepare for. So, you’re undergoing this review – now what? Obviously, listen for recommendations on areas that you’re weak in and use that information to improve yourself in the coming months.

However, it goes further than that. A performance review is the perfect time to directly ask what you can improve on and what you can prepare for. Even the best employees have areas of potential improvement. Even the most prepared employees have upcoming situations that they might not be ready for.

A performance review is the perfect time to figure out where you are weak and what’s coming up. That information spells out exactly what you can do to avoid becoming obsolete.

Base your learning around those upcoming objectives and those suggested improvements. Take the feedback from that review and use it to shape what you’re going to learn about next. Cycle that information right back into that first strategy and use it for input for learning.

If your boss indicates that you’re weak in an area, study that area. Become strong in that area. If your boss says something is coming in the future, study that something. Become strong in that something. That way, rather than becoming obsolete, you’re becoming stronger and more useful.

Remember that in most situations, your supervisor is telling you the truth, as you both benefit if a review is honest and taken seriously by the employee. As I noted earlier, in a normal employment situation, it is in the best interest of your boss to give you an honest review and to give you good advice on how to improve yourself and your work situation. If they have better employees, then it’s likely to reflect better on them to their supervisor.

Take advantage of that. Take your supervisor at his or her word and move forward based on their advice. They’re not going to suggest things to you that are going to put you in a worse place in terms of professional growth, because that doesn’t help them, either.

Strategy #5 – Be Involved in Professional Groups

Another powerful way to stay in touch with changes in your profession, to have a lot of opportunities for learning, and to build a ton of professional relationships at the same time is to join professional groups, particularly face-to-face ones, and go to professional meetings. Such groups are prime opportunities to meet people in your field and learn about the latest innovations in your career directly from them.

Here’s how to take advantage of this route for professional improvement.

Find professional groups online and in your area. Many professions have local groups that you can get involved with. You can find them online through professional associations in your career path or, lacking that, through services like Meetup. Look for any and all groups that may have something to do with your career and professional interests.

If you’re having difficulty finding professional face-to-face groups in your area, look for tight online communities focused on your field where you can share ideas. LinkedIn is a good place to start here.

Going to professional conferences and conventions is another great step along these lines. It allows you to compress many of the benefits of a professional group into just a few days that are jam packed with face-to-face interactions and learning. Many conventions often facilitate online groups as well.

Get actively involved with the discussions in those groups, both in terms of helping others as well as seeking out people who have knowledge you’re seeking. You’ve found a group or two – online or face-to-face. Now, get involved. If you see someone asking a question that you can answer well, answer it – do it with no questions asked and no thanks or benefit required. If you have a relevant question, ask it – many people will answer it as well as they can.

It’s that active exchange of knowledge that makes a community valuable, not only for you, but for everyone else involved. The more you participate, particularly in being helpful, the more others are drawn to participate and the more of a draw the group becomes.

Use learning as a tool for building relationships. Not only are such communities useful in terms of adding new knowledge and skills to your repertoire, it’s good for building professional relationships.

Those relationships come in handy. They can help you take the next step in your career by opening doors and opportunities. They can provide help when you’re trying to learn something new or add a new skill. They also can provide social fun and entertainment.

Get involved! You won’t regret it!

Strategy #6 – Use New Skills Outside of Work

If you’re struggling to find ways to apply some of your skills in the workplace, look outside of the workplace. There are almost always great opportunities for using skills in situations outside of our primary employer.

Here are some avenues to apply what you’re learning in real projects if they’re not available at work.

Look for projects in the community or within your passion areas to apply skills you’re learning but perhaps not applying at work. See if there are any community organizations or nonprofit groups or charities within your community that could use the skills that you’e trying to hone. Does an organization need some IT support? Could you set up a bit of custom software for some group? Could a local community group use some design help? Offer it up.

Remember, the goal here is to hone and master a skill that you want to practice while helping out a deserving group in your community. You most likely won’t make money from such an endeavor, but you will likely make some great connections in your local community.

Don’t be afraid to freelance outside of work, especially if it pulls you in new directions. Another option, of course, is to simply hang out your shingle for freelance work. This involves some self-promotion to find that work, but there are few things that will really put new skills to the test like a paid contract.

The thing to remember with freelancing and consulting is that, especially at first, you have to dig up the work. It doesn’t come to you. Don’t be afraid to seek out opportunities, even low income ones at first. This isn’t about making money, at least not at first. It’s about stretching your wings.

Intentionally choose extra projects that force you to stretch your skills a little. It can be tempting to just go back to the skills that you’ve honed over the years and just ply them again and again, but doing that really doesn’t help you to grow. It doesn’t do anything to keep becoming obsolete at bay.

When you’re looking for extra projects to work on, make an effort to choose ones that are likely to push you to use skills that you don’t normally use at work. Using those skills on a real-world project will really help your skill set to avoid becoming rusty and outmoded.

Final Thoughts

Obsolescence is a real fear in many professional careers. The skills that once carried you can slowly – or quickly – become skills that are no longer valued in your field, and at that point, you become expendable and it becomes difficult to find more work.

Don’t let that happen to yourself. Be proactive. Take steps to protect your career. In doing so, you give yourself more professional options than ever before.

Good luck!

The post Staying Ahead of Becoming Obsolete appeared first on The Simple Dollar.

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9 Tips That’ll Help You Score a Sweet Job at Your Next Career Fair

الجمعة، 29 سبتمبر 2017

South crowns homecoming court

East Stroudsburg High School South crowned Brandon Dixon and Genni Martinelli as their homecoming king and queen on Friday at the campus in East Stroudsburg.

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PM East crowns court

Pocono Mountain East High school celebrated homecoming at the campus in Swiftwater on Friday. [BOB SHANK/POCONO RECORD]

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Self-Employment Tips From a Real Handyman Who Earns up to $3K/Week

Working as a handyman doesn’t sound like a lucrative business to most people. I can see why: The average maintenance and repair worker made about $37,000 in 2016, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

But what if I told you how one handyman earns $3,000 per week? Would that make you reconsider this business?

My husband, John, has been working in construction for more than 15 years. He specializes in painting, drywall and general handyman services, including plumbing, carpentry, deck repair, general appliance repair and ceiling fan installation.

After so many years in the business, he’s willing to take on just about any project.

Here’s how John has developed his skills and built his business to the point where he can earn up to $3,000 a week as a handyman.

Do You Need Certifications to Start a Handyman Business?

This is probably the first question you have, because many high-paying jobs require some sort of degree or certification program.

You can get many types of certifications in the construction field, including a degree in construction management or certificates in electrical work; plumbing; heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC); or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design.

John doesn’t have any of these certifications.

Instead, he has learned through self study and experience while working with other tradesmen, and he’s a jack of all construction trades.

How to Make More Money From Your Handyman Services

Ready to earn higher pay as a handyman? Here are the strategies John recommends:

1. Work for Yourself

The average handyman’s salary includes the wages of people who might work for the government, large construction companies, college campuses or apartment management companies.

To bring in the big bucks, you’ll have to work for yourself. While this rule may apply to many industries, it’s particularly true in construction, where employers often take a large cut of the rates they charge clients.

2. Charge a High Rate for Professional Service

You’re not just selling a handy services — you’re selling yourself.

Clients are hiring you to work inside their homes for a few hours or a few days. They’ll want someone who’s professional, trustworthy, reliable and punctual — and they’ll likely be willing to pay more for services they know they can count on.

By returning calls promptly, being professional and always showing up on time, you can charge a higher rate than someone who doesn’t take their business as seriously. Your clients will be happy to pay it.

3. Find the Right Clients

To charge a high rate, you have to find the right clients. If someone only cares about price, they aren’t for you.

There are plenty of folks willing to pay more for better service — those are the people you want to work for.

John goes on plenty of bids — visits to the client’s home to look at the project and provide a cost estimate — where he knows he won’t get the job no matter how much he sells himself.

Some people only care about price, and they will always go with the lowest bidder.

Clients who want more than a cheap price will want to know a little bit about John’s history, the exact steps he’ll take to get the job done. They’ll often ask for references from previous clients, who can emphasize his professional qualities and the value of his service.

Successful bids require getting to know the client. They can last anywhere from 30 minutes to one hour.

If you develop a rapport with the customer and earn their trust from that initial consultation, they’ll have a hard time turning you down, even if your price isn’t the lowest bid.

4. Hire a Crew

No matter how high your rate is, you can only physically do so much work each week. By hiring other handymen to do some of the work, you can focus your attention on completing the work more quickly, finding other projects, advertising and growing your business.

Often, the more people you have working for you, the more money you’ll be able to make.

Note: If you have a crew, you’ll need to workers’ compensation insurance. Prices and guidelines will vary by state, so look into the details before growing your business.

What a $3,000 Week Looks Like for a Handyman

The more jobs John has lined up, the more money he’s able to make in a week. Here’s what his schedule looks like during a sample $3,000 week:

Monday to Wednesday

Rental property turn: Turning a rental property is kind of like flipping a house or apartment, with the goal to get it ready to rent out rather than to sell.

This home needs its walls freshly painted, appliances installed, drywall repaired, ceiling fans hung, light fixtures replaced and more.

The total pay for the job is $4,400. John hires crew members to do some of the work and he works on the job site himself for three days.

John profits $2,200 over the six days it takes to complete the job.

Thursday

Popcorn ceiling removal: A client needs a popcorn ceiling removed in her kitchen on a day’s notice. John heads over early one weekday morning and works for four hours.

He profits $150.

Thursday and Friday

General handyman services: A new client just moved into her house and needs help with general tasks. John hangs ceiling fans, installs a security door, hangs pictures, mounts a television and more,.

He earns $350 in less than two days.

Saturday

Painting: John lines up a painting job with another client. He arrives at the client’s home at 6:30 a.m., paints the family room, kitchen and dining room for 11 hours, and comes home.

He profits $450.

Total profit for the week: $3,150

Miscellaneous Time Spent on the Handyman Business

Keep in mind this weekly schedule doesn’t include the time John spends on advertising or invoicing.

He wakes up early each morning to advertise (e.g. posting ads on various sites, responding to emails, working on his website) and spends another 30 minutes each evening sending bids and invoices to current and prospective customers.

Running a handyman business does not give you a 40-hour workweek!

What a Low-Income Week Looks Like

In this profession, your income might not be consistent. Self-employment can be a constant battle between feast and famine. While business is great some weeks, plenty of weeks John’s income is significantly lower (and others when it’s higher!).

For comparison, a week where John has fewer jobs lined up results in a much lower income. Here’s a sample week with a low profit.

Monday

Two bids: The weekend was slow, but John received one phone call for a bid on Monday morning.

While on the bid, he gets another call from a new client. He visits that home later in the day and sends the client a breakdown of the job via email that evening.

Tuesday and Wednesday

Drywall repair and ceiling painting: A regular client is fixing a house to make into a rental property. He needs John to repair drywall in two of the main rooms and paint the ceilings in the garage and kitchen.

It’s 15 hours of work for a profit of $250.

Thursday

Advertising and networking: John doesn’t have anything scheduled today, so he focuses on advertising and looks for ways to grow his business.

He hands out a few business cards to real estate agents in the area, follow up on all pending jobs and call previous clients to see if they need additional work.

Friday

General handyman services: Luckily, John has a few go-to clients who usually need something done whenever he is available.

These projects can be anything from repainting a laundry room to hanging ceiling fans and replacing light bulbs. John contacts one of these customers and books six hours of work for $180.

Total profit for the week: $430

The Challenges of Self-Employment

As you can see, being a self-employed handyman is not a quick or easy way to earn a living.

It can take years to build a handyman business to the point where you have more good weeks than bad, so it’s smart to save a substantial amount of money before starting your own business.

John recommends having at least six months of living expenses saved before striking out on your own.

In addition to low-income weeks, John faces other obstacles.

When we moved to a new area, he had to grow his business from the ground up. With no connections to family or friends who could help John find work, he needed to work hard to grow his business and generate referrals from satisfied clients.

He also sometimes can’t complete scheduled jobs because of the weather.

One February, our entire city shut down for a week due to ice on the roads. He’s also had to reschedule two outdoor deck jobs due to rain and humidity.

When the weather is bad, business slows down drastically, as home repairs usually aren’t the first thing on people’s minds.

For us, though, the benefits of running a handyman business far outweigh the challenges. Once John has a steady stream of clients, we know business will be more consistent and we’ll be seeing a lot more of those $3,000 weeks!

Sarah Brooks is a personal finance writer and blogger living in Charlotte, North Carolina. Combining her bachelor’s degree in finance with her passion for writing, she’s been able to make a career out of doing what she loves from the comfort of her home!

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7 Smart Ways to Use Your Time to Earn $100+ per Hour

How much money do you make if you put in an extra hour at work?

If you’re on a fixed salary, nothing. If you’re paid by the hour, you might earn some overtime pay. But there are only so many hours in a week, so you’re better off thinking about how to get more money for your time, not putting in more time.

Here’s an example: Instead of working that extra shift, implement a plan to get a raise.

If it takes you 10 hours of preparation to get a $40-per-week raise now instead of in a year, you made an extra $2,080. That’s more than $200 per hour for your effort!

In addition to making more money from your job, activities outside of work can pay well for your time.

Here are seven creative ways I came up with for how to make money — and they pay at least $100 for an hour’s work.

1. Switch to an Online Bank Account

My wife and I were earning 0.61% interest on our savings account, and 0.45% on our checking account, both of which are pretty good rates compared to some banks. But we could do better.

When I switched to an online account, I started earning 1.05% interest on our money. It took less than an hour to set up the account and transfer the money.

That promotion is over now, but if you’re looking for a deal like this for yourself, check out Aspiration’s Summit checking account.

You can set it up in about 15 minutes, and you’ll earn 1.00% interest on your balance of $2,500 or more. For balances less than $2,500, you’ll earn 0.25%, which is still more than the average savings account.

If you keep healthy balances in your savings and checking accounts, it can be worthwhile to move money to accounts that pay more. And remember you’ll earn that extra interest for years to come.

If we keep this latest account for three years, I figure I’ll have earned at least $300 per hour for the time I spent switching to a new bank.

2. Collect Credit Card Sign-up Bonuses

Wondering how to make money with almost no work?

If you have a decent credit score, you can get sign-up bonuses for opening credit card accounts.

You may get offers in the mail already. If not, just Google “credit card sign-up bonuses.” Which ones should you apply for? Here are my criteria:

A bonus of at least $100

A spending requirement of $1,000 or less (some are as low as $500)

At least three months to meet the spending requirement

Typically, you’ll spend less than 10 minutes applying online and a few minutes activating the card when it arrives. Put the card in your wallet, and use it until you hit the spending requirement.

That part takes no extra time — you have to use some card to pay for your normal purchases, right?

In one six-week period last year, I made $670 from credit card sign-up bonuses. I spent no more than a few hours on this project, so my rate of pay was at least $200 per hour.

3. Open a New Bank Account

Chase Bank recently sent me a coupon offering a $175 bonus to open a savings account. I went to a local branch, and 30 minutes later my account was open. After I left the money in my account for the three months the offer required, it took 20 minutes to close the account.

I made $150 more than if I had left the money in its original account, and it took me just 50 minutes of work — which works out to a rate of $180 per hour.

Keep an eye out for offers in your mail and email, and check out our list of the best bank promotions for offers of up to $300 for opening a new account.

4. Lend Money on Real Estate

If you know people who invest in real estate and you have substantial cash in the bank, you might have an opportunity to make a great return on your money with very little work.

My wife and I have friends who flip houses and regularly need money quickly.

Banks don’t lend on projects like these, and they don’t close loans quickly in any case. We do both. The result is thousands of dollars in interest for a few hours reviewing paperwork and a few emails back and forth with an attorney.

Be careful if you decide to try this kind of investment. We have three rules that have kept us safe so far:

Never lend more than 70% of the value of the property.

Always have a first mortgage on the property.

Have an attorney prepare and/or handle everything.

Sitting in our bank account, the money earns about 1% annual interest (and that’s a good return), but investors pay us 10% and guarantee five month’s interest even if the house is sold more quickly than that.

I figure we make at least $400 per hour for our efforts versus leaving the money in the bank.

5. Rent out Rooms in Your Home

I paid for my first home by renting out rooms. Once the mortgage loan was paid off, the rental income covered all the bills and gave me extra cash to spend.

Living with other people doesn’t work for everyone, but if you own a home, it is perhaps the easiest way to make a lot of money. Plus, unlike the other projects suggested here, you can keep collecting money every month for years, with little additional effort.

Think of it this way: If you rent out a bedroom for $100 per week, is it going to take you more than an hour per week to deal with the tenant? Not likely.

At one point I was collecting more than $800 per month of rental income from the home I lived in. I spent a few hours each month nagging renters to clean up after themselves or to pay on time, so I made at least $200 per hour renting rooms.

If you don’t want tenants in your space all the time, try short-term rentals with Airbnb.

Good hosts with a desireable space can earn hundreds — or even thousands — of dollars a month.

(Hosting laws vary from city to city. Please understand the rules and regulations applicable to your city and listing.)

6. Get a New Insurance Policy

Many of the best ways to make good money for your time involve cutting your expenses. After all, if you find a way to get the same thing for $100 less, you have exactly $100 more to spend on anything else you want — or to put toward paying off debt.

When I switched insurance companies for our car and home, I spent an hour checking rates and another hour at the agent’s office.

The savings amounted to $145 per year, which would seem to put the project below the hourly pay target of this article. However, savings like these continue every year without additional effort. If we stay with this company for three years, I will have saved more than $200 per hour I spent getting new insurance.

7. Cut Your Housing Expenses

Part of the reason my wife and I moved last year was to reduce housing-related expenses. We bought a house, but you could save if you rent, too.

Again, the big advantage of savings like these is they’re not a one-time benefit. If you find an apartment that costs $200 less per month than your current place, and you stay there for three years, you’ll have $7,200 more to put toward other items in your budget.

It’s not always practical to move, but there are other ways to save on housing-related expenses, too.

Try these home improvements that can save you hundreds of dollars per year. For example, you can swap incandescent bulbs for compact fluorescents in less than an hour and save about $100 per year on electricity.

Finding ways to reduce regular expenses is one of the easiest ways to free up spendable income.

As for our move, it was cheap (We used our own van and bought a home just 80 miles away.), and we now spend at least $1,300 less per year in housing expenses. Plus we kept our previous home and now earn rental income.

Although I can’t calculate the time involved with any accuracy, I’m sure we beat the $100-per-hour target for our effort.

Steve Gillman is the author of “101 Weird Ways to Make Money” and creator of EveryWayToMakeMoney.com. He’s been a repo-man, walking stick carver, search engine evaluator, house flipper, tram driver, process server, mock juror, and roulette croupier, but of more than 100 ways he has made money, writing is his favorite (so far).

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How to Earn Extra Cash With Vintage Magazines… and a Pair of Scissors

I once sold a stack of old “National Geographic” magazines at a rummage sale for a few bucks. Now I wonder if I gave up an opportunity for a much bigger profit.

Why? I’ve since learned a smarter way to make money with old magazines. It starts with a pair of scissors — but we’ll get to that in a moment.

People get nostalgic when they see old magazines, especially issues featuring specific events — like a royal wedding. Or from meaningful dates — like birthdays and anniversaries.

Because of this nostalgia, they’re willing to pay for them. In fact, I searched “old magazines” on eBay and saw over 30,000 results! When I sorted by bidding action, the following three listings topped the page:

11 “Good Old Days” 1965 magazines in newspaper form. Highest of 27 bids: $50.36

“Sports Afield” January 1939 and “Field & Stream” 1940 with an article on Clark Gable. Highest of four bids: $11.00

1955 “Modern Man” magazine (nude Betty Page and Marilyn Monroe photos). Highest of two bids: $20.49

OK. These look pretty good. If you find a big stash in your grandpa’s attic, you might make a nice chunk of change, but you won’t get rich with most old magazines.

If you want to earn even more from your old reading material, read on.

How to Make the Most Money From Vintage Magazines

Turns out, you might make a lot more money cutting up those magazines than selling them whole. The old advertisements inside are sometimes more valuable than the magazine itself.

Michael Franco of Pick 4 Profit says he makes money with vintage ads by putting them in plastic sheet covers or dollar-store frames and selling them online and at flea markets

He suggests displaying them in an antique booth or at flea markets.

“People will drop $5 to $10 for one ad,” he says.

For an ad that “really stands out,” Franco suggests buying an 8-by-10-inch photo frame at the dollar store to display it. You could “sell those for $15 to $20,” he says.

Franco says these types of advertisements are easiest to sell:

Vintage cars

Trains

Alcohol

Food

Guns

Sports-related items

Mid-century modern furniture

The magazines don’t even have to be that old, nor the ads flashy.

On his website, Franco displays a Nike ad from a 1990s Chicago newspaper. It features Michael Jordan and Spike Lee — he sold it on eBay for $23. He also displays one he sold at his antique booth for $12. It featured a Paul McCobb chair, and he cut it from an old grocery store magazine.

Franco certainly isn’t the only one doing this.

Kevin O’Hara, a British picker, says he made $480 from one magazine. It was a 1957 copy of U.K. Vogue he bought for about $27. It had over 150 advertisements. He suggests you buy famous magazines from the 1980s or older on eBay, and start clipping.

Other places to find old magazines include:

Used book stores

Library sales

Rummage sales

Thrift stores

Flea markets

Antique shops

Attics

Basements

How Much Money Can You Really Make Selling Ads?

To see whether these pickers’ experiences are easily replicable, I went to eBay again and searched “vintage ads.” I narrowed the 200,000 results down to 8,400 by clicking “Auction” and sorted by “Number of bids: Most first.” I found these:

Monarch Coffee ad from a 1924 “Ladies Home Journal.” Highest of five bids: $3.01

Lucille Ball RC Crown Cola ad. Highest of five bids: $7.50

Farrah Fawcett Wella Balsam Shampoo ad from 1977: Highest of three bids: $11.50

Making a $3 or $11 sale may not sound like much. But these are single pages torn from a magazine, and none of them were framed. Plus, the $4 to $6 the sellers were getting for shipping is probably an additional profit, because it doesn’t cost much to mail a piece of paper.

How to Sell Your Vintage Ads

Ready to get started? Here are a few tips to keep in mind:

If you want to sell online, setting up a new account on eBay is easy enough. Good photos of your ads are also easy to create with just about any digital camera.

Check current auctions to get an idea of pricing before setting your price or minimum bid. You might want to experiment with selling just the ads versus framing them first to see which brings in more cash.

If you sell at flea markets, a frame is probably a good idea. A guy buying an old car ad for his man cave probably wants to be able to hang it on the wall as soon as he gets home.

If you know an antique store that accepts consignments, the owner might be interested in your vintage ads as well. However, you’ll probably pay half of each sale as a commission.

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Your Workout Equipment Should Help You Kick Butt, Not Slap You in the Face

Feeling the burn during your workout: great.

Feeling the burn because your workout gear snapped at you: not great.

Fitness Gear resistance tubes, sold by Dick’s Sporting Goods, were recalled this week because of reports that they could break and strike the user. You don’t necessarily have to tone down your overzealous workout manner, but you should check the model numbers on any resistance tubes you have at home.

Dick’s explains on its recall website that the recalled tubes were sold in kits of three to five tubes and ranged from 5 to 30 pounds of resistance. Model numbers STA00560, STA00561, STA00562, STA00563, STA00564, STA00565, STA00566, STA00567 and STA00568 are included in the recall.

There have been 12 reports of tubes breaking, and in two of those reports, the broken tubes struck the user. In one report, the user fell when a tube broke.

I have been wracking my brain for jokes to make here, but let’s be real: It takes serious energy and motivation to get off the couch and squeeze in a workout. I can’t bear to laugh at someone who got hurt trying to work on their fitness.

What to Do if Your Resistance Bands Got Recalled

If you have the affected resistance bands, return them to your nearest Dick’s store for a full refund. If you don’t have your receipt, you’ll receive store credit in lieu of a cash refund.

Similar Fitness Gear resistance bands on Dick’s website are priced at $15 to $20 each or $40 to $80 for a set.

Lisa Rowan is a writer and producer at The Penny Hoarder.

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Hop Onto This Chance to Become a Professional Beer Drinker (Yes, Really!)

Here’s the scene: You drag yourself into work on a cold, dreary Friday morning.

It’s been a long week, and the boss is busting your hump to get that big project done, even though the weekend is mere hours away.

So you get to work and crack your first beer at 9 a.m. Then a second. You’ll have a few more before noon.

That didn’t go like you thought it would, did it?

Yes, that could be an average Friday if you land a part-time job with Meantime Brewing Company as a professional beer tester.

Become a Beer Taster and Get Paid to Sample Suds

Full disclosure, this job is located in Greenwich, east of London in the U.K.

So if you can’t jet across the pond once a week in your private jet or handle cold, rainy weather, this job isn’t for you (but there are tons of others posted on The Penny Hoarder Jobs page on Facebook).

Meantime is looking for an experienced beer drinker who can tell an IPA from a pale ale, work with a team and provide consistent informed feedback on the suds they are tasting.

You’ll work three hours a week, on Friday mornings. The specific salary is not listed, but the listing says it is “competitive… with beer benefits.”

You don’t need a college degree, but you will need to be well versed in the English language and understand beer terminology. BeerAdvocate is a good starting point for brewery newbies.

To apply, join LinkedIn, then write a 30-word post about why you should get the job with the hashtag #pickmemeantime. Meantime will review your profile to see if you’re truly beer-worthy and then will pick three candidates for a taste test.

Cheers!

Didn’t land the job? There are still plenty of ways to drink good beer for cheap.

Alex Mahadevan is a data journalist at The Penny Hoarder.

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Florida Colleges Are Stepping Up to Help Those Affected by the Hurricanes

It’s been an active hurricane season, to say the least.

First Harvey sat on Houston. Then Irma barreled through the Caribbean and made its way up Florida and into Georgia. And Maria followed, leaving Puerto Rico and other islands paralyzed.

Now, many of us are wondering how we can help — including Florida’s Gov. Rick Scott.

Earlier this week, Gov. Scott asked that all Florida colleges and universities offer in-state tuition to students from Puerto Rico.

“I am also asking all Florida state colleges and universities to offer in-state tuition to any student who was displaced from their home in Puerto Rico to make sure we are doing everything we can to help these families,” Scott said in a press release.

Florida’s colleges and universities are following suit, including the state’s (and country’s) largest university, University of Central Florida.

The Orlando Sentinel reported UCF is offering in-state tuition to its current 120 students from Puerto Rico. For context, the average out-of-state student at UCF pays $11,200 per semester whereas the average in-state students pays about $3,200 per semester.

Osceola County School Board Chairman Kelvin Soto suspects more displaced Puerto Rican residents will arrive in Central Florida over the next year — up to 70,000, he estimated — and this decision will help those students transferring or starting as freshmen as well.

Across the state in St. Petersburg, Florida, St. Petersburg College sent an email out to its students Thursday evening. It read, in part:

“With the recent devastation caused by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria, SPC President Tonjua Williams has decided that the college will be offering in-state tuition rates to displaced students from Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Houston area. Additionally, the college’s $40 application fee will be waived for these students.”

If you’re a student who’s been affected by one of the recent hurricanes, be sure to contact your school’s admissions department to see what tuition, fee reductions and other relief are available to you.

Carson Kohler (@CarsonKohler) is a junior writer at The Penny Hoarder.

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Need a Job for the Holidays? Kohl’s Is Hiring Now — Here’s How to Apply

It’s nearly October, which, in retail time, means Christmas is upon us.

I know. It makes me cringe, too. I can’t quite stomach the idea of already squirrelling away extra money for holiday shopping.

But, on the bright side, this means a ton of retailers are ramping up holiday hiring — including our go-to discount retailer, Kohl’s.

Last year, Kohl’s hired something like 69,000 temp workers to handle the chaos that is the holidays.

This year it’s not announcing any numbers, according to CNBC. It’s simply hiring, which is good enough for us.

The retailer is looking for sales associates, who will assist customers; distribution associates, who will pack, sort and ship products from the distribution center; and freight associates, who will unload merch and move it to the sales floor.

A major perk to signing on as a seasonal worker is that you’ll be able stash away some extra money with a weekly paycheck — and you’ll get a discount. That’ll help you conquer your holiday shopping list. Glassdoor estimates an average hourly pay of $8.71 for sales associates.

Plus, Kohl’s is known for keeping seasonal hirees on full time. Last year, it boasted that 14,000 of its seasonal folks turned full time following the holiday rush.

If you’re interested in joining Kohl’s for Christmas, it’ll be holding hiring fairs on Oct. 7 in more than 200 location across the U.S.

You can find all the information you need on Kohl’s holiday and seasonal hiring page.

And if you want to find more seasonal opportunities, including some work from home, you bet we’ll be posting our favorites on our Facebook Jobs page.

Carson Kohler (@CarsonKohler) is a junior writer at The Penny Hoarder. If you snag one of these positions in St. Petersburg, Florida, you’ll likely see her aimlessly wandering around Kohl’s, trying to check items off her Christmas shopping list.

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Meals in Minutes: Bacon Egg and Cheese Breakfast Cups

By Holly Reisem Hanna One of the biggest challenges of being a work-at-home mom is finding that ever so delicate balance between work life and home life. For myself, and many other women out there, cooking and cleaning house becomes a never-ending task which depletes our valuable time and energy. To help put the focus back […]

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U.S. Households Have $16.8K in Credit Debt. Here’s How to Consolidate It

So, you’ve got credit card debt up to your eyeballs. You’re hemorrhaging money on interest payments to your buddies at Chase, Citibank and Capital One.

You’ve got to get out from under that burden. It’s time to get smart and refinance your debt.

Consolidate it. Make your evil black hole of debt more manageable. Get a personal loan with a low interest rate, and use it to pay off the balances from your high-interest credit cards.

Now, having said that, debt consolidation isn’t for everyone. It’s a long process, not a magic wand that’ll make your debt disappear. (Presto! Chango! Debt be gone!) The advantage here is, you’ll save some serious coin on interest payments, freeing up cash to pay down your debt.

We talked to some financial experts about this, and here’s what we learned. If you want credit card debt consolidation to work for you, you’ll need to take the following six steps:

1. Make a Budget

Most importantly, make a budget you can actually stick to.

Maggie Johndrow, a financial advisor with Farmington River Financial Group in Hartford, Connecticut, encourages her clients to spend 30 days tracking what they really spend. What seem like small costs — going out for lunch or coffee every day — may add up over time.

“Being honest with yourself is the first step to successfully paying down debt,” she said.

Here’s a Penny Hoarder strategy for budgeting. Streamlining to one main payment method — paying with all credit, debit or cash — makes it easier to to track your expenses.

“Just wrapping loans into a lower-rate package isn’t going to help if there isn’t an underlying balanced budget,” says Warren A. Ward, a certified financial planner with WWA Planning & Investments in Columbus, Indiana. “The temptation of ‘extra’ cash is just too much for some people.”

2. Lose Your Credit Cards

Quit using them. Cut them up or lock them away.

Seriously. Put yourself on a spending diet. If you can’t pay cash for it, you don’t need it.

Just don’t close all your credit card accounts, which could hurt your credit score.

“By closing existing cards, your available credit line shrinks, hurting your debt-to-credit ratio,” Johndrow says. “You’re better off paying off your credit cards and then simply not using them.”

3. Decide If Credit Card Debt Consolidation is For You

Debt consolidation is most effective for high-interest debts like credit cards. (The average U.S. household is carrying nearly $16,800 in credit card debt.)

This is important: To successfully pull this off, you should be able to pay your debt in three to five years, the typical length of a debt consolidation loan.

“Take into consideration your ability to repay the debt that you’ve accumulated,” advises Josh Gehring, a senior vice president with the Bank of Oklahoma. “Create a plan for yourself that you can realistically afford.”

Figure out what you owe. Sign up with a free service like Credit Sesame. It’ll show your balance on any unpaid bills, credit cards or loans.

If you really can’t repay your debt, consider bankruptcy as a last resort. Here’s the skinny on filing for bankruptcy and how it affects your life.

“A bankruptcy sticks on your credit report for many years, and it may not deal with all your debt,” Gehring says.

Talk it over with a financial adviser, a banker at your bank or someone whose judgment you trust.

4. Compare Your Debt Options — and Choose Wisely.

If bankruptcy is a bridge too far for you, check out your other options.

Debt settlement: You could sign up with a debt settlement company that promises to persuade your creditors to take less money than they’re owed. Beware, though. Debt settlement companies often charge high fees and can hurt your credit score.

A balance transfer card: If your credit is good, apply for a zero- or low-interest credit card. Then transfer the balance from your high-interest cards to your new card. To entice you, these balance transfer cards will offer you a super-low annual percentage rate (APR) — for a certain period of time. Then a double-digit interest rate kicks in.

A personal loan: Get a loan from a lender at a lower interest rate. Use that loan to pay off your high-interest credit cards. Then you repay the lender a fixed amount every month for a set time period, usually two to five years.

“Personal loans tend to have lower interest rates than credit cards,” Johndrow said.

An easy place to start is Even Financial, which can help you borrow up to $100,000. Type in your info, and it compares interest rates from several lenders. There’s no charge for this. Rates start at 4.99%, and repayment plans range from two to four years.

Another option to check out is Lending Club, a social lending platform that lets you apply for credit from the general public. You can borrow $1,000 to $40,000 from groups of people who each invest a little bit into your loan. Rates start at 5.99%.

Here’s our look at how Lending Club works.

5. Adulting

Congratulations! Now that you’ve got a debt consolidation loan, do yourself a favor and don’t miss your monthly payments.

“Paying your credit cards on time accounts for 65% of your credit score,” Johndrow says.

6. Save for a Rainy Day — or Maybe a New Phone

One last thing. Get into a habit of saving up for major purchases instead of whipping out some plastic and buying something on the spot.

Sure, you’ll have to wait. But the things you really want are worth waiting for, aren’t they?

Stash and Acorns are two popular apps that offer easy, automatic ways to start saving and investing. They’re really useful for tricking your brain into saving more. You’ll save without even realizing you’re doing it.

At the very least, you’ll want some kind of emergency fund. Here’s our guide on how to start one.

If you’re drowning in credit card debt, your worst option of all is this: Don’t do anything. Just keep on paying all that interest, month after month.

“My main piece of advice is, don’t wait. You’ve got to take action as quickly as possible,” says Josh Gehring, who supervises nearly 60 banks for the Bank of Oklahoma.

“If you feel like you have a debt problem, you do.”

Mike Brassfield (mike@thepennyhoarder.com) is a senior writer at The Penny Hoarder. He knows a lot about debt, based on personal experience.

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