MAKE MONEY ONLINE POSTS: 09/27/19

الجمعة، 27 سبتمبر 2019

Coventry Building Society launches inflation-beating 2.5% regular saver with generous monthly allowance

The new account offers greater flexibility than other regular savers on the market

Stephen Little Sat, 09/28/2019 - 00:37

Coventry Building Society has launched a new inflation-busting regular saver account at 2.5%.

Savers can deposit up to £500 each month, meaning a maximum £6,000 can be saved in the first year.

After 12 months, the account transfers to an easy access saver account which pays an interest rate of 1.05%.

The new accounts can be opened at a branch, over the phone, online or by post.

There is a penalty charge of thirty days’ worth of interest for any withdrawals in the first twelve months – the equivalent of around 21p for every £100 withdrawn.

After a year, savers can take money out of the account as often as they like without charge.

Matthew Carter, head of savings and mortgages at Coventry Building Society, says: “The regular savings market is unnecessarily complex and people’s good financial intentions risk being stifled by the number of strings attached to many accounts.

“The regular saver offers an attractive rate that will encourage people to start saving, along with simple terms and conditions that make it straightforward to put money aside.”

Regular savings accounts

A regular savings account requires you to put aside money each month and can pay up to 5% interest – considerably more than the average easy-access account.

Offering some of the best rates on the market, they are ideal for someone looking to start saving.

However, some only offer the headline rate for a year or require you to be an existing customer.

Another downside is the low maximum deposit amount – usually around £250 every month - while there are penalties if you fail to make a monthly payment.

Alternatives

With falling interest rates savers are having a tough time at the moment. Taking out a regular savings account is a good way of beating inflation.

While the Coventry regular saver does not have the best interest rate on the market the maximum £500 you can deposit each month is the joint highest you can put in.

The minimum deposit you can make each month is £1 and there is no limit on the number of times savers can put money in, giving you greater flexibility than some its rivals.

Another advantage of the account is that is open to new customers. While First Direct, HSBC and M&S all offer higher paying regular savings accounts, you have to be a current account holder with them.

James Blower, industry expert and founder of the Savings Guru, says: “Current account holders of HSBC, First Direct and M&S Bank can all earn double this with their 5% regular savings accounts and Virgin Money, Kent Reliance offer 3% to savers. So, while the rate is inflation beating and competitive, there are better options for savers which I’d recommend ahead of this new account from Coventry.

“I am a big fan of regular savings accounts – they pay some of the best rates on the market, allow savers to set up their contribution on pay day - so savings contributions can go out before any spending plans - and are a great way to start saving if you don’t have a lump sum of money to open an account.”

First Direct Regular Saver - 5%

For deposits between £25 and £300 per month. The rate is fixed for 12 months and is only available to current account customers. Can be opened online or by phone.

HSBC Regular Saver - 5%

For deposits between £25 and £250 per month. The rate is fixed for 12 months and available to current account customers. Can be opened in branch or by phone.

M&S Bank Monthly Saver - 5%

Rate available on deposits between £25 and £250 to its current account holders. The interest is paid annually, and the rate is fixed for 12 months. Can be opened online, by post, over the phone or in branch.

Best open-to-all regular savers

Virgin Money Regular Saver Issue 18 - 3%

This account pays 3% on deposits of from £1 to £250 per month. This account can only be opened in branch and the 3% AER is fixed for 12 months.

Kent Reliance Regular Saver - 3%

The Kent Reliance regular saver pays 3% for deposits between £25 and £500 every month. At the end of 12 months you are transferred over Kent Reliance’s easy access account which has a rate of 1.30%. You have to open the account at one of its nine branches.

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Decision to scrap free TV licence for over-75s could be a 'bonanza' for fraudsters

Age UK says TV licence fraud could go up by 13% once the licence fee is scrapped next year

Stephen Little Sat, 09/28/2019 - 00:19

The decision to scrap TV licences for the over-75s could lead to more pensioners being targeted by fraudsters, Age UK has warned.

The charity estimates that successful scams could rocket by 13% when the new rules come into force next June, with fraudsters making off with over £320,000.

Caroline Abrahams, Age UK’s charity director, says: “Fraudsters are always searching for new opportunities to part us from our cash and it seems that the BBC’s decision to make millions of older people buy a TV licence from next summer could be a bonanza for them.

“As though the prospect of losing their free TV licence wasn’t bad enough for our over-75s, this expected upsurge in fraudulent communications adds insult to injury and will be a further kick in the teeth for anyone unfortunate enough to be caught out.”

How does the scam work?

Scammers typically contact people by letter, email or text, posing as TV Licensing – the body responsible for collecting the licence fee.

They then say that there’s been a problem with their TV licence fee payment or that the victim needs to pay up now.

There have been almost 18,000 reports of people receiving fraudulent TV licence emails and hundreds of crime reports in which the victim has lost out financially in the past year, according to Age UK.

Ms Abrahams says: “Fraud in all its guises is a real risk to older people’s finances and to their wellbeing too, and the reality is that fraudsters are merciless and it’s all too easy to be taken in.

“Our advice is to be ultra-cautious about any communications you receive linked to TV licences."

She adds: "Of course this problem is only arising because the government passed responsibility for free licences to the BBC without the money to pay for them, and this enhanced risk of scams is just the latest in the long list of reasons why the government should stump up the funding to allow TV licences to remain free for all our over-75s.”

Moneywise has approached the BBC for comment. A spokesperson says: “We take these issues very seriously and we are doing everything we can to help protect our customers against fraudsters by ensuring they can distinguish between what is a genuine TV Licensing communication and what is a scam.

"Our advice is that if people are unsure about a communication they’ve received, they should contact us directly and we can help. We never contact customers out of the blue to ask for bank details, personal information, or to tell them that they may be entitled to a refund.

"For our customers who are over 75 and have a free TV licence, we will not cold call them and will provide the information they need to contact and engage with TVL directly. Anyone who is concerned about communications that seem suspicious, you can call on 0300 790 6112 or visit www.tvl.co.uk/scam.”

Why the BBC is scrapping the TV licence

After the Conservative government shifted the cost of the licence fee for over-75s to the BBC, the corporation was left between a rock and a hard place: either scrap the concession for the elderly or cut broadcasting services.

The cost of funding the TV licence for people aged over 75 is £745 million a year.

The BBC says that to renew the scheme would cost around a fifth of its budget - the equivalent to what it spends on BBC Two, BBC Three, BBC Four, the BBC News Channel, CBBC and CBeebies.

The current licence fee costs £154.50 for a colour licence and £52 for a black and white licence.

The scrapping of the licence means up to 3.7 million pensioners will have to start paying from June 2020.

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Stay-at-Home Parents: Here are 10 Side Gigs You Can Do With Kids in Tow

Stay-at-home parents have ALL the free time…

…Said no one who ever actually stayed at home with their kids.

Commanding the homefront is a job with a capital J. And yet, during those hours at home while the kids are playing in the sprinkler, watching cartoons or — heaven bless them — napping, parents often feel like they could be doing something productive. Lucrative even.

We hear you, frazzled moms and dads. Here are 10 ways to make money as a stay-at-home parent that you can squeeze in between trips to the playground and running laundry.

Your time is worth a lot, but toddlers don’t pay. These gigs do.

10 Ways to Make Money as a Stay-at-Home Parent

1. Make and sell stuff online

Let’s get one thing out of the way: Etsy is not a set-it-and-forget-it type of website. Compared to other online marketplaces, Etsy takes some work. But that hard work can pay off as a profitable side business. And if you’re already inclined toward making crafts or spotting cool vintage finds, Etsy is the ideal marketplace for those one-of-a-kinds.

Read our complete guide to selling on Etsy to help you get started.

Not the crafty type? You can still make a handsome sum selling through Fulfillment by Amazon. A lot of Amazon sellers are private-label businesses that buy generic products from abroad, brand and pack them, then send them off to Amazon, which does the rest for you.

2. Work on Mechanical Turk

Speaking of Amazon, the online retail giant’s Mechanical Turk platform lets you complete small tasks online for a price.

According to Michael Naab, who wrote our guide (and a book) on making money with Mechanical Turk, you can expect to earn around $6 to $12 an hour doing Human Intelligence Tasks (HITs) on the platform. HITs range anywhere from completing surveys to Excel spreadsheet tasks to audio transcription.

3. Be an online tutor

Tutoring has become a prime opportunity for anyone who wants to work from home. Online tutoring companies abound, and there’s often a lot of flexibility around when and how many hours you want to devote.

Consider signing on with one of these nine companies and earn money tutoring during the kids’ swim lessons or playgroup.

4. Teach English Online

Interested in more teaching opportunities?

To fill the demand for English around the world, many companies hire native English speakers to run classes online. In most cases, online teachers can set their own schedules and earn up to $25 an hour.

To meet baseline qualifications, all you need is English fluency, a high school diploma and a computer with a high-speed internet connection. Ready to get started? Here are seven legit sites that will pay you to teach English online.

5. Write for a parenting blog

You’re already a subject-matter expert in the care and feeding of small humans. Get paid for hard-earned that knowledge by writing for a parenting blog or magazine.

6. Babysit other people’s babies

You’re already watching your own kids. You’ve got your house stocked with crafts and snacks and all the outlets are child-proofed. It’s not a new idea for stay-at-home parents to take in other charges, but now there are plenty of sites to connect you to potential clients. For starters, check out Care.com and Sittercity to create a free membership.

7. Babysit fur babies

A woman pets a dog while hugging her son in their backyard.

A cardinal rule of staying at home with kids: Get out of the house. While you’re running errands and hitting the library, build in some paying work as a pet sitter or dog-walker. As you might have guessed, there’s an app (or six) for that.

8. Sell home-baked goods

Even if you’re not a bona fide pastry chef, there’s money to be made whipping up specialty goodies the rest of the world doesn’t have the motivation to create. We talked to two people with home-baking side businesses about how they found a sweet spot.

9. Rent out your baby gear

Strollers, car seats, high chairs, play pens — these are the tools of the stay-at-home parenting trade. They’re expensive and they take up a lot of space in your life. Now there are apps that let you rent out your baby gear to other families in your city and get a little return on those big investments.

10. Check The Penny Hoarder’s Work-From-Home jobs portal

If you’re looking for a real job you can do from home, or even if you just want to browse what opportunities are out there, check in regularly with our Work-From-Home Jobs Portal, which is updated regularly with new postings. Many of them can be done from anywhere.

Molly Moorhead is a senior editor at The Penny Hoarder.

This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, which helps millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. The Inc. 5000 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the fastest-growing private media company in the U.S. in 2017.

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18 Free Apps That Help You Make Money With Your Phone

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Chances are you probably have a smartphone. And those don’t come cheap.

So why not put a dent in your phone bill and use the thing to earn some money?

We put together this list of free apps that will help you make money on your phone. You can earn rewards that are redeemable for cash and gift cards by doing some pretty simple, mindless tasks on your phone, such as playing games, browsing the web, taking surveys, watching videos and taking photos.

While these apps will definitely make you a buck or two, don’t expect to make enough to quit your job.

Still, those pennies and dollars definitely add up. Using these apps could be a great way to sock away some extra cash for big purchases or holiday shopping.

Get Paid to Kill Time

Got a few minutes while you’re standing in line or waiting at the doctor’s office? Instead of spending your downtime on Facebook or scrolling through Instagram, why not download one of these apps that pay you to take surveys, play games or test out new tools.

1. Lucktastic

There’s something so satisfying about those gas station scratch-off tickets, but it’s better to avoid them because, well, that’s not Penny Hoarding.

Instead, try scratching for free using an app called Lucktastic. Each day, it releases a new assortment of digital scratch-off tickets. Lucktastic says instant wins range from $1 to $10,000. You can also earn tokens that you can exchange for free gift cards to retailers including Amazon, Walmart, Kohl’s, Sephora and more.

2. InboxDollars

Surveys aren’t the quickest way to make money, but they’re a great way to cash in on your down time. Fill them out while you’re watching TV, riding the bus or waiting in line.

One survey site we love is called InboxDollars. It offers several short, daily surveys you can take. If you take all of them each day, you could earn an extra $730 a year — not too bad.

Here’s our ultimate guide to InboxDollars.

3. ESPN Streak for the Cash

Sports-obsessed? This one’s for you. With the ESPN Streak for the Cash app, you make predictions for upcoming games in different sports.

If you keep a long streak of correct predictions going, you get cash rewards.

4. Google Opinion Rewards

Google Opinion Rewards lets Android users earn free apps, music, movies, games and books through the Google Play store.

Get credits in exchange for taking short, anonymous surveys on your phone. Credits vary depending on the length of the survey.

5. GrabPoints

With the GrabPoints app, all you have to do is watch videos or GrabPoints TV on your phone to accumulate points. Other ways to accumulate points: Take surveys, download and test apps, play games and refer your friends to join.

Redeem your points for gift cards to Amazon, Target, Gap and more. GrabPoints is only available for Android.

6. User Testing

Before new apps launch, companies pay users to test them out. Sign up at usertesting.com to apply to become one of their testers and take a sample test. Once approved, test apps on your phone and get paid for what you think.

For every 20-minute session you complete, you get $10 via PayPal within seven days. For this one, you’ll need to try the apps, and then submit a voice recording with your feedback.

Save and Make Money on Groceries

If you’re a true Penny Hoarder, you likely cook at home more than you eat out, which means a big part of your budget goes towards buying groceries. Take advantage of these apps, many of which can help you get money back on groceries you already buy.

7. Ibotta

Ibotta is a simple cash-back app that works at tons of retailers, including grocery stores, liquor stores, even restaurants. Just download the app, choose your store, select your rebates and go shopping. When you get home, snap a photo of your receipt through the app and the money will appear in your account in 48 hours.

You can cash out for gift card or a PayPal deposit. Plus if you sign up through this link, you can collect a $10 welcome bonus.

8. Nielsen Homescan

Sign up to become a Nielsen Consumer Panelist, then use your phone to scan what you buy at the grocery store. You’ll accumulate points with each scan. The longer you stick with it, the more points-earning potential you have. You can cash in those points for gift cards or items from the NCP catalog (items include electronics, jewelry, household items and toys.)

Sell Photos, Books and Clothes

Instead of physically taking your items somewhere to sell them, stay at home and sell from the comfort of your couch.

9. Decluttr

Decluttr is a simple mobile app lets you sell your old CDs, DVDs, Blurays, video games, game consoles, phones and other media for cash. You’ll get a quote as soon as you scan an item’s barcode.

The best part? Decluttr sends you a free shipping label. Just put your stuff in a box and ship it — your money will appear in your account within 24 hours of Decluttr receiving it.

10. Letgo

You can sell just about anything on this intuitive app.

Just take a picture, type up a short description and Letgo puts it’s on the market in a matter of seconds.

11. eBay

You already know you can make money by selling everything from coupons to used books on eBay. But did you know the site has an app you can use to snap a photo, write a description and upload a listing?

It’s an easy way to become an eBay seller in just a few minutes. Just keep in mind that the site keeps a percentage of your sales.

12. Foap

Turn your smartphone photos into cash with Foap. It’s a stock photography website, so you need to have an eye for taking quality photos.

Once you download the app and sign up for an account, you can add your photos to the marketplace. When someone buys your photo, you make $5. So if 20 people buy the same photo, you make $100.

13. Popular Pays

If you’re Instagram “famous,” meaning you have thousands of followers, get the Popular Pays app. Brands will pay you to take photos of their products and broadcast them to your followers through your Instagram feed.

Do Odd Jobs

You can make a bit more cash with apps that require you to do a little work. These apps are middlemen between you and big consumer brands that want to check in on their products in various stores to ensure consistency. It’s kind of like doing market research — and you’re the collector of the data.

Keep in mind that these apps need to track your location to find jobs, which can drain your battery.

14. Field Agent

Becoming a Field Agent is kind of like mystery shopping — except you don’t have to buy anything. Download the Field Agent app and look for assignments in your area. You may be asked to take photos of displays in stores, scan barcodes and record prices. You’ll be paid $1-12 for these short jobs.

15. Gigwalk

Similar to Field Agent, use Gigwalk to find small, paying gigs in your area. Large companies want to keep tabs on in-store displays, see if products are available and check to see if prices are correctly displayed, and Gigwalk helps connect them with locals. So you’ll visit stores, snap photos and respond to questions.

Gigs can take anywhere from five minutes to a few hours to complete, and pay anywhere from $3 to $100.

16. Rewardable

Download the Rewardable app and look for tasks nearby. You might be asked to watch videos or complete surveys at home, or you could leave the house and visit retail stores or give product feedback.

Get Paid to Shop

While you’re already out shopping, keep these apps handy to make a few extra bucks.

17. Mobee

Mobee is a mystery shopping app that asks you to rate the customer service, cleanliness and other criteria at stores in your area. Once you complete a “mission” by answering questions, you get points you can redeem for gift cards or prizes.

We tried a Mobee mission at Subway that paid $8. Though the payouts aren’t as high as other mystery shopping companies, we can’t complain about a free sandwich!

18. Shopkick

Shopkick pays you simply to enter certain stores such as Macy’s, Target, Best Buy and JCPenney. You get “kicks” to walk in the store, scan barcodes and make purchases. You can redeem your kicks for gift cards to Target, Starbucks, Sephora and other stores.

Betsy Mikel is a Chicago-based freelance copywriter.

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This Company Lets You Invest Like the Wealthy (With Just $1)

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It’s no secret: Investing can a great way to grow your money. But that’s something only wealthy people do, right?

Wrong.

You don’t have to be Warren Buffet to start investing.

In fact, you can get started with just $1, using a company called Ellevest.

Plus, when you sign up through The Penny Hoarder, you’ll get a $25 bonus in your Ellevest account.*

All You Need is 10 Minutes and $1 to Get Started

The nice thing about Ellevest? You don’t even have to know how to pick stocks.

When you sign up, you’ll answer a few questions about yourself and your goals. Want to buy a home? Plan for retirement? Save for a vacation? Then, Ellevest creates a customized investment plan for you.

Even better: The whole platform is designed for women, by women and in support of women-owned businesses. In fact, the company was founded to address the fact that women statistically get paid less than men (and live longer!), which most financial companies typically ignore.

Ellevest is free to sign up for, and there’s no minimum balance. That means, if you need, you can start with $1. Then you’ll pay an annual fee of 0.25% of your assets under management to Ellevest. (For context, that’s $25 on a $10,000 account.)

Oh, and don’t forget about that $25 bonus to help you get started!

*The Ellevest The Penny Hoarder promotional offer is valid for the first 1,000 new clients of Ellevest who enter through this designated landing page. Clients who enroll and fund their non-retirement account will receive $25 added to their highest priority goal in their Ellevest account. Clients who enroll and fund their retirement account will receive a $25 Amazon gift card which can be redeemed by visiting www.amazon.com. Please review Amazon.com Gift Card Terms and Conditions prior to redemption. Ellevest is not responsible for lost Amazon Gift Cards. Ellevest’s processing time for depositing $25 into a client’s Ellevest account or delivery of a $25 Amazon gift card may be up to 60 days.

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The Math Behind the “Never Ending Pasta Pass”

Mary writes in with a fun question that was originally going to be in a mailbag, but my answer got a little long:

My husband and I really enjoy eating at Olive Garden and have considered buying the Never Ending Pasta Pass when it has been available. We are trying to work out the math on it and hoped you could help us. Is it worth it?

Let’s dig in here.

The “Never Ending Pasta Pass” is a promotional item sold by Olive Garden on a somewhat recurring basis. For $100 plus tax, usually totaling around $107, the pass allows you to order the “Never Ending Pasta Bowl” meal at Olive Garden for free every time you go to the restaurant in a nine week span.

To be clear, the “Never Ending Pasta Bowl” is a dine-in-only menu item at Olive Garden that allows you to order a combination of several pastas, several sauces, and several toppings, along with unlimited soup or salad and unlimited breadsticks, for $11 plus tax (around $11.80 in my area).

The basic math is simple: you’d have to go to Olive Garden a little over nine times during that period in order to save money buying the pass versus just ordering the “Never Ending Pasta Bowl” off the menu. On your tenth visit in that nine week span, you would be spending less per visit using the pass than just buying it regularly, and that remains true for every visit thereafter within the period. So, if you want to simply make it cheaper than just buying the “Never Ending Pasta Bowl” each time, you have to visit Olive Garden more than once a week and order the “Never Ending Pasta Bowl” each time.

But how cheap can it get? Let’s say you went there for lunch or dinner every single day during that nine week period – 63 days in all. If you paid $108 for the pass after tax and went there 63 times in that period, you’d be effectively paying $1.71 per visit for a “Never Ending Pasta Bowl.” That’s pretty good, actually, but there are a few catches.

First, you would reasonably have to pay a tip each time you visited. If you pay a 15% tip on your meal, that’s $1.77 in tip each visit on top of the food cost each visit. A 20% tip is $2.36 on top of the food cost each visit.

Second, if you’re drinking anything besides water, you’re paying a restaurant price for that beverage, too. A “bottomless” fountain drink comes in at $2.99, for example, and their various fruit juices and coffees range from $2 to $5, according to their menu. If you want to order wine or another alcoholic beverage, the price goes up significantly. (The most cost-efficient way of using the pass is to just use the pass and drink water with it, of course.)

It is worth noting here that these extra expenses don’t really affect the comparison between just ordering a “Never Ending Pasta Bowl” and a “Pasta Pass.” It’s just the additional cost of dining at a restaurant. If you just go in there and have the “Never Ending Pasta Bowl,” whether with the pass or not, and you also order a fountain drink and tip at 20%, your cost beyond the entree is going to be between $6 and $7, depending on local taxes. That’s simple reality. Thus, even if you’re only “paying” $1.71 per visit because of daily use of the pass, you’re tacking on at least $2.36 per visit and likely tacking on $6 per visit, and possibly tacking on more than that.

Then there’s the final issue: eating at Olive Garden on a daily basis for nine weeks is going to have a negative health impact that contributes to long term health costs. If you go there and have a “Never Ending Pasta Bowl” every single day for nine weeks and eat enough of it to make it worth even considering as an entree option, you’re almost guaranteed to be exceeding your daily caloric intake unless that’s literally the only thing you eat each day. The nutritional facts on those “never ending pasta bowls” are pretty amazing – the absolute healthiest combination I could find, which is whole wheat linguine, marinara, and garden vegetables, adds up to 525 calories, while a combination like the cavatappi, creamy mushroom sauce, and Italian sausage adds up to 1,470 calories for a single bowl. Add in two breadsticks at 140 calories each and a bowl of soup, most of which weigh in around 200 calories, and you’re very close to 2,000 calories for that meal with just a single bowl of pasta and no refills. The sodium count is amazing, too. Let’s not even add in any extra beverages.

The reality is that in terms of reasonably healthy eating that will keep your long term health care costs low, Olive Garden is probably in the “rare occasion” camp, not the “daily meal” camp. To eat this daily and maintain some reasonable definition of healthy eating, it’d probably have to be your main meal of the day, with just a single bowl of the healthiest combination you could put together, one breadstick, and a small amount of the salad.

Not only that, it’s not actually that much of a bargain, as you can approximate this meal at home for a small fraction of the price. I can approximate this meal at home for about $8 for all five of us – naturally, the “pasta bowl” won’t have quite as many options for sauce and toppings, but I could make something distinct for everyone in that price range in reasonable time if I wanted to. That would include a few homemade breadsticks for everyone and a nice side salad or a bowl of soup. I’d also guarantee that it would be light years healthier than the Olive Garden option and (debatably) taste as good, too. That’s about $1.60 a plate, and I don’t have to pay taxes on any of that food, and any beverages would be a tiny fraction of the cost, and I don’t have to pay a tip, either.

It’s not a time issue, either. Assuming I make the dough in the morning and let it rise all day, I can probably get this full meal to the table in about twenty minutes, we eat in fifteen or twenty minutes with conversation, and I have the table cleared and everything in the dishwasher in ten more minutes. That’s fifty minutes, which is less time than we’d probably spend at the restaurant, let alone time spent driving there and driving home.

But what about leftovers? The strategy that many people point to with the Never Ending Pasta Bowl/Pass is to order a second bowl and essentially take it home as leftovers in a doggie bag. That way, you have lunch covered the next day. While that would extend the savings of the pass notably, as you’re effectively getting two meals out of the prices noted above, you’re also multiplying the negative health consequence. I seriously can’t recommend eating an entire pasta bowl twice a day for nine weeks, as the calories for even a “healthier” pasta bowl would blow away daily recommended health standards if eaten twice a day.

If you’re really going to dive into this and are trying to get the maximum value out of it over the short and long term, my recommendation would be to go to the restaurant once or twice a week during the span of the pass, order a pasta bowl and a refill and water, fill up as much as possible on soup or salad and breadsticks, and take home the leftover pasta bowl contents for lunch for the next day or two. This will get you about thirty meals worth of food out of about twelve visits, and with the cost of tipping about $2 per visit, you’re spending a total of $132 to cover about thirty meals, or roughly $4.50 per meal with the pass. If you do this more frequently, the price per meal will go down further, but that’s a lot of calories and sodium in a relatively short amount of time, which amps up your likelihood of health-related expenses.

(What about that lifetime pass, for only $500? You’d have to eat a never ending pasta bowl 50 times just to break even on it and somewhere around 60 times just to get your meal cost plus tip with just water to drink down to $10 per meal. Unless you utterly love Olive Garden, you’re almost assuredly going to be sick of the Never Ending Pasta Bowl by that point, and prior to that it’s not a bargain. I’d definitely pass on this unless you’d be content eating at Olive Garden every week for years and ordering a limited selection of dishes without getting tired of it.)

For me, I’ll save Olive Garden for a rare occasion and just make pasta dinners at home. It’s a lot cheaper, particularly for a family of five, but I’d probably do the same even if I were single and just make lots of pasta meals in advance.

The post The Math Behind the “Never Ending Pasta Pass” appeared first on The Simple Dollar.

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Dear Penny: Should I Invest My $10K Savings or Use It to Pay Off Debt?

Dear K.,

My vote is for “none of the above.” (Wait, that is an option, right?)

Assuming the $10,000 is your only non-retirement savings, I’d suggest you keep it as liquid savings.

I know, I know: When you’re paying interest on debt and you have investments that are (hopefully) gaining value, your pile of cash can look a lot like your lazy relative who hogs the couch and the remote but doesn’t contribute. And you want to scream: Just. Do. Something. But then when you really need something, they come through.

Cash doesn’t do much in the way of earning interest, but you need it as a lifeline in case of an emergency. Generally, the recommendation is to have at least three to six months’ worth of expenses saved in a rainy-day fund.

Consider that if you’re earning $58,000 a year, $10,000 might only replace three or four months of your net income if you were temporarily unable to work or you lost your job — so $10,000 is probably the minimum you should have sitting around in cash.

The good news is, it sounds like your finances are in pretty good shape. Your debt isn’t insurmountable, and you’re the rare 30-year-old who has nearly one year’s salary saved for retirement — which is the recommended retirement savings based on your age.

You’re also relatively young, you’re single and you don’t own your home — and while we all need to be prepared for emergencies, your odds of a major unexpected expense are probably lower compared with, say, a 55-year-old with a family of five who owns a home with a roof that hasn’t been replaced in 40 years.

So provided that you’re in relatively good health, your check engine light isn’t on and you don’t have reason to believe your employer will replace you with a robot soon, I’ll give you my blessing to keep your emergency fund at the lower end of the three-to-six-month range.

That means if $10,000 would cover at least three months of your expenses, I won’t bug you to keep socking away more in your emergency fund for now, and you can start putting any monthly excess toward one of your financial goals.

Personally, I’d opt for using whatever extra money you can to pay down your debt over investing. Sure, the interest on your debt may be lower than the potential gains in the stock market. But as you put it, investing would be a gamble — and with the stock market’s volatility and renewed concerns about a recession, you’d need to be prepared for the possibility that your investment could tank, at least temporarily.

By paying down debt, you’re getting guaranteed returns in a sense, because you’re guaranteed to save on interest, and you’ll also lower your monthly expenses, eventually.

As for the $10,000, you can still put it to work a little by putting it in a high-yield savings account or money market account, which can typically earn you 2% interest or more — unfortunately, a far cry from the 7% or 8% returns we’re often told to expect from the market on average, but still better than the 0.09% the average savings account currently pays.

Just remember that this $10,000 is there for an emergency. Keep it in an account that’s separate from any money you’re saving for a big goal, like a home purchase. Your goal with this money is to look but don’t touch — unless absolutely necessary.

Robin Hartill is a senior editor at The Penny Hoarder and the voice behind Dear Penny. Send your questions about saving money to AskPenny@thepennyhoarder.com.

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