Staff Writer
Bill Fay
Bill “No Pay” Fay has lived a meager financial existence his entire life. He started writing/bragging about it in 2012, helping birth Debt.org into existence as the site’s original “Frugal Man.” Prior to that, he spent more than 30 years covering the high finance world of college and professional sports for major publications, including the Associated Press, New York Times and Sports Illustrated. His interest in sports has waned some, but he is as passionate as ever about not reaching for his wallet. Bill can be reached at [email protected].
Credit unions are nonprofit organizations that provide members the same financial services as banks, but without the emphasis on making money. The 115 million Americans who belong to credit unions…
Interest rates and credit cards have a powerful — and potentially explosive — relationship in the U.S. economy. Interest rates are the economic fuel that makes credit card companies so…
Watching somebody legally swipe a car can be entertaining in a movie. The downer comes if you leave the theater and find your car isn’t where you left it. The Repo…
Grab four quarters from your car’s ashtray and make a quick trip to the discount store and you could immediately begin a budgeting system that can revolutionize your financial fortunes…
We’ve all heard this one: Numbers don’t lie. And, probably, this one, too: You can make numbers tell any story you want. Experience tells us both claims can be true…
Filing for bankruptcy can be a scary thought, in part because the fallout from filing is significant. However, if bankruptcy is necessary and is managed properly, it can offer short-term pain…
Dave Ramsey, the silky voiced straight-arrow with 13 million radio listeners built an eight-figure media empire on the gospel of financial modesty rooted in self-reliance. He preaches daily against the…
The calls came like clockwork, several times a week just as the Pinkuses were heading for bed. Each time, it was the same: a threatening voice with an even more…
It’s easy to get behind on paying the monthly bills. The economy may have slowed your ability to generate income, your investments may have dwindled, or perhaps you had an…
What do you call it when someone tells one side of a story? Dave Ramsey calls it: “The Truth.” Ramsey boldly proclaims on DaveRamsey.com that he’s going to deliver “The…
Few people sail through life without borrowing. Almost everyone needs a loan to buy a car, finance a home purchase, pay for a college education, or cover a medical emergency.…
There are billions of dollars awarded every year for grants and scholarships that target specific students based on ethnic, gender, religious and other clearly-defined backgrounds. Businesses, community organizations, clubs, churches…
Adjustable Rate Mortgage – Universally known as ARMs – have cleaned up their image enough to once again be considered a useful product in the home-buying market. An adjustable rate…
The definition of debt collector harassment is to intimidate, abuse, coerce, bully or browbeat consumers into paying off debt. This happens most often over the phone, but harassment also could…
A line of credit is a pre-approved loan that allows you to get money when you need it and not all at once. These credit lines are sometimes backed by…
The Direct Loan program run by the U.S. Department of Education has two plans under it that often get confused with each other because they share the name “PLUS.” The…
Reverse mortgages allow homeowners 62 and older to extract home equity without selling their houses. Reverse mortgage issuers pay cash to owners in lump sums or over time. You do…
Latest News on Student Loan Forgiveness Student Loan Forgiveness remains a hot topic for the Biden Administration, which announced July 14th that another 800,000 borrowers enrolled in income-drive repayment plans, have…
The question ‘can you file for bankruptcy online’ is a tricky one in 2022. Because the answer is: You can’t, unless you have a specific certification that typically only goes…
Once you know what a HELOC — a home-equity line of credit — is and how you intend to use it, one key question remains: How do I get the…
With a nod to Mark Twain, inflation has replaced the weather as the thing everyone talks about it, but nobody seems to do anything about it. Until now. Not that…
America has turned into a nation of quitters, though that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Spurred by the COVID pandemic, millions of people have joined “The Great Resignation” that’s happening…
The rules governing repayment of federal student loans contain so many nooks and crannies that it shouldn’t come as a surprise that you may have missed one created during the…
The average Joe – not Biden – figures to benefit most from passage of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan. Approximately 145 million Americans will receive a third round of…
Biden wants the minimum wage – currently set at $7.25 an hour – to jump to $15 an hour by 2025. The increases would be phased in at approximately $1.75…
President-elect Joe Biden unveiled the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion war on the prolonged suffering of Americans hardest hit by coronavirus. Included in his proposal: a fresh round of…
The second COVID-19 relief bill is now law – all 3,126 pages of it. The people in Congress who passed it admit they don’t know what all is in it,…
If you haven’t looked at your bank account this week, now might be a splendid time. The long wait for a second stimulus check from the U.S. government finally is…
A second stimulus check – the financial gift from the U.S. government to help consumers recover from the economic belt coronavirus gave the American economy – needs only a signature…
If the biggest employee benefit you receive is when your company bothers to fill the toilet paper rolls in the employee bathroom, you might not want to read this: Google…
If you are paying on a federal student loan, you probably already know that the government CARES Act has provided benefits that suspends payment and interest requirements through May 1,…
Americans with student loan debt have a $1.6 trillion question on their minds: What would President Trump or a President Biden do about all that money these 45 million borrowers…
There hasn’t been much good economic news in 2020, but if you’re buried in student loans, there was an astoundingly positive development recently. Thanks to a recent court ruling, you…
The COVID-19 pandemic has created record unemployment, erased profit margins, closed businesses and wreaked havoc on almost every family’s money outlook. It has even affected America’s ultimate get-out-of-jail financial symbol…
Veterans indebted to the Department of Veterans Affairs won a partial payment reprieve this summer that will last at least through the end of 2020. The VA action extends a…
Dorothy surely wasn’t thinking of life in a COVID-19 pandemic when she clicked those heels in the “Wizard of Oz” and opined that ‘there’s no place like home.’ But her…
Congress and the White House are still debating whether the HEALS Act, HEROES Act – or some compromise Act in between – will deliver the next round of coronavirus relief…
When the House of Representative passed the $3-trillion HEROES Act on May 15, it all but guaranteed that a second stimulus check would arrive for Americans in need of financial help…
The storm is coming. American consumers will be filing personal bankruptcies in record numbers by the end of 2020. That is the projection from bankruptcy attorneys, bankers and other experts…
The phrase “stimulus check” is second only to “coronavirus” or “COVID-19” as something to talk about these days and people are definitely talking. About 159 million Americans have received the…