Children often dream of the day they can call themselves grownups, but few look forward to—let alone think about—the financial realities of independence. It’s never too early to start teaching your children how to save money and spend responsibly. “As parents, our job is to set our children up for …
Read More »Money Matters
Buyer Beware
As back-to-school time slowly segues into the holiday season, parents will be spending money on a variety of purchases. With busy fall schedules and more to buy, it’s easy not to notice money missing from a bank account or when an unsanctioned purchase winds up on a credit card statement. …
Read More »Sane Spending
Ashley Campos worked for a large electronics and entertainment retailer for nine years and the experience made her loathe the holiday shopping season. “I hate how people act,” the Frederick resident says. Plus, the deals “aren’t always that great during the holidays. You can sometimes find better deals during the …
Read More »Assistance, please
Marc Blatt and his wife, Rachel, had every intention of sending their 7-year-old twin daughters, Hannah and Tova, to public school. But after visiting some of the local elementary schools and talking with their friends, the Blatts had a change of heart. Instead, they decided to send their girls to …
Read More »Start-Up Spirit
The rules have changed, Aisha DaCosta says about of today’s job market—for adults as well as for kids. “There’s no such thing as job security. How do you make yourself valuable,” asks DaCosta who founded I AM O’KAH! (pronounced “I AM OKAY!”) in 2011 to teach Baltimore students about the …
Read More »Home Work
by Liz McMahon Flexibility is a “tremendous benefit” when it comes to being a parent and a business owner, says Kelli Gravelle, owner of Kelli’s Sign Painting Parties and Custom Vinyl. Gravelle, 34, of Reisterstown, is the mother of three children aged 6 and under. She had career in law …
Read More »Buying a home, with debt
In this country, there has always been a well-worn path to household wealth—and that’s buying the house itself. Since the 2008 recession, the home is “still the major source of stable wealth” in this country, says J.P. Krahel, an accounting professor at Loyola University Maryland’s Sellinger School of Business and …
Read More »All in a Day’s Work
Summer job. Those words may conjure up different reactions, depending on your age. If you are old enough to look back on a summer job, you likely have fond memories of fun co-workers, not-funny-at-the-time-but-hilarious-now workplace horror stories and that feeling of money in your pocket that was all yours. But …
Read More »Score!
When I was a kid, exercise consisted of running around the neighborhood and playing backyard games with friends. The most organized sport I participated in was summer swim team where, quite frankly, I was mostly in it for the permission to eat strawberry Jell-O crystals straight from the box …
Read More »Downsizing
Baltimore-area family the Smiths followed the trajectory of countless homeowners before them. They bought a “starter house”—a reasonably sized duplex—where they lived when their two children were young, before “buying up”. Their second home was a big old house dating to the late 1800s with a large wrap-around porch, …
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