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Monday Night Finance- Volume 66

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Monday, 25 April 2022 / Published in Monday Night Finance

Monday Night Finance- Volume 66

9 Legit Ways to Make Money With Your Bike

Have you ever considered driving Uber or Lyft to make some extra money? While these apps can put money in your bank account, they can also be expensive. You have to pay for gas, oil changes, and new tires. At the end of the day, you might realize that you are making much less money than you thought you were. While it can be expensive to drive your car around to transport passengers (or food for DoorDash), bicycles can be a much cheaper alternative. This article explores different ways you can make money with a bicycle.

You don’t always have to ride your bike to make money on the side. If you have a bike that you don’t regularly use, you can also list it on Spinlister to earn cash. It doesn’t cost anything to list your bike on the platform. You only get charged when someone rents out the bike. At that time, the company keeps 17.5 percent of the total rental cost. ~Frugal Rules

Let’s start with the obvious choices: DoorDash and Instacart. Not only can you deliver food on a bike with these apps but it can be especially advantageous for you to do so. Not only would you save on the fuel and maintenance costs of your vehicle, but you’re also getting paid to exercise and reducing your carbon footprint. It’s a triple win! But there are more ways to earn money with a bicycle besides just making deliveries. Did you know that you can rent out your bicycle when you’re not using it with Spinlister or turn your bike into a moving billboard with the Ridevert app? If you have a bicycle and are looking for extra cash, check out this article.

Planning a mini-retirement with kids

Mini-retirements are just one of the potential ways that people are exploring the FIRE (financial independence/retire early) movement. You may have read articles of people who have quit for a year and taken a sabbatical to drive across the United States or hike the Camino de Santiago. These sabbaticals are often described as pivotal and life-changing by those who undertake these mini-retirements. However, very rarely do these stories of mini-retirements involve kids. Financial independence blogger and mother of 5 Jillian Johnsrud just completed a 12 week “mini-retirement” traveling with her kids and shared what she learned.

My family of 7 just returned from a 12-week road trip in our 26-foot camper. Planning this kind of trip can be overwhelming. There are so many unknowns and complications to work through. Large adventures with kids in tow (ages 14, 13, 9, 8, and 6), seem wonderful in theory, but when it comes down to the nitty-gritty can be stressful to get started. ~Jillian Johnsrud

As someone with my own family, I thought that a mini-retirement or sabbatical was completely out of the realm of possibility for my family. What about school? What if we ruined our kids lives? Jillian did a great job of describing how school and family dynamics worked during this time. She un-enrolled her kids from public school, homeschooled them for 12 weeks, and then re-enrolled the kids upon her return. Although she was worried that one or more children would fall behind academically, she in fact was happily surprised to find that they all excelled academically during this time. She also discussed the calculus of upsetting the kids and the trade-offs that they faced as a family. If you’ve ever dreamed of having a major family trip but were worried about the logistics, this article was written just for you.

A Brief History of American Money

Did you know that American currency got its start during the Civil War? I sure didn’t. In fact, while I consider myself fairly knowledgeable about money and read finance articles every day, I knew very little about the history of paper money in the United States. In this interesting article by GoCurryCracker, I learned so many facts about the history of money and banking throughout US history.

Last fall during a trip to Virginia, we stopped into the American Civil War Museum in Richmond. Among the many well-crafted displays was an excellent exhibit on the history of American money and how the currency we know and use today began as a result of the war. ~Go Curry Cracker

Paper money was created during the US Civil War as a tool to finance the war. One cool thing about being the government is that if you don’t have enough money to pay for something, you can just print more money. Which, as I learned from the article, is what both the Union and Confederate governments tried to do to finance the war. Unfortunately, a biproduct of printing money is inflation, which apparently was a much bigger problem in the Confederate states. This printing of money by a central bank during the Civil War was a major innovation; before that, each bank printed their own money and it often became worthless overnight (could you imagine???). This creating of currency also resulted in our distinctive green color of money. The government used chromium oxide to make the money turn green which made it harder to counterfeit. The article does a wonderful job of explaining not just the start of dollar, but also about many innovations in the US currency that continue to the present day. It’s definitely an interesting read!

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Shirley Hou
CountAbout was Perfect
15-03-2017

I was looking for finance software to use as treasurer of the parent-teacher association at my child's school. CountAbout was perfect - it had all the register features and download capabilities that I was familiar with from desktop Quicken, but it has the advantage of being in the cloud so I can use it from any computer.

 
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Amanda Sherlock
25-08-2020

I started using Quicken in 1987, before I had my own PC. I continued using it for years, frustrated by the frequent breaks in the synchronization. Finally I took the leap and used Mint for a year or two. Free software is worth as much as I pay for. Finally, in 2019 I found Countabout. The synchronization is great and I am happy to have a product that's easy to use and reliable. The customer support is excellent and very responsive to my questions.
There aren't as many bells and whistles as Quicken but the simplicity outweighs the complications.

 
Barbara Ann Feeney
16-05-2016

I switched from pencil and paper on grid accounting paper, then to a Google spreadsheet, then to CountAbout. Really happy with how this app makes it easy to track how I doing, staying (or not) on budget.

 
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Steve P.
22-09-2017

My search for a cloud-based alternative to Quicken is over! Very easy to transfer my Quicken data and customize my account. Thank you CountAbout!

 
‏@davepurcell
15-11-2016

I rarely tweet endorsements, but -- after years of using/hating Quicken, Countabout is awesome for tracking home budget/finances. Thx!

 
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Richard Luna
03-02-2021

I'm a one-person real estate brokerage and having accurate financial records and being able to easily search transactions and generate reports is crucial. I'd been using Quicken for Mac for 10+ years and wanted to migrate to using a Chromebook instead of a Mac, to do that I had to find a replacement for Quicken.

The replacement had to be online; available from my phone, tablet, etc., and no software installations almost every year. I immediately dismissed any 'free' financial software (Mint, etc.) - I believe that you get what you pay for and there is no such thing as 'free.'

I settled on Tiller and CountAbout and subscribed to both; I quickly decided that a spreadsheet is not what I wanted. I wanted something that worked a lot like Quicken and CountAbout fit the bill. It took me awhile to fully embrace it but once I did I've been very happy and would not go back to Quicken even if they offered a fully online version. The few times I've had a question about using CountAbout I've always gotten a response by the end of the day - and often in an hour or less. If feels like I'm working with a small enterprise that's interested in putting out a superior application, improving it and solving issues and responding to questions. I'm very satisfied!

 
David M.
16-07-2016

CountAbout is as easy to use on my mobile as it is on the desktop and it provides me with the same or better information than Quicken.

 
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Jim Powell
17-03-2018

Vastly superior to the execrable Quicken, which caused me to have to choose a new bank password every time I used it. CA is fast, simple, and all you need unless you have a complicated investment portfolio. Its almost fun!

 
Nate E.
05-02-2016

Fantastic! I finally found a great replacement for Quicken! CountAbout is entirely cloud-based, so you can access it from whatever OS you happen to be using. And the mobile app isn't hamstrung like Quicken's. No looking back for me, this is a great app and a great service!

 
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Jeffrey Wilk
02-04-2018

Great product and great customer service. Thanks!

 
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Keith Hurst
22-05-2020

I've been trying to ditch Quicken for years, finally a worthy replacement, but it's so much more, so clean and intuitively designed. I was really surprised and delighted to find a full featured iphone app that meets all my needs.

 
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Nancy
10-08-2018

I love CountAbout! I have hated Quicken for years, but didn't have an alternative. Now I do! I love that the cost is only $9.99 per year for the basic service (which is all I need). You can upgrade for more features, if you need them. But for personal use, the basic plan is just fine. When I found CountAbout, I gleefully gave Quicken the boot and I haven't looked back or missed it at all. Bye bye Quicken!!!

 
Widgets to Compare Monthly Spending in Active Categories
17-02-2017

Huzzah! I can add widgets now and already made one to compare my monthly spending in my active categories to my budget. Excellent. That tool is one of my favorite features in a personal finance product.

 
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Ann
28-06-2021

Countabout's concept is awesome. I track checking and credit cards by transactions, and investments by total only. The reason for four stars is that periodically the investment accounts refuse to update the correct amount. Then, I have to unlink the account, delete the account then set up the account a second, third or fourth time. Often times, when trying to link a new account, CA logs me out. If you have patience, CA is a hundred times better than Quicken, but not yet perfect. Still trying to set up a credit card account after 6 attempts. At some point, it will click.

 
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Dana Linder
29-03-2019

This is an incredibly well thought out program.

It imports QIF files perfectly. I tried a number that failed miserably.

It has a function that emails reminders about scheduled transactions. That is an extremely useful function that I hadn't seen anywhere.

Tech support is second to none. All my questions were answered in detail within hours (sometimes minutes).

The companion phone app is very simple. You can browse, search, enter transactions and see scheduled transaction. That's really all you need on the phone.

It's one failing for me is that I have a transaction that I have a transaction that occurs on the 3rd Wednesday of the month, and it's not possible to set that up. It's easy enough for me to change the date of next transaction when I enter the current one.

I am extremely impressed with the company. The trial is free for 15 days. You have nothing to lose.

 
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Colin R. Vine
13-07-2021

I have been using Countabout Basic for a few months now and love the program. It is far and away better than any other personal finance program I have used.
I would recommend Countabout to anyone. Give it a try. The web interface is easy to use on my Chromebook and on my Android phone and tablet.
When I have had a query, the company has written back almost instantaneously. Great service!

 
My Bank Tracker
24-11-2016

...you won’t be bombarded with ads when you log in. Mint, for example, uses targeted ads to help keep the platform free. All in all, CountAbout could be a good choice for Quicken and Mint users who want to start fresh with their finances without losing their past transaction history.

 
Mark Goldfarb
20-01-2017

I love the software – nice and clean – the categories was a must have that your competitors are lacking.

 
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Wayne Everett
07-02-2022

I have been using Countabout for over 2 years. I got sick of quicken continuing to "improve" itself with crap I did not want, even if they did not increase their costs constantly. Countabout has done everything that I need. I have 20+ accounts linked and all is great!

 

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CountAbout® is an easy-to-use online personal finance application that imports data from Quicken and Mint and automatically downloads data from banking, credit card, and retirement accounts. With no software to install, we’re anywhere you have an Internet connection. Our platform is stable, secure, and totally private. Our dedicated customer service team is friendly, knowledgeable, and quick to respond.

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