As Mr. Cheap announced yesterday, our blog partnership has come to an end.  It’s been a great three years and I only hope that he continues to write elsewhere, so I can still enjoy his posts.

Future direction of Money Smarts Blog

My plan for Money Smarts Blog is to make the blog more focused on personal finance.  There will be the usual range of personal finance topics, but there will be an increased emphasis on investing topics such as investing accounts and investing products.

I’m going to do one post on Wednesdays and a roundup on Fridays.  I may try doing the occasional extra post, but my hope is that by only having one “real” post per week – the quality will be higher than if I try to do several posts per week.

I wrote a book!

I have written a book – it’s very, very close to being published.  I’m not going to reveal the book topic just yet, but I hope to announce it sometime this month.  Writing and self-publishing a book has been a very interesting project. It’s a lot like doing home renovation – there is always one more thing to do. You might have noticed the name change underneath the post title – this is a result of the book. It’s hard to sell books that are written by “Mike”.

Thanks a lot for reading Money Smarts Blog and thanks to Mr. Cheap for all his great posts!

Mike recently hinted at some upcoming changes and got frequent commenters intrigued. In the past, it’s often take us a couple of stabs to clearly convey changes to the blog, so this is my half of the description of what’s happening.  Mike should be providing more details tomorrow.

Mike recently called me up, reminded me that when I sold him my half of the blog we’d agreed that either one of us could opt-out of the paying me $20 / post agreement we’d made, and that he wanted to bring it to an end. My reaction was actually to laugh, because I’d been planning for a while to tell him I was ready to wrap it up as well, so we were completely on the same page (the official credit for the “dump” goes to Mike, but it was a very mutual decision! ).

My understanding of Mike’s perspective, which I’m sure will be explained further in future posts and be put into effect in September, is that he’s interested in making the blog more practical, with posts that explain precisely how to do things. I certainly have a “navel gazing” element to my take of personal finance, musing about what it all means more often than detailing alternative asset allocations.

My current plans are somewhat up in the air. Part of me wants to go back to blogging on my own, with a more experimental approach (incorporate pod-casts, shorter daily posts, longer essays, instructional videos and the like). Part of me is drawn to moving to a totally different area and starting to blog on something other than personal finance. Part of me is also drawn to using my “blog writing” time to move forward on one of my book ideas. The current twice a week, close-to-1000 word blog posting has gotten somewhat stale for me, and if I’m going to keep learning I think I need to move to something new.

At a conference recently I talked to a woman who said that she feels every grad student needs something outside their studies to “feed their soul”. She said she cooks gourmet dinners for a dinner party every Sunday night and that feeds her soul (and her friends’ stomaches!). In “Better“, Atul Gawande talks about something similar when he discusses how writing makes him a better surgeon (and he recommends to every surgeon that they have another activity that they’re passionate about outside the hospital). Blogging has served that role for me for the last couple years of my PhD program, so it’s time to find a new outlet for this part of my life.

At every step of the way, Mike and I have been of almost the exact same mind about most issues (joining forces, how to run the blog, advertising policies, investing philosophies, acceptable and unacceptable behaviour on the part of commenters, and when to go our separate ways). From my end, I really couldn’t have asked for a better partnership (if I can find a woman like Mike I better marry her immediately! ).

Thanks to the Quest for Financial Security / Quest for Four Pillars / Four Pillars / Money Smarts Blog readers and commenters and the Canadian (and International) Personal Finance bloggers for the last three years, it’s been a blast! I’ve LOVED the comments and trackbacks (responses on other blogs to my posts)!!!

The Toronto heat wave is finally over. I think it started sometime in February?

Lots of big announcements regarding Money Smarts Blog next week, so make sure you come back and check them out. One announcement on Tuesday and another on Wednesday.

My wife sent me a couple of great quotes regarding inactivity this week – I thought they were great.

You cannot plough a field by turning it over in your mind.

Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.
Samuel Johnson

My faves

Michael James on Money wrote a neat post on exactly how much his in-ground pool cost in 2010 dollars.  You’ll have to read the post to find out the cost, but it is big bucks for an item that probably has a neutral effect on your house price.  It was worth it for him though.

Jonathan Fields had a great post about how the little things on your to-do list can prevent you from completing your important tasks.

More great links

My Own Advisor has switched his RRSP holdings to low-cost ETFs.

Remodeling This Life wrote about her adventures in Algonquin Park.

The Financial Blogger brags about his huge passive income while blogging from his yacht.

Saving to Invest shows how refinancing may appear to save money, but in fact often cost you money.

The Oblivious Investor says that most retirement calculators are garbage.

Landlord Rescue came up with 11 reasons to use a real estate agent.

Rachelle wrote a post for this blog called A Modest Income Tax Proposal.  The title was based on a Jonathan Swift story called A Modest Proposal which is an entertaining read, even though it was written a couple of centuries ago.

Million Dollar Journey exposes the downside of owning REITs.

Canadian Capitalist wrote about a site that will keep track of your ACB and capital gains.

Preet covers the news that ING has launched a free chequing account.

Larry MacDonald thinks the financial sector is too big.

Canadian Couch Potato offers some guidance for choosing a Canadian dividend ETF.

For the bloggers:

Blogthority warns don’t be a slave to your regular readers.

A while ago I reviewed Rob Carrick’s excellent book – new book “Rob Carricks’s Guide to What’s Good, Bad and Downright Awful in Canadian Investments Today“.  I managed to get a copy of his previous book, “How to Pay Less and Keep More For Yourself: The Essential Consumer Guide to Canadian Banking and Investing” out of the library and gave it a quick read.  How to Pay Less and Keep More For Yourself is a pretty good book.  It’s more basic than his most recent book and a bit dated in a few places.  However, there is a lot of good advice regarding banking ie bank accounts, credit cards and mortgages.  The investing section is pretty good too.  Most MSB readers would be better served getting this book from the library, however it might make a good gift for someone who is just getting started with managing their own money.

On with the links

Investor Junkie comments on a recent study which says that credit card reward programs transfer money from the poor to the rich.  He says this is nonsense, and I agree.

Credit Card Chaser wrote about the same study and thinks that it is a crock.  I agree with him too. 

Get Money Energy speculates on which Canadian bank will raise its dividend first?

Where Does All My Money Go talks about a contago killing commodity ETF. Are contagos good things or bad things?  Read to find out.

Canadian Capitalist discusses the paradox of financial advice.

Million Dollar Journey has some tips on how to save money when eating out.

Thicken My Wallet says that investing in yourself is a good investment.

Michael James clearly has a man crush on Moshe Milevsky – he reviews Your Money Milestones which apparently is an excellent book.

The Oblivious Investor has some pretty good basic investment advice.

Larry MacDonald thinks that Manulife is a contrarian buy.

For the bloggers

Blogthority shows how to write money making posts more efficiently.

With the hot weather we’ve been in enjoying in Toronto, it’s hard to believe that September is only a few weeks away. September will bring changes to the temperature as well as school for younger folks. It will also bring my announcement of the big project I’ve been working on, and big changes for this blog.

Author visits

One of the highlights of this summer has been meeting up with a couple of published authors. I had the good fortune to meet up with Preet from WhereDoesAllMyGo.com who wrote “RRSPS: The definitive book on RRSPS” as well as Kerry (and her hubby Carl) from Squawkfox.com who wrote “397 Ways to save money“. Both of them are very interesting and I look forward to meeting up again in the future.

On with the links

Michael James says ETFs are dead. I respectively have to disagree. ETFs are an investment structure similar to the way that a mutual fund is an investment structure. There is nothing in the ETF manual that says anything about fees limits, indexes or passive/active management. If you create an ETF, you can put whatever investments you want inside, buy and sell according to whatever methodology you feel like, charge a 25% MER and it’s still an ETF. The fact that some people have associated the term “”ETF”" with a more specific definition does not make that definition so.

Invest It Wisely learned a good lesson about avoiding time share scams on holiday. Unfortunately, holidays are when we tend to let our guard down about this sort of thing.

The Financial Blogger, channeling Garth Turner predicts that the Canadian housing market is the next bubble to pop. Mike, didn’t you just buy a new house?

The Oblivious Investor likes Benjamin Graham’s take on asset allocation. But implementing might not be that easy.

Million Dollar Journey tells us how he calculates the dividend payout ratio. Like all financial ratios, this one isn’t enough to buy or sell a stock on – but it’s a good ratio to consider along with many other factors.

Canadian Capitalist shows that credit card exchange rates are too high. You should get a US$ credit card to go with your US$ bank account.

Preet argues about Warren Buffet with a disgruntled readers. I’ve always thought Buffet is overrated myself.

Speaking of Buffet, Larry MacDonald says that investing in what Buffet invests in, is (was?) a profitable investing strategy.

For the bloggers

Blogthority has some solutions for the Akisment spam dungeon.

Carnivals

Carnival of Personal Finance

Hope you had a great “holiday” week. I managed to get my home office setup. I’ve been blogging from a laptop on my couch for the past 3 years and I decided that having a proper workspace would help with productivity. I’m also hoping it will allow me to set “office hours” so I can limit my blogging time a bit.  I have a hard time putting the laptop away.

I bought a used PC and 2 19″ monitors. After using a laptop for so long, the extra screen space will take a bit of getting used to.  They are about five years old, but work quite well.

On with the links

Preet uncovered this gem. BMO wants to rename their index funds to include “ETF”. This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of. Why stop at ETF? Why not call it the ETF Gold Lady Gaga Index Fund?

Jon Chevreau wrote an amusing article about the best and worst bank mutual funds. He points out that Gordon Pape somehow likes to ignore the ETFs in his evaluation.

Canadian Capitalist wrote an “I told you so” post about an ill-conceived investment product.

Larry MacDonald wrote about fundamental weight ETFs and bear markets. In my opinion, there are passive investing products (market cap ETFs) and then there is everything else.

Rachelle from Landlord Rescue finishes off her trilogy of Landlord from Hell stories. This one is a doozy!

The Oblivious Investor needs help deciding whether to invest in retirement savings or invest in income growth. I say both.

Michael James says that pet insurance is hard to justify. Sometimes I think that the cost of pets is hard to justify.

Million Dollar Journey came up with 6 ways to buy gold. I have a 7th way – just don’t buy any.

The Financial Blogger explains the difference between working on salary or 100% commission.

Busy week here at MSB with posts every day. Next week will be a bit lighter since Monday is a holiday, however I will be publishing the last post from the “tenant from hell” trilogy. The last post is very much on the disgusting side and I’ve changed my mind several times about whether it is appropriate for the blog or not. It would be easy not to publish it, but on the other hand the “tenant from hell” posts are a good reminder that real estate investing is not always so “passive”.

I’ve been on a bit of a writing holiday myself, since I’m finishing up a pretty big project which I’ll be announcing near the end of September or early October.

On with the links

Sad story about a mother who is suing her kids for support even though she allegedly abandoned them. The story profiles one of the sons, and is worth reading just to see how he made out.

In Search of Salt has some very good negotiation strategies.

Michael James makes an excellent observation that equal billing plans encourage increased consumption.

Canadian Financial DIY wrote a book review on William Bernstein’s latest book the Investor’s Manifesto.  He thinks it’s good, but not great.

Squawkfox had a great idea for microwaving popcorn in a paper bag. We’ll be trying this one.

The Financial Blogger has taken over the Dividend Guy blog. I’m sad that Jeremy won’t be blogging there anymore, but hopefully the acquisition will pay dividends for Mike. You can win an iPod touch by commenting on the linked post.

Million Dollar Journey says that rental applicants have declined in quality because of looser lending standards. A very interesting idea and I tend to believe it.

Canadian Capitalist says give yourself a financial education. A great message.

Preet is giving away an iPad, a gold coin, and a spork! Not sure what a spork is? Go find out.

Larry MacDonald says that special offers from financial institutions are not worth the hassle.

Mike from the The Financial Blogger talks about improving his newsletter. Go and sign up now. I’m thinking of starting a newsletter as well.  I hope Mike signs up for it.

For any bloggers out there – learn how to create useful and positive titles that people want to read.

Every so often I have an experience that reminds me why working is slowly killing me. I’ve started job hunting and the market for technical people is red hot right now (I started sending out resumes last Monday, and have already had 4 interviews today, with more coming up).

I was talking to two guys in Mountain View. They start asking me trivial Java questions. These are THE WORST technical interviews (programming on a whiteboard is bad too). Its like you’re interviewing someone to be a high school geography teacher and the entire interview is asking him populations of countries around the world. At the end, he’s going to feel like shit because he doesn’t have the population of Thailand memorized and you’re not going to have any better idea whether or not he’ll make a good teacher.

There are websites listing Java interview questions, and I could just spend an afternoon, read through them all, then come across like a genius to these nimrods, but I refuse to do it because its just *SO STUPID*. This was one of their questions if you’re interested.

One of them seemed like a decent guy, but the other guy, after every question I said I didn’t know or didn’t answer exactly the way he expected (often with technical questions there are many possible answers, and the interviewer has to be bright enough to realize when an answer is correct – even if it wasn’t the answer he was looking for), he acted snooty and made disparaging comments. Some people seem to be very good at deferring to people higher up the food chain from them, and treating people they see as below them like crap.

Towards the end of the interview I’d had enough and actually stopped it (only the second time I’ve ever done this). It surprises the hell out of interviewers when you end one early (its the ultimate in taking charge!). Probably not the smartest thing to do (I may have lucked out and got offered the job), but why would I want to work for a company that assigns a jerk to interview me?

With technical work, it seems to be necessary to get treated badly by the people above you in order to get a paycheck. I’m not sure if this is because our work is mysterious to them, so they feel they have to exert their authority somehow, or if its because we’re earning big salaries and they resent having to pay them or what.

Maybe this is simply the nature of 9-5 work (and why I hate it).

Any cycling fans out there? I’ve managed to convert my wife to an avid fan.   This year’s Tour de France was quite exciting and you just can’t beat the scenery and interesting historic buildings along the route.

It looks like Contador will win this year. I am cheering for Schleck, but I always thought Contador was the favourite.

On with the links

Michael James commented on the idea that buying a house makes you more financially responsible. He shows that the evidence provided to support this theory is pretty lame.

Larry MacDonald looks at the book How to buy at maximum pessimism. I’ve tried to do this by switching some of my bond etfs to equity when the market tanks. So far it’s worked fairly well.

Preet has an infographic showing 40 years of asset class performance.

Canadian Capitalist says that Canadians don’t need to add commodities to their portfolio. I agree.

Canadian Personal Finance Blog says that interest rates are skyrocketing!!!!!

Squawkfox is giving away a free windfall planner worksheet. Now if she would just tell me how to get that windfall.

The Financial Bloggers offers everything you need to know about income trusts.

If you like reading about what bloggers talk about then check out the Financial Blogger’s guest post which discusses his blog business.

Million Dollar Journey deciphers the insurance puzzle.

I personally think kids are great and I enjoy spending time with mine. However, like everything – too much of a good thing isn’t so good. It can get tiresome after a while.

Judith Timson wrote about how parenting is no fun. She is reacting another post about parenting in New York Mag which outlines all the problems of being a parent.

Jennifer Senior wrote that NY Mag article about parenting called All Joy and No Fun. Some great quotes like “They’re a huge source of joy, but they turn every other source of joy to shit”. Couldn’t agree more. 

Garth Turner wrote an absolutely hilarious post about property virgins. I don’t agree with much of what Garth has to say, but this post was spot on.

My Wife Quit Her Job is a site that I just started reading – it is fantastic for those of us who are into online entrepreneurship. The writer Steve is one smart guy and I love reading his posts.   This post was just excellent: Starting A Business: Convincing Yourself To Take Action

Canadian Tax Resource is starting a new tax advisory service. I’m interested in the question of whether or not to incorporate.

Million Dollar Journey had an interesting post about investment loans.

The Oblivous Investor shows how to calculate real estate investment return.

The Financial Blogger reveals how we evaluate our online business.

Larry MacDonald says that retirement pensions improvements might not be necessary.

Squawkfox put together an expense tracking spreadsheet for the holidays.

Preet says that the Eco Fee is a tax.

Canadian Capitalist put together some useful used car pricing resources.

Canajun Finances wrote about pet insurance.

Carnivals

Carnival of Financial Planning

Carnival of Personal Finance

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