The New Personal Finance

What a year it has been so far. With a real estate crisis, banking crisis, recession and now job crisis in full gear, a new era in personal finance seems to be dawning.

The new trends in personal finance that are sweeping the nation are the following:

1. Renting beats buying a home, at least for the time being
2. Dividend stock investing may beat parking cash in money markets, CDs and savings accounts as the preferred form of predictable income streams
3. Smaller homes are being preferred to larger homes, and near-to-the-city homes are being seen as preferable to suburbia.
4. The retirement age is increasing. Think retirement at 66 instead of 62
5. Credit card debt is being paid off, and debit cards are increasing in popularity
6. Think of 7-8% annual returns for your investments go forward over the next few years
7. Foreign stock investments – international ETFs – are a welcome additional to investment portfolios
8. People have woken up to the fact that they must start saving earlier for retirement
9. Students are rethinking the wisdom of going to expensive colleges and ghraduating with a mountain of debt and no job to go to

The trends in personal finance are always changing, but these are the current tendencies we see forming.