Do you have what it takes to buy a home? Consider this exhaustive guide from Kiplinger. Tired of renting? It could be a great time to buy your first home. In many cities, home prices have bottomed, and rents have risen. Mortgage rates are still superlow. In fact, homes haven't been as affordable since 1971. On the downside, in many cities, buyers have fewer homes from which to choose and more Read more

Build up your emergency fund with these tips from Kiplinger. You know you need an emergency fund — easily accessible cash to pay for unexpected expenses. Without one, you could find yourself looking around the house for valuables to pawn, racking up credit-card debt or maybe even considering a payday loan to cover the costs of an emergency. But you may be wondering how you can find enough Read more

Now that you're done with taxes, it's time to do a little Spring cleaning with your financial documents. Kiplinger advises what to keep and what to toss. It's smart to keep your tax returns indefinitely. Old returns can provide important background information in a variety of situations — for example, if you're applying for a mortgage, applying for disability insurance or trying to figure out Read more

Be savvy about your retirement. Kiplinger gives eight compelling reasons for getting a Roth IRA account now. Smart young savers know to participate in their companies' 401(k)s as soon as they join the workforce to benefit from as many years of saving and compounding as possible (see Why You Need a 401(k) Right Away). But really smart young savers — including all of you who read Starting Out, Read more

If you owe credit-card debt, educate yourself with these pointers from Kiplinger about how the whole collections process works and what your rights are. Year after year, debt collection complaints rank among the most-common consumer grievances the Federal Trade Commission receives. In fact, reports of deceptive debt-collection tactics were the second-most common complaint (after identity theft) Read more

Many people pay a lot of money for medical expenses. Kiplinger shares a couple of ways to cut your health bills. Spend less on drugs Switching to generic drugs is one of the easiest ways to save — especially now that some big-name medications, such as Lipitor, have gone generic (see Brand-Name Lipitor at Generic Prices). Some brand-name drugs don’t have a generic clone but do have a Read more

Does paying for college overwhelm you? Here's a helpful post from Kiplinger. College students who borrow graduate with an average of $25,250 in debt. That's the equivalent of a new-car purchase or a down payment on a home. Even if some borrowing is inevitable for you, first explore other options to help you pay for college. Coverdells, 529 plans and Roth IRAs come with tax advantages for college Read more

We're thrilled to present this smart Kiplinger story here on Savvy! Working in corporate America, you're bound to encounter a difficult communication situation or two with your manager — from asking for vacation time during a busy month to letting him know that you're considering jumping ship. Whether you're an entry-level worker or in a more senior position, having to address these types of Read more

We're thrilled to present this smart Kiplinger story here on Savvy! If you got your first job last year, you may have been agitated every payday to see how much of your salary was going to the tax man. If you’re like most taxpayers, tax filing time is payback time. So don’t think of filling out your tax forms as a pain. Instead, think of it as sending a bill to the IRS, demanding a refund of Read more

We're thrilled to present this smart Kiplinger story here on Savvy! Political theater over whether or not to extend the 2% payroll tax holiday has overshadowed the fact that most workers can do more to reduce the amount of tax withheld from their paychecks than anything cooked up in Washington. The power-to-the-people ploy? Using a W-4 form to put an end to overwithholding from your paychecks. Read more