Right now I'm reading Michelle Singletary's book, 7 Mantras for a Richer Life. Ok, well, I'm listening to it on CD, but still. Anyway, I got to thinking about how there are personal finance blogs for just about every demographic: young professionals, baby boomers, married couples, GLBT folks, single parents, black women, etc. etc. but I have not yet seen any of these that are run by Hispanic/Latinos or from our point of view.
If you look in the cookbook section of any public library, it is astounding to see how many books are there and how many shelves it takes to hold all these cookbooks. Yet more and more cookbooks keep getting published year after year, month after month. Same thing with talk shows, it seems there's always room for more talk shows. So surely there is room for one more personal finance blog!
So, what is the Hispanic/Latino/a point of view when it comes to personal finance? Ha! Good question. I'm no expert, seeing as how assimilated I am, but there are some observations I've made. Generally it seems that we tend to be bad with money--just like all the other racial/ethnic groups in existence, right?--and we don't seem to want to trust banks. However, I have also observed that lots of our immigrants, illegal or otherwise, have an amazing capacity for working and saving money in order to send it back to family in the home country. (Of course, they do this by living 12 to a one-bedroom apartment.) But then you have people like my maternal grandfather, who is 91 and lives comfortably, or at least comfortably enough that he really doesn't need to worry about money. He and my deceased grandmother, who was a housewife, were able to accomplish this even while raising 4 children by never owning a car and never taking vacations, among other strategies. I'll address some of these strategies and how they've influenced me--and worked for me!--in future posts.
So just as Michelle Singletary quotes her "Big Mama", I'll attempt to personalize the world of personal finance/money management for any lost Latino/a/Hispanic souls out there. Maybe some of them will do a search on Google Blogs, like I did, and find me. I sure don't have all the answers, but after a year of faithfully listening to Dave Ramsey's radio show and reading a couple of dozen personal finance books and checking in every single day to my fellow money bloggers and other websites, I've learned a hell of a lot! At the same time, I'll outline my ongoing-money war and battles lost and won.
For example:
Money saved today: almost $4 in coupons last night at the grocery store (and no, I don't buy crap I don't need just b/c I have a coupon for it). Also saved $12 by buying advance tix to I-fest instead of at the gate.
And: Still trying to get DH to consider his job/career options so he can start making decent wages. Called my jailer friend who is going to call DH tomorrow and tell him that working in the jail is not as bad as it sounds!
Finally: Still posting items to sell on craigslist. No word yet, but depending on the item sometimes these things take time.
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