Bean Counter's Main Site

Bean Counter's Bookkeeping Tutorial Site

Life presents us with many and varied types of decisions that we have to make. Just like a business, in order to make the right decision we need good tools, information, and the knowledge of where to go to find it and how to use it. These sites provide you information, advice, and tools to help you with the difficult financial and other decisions you face.

Life Events MetLife has a very nice site where Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Lucy, Woodstock and the rest of the gang give easy to understand life advice about the following topics: Family- Money- Insurance Health- Business- Major Purchases MetLife Life Events

Another site that provides useful information, calculators, and financial planning tools is State Farm. State Farm Life Events This site offers access to an array of resource materials, including books and online publications, tax information, a guide to state aging agencies, retirement news, shopping for special assistive products and services, and links to online stores Retirement Living Information Center The information you need to manage your personal finances courtesy of CCH. Financial Planning Guide If you plan to move to another state when you retire, examine the tax burden you'll face when you arrive. Taxes are increasingly important to everyone, but retirees have extra cause for concern since their income may be fixed. State Taxes Consumer Help and Advice The Fairfax County Web Site provideds excellent links to all sorts of beneficial sites that provide consumers with a wealth of useful information. Fairfax Consumer Information Shares product ratings and reports for autos, appliances, electronics, personal and sporting goods, and other items. Consumer Reports All sorts of helpful information, guides, and tips for consumers provided by the U.S. General Services Administration. Federal Citizen Information Center Consumer World is a public service, non-commercial guide with over 2000 of the most useful consumer resources. ConsumerWorld Site loaded with free consumer information and reports. Topics include money and credit, education, travel, and more. Free Consumer Information Site provides resources for consumer information supplied by the federal government. Topic include money, product safety, transportation, education, amd more. FirstGov For Consumer The Rightonthemoney.org provides an excellent site for finding advice and information about - Household Affairs - Debt - Cars - Insurance - Investing and ..... more. Advice and Tips Tired of being pestered at dinner time by sales calls ? Register for free with the Do Not Call Registry. Do Not Call Registry Get Information about your benefits, apply for benefits, request a statement of your earnings, and more. US Social Security Administration

Money Skills Over a thousand pages of essential information and tools to help you manage your personal finances through planning, investing and asset protection strategies. CCH Financial Guide Mymoney.gov is the Federal Government's website dedicated to helping Americans understand more about their money – how to save it, invest it, and manage it to meet your personal goals. Understanding Your Money Topics Covered Include: Budgeting & Taxes Credit Financial Planning Home Ownership Paying for Education Privacy, Fraud, & Scams Responding To Life Events Retirement Planning Saving & Investing Starting A Small Business Get Your Annual Free Credit Report. Free Annual Credit Report Get information that is on file about you such as: Payment Histories Loan Balances Bankruptcy Filings Arrests Law Suits Other Personal and Financial Information Your Credit Score is not included in the free report but can be obtained for a small fee. Your Credit Scored is a numerical measure of your credit worthiness used by lenders and creditors. Guides to help with money management in evey life stage. Money Skills-Consumers Tips for you to help your children be responsible with money. Money Skills-Parents Games, quizzes, and activities that make it fun to learn about money. Money Skills-Students These online tutorials will help you understand all the details of writing checks, reading bank statements, reviewing credit reports and more. Banking Tutorials The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) is committed to investing in communities. MBA wants to help everyone who wants to own a home realize the American dream of home ownership. This web site will help you learn what you need to know about the mortgage process. Whether you have your downpayment in hand or first need to repair your credit, this web site will help you learn what you need to know about the mortgage process. Home Loan Learning Center The Federal Reserve provides all kinds of information about money and banking, credit, interest rates, the economy, home mortgages, and other financial information. Personal Financial Education Consumer Handbook To Credit Protection Laws The Consumer Price Indexes (CPI) program produces monthly data on changes in the prices paid by urban consumers for a representative basket of goods and services. Consumer Price Index Moving or retiring to a new location ? Use these cost of living calculators to see what affect this move will have on your buying power. BestPlaces BankRate See if your wages are keeping pace with inflation. AIER Cost-of-Living Calculator Zilch Standard - Debt Reduction Play What If and Get out of debt and save thousands of dollars in interest. Simply enter the name, annual percentage rate, starting balance and monthly payment for each of your debts and... Zilch does the rest. You get a personalized monthly payment schedule that shows you exactly how much to pay each creditor each month. Now, you can take advantage of trade secrets used by many financial counselors in the privacy and comfort of your own home at a fraction of the cost. Download Zilch Standard - Debt Reduction Trial Version Money 101 - a step by step guide to gaining control of your financial life courtesy of CNN Money. Money 101 The goal of Free Financial Advice is to teach and explain the fundamental rules of money management, wealth management and debt management, but more importantly to teach you a new way to look at your spending, investing and debt management decisions so that you can make intelligent, informed and calculated decisions as to how to optimize and manage your money and debt. Free Financial Advice

Legal Advice Legal advice site for consumers and small business. Provides answers to questions about estate planning, bankruptcy, taxes, and more. Free Advice Another good legal site providing useful information. Nolo Law Center Have a legal problem or need some legal assistance ? Not free; but, very affordable. Reasonably Priced Legal Help

Home Buying and Selling Guides One of the biggest expenditures for most of us is the purchase of a home. To make a wise decision you need to do your homework. Sources for information and guides for buying and selling a house. Bank Rate Our Family Place Mortgage-X Real Estate ABC-Buying Real Estate ABC-Selling HUD For Sale By Buyer ReLibrary US Real Estate-Sellers US Real Estate-Buyers

Auto Buying Guides Aside from buying a house, for most of us, the purchase of an automobile is probably our next biggest expenditure. To make a wise decision you need to do your homework. Sources for new and used car buyer guides, reviews, auto insurance, car loans, and more! NADA Kelly Blue Book Edmunds Buying Guide CarFax Automotive.com Autoweb CarSoup Car Buying Tips Smart Sense Smart Car Guide Got Trouble Car Clicks CarMax State Lemon Laws State lemon laws are found under every State's consumer legislation, which governs pretty much everything about how goods can be sold, in what kind of condition, and under what terms and circumstances. State Lemon Laws

Calculators Need help making some financial decisions ? These calculators offer solutions to many decisions we all at one time or another need to make. Bankrate.com has assembled one of the most complete sets of financial calculators on the Web. Their calculators answer questions such as: Should I refinance my house ? How much house or car can I afford ? Should I buy or leases a car ? How long will it take me to pay off my credit card(s) ? Check out their super calculators Bankrate.com Other good sites for calculators are: CCH Financial Planning Toolkit These calculators require that you have Java installed on your computer MortgageCalc MortgageCalculators Kiplinger CPA Directory More Business Money Cops Investopedia Dinky Town (Please note that all financial calculators require a browser that can display Java™ applets. For best results use Internet Explorer version 4.0 or higher or Netscape Navigator 4.0 or higher).

Computers and Internet Help Have a question about computers, the internet, or just about anything and don't know where to look ? Try these sites to get your answers. Ask Jeeves WhatIs HowStuffWorks AllExperts LibrarySpot AskMeHelpDesk RefDesk SoYouWanna HowToDoAnything Are you frustrated trying to find information on the net? Get some help from the web hound! You will learn a great deal while having fun doing scavenger hunts and other searches. The web hound, developed by Maricopa Center for Learning and Instruction (MCLI), will show you how to use different types of web search tools through a series of steps, guided examples, and hands-on practice. Web Hound

Tax Help Needing individual tax information, help, and guidance ? Check out MetLife and the Charlie Brown gang for tips on doing your taxes. Doing Your Taxes You can find additional help, forms, and information in our Individual's Tax Section. Additional Tax Help

Business Skills Needing to acquire some new or polish some old business skills ? Our Business Information, Tools, and Tutorials Sections provides you with Bookkeepimg, Word, Excel, and other business tutorials to help get you headed in the right direction.. Accounting and Bookkeeping Tutorials Business Information and Tools Excel and Word Tutorials