Welcome to Monday, money nerds. Last week didn’t end with a cliff-hanger, but this week starts with one! My girlfriend and I are in Denver visiting friends. All great, right? Except that a snowstorm is forecast for Sunday. (It’s Saturday morning as I write this.) Will we manage to make it to the airport for our Monday morning flight?
Ooohhhh… the suspense is killing me.
Let’s leave this mystery for now and look at some of today’s top money stories. We’re going to start with crime.
“I would only rob banks for my family.” [Texas Monthly] — “By law enforcement standards, the Catts were as unlikely a set of bank robbers as one could imagine. They had no pressing financial issues and no obvious personal problems…Yet when it came to robbing banks, said Nehls, ‘they were very bold, very daring, and very risky. They’re lucky they didn’t get caught up in a shoot-out.'”
How much does it cost to be a stay-at-home parent? [Tawcan] — “I have always wondered what’s the actual financial cost of a stay-at-home parent. Therefore, I decided to reach out to Chrissy at Eat Sleep Breathe FI about writing a post and analyzing how much does a stay-at-home cost?…Rather than a generic article, I requested Chrissy to provide as many numbers as possible (I really pushed her comfort zone with this request hehe!). I wanted to make sure that we cover as many potential scenarios as possible…”
FICO scores are beginning to seem arbitrary. [/r/personalfinance/ on Reddit] — “I work in automotive lending for a major automotive lender. With increased technology, credit swipes, credit boosts, authorized user credit, and just straight fraud, FICOs are starting to become unreliable...I would not be surprised if in the coming years a FICO score becomes irrelevant. So instead of trying to inflate your score, just work on paying the important things on time every time.”
Finally, today, here’s a 13-minute rant from Chelsea Fagan at The Financial Diet. She’s sick of how “self-care” is portrayed in social media nowadays and she wants to set the record straight about what actually constitutes self-care.
Found something you think your fellow nerds might like? You should send it in! Help spread the top money stories on the web here at Apex Money.