word!

How is it that some buffoon on CNBC has a job where he just sits and picks stocks out of midair, day after day after day? Does anyone no how to spell fraud?

Seems as though I have finally found a reason to side with the IRS and be disappointed with WellsFargo. Seems that Wells Fargo has taken it upon themselves to feel special and mail out my 1099s whenever it suits them.

By all indications, Federal law states that tax documents should be mailed out by January 31 for previous year (bumped to February 2 due to 31st falling on a Saturday). Well giving WF the benefit of doubt, I should have had my documents as of this post.

I called WF last night and they stated that 1099s would not be mailed out until the end of February. So I decided to call the IRS to get their take on this discovery. Seems that IRS is already swamped, as it took them a full 15 minutes to get a person on the phone to talk about this. Not real stellar, but I have heard that’s what the government does ~ make you wait. They say I have to wait until the 15th before ‘worrying’ about it. We’ll see.

Personally, I would like to stick it to WF. I had liked them for a while, but they are starting to wear on me. Their policies are wishy-washy and every person you talk to, gives you a different answer.

The bozos are rescinding their executive retreats as tax-payers don’t appreciate giving the poor bastards gobs of bail-out money and all the while the big-shots enjoy the good life.

Good grief.

The biggest reason I am miffed, is that due to the home buyer credit, I am entitled to a fairly hefty refund, which would come in nice for home improvements and/or a upcoming wedding.

Plus the whole fact that we live in a digital world where computers do the banking work for them, it’s stupid that they would get any kind of reprieve.

Plus, they’re screwing with the feds, so you know they are so toast. Probably has something to do with the bailout $$. It makes everything slow to a government like snail’s pace.

Screw you Wells Fargo!

By now you should know I like delving into interesting financial concepts, especially those online. Having a community based lending option has been intriguing as Prosper has shown.

Well Zopa has finally come into it’s own in the U.S. An import of the U.K. that has now also expanded into Italy and Japan. They were almost 2 years late in the coming to America. Oh, well, at least they made it and could give Prosper a run for it’s (lending) money.

Zopa is a somewhat different beast, but interesting none the least. It also lends out $ but these loans are based at local credit unions. They are associated with Affinity Plus, a credit union from the Cities that I had been acquainted with from my schooling at MSU, Mankato. But the loans are cool. If you get someone else to invest in a CD with Zopa, they can actually help you out. For every CD you purchase through Zopa (CDs are FDIC insured through the credit unions) you help someone out by reducing the rate they pay for their loan thru Zopa. Yes, you can even get your rate down to 0% (i.e. no loan payment) if you get enough help from other Zopa members. That is very cool.

Every CD you purchase is much like a CD at a local bank/credit union. Their current rates continually beat the pants off of local CD rates. These CDs are currently only for 1 yr terms, pretty common for most CD holders out there. With the purchase of a CD you get to apply what ever percent of your return on your money you want to your friend/family member through the site. Say the site offers 3.75% on your money, if you were real generous you could knock down your rate to say 3%, thus giving 0.75% as help to the person of your choosing or even stay at 3.75% and still help someone out a bit more minimally. You get a great rate on a CD and your money goes to help an actual person with their loan rate. Pretty cool.

So ready to help a man out. Check out the link to the left if you are so far interested. Otherwise, contact me and I’ll answer any questions you may have. Wouldn’t it be nice of you to help me pay less on the loan I’m taking out to help with wedding finances? I intend to pay this loan back shortly after festivities, it’s more of a cushion for me.

Thanks!

I love watching that crazy lady Suze Orman on PBS from time to time. She rants and raves at us like she’s rich… oh wait she is. But once in a while she throws us a golden bone. This particular book run of hers, she’s getting women (but men too) to start thinking for retirement.

With the SAVEYOURSELF one can start a retirement account with as little as $50/month for 1 year and get $100 bonus on the 13th month. Sounds like a lot better interest to me than the ol’ rich banker will give you up town. I’m in……

Oh, use code 701

Well, well. I’ve finally made it in life.

Having been keen on the blogging scene and having more than a passing interest in personal finance, I’ve been an avid reader of the back page of the Business Section in the daily Startribune. There is a younger reporter that actually writes about young adults and their finances, so this is always a very interesting section to peruse. Being the hip, young reporter she is, she has set up a Blog (Ka-Blog!) to go along with her articles.

So lo and behold, when she asked for opinions about tax refunds for this past filing season, I emailed her to tell her that I didn’t think giving the government a 1 year interest free loan was all that awesome. My little conversation was reduced to this blurb:

In the past, Michael Piotter, 26 of Gaylord, Minn., put refunds into Roth IRAs, but the microbiology technician does not look forward to getting money back. He’d rather owe a little than receive a refund, although he prefers that his tax bill be as close to zero as possible.

The rest can be read online at the StarTribune.

Not all that exciting of paragraph, but it seems like I’m one of few people that doesn’t trully appreciate a huge refund. But then again, wouldn’t you think that getting 15,000 back a year is a tad excessive as the lead individual gave out for his situation? And the guy helps others out at tax time? OUCH!

I can see the points if people don’t have money to pay their respective tax bills each spring, but they should feel guilty for consistantly recieving huge refunds. They must be the most loyal Americans, wiling to loan the US government their money for a year at a time. Not me.

Update: Scanned pages of said article:

Main Page

Inner Page