Welcome to the hottest Best of Money Carnival ever. Why is it so hot? Because the heat index says its 110 degrees outside – that’s why!  Luckily, I’ve been reading all the entries and putting this together in the confines of my A/C.  Lemonade anyone?

photo credit: carriestroud

Okay, now that you have your nice cool summer drink, it’s time to check out the top 10 posts of the week.  Enjoy and stay cool!

This Weeks Top Pick

Best of The Rest

Okay, here’s the remaining nine posts of the week, in no particular order. Congrats to all those that made the cut!

photo credit: ::hap

• Mike Piper presents HDHP Insurance: When Does a High-Deductible Health Plan Make Sense? posted at Oblivious Investor.
• Intelligent Speculator presents Please do not let the Bush tax cuts expire posted at Intelligent Speculator.
• Silicon Valley Blogger presents Investment Psychology: Top 5 Ways Investors Go Broke posted at The Digerati Life.
• freefrombroke presents How Can I Improve My Credit Score? 8 Ways to Increase Your Rating posted at Free From Broke.
• Cara Henis presents Protect your identity from life online – CreditCards.com posted at Taking Charge.
• Ryan @ CML presents How To Prevent Medical Identity Theft posted at Cash Money Life.
• MoneyNing presents 15 Ways to Earn Extra Money posted at Money Ning.
• Paul Williams presents The Three Methods of Making Money posted at Provident Planning.
• Ashley presents 10 Things You Should Never Buy posted at Cash Flow Sherpas.

To participate in this carnival next week, be sure to submit your best post and follow the guidelines

photo credit: Dave_B_

Welcome to the January 4, 2010 edition of Carnival of MoneyStories 2 New Year’s 2010 Edition!  What not a better way to ring in a new decade with some great stories about money.  Happy New Year!

Editor’s Picks

Darwin presents How I Saved 44% on my Comcast Bill-Chat Transcript ($1104 per Year) posted at Darwin’s Finance, saying, “Want to save 40% or more on your Comcast or other provider bill? A step by step chat session transcript outlining exactly how to negotiate massive discounts from service providers.”

Silicon Valley Blogger presents Mystery Shopping: How I Earn Extra Cash Online posted at The Digerati Life, saying, “I tell my story of how I earn extra income online.”

Pete presents How to Make Money With a Blog posted at Bible Money Matters, saying, “If you want to learn how to make money blogging, this is the series for you.”

Career

Joe Plemon presents How Do You Measure Success? posted at Personal Finance By The Book, saying, “Do you equate success with being a super achiever or can one be considered successful by simply doing worthwhile activities? This post explores the measurement of success.”

Credit

jim presents New Credit Card Costs ±14 FICO Points posted at Bargaineering.

David presents List of Credit Card Foreign Currency Transaction Fees posted at Credit Card Offers IQ.

DR presents How to Find a “Good” Bad Credit Credit Card posted at The Dough Roller.

Connie Prater presents ABC’s ‘The Middle’ takes a jab at the evils of deferred interest posted at blogs.creditcards.com.

Investing

Matt Jabs presents Traditional and Roth IRA Contribution Limits posted at Debt Free Adventure, saying “Continually updated information on Roth IRA contribution limits and Traditional IRA contribution limits for each subsequent tax and contribution year. Now that you know how much and when to contribute, now you should focus on where to house your IRA.

photo credit: dcwriterdawn

Debt

Adam presents My Call From a Debt Collector posted at Your Money Relationship.

Pinyo presents How Payday Loans Work and My Experience posted at Moolanomy, saying, “Miranda writes about her payday loan experience, then goes on to explaining how the system work and why you should avoid payday loan.”

Jeff Rose presents Suze Orman’s Cash Survival List at Good Financial Cents, saying,” Check out this list if you are in need of some quick cash”.

debt kid presents 9 Rules To Get Out Of Debt posted at Debt Kid.

Housing

Peak Personal Finance presents New Year Financial Resolution: Refinance posted at Peak Personal Finance, saying, “Resolve to lower your housing expenses this year!”

The Smarter Wallet presents Housing Prices Still Down: Predicting Home Price Trends posted at The Smarter Wallet.

Net Worth

photo credit: asterix611

Curt presents 2009 Budget Reflections posted at PennyJobs.com.

Other

Lynnae presents Do It Yourself Frugality posted at beingfrugal.net.

FMF presents Free Money Finance: The Big Clean posted at Free Money Finance, saying, “We recently cleaned our house in a major way. Boy, did we learn some things.”

Austin Morgan presents How Japan and America View Christmas and New Year?s Day posted at Foreigners Finances, saying, “I’ve lived in Japan for 5 months now, and the differences in how America and Japan view the Christmas and New Years holidays tells a lot about the respective nations and how we view money/traditions.”

LeanLifeCoach presents DIYing for Dollar$$$ posted at Eliminate The Muda!.

Rainy-Day Saver presents Cats: What They Really Cost You posted at Rainy-Day Saver, saying, “Thanks for hosting — Happy New Year!”

photo credit: justine.k

Shopping

Kyle presents Stupidity Is Costly posted at Suburban Dollar» Suburban Dollar: Personal Finance Blog from a Suburbanite’s Perspective.

freefrombroke presents How Much Are You Spending On The Kids This Holiday? posted at Parenting Family Money, saying, “We didn’t go overboard with the kid’s presents this year. How much did you spend on the kids this holiday?”

freefrombroke presents A Little Investigation And Elbow Grease Saved Us Over $150 posted at Free From Broke, saying, “When our vacuum stopped working our first instinct was to look to buy a new one. But I realized I might be able to fix it instead. Glad I realized that ’cause it saved us a lot!”

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of carnival of money stories 2 using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

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