Weekend LinkLove: Saturday, February 27, 2010

Seems like just yesterday (or about a month ago) that we were getting set for the latest rivalry games between Hope and Calvin.  Today will be a renewal of that rivalry as both the men’s and women’s teams do battle in the MIAA tournament championships.  It should be a great day of Hope basketball, that’s to be sure.  Do you have a similar rivalry in your home area?  Let us know in a comment below!

So that’s coming up later today.  Now, have a look at what we’ve been reading this week in personal finance:

WC, a guest poster on Get Rich Slowly, shares the narrative “What Marriage Has Taught Me About Money.”  We don’t totally agree with WC or JD when it comes to the first point, “There is no I.”  For us, marriage meant that our finances do come together as one, but it’s not a chore as the writer seems to describe it.  We consider ourselves equal partners in the process of being good stewards of resources we’ve been blessed with by God.

Along the same lines, Jason from One Money Design shares 10 Smart Personal Finance Tips Before You Get Married.

PF Journey is a new blog to us this week, and Lakita gives us this great post — Cutting Cable Saved Over $70 per Month.  One of our favorite topics, as you can read here and here.

Flexo at Consumerism Commentary previews the new Quicken Essentials for Mac.  Walt Mossberg’s full review is available from All Things Digital.  Sounds like it just doesn’t get the job done — hopefully, Intuit’s acquisition of Mint means that much of Mint’s goodness will make its way into the desktop software.  For $70, though, we’re not going for the upgrade just yet.

It was hard to decide which Money Crashers posts to include this week, so our advice is to take a look at each of these:

• How to Get Cheaper Entertainment Without a Cable Subscription
• How to Spend Less on Music Downloads
• Set a Budget for “Hobby” Expenses
• 3 Ways To Build Wealth At An Early Age

Mike from Gather Little by Little takes a look at the Pros and Cons of Using Prepaid Debit Cards.  We just got one of these as a perk from upgrading our internet service with AT&T U-verse — interesting concept, and we like the idea of using them for gifts or kids’ commissions for doing chores.

And finally, Jason from Automatic Finances (another new blog to us this week) provides his take on a major debate, “What’s More Important: An Emergency Fund or Being Debt Free?“.  We tend to agree with Ramsey on this one — small emergency fund, pay off debt quickly, build up to a larger emergency fund.