I'm going to try Prosper.com

While I wait for $1000 to transfer into my Prosper account, I started looking at what types of borrowers I would consider. Prosper's new Porfolio feature seems pretty nice -- a packaged up ball of debt that I can purchase. Sounds familiar? It should. That's exactly what got us into this Subprime mess in the first place. So I'm going to be very conservative with this for the time being.

Here are my lending rules:
AA or A credit
Less than 30% DTI (debt to income ratio)
Less than $10000 loan request
Exclude automatic funding
0 Now Delinquent
0 Delinquencies last 7 years
0 Public Records last 10 years
0 Public Records last 12 months
0 - 4 Credit Inquiries last 6 months

This search netted me 36 listings at 10:15am. A few are set to expire today, so I won't be able to bid on them. I'm going try playing with the Portfolio method. What I'm hoping is that once my funds clear, I can contribute 4% equally across 25 listings. It'll probably earn very little since I'm not touching any risky credit borrowers, but I'm hoping that it earns more than a 3-year CD.

Spending Awareness

Check my credit card balances online multiple times weekly
Check my banking savings/checking multiple times weekly
This is something where Microsoft Money or Quicken could probably help, because logging into multiple credit card web sites can get tedious. With finance software, it would aggregate all that information into one application.

I managed to catch credit card fraud within a day with this method. Someone had used my Visa card number for some transactions in Mexico. I called up my bank and explained the situation. They had me come in person to the bank to verify photocopies of the receipts, and I signed in front of a notary with the statement being that I was not the person making said charges on my credit card.

All in all, it was a positive experience. I went and got a credit report next month to ensure my bank reported things were still okay with me.

Checking my balances on a weekly basis also keeps me appraised of how much I've charged on my credit cards, and ensuring I have enough money in my checking account to pay for my charges. That way I can pay my credit cards in full each month.

Pay my credit cards in full each month ONLINE automatically
I first got a credit card in college. Thankfully, my parents had instilled in me a fear of overspending, so I didn't go overboard. However I was late in paying some months, simply because I was lazy and procrastinated a lot, putting off having to actually write a check, lick the envelope and lick the stamp. Yes, back then we had to lick the stamp! Those late payments must have cost me hundreds of dollars in fees and interest payments.

I was lucky to have parents there to bail me out back then, and to dispense some harsh words of wisdom as well. So, now that I'm online basically every day, I schedule my credit card payments automatically by linking my bank account to it -- like a direct-deposit in reverse.

Obtain a free credit report every 4 months
Annualcreditreport.com lets you get 1 free credit report from each of the three agencies per year. Just get it from one reporting agency every 4 months, and you don't have to pay anything. I've still gone and bought a combined 3-in-1 credit report once a year, just to be sure though.

Financial Awareness
Awareness of your current financial condition makes me feel like I'm on top of things, in control, and empowered to reach my goals. What are my goals? I really don't have anything written down yet. I will soon.