I work for Applied Materials (Santa Clara), which is where I first interned while in college, and secured a full time position upon graduating. I initially did get the internship because I got lucky and met a girl in a school club (one of those finance/accounting clubs) who was interning there and was leaving, so I could take her position. I did not go through a post-graduation job hunting phase (and seriously didn’t want to) so I don’t exactly know what those folks did to get their jobs.
The finance offices in SF are likely to be the kinds of consulting, investment banking, CPA firms, government related etc. There was a lot of recruiting going on for the Big 4 firms at most bay area campuses, and anyone who had decent grades usually got a job there (oh and being a hot looking girl was a lock, notice how the recruiting girl is always insanely hot for some surprising reason). What sucks is that CPA firms do their recruiting for full time positions during winter time I believe, and I really have no idea of the recruiting of the other offices.
Getting advanced finance books may not help. Depending on the book they may be glorified accounting textbooks. Going for the ‘Dummies’ books are a great way to start then you should move into the more advanced areas such as Investing, real-estate, Business, etc etc.
thanks to everyone who contributed to this thread. My economics class was not really specific on how these things work and now i understand it much better.
So after this was posted, I went ahead and opened an Emigrant Direct account. I took akumatrunigga’s advice and put the equivalent of five hours a week into the account. I make $17.90/hr, so that turned out to be $89.50/week added into the account with 4.93% interest. As of right now, my account’s just under $900. Surely it’s nothing to applause at, but that’s money that I don’t see at payday, pushed off to a rainy day/stashed away fund. And it’s money that I know is going to a good place: away from being spent. =P
very good thread indeed…prolly the best I’ve ever seen on SRK short of the “Women” posted quite some time back.
EDIT: ^^mastermind…i would say that $900 is something to applasue at, casue you invested wisely and now have about a weeks pay for not doing any formal work in about 3 weeks…Its a good step, and you keep it up weekly with the interest compounding, who knows how large it could acrue in a year, 5 years or 10 years +. Keep it going.
Good reads. I’m currently trying to clean up my credit. Its phucking horrible, despite my best efforts. Frustating because I want to buy a house and can financially afford it, but my credit rating will KILL me. Back with more later.
Did any of you start investing while still in school?
I’m going into my final year of university, and only have about $5,000 saved up. I don’t think I can invest that, since I’ll probably be dipping into it throughout the year. My current bank (BMO) has an interest rate of 2.6% on savings accounts I think. I was just gonna let it sit in there, since I get free banking (student plan).
If you have credit cards, cut 'em up, son. For the ones you absolutely have to keep, ask about getting the spending limit reduced if you’re on a zero balance. Pay them off, pay them off, pay them off. Try not to apply for anything else that will ding your credit report (new cellphones, credit cards for stores, etc.). Get a copy of your credit report, too. Find out what’s being thrown on there.
I’m pretty cheap as it is, so my two only credit cards never see anything over 5% of their limits (one card $1000, the other is a miles card limited at some insane 5-digit number :looney: ). And with my bank accounts, $1000 is considered $0 to me. So if I ever spend and my account falls under $1000, I panic like a mofo and don’t eat for a while until it gets padded back up. hahah
I also have a bmo premium savings account but imo the interest is not that great compared to other high interest accs like pc and e*trade. I’ll probably switch to one of those banks soon.
Yes, I started to invest in my freshmen year of college, worked all 5 years in school and stepped it up every year. Get rid of your savings account at a bank, its highway robbery! 2.6% with probably limitations on how much you need and a monthly/yearly fee. ED (Emigrantdirect) has no fees and no limits, AND you get 5.05% back. I don’t know about you, but thats more money for your money!
Credit: Pay your bills, enough said. If you have a balance on a CC, pay the minimum at the very least! If you start skipping payments or go into collections, GGPO!
My personal debt is more than I want it to be now, I have about 10G’s in debt (not including car and school debt…but does include a bomb ass honeymoon!) Getting grown and not to mention my wife is an CPA accountant, money is a issue at the household, so what I did (which she suggested) was to get another bank account they are free at Wachovia and basically have one account where all my bills pull from (also the account where my pay check comes in) and then other other account is “Ace’s play money”
So, in a sense, I pay myself every week. $100 on friday goes from my “Bill” account to my “Ace” account. Thats the money I use to buy games, eat out, buy liqour, gas, etc. So when pay day comes, I have a spreadsheet of what comes out that account, anything left over goes to the highest APR credit card I have. Right now that is AMEX; but I also still put $50 on my other cards as well.
Another thing you can do is call the credit card company and ask for a lower APR. I think the norm right now is 12-18%; I called them and said “I want a fixed 8.99% for the life of the card”; of course it took like 3-4 people to get them to lower it, but now that is less money they are getting and more than I am putting towards paying off the debt.
If you do miss a payment, be it, forgot or you don’t have the funds, call them…I repeat, CALL THEM and tell them! They will more than likely give you an extension so your credit will not be messed up. They will work with you! You just need to ask, now don’t do it every other month though.
Once your out of debt, put that money that you were putting into your cards into a savings account, you will see your wealth grow QUICK! As a general rule I tell people, you want to have a nice pot to fall back on. I lost my job and was out of work for a month, I still payed my bills and had fun (most of my friends didn’t know I was out of work). I had something to fall back on. Life will be easier if you take care of your mind, body and soul first, second is your money.
Hmm, I don’t know if I like the idea of using an e-bank account. Do these places have physical locations where I can withdraw money? I dunno bout the States, but in Canada, we have to pay a service fee ($1.50 from the ATM, and another $1.50 from your bank - a whopping $3.00) to use an ATM from a different bank. I don’t wanna get raped by service fees if I’m gonna use an e-bank savings account.
These are savings account, not debt accounts. Yes, in the states some banks will charge you a fee (more sometimes). Other banks give you a set number per month you can use. The most I paid was in vegas, 5 bucks to use the ATM, wachovia covered me though.
I’m surprised no one brought up the fact the Canadian Dollar reached parity with the US Greenback today. It reached a high of 1.0004 USD before closing at 97.89. Declining US economy and soaring crude oil prices seem to be the major factors.
What type of intimate details do you mean? See I want to get into funds and stocks, but whenever I try to look for info online I get snowed under with too much information that I cannot make any sense out of.