“When your dream appears as an opportunity, you must have ready cash to take it home with you.”

- Anonymous

Welcome to Money-Smarts, MsMoney.com's weekly newsletter of financial facts, features, and tools. Money-Smarts is designed to provide quick and useful information to help secure your financial future. Enjoy, and tell a friend about MsMoney.com!

In This Week's Issue:

• Market Summary for Friday, June 30, 2000
• Tips for the Week: Daily Advice to Help Get You Through the Week
• Read the Latest: How to Stop Fighting Over Money
• Run the Numbers: What's It Worth to Reduce Your Spending?

Market Summary for Friday, June 30:

Close

Net Change

Percent Change

DJIA

10447.89

+49.85

+0.48%

NASDAQ

1454.60

+12.21

+0.85%

S&P 500

3966.11

+88.88

+2.29%

30-Year Bond

5.89%

+0.02

N/A

Source: Reuters

Tips for the Week: Daily Advice to Help Get You Through the Week

Monday: Equities tend to be good long-term investments. While past performance doesn't guarantee future results, history shows that over the past 45 years, the stock market has yielded positive results in every period that investors held onto their investments for 5 years or longer. Learn more about stocks.

Tuesday: Create a fun visual for your children that helps them see their money grow. How about a money growth chart just like a child's height chart? Every time they save and earn money, they can update their chart with colored pens or pictures.

Wednesday: Don't push the sell button too fast! As long as you don't sell, your investment will have the chance to recover from price declines and earn you a greater profit. Learn more about investment risks and how to protect yourself.

Thursday: Whether you're 20 or 80, single or married, climbing the corporate ladder or raising a family full-time, you can take charge of your financial life. You just need to learn the basics and which steps to take to achieve financial health. Learn more about how to get financially fit.

Friday: Dollar cost averaging--where you invest a fixed amount of money at regular intervals, usually monthly--is a great way to start investing if you don't have lots to invest or you want to follow a consistent and structured investment plan. Learn more about dollar cost averaging.

Read the Latest: How to Stop Fighting Over Money

By Katie Sweeney

For the first six years of their marriage, Denise and her husband rarely fought about money. But last year, after their first child was born, and Denise cut back to part-time work, the squabbles started.

Her husband "wants to save every penny," Denise says. She wants to save for tomorrow, too, but not so much that she can't enjoy today. In their pre-baby life, they could sock away cash and still have plenty of fun money left. "We each got what we wanted," she says. "Now I make less and we cost more. Now it's save or have fun, so we're butting heads."

Dueling over dollars is a common problem in marriages--and a common cause of divorce, says Ruth L. Hayden, a financial educator and author of For Richer, Not Poorer: The Money Book for Couples. There's endless room for conflict: How much should we spend on a car, house or haircut? Should we invest in stocks or stash cash in savings accounts? How much debt is OK? And who decides?

But financial feuds don't have to be the norm. More>>

Run the Numbers: Should You Consolidate Your Debt?

How much can you save by making small changes in your lifestyle-seeing fewer movies, for instance? Calculate the long-term consequences of changing your spending habits.

Questions

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