photo credit: Ken +

The $700 billion bailout package is being decided by the House and Senate and investors are nervous about the financial industry and access to credit. Bank customers are concerned about cash reserves at banks and limits might be raised to curb fears over FDIC insurance. The financial news can be overwhelming and I was thinking the other night about my first bank account and what it meant to me. Saving money has always been a passion of mine and I love to think back to my first bank account and how is impacted the way I treat money and personal finances. With all the negative news, I want to have some fun and have a Costco cash contest. I will be giving away a $50 Costco cash card and am asking you to share your first bank account story with us. Maybe you were a child and your parents took you to your local bank branch or your grandparents opened a savings account for college. Maybe you didn’t open your first bank account until your first job. What emotions did you feel when you opened your bank account? Were you excited to have some money for the future?

Share your story and you will be automatically entered in the $50 Costco or American Express gift card blog contest with one entry. Subscribe to my RSS feed for an additional entry to the blog contest and send me an email confirming your subscription. Your email address will be kept private and not be sold. Feedburner will send you a free email or RSS update daily from this blog. Link to this $50 Costco or American Express gift card prize blog contest and receive 5 entries. (Send an email to thepassivedad at gmail.com with your link)

Blog contest will end at midnight pacific time on October 19th. One winner will be chosen at random and no preference will be given to blogs, websites, or friends. A valid email address is required so the winner can be notified.

Why a $50 Costco gift card as the prize? You can use the $50 Costco cash card to purchase items in the Costco Warehouse, purchase Costco gas, and even purchase items through Costco.com. You could even buy a hot dog, pizza, or churro at the Costco food stand with the cash card.

Don’t have a Costco near your home? No problem. A $50 Amex gift card will be given in the event you can’t utilize a Costco cash card.

It’s only fair if I’ve asked you to share your first bank account experience, that I share mine. I was 7 and my parents took me to a local savings and loan to open a passbook savings account. I remember getting excited to go with my parents to the bank and watch them deposit a paycheck or talk to a loan officer about financing. My first memory was when my parents held a garage sale and needed change and we went to the bank for coin rolls. I had never seen so many coins, I thought we were rich! In actuality it was probably $40 in change. I also had fun rolling pennies as a child and taking the change to deposit in my passbook savings account. I would often look at the green savings passbook and review the deposit amounts and dream of my future. At 7 years-old, my dream was a new motorcycle or ATV.

What was your first bank account experience? Good luck and I look forward to reading your stories.

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This week I participated in the Carnival of Personal Finance #171: Celebrate Fall Edition held at Sound Money Matters. You can find some other wonderful personal finance articles that were submitted this past week.

Some of my favorites are:

Create passive income from writing by Passive Family Income
29 Steps I took to leave the workforce at age 29 by My Dollar Plan
The Test: Can You Handle a Troubled Economy? by Free Money Finance

Personal Finance In One Simple Equation by Free From Broke

Fun Links

Martha Stewart has a blog contest where you can leave a comment and have a chance to be featured on her website.

Google has a new website that can help change lives called Project 10 to the 100th

Free Money Blog Contest Links

Visit these blog contests and you could walk away with some additional spending money.

Free From Broke has a contest to win one of three Amazon gift cards $75, $15, and $10
Hank at My Investing Blog has a contest where you can earn over $300 in prizes.
Jake at Compounding Dividends has a contest on his blog and the winner will receive $200 cash. Leave a comment and you might just walk away with a cool $200 in cash.
Indo’s Birthday Contest Bash by Indo Contest for a chance to win $25 cash, entrecard credits or 125 monthly ads
Win up to $50 Paypal Simply by Commenting through Another MMO Blog
Out of debt again has a blog contest for $60 in cash prizes.

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I first want to say that I’m excited that I even received 14 entries for my Spring Cleaning Contest #1. I wish I had 14 Lego Xbox games to give each of you, but only one person was picked to receive one this month. I will have another drawing in the next few days as I still have a closet full of new items left over from my ebay business.
The drawing was old fashioned as I placed all names on sheets of paper and pulled one from a box. I’m looking for a program similar to random.org, but free. I tried registering at random.org, but they want something like $50 for the software. Since I believe in limiting debt exposure, I am going to withhold from this purchase until I have earned income to cover the expense. For now, I’ll still utilize the box and written names. I guess I could have used an excel spreadsheet and just pointed to a cell, but this was sort of fun.

Okay…the winner is…I really want to thank all of you who left comments on this blog and my other posts. I enjoy seeing new traffic come to my site, but reading comments has been a blast. Sweetsue from Oregon. Yes, Sweetsue!!! Congratulations, please contact me at thepassivedad at gmail dot com with your address and the game is on it’s way. No charge for shipping as this contest was 100% free.

I will be having another Spring Cleaning contest in the next few days. Check back often and if you didn’t win this time, you can always enter again.

Thank you all for making this blog fun.

Scott

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Only 7 days left to enter my first Spring Cleaning Blog Contest. I’m cleaning out my closet that has brand new items left over from my ebay business. In case you are wondering, I have donated many of items to local charities but still have some great items left over. Some I have kept to give as gifts to birthdays or Christmas presents, and even a few for myself. But, I purchased a lot of inventory for my ebay store and it’s time to clean out the closet. All you have to do to enter is subscribe to my RSS feed (found in the upper right corner of the blog) . Subscribe via a reader or via email. I enjoy subscribing via email so I can read blogs on my cell phone. I have a Samsung Blackjack and enjoy reading my mail when waiting in lines. I always find myself looking at the covers of those trashy supermarket magazines and catching up on fun and interesting blogs is a better use of my time. Who cares how Christina Aguillera lost all of her baby weight? I know the answer without even picking up the magazine. It’s called a personal trainer. They cost from $50-100+ an hour. You don’t have to be a celebrity to have one and you will see results within weeks, just like Christina.

O.k. back to my contest. I really love having my Blackjack phone. I just need to learn how to turn blogger into a mobile blog and I’ll be set. After you subscribe to my RSS feed, leave a comment in this blog or the original post found here at Spring Cleaning Contest #1. Simple! No cost to enter and no cost to win. I will pay for shipping to your house, apartment, business, or wherever you want it to go. If you want it sent to your grandkids, I’ll ship it to them. I’m going to give a hint for the Spring Cleaning Contest #2 in the next few days. So be sure to check back often.

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Spring Cleaning Contest #1 is one New Xbox Lego Star Wars Platinum Hits Edition. This game will work on the Xbox and Xbox 360. Contest ends 12am PDT 5/31/08

It’s Spring cleaning time at my house and I thought it would be fun to offer a contest to my blog readers and empty out my closet at the same time. My ebay business has been closed for a few months, but I still have some cool inventory in my large office closet. If you can’t use this xbox game, you could always give it away to a friend or sell it yourself on ebay or Craigslist.

The contest rules are simple and easy. All winners will be chosen at random and this contest is totally free. You won’t even pay for shipping. All I ask is that you leave a comment in this blog and subscribe to my RSS feed. When you leave your comment be sure to use a valid email address as I will contact the winner via email. Don’t worry, I hate spam and will not sell your email address. The RSS feed above will allow you to learn about contest updates and when new posts are available from my blog. If you want extra brownie points, post this contest link in your blog or website. But remember, all winners are chosen at random. Good luck and check back often!

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