Beating Broke

Personal Finance from the Broke Perspective

Earn Rewards with Swagbucks

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It’s been a while since I last wrote about Swagbucks.  A little over a year to be exact.  And almost 3 years before that.  I’ve been using Swagbucks for a long time, I guess.  What is Swagbucks?

Swagbucks is a rewards program.  You earn rewards called Swagbucks for doing a variety of activities.  What sort of activities?  Glad you asked.

Swagbucks Search

Earn SwagbucksThis is probably the easiest way to earn Swagbucks.  You can install the Swagbucks add on for your browser and set the Swagbucks search as your default search so that when you search in the location bar it directs you through their search engine.  When you use their search, you can randomly win Swagbucks.  It’s not every search, but depending on your search volume, you might win about once a day.  Your winnings will vary, but they can range from lower amounts like 5 Swagbucks all the way up to 20-50.  The search feature is powered by Yahoo search.

Swagbucks Polls and Surveys

This is probably the second easiest way to earn Swagbucks through the program.  You log into the site and take a poll.  The payout is usually something like 2 Swagbucks for each poll you take and the polls are usually pretty short.  You can also take surveys which tend to be a little longer, but the payout, which varies, is usually a bit better as well.

Swagbucks Coupons

Swagbucks has a relationship with Coupons.com that allows for you to sign into their site and print off coupons.  Because of that relationship, there’s always a pretty good selection of coupons on stuff you’ll use all the time.  For each coupon that you redeem, you earn 10 points.

Swagbucks Shopping

Like most rewards programs, Swagbucks has agreements with all kinds of online retailers where you can click through a link on the Swagbucks site and then earn points based on the money you spend at the retailer.  For example, their homepage is showing 4 Swagbucks for every dollar spend at Walmart.com right now.

Swagbucks Daily Crave

This is a newer way (to me at least) to earn Swagbucks.  There’s a link on the sidebar of the Swagbucks site that leads you to a new page that shows you some videos.  You earn a Swagbuck for watching a few of them.  Pretty easy to use and easy to earn a few Swagbucks each day.

Swagbucks Play

With the play feature, you can play online games for Swagbucks.  The amount you can win varies depending on the game, but certainly a great way to have a little fun and earn some Swagbucks easily.

It’s pretty easy to earn Swagbucks and work towards rewards.  Do a few of these tasks each day and the Swagbucks will add up pretty quickly.  And trading the Swagbucks in for your rewards is pretty easily too.

There’s two ways to redeem your Swagbucks.

Rewards

This is my favorite way to redeem Swagbucks.  For me, the thing I redeem them for the most is the $5 Amazon gift card.  It’s only 500 Swagbucks.  There’s a whole bunch of different places that you can get gift cards from, and you’re sure to find at least one or two that you’ll want to have.

Swagstakes

While it’s never a sure thing, Swagstakes can be a fun way to redeem your Swagbucks.  Obviously, Swagstakes is a play on Sweepstakes.  You redeem your Swagbucks for entries into a Swagstakes with the hope that you’ll win something worth way more than your Swagbucks are worth.  The entry “cost” varies by the Swagstakes, but most are less than 20 Swagbucks per entry.  I don’t use this option very often as I tend to prefer the sure thing of a gift card, but I have entered a few of them.  Never won yet though. 🙁

Swagbucks is a pretty cool rewards site that I’ve been using for years and I’ve never had a bad experience with them.  Over the years, I’ve redeemed my Swagbucks for a whole bunch of Amazon cards.  Depending on how much I use the site, I’ve sometimes earned a new card every month.  On average, it’s more like every 3-6 months though.  Still, for a few minutes a day, it’s an easy way to save a bit of money on my Amazon purchases.

 

 

Confessions of a Professional Blogger – Book Review

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Confessions of a Professional Blogger

By: Miranda Marquit

Confessions of a Professional BloggerDisclaimer: I received a copy of this book from Miranda.  My policy on books I receive free copies of is that I don’t review them unless I like them.

How many of us, myself included, don’t jump at the chance to get a little insight into how someone who does something that we want to do for a living, for a living?  I know that when Miranda asked me back at the end of 2013 if I would read her book that I immediately said yes.  It’s been a little while since she first sent over a copy, but that’s totally on me.  I read a lot of books, and somehow hers got lost in the shuffle and ended up at the bottom of the to-read pile.  I wish it hadn’t, but it did.

On to the book.  It’s a short read at just over 100 pages, but it’s chock full of excellent information on becoming a professional blogger.  Miranda leads the reader through the steps of starting out and gaining fans for your blog, or for gaining customers for your freelance writing.  Throughout the book, Miranda focuses quite a bit on the details on how she manages her freelance clients, the way she’s created the “package” of services that she provides, and how she structures it all to the benefit of all involved.

If you’re looking to test the freelance writer waters, Confessions is a quick read that’s loaded up with information on where to start, what you need to do, and how to keep it rolling.  You’ll find the book to read like a lot of Miranda’s articles, smooth and concise.  And who better to learn from than someone who used her freelance writing to become the primary breadwinner for her household?

You can pick up a copy of Confessions of a Professional Blogger at her site, MirandaMarquit.com.

Lending Club Returns 2014 EOY Update

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If you’ve been reading here for very long, you’ll know that I’ve been posting and discussing my Lending Club returns since the end of 2011.  For the first year or so, I updated with quarterly updates.   I didn’t do that in 2014.  Part of the reason for that was that it was a busy year for me, and the time to put together a full post on that every quarter just wasn’t always there.  The rest of the reason was that it was beginning to feel redundant to me, so I slowed them down a bit.  Now, I’ll be doing the updates on a yearly basis (twice a year at most) to hopefully avoid that feeling of repeating myself in each one.  On to the Lending Club Returns 2014 update.

If you don’t know what Lending Club is, the simple answer is that it’s a peer-to-peer lending network where people like you and me can both borrow and lend to people like you and me.  Want a little better explanation?  Head over to my Lending Club page to read more.

Lending Club Adjusted NAR

Beating Broke Lending Club UpdateWhen we left 2013 behind, my NAR on my Lending Club account was sitting at 13.16%.  A full year of lending has passed, and, as I’ll explain in just a bit, there’s been some changes to the account.  At the end of 2014, my NAR is now showing at 9.61%.  Down from 2013’s EOY number, but still a very healthy return on my investment.  For comparison’s sake, the S&P 500 returned about 11% for 2014.  So, ultimately, I could be getting more of a return on my money in an S&P 500 index fund.  The biggest difference for me is that each of the loans I’ve invested in on Lending Club has a set rate of return.  The only thing that changes that rate of return is a default.  I’ll talk about defaults in a minute, but the rate of default is pretty low.  Try and get a set rate of return on an index fund.  Your brokerage will laugh you out of the office.

Lending Club Defaults and Late Notes

As of the time of this writing, there are no late notes listed on my account.  In 2014, three notes went into a default status.  At the end of 2013, only one had gone into default.  It’s a little bit higher rate, obviously, than it had been previously.  But, as my portfolio on Lending Club has grown, the odds of a default here and there also has grown.  The full picture looks pretty good still.  Since I began investing in Lending Club, I’ve invested in 118 loans.  Only 4 of those have gone into default.  That’s a default rate of about 3.4%.  Flip that around, and if the trend holds, 96.6% of the loans I invest in will not default.  96.6% is a pretty good success rate if I do say so myself.

The 4 loans that have gone into default meant a total of $52.17 in written off principle.  Of that $52.17 that was written off, $10.74 has been recovered through collections for a total loss of principle of $41.43.  I’ll go into further detail in the next section, but the interest I make on the non-default loans more than makes up for that lost principle.

Lending Club Income

The biggest reason that I invest in Lending Club is for the higher rates of return and the income that it provides to continue building my portfolio.  I bank the interest payments and then reinvest them into new loans when I’ve passed $25 in available funds.  Those interest payments, after fees, totaled $115.69 for 2014.  That’s up from $109.88 in 2013.  Less of an increase than I expected, honestly, but still $115.69 that I didn’t have before.  And it still leaves me with about $75 in income on the account after you account for the lost principle that was written off.  And that’s $75 that I’ve reinvested into principle and am now earning interest on.  Given my current rate of return, I can expect that to increase by about $12 next year.

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Another of the metrics that I like to look at is the average amount of interest earned each month.  I reached point where the payments (principle+interest) each month exceeded $25, and I could make reinvestments each month, but the next benchmark I’d like to reach is to make $25 in interest each month to reinvest.  That’s one new loan to invest in each month.  The average for 2014 was $9.64, so I still have a way to go, but it’s increasing year over year.  It was $9.16 in 2013, $5.94 in 2012, and $1.91 in 2011.

I think the thing that I like the most about Lending Club is the income potential and the growth I’ve managed with my portfolio.  I haven’t deposited any new money into the account since November of 2012.  Through active investing and reinvesting, my portfolio has increased by almost $200.   I think that’s pretty good on deposits of just a hair over $700.

The Future of my Lending Club Portfolio

In the past, I’ve talked about changes I planned on making to my investing strategy in this section.  I’m pretty happy with my returns, and with the numbers that I’ve just shown you, and so there won’t be any immediate large changes.  If the default rate jumps by a lot, there’s a good chance that I might begin investing a bit more conservatively. But, if it holds steady, I see no real reason to do so.  My portfolio is pretty heavily weighted towards the B and C grade loans in any case.  And I don’t know that moving to A grade loans would give me the return I’m looking for.  So, short term, there won’t be any changes to my investing strategy.  I’ll just continue to reinvest the payments and see what kind of growth I get in 2015.

Do you have any questions I can answer about my experience with Lending Club?  Other things related to peer-to-peer lending that you want to know?  Let me know in the comments below, or through the contact form linked in the bar on the left.

Want to open an Investment account with Lending Club?  Click here to start the process.