The positive story of Clayton Homes stands out in the current subprime mess. A builder and financer of modular homes dealing primarily with the lower income market segment, Clayton Homes has bucked the trend of rising mortgage default rates. Their secret – practice conservative, old fashioned lending.

Their story highlights two big issues in the recent liquidity crisis:  First, institutions originating and selling off bad loans did not have to live with the consequences of their actions. Second, Clayton was careful in who they lent to.

A great take-away for all of us is not to forget that our decision-making (in business, as families, etc.) will be better when we  spend more time considering the cost of financial decisions knowing that we will be personally affected by any negative long- term consequences. 

Scott Houser, the Chief Compliance Officer of Ronald Blue & Co., recently penned an article that was highlighted in the Sound Mind Investing newsletter.  He and his wife, Candy, have had the privilege of raising and launching 5 children into college and beyond.  In this article, Scott shares the wisdom they gathered in the college search process.

You don’t have look far to get a negative view of all that is going on right now within our economy and the investment markets.  Certainly, there are reasons for concern, but there are also some alternative views which are going largely unreported or discussed.  Below are three recent articles highlighting a different perspective. 

Quit Doling Out That Bad-Economy Line

Why blue chips will bounce back

Recession … or not?

You have heard the adage: It seems too good to be true.   When it comes to financial opportunities and products, we would say: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is!  This article highlights how JP Morgan sidestepped the subprime mess that a number of their peers are now dealing with.  In their CEO’s own words, “We’d get the quarterly reports from our competitors and see that they’d added $100 billion to their balance sheets,” says Dimon. “And they were hardly adding any capital, so it looked like their investments were almost risk-free.”

The almost is a pretty painful place right now for quite a number of institutions and individuals.

Anyone who has sent a child to college can probably tell you that you have your work cut out for you. Navigating the financial aid maze is often difficult for parents.  Here is a link to a great primer on the topic of maximizing financial aid from www.finaid.org.  This site is a wealth of information when it comes to funding education.

You have probably heard some version of the story about the fisherman sitting lazily on the bank who was approached by a businessman who explains how he can build a fishing empire step by step.  As the man explains each step in the process, the fisherman says, “And then what?”  After the hard work of building an empire and then selling his large fishing enterprise so he can retire and reap his huge monetary reward, the fisherman asks the final “And then what?”  The businessman exclaims that he can spend all his days lazily fishing - to which the fisherman replies, “That is what I am doing now!”

Most of our cultural conversation around the idea of retirement focuses on that magical date and making sure we have enough money to last.  This USA today article highlights some of the challenges retirees are currently facing.  Retirement sounds good and certainly some downtime is good for anyone, but we were created for purpose (Ephesians 2:10).  Unfortunately, lost in all of that noise, is the simple question – “And then what?”

Conflict in the Middle East, the subprime mortgage issue, the price of oil, etc…  All good reasons to worry. In fact, worrying is a natural part of who we are – and some of us have more of this gift than others!  Here is a great article by Randy Alcorn that puts in perspective what we should really be worrying about. 

Our goal in public communication has always been to provide our unique perspective coupled with practical financial information that leads to sound financial decision making.  The Internet is full of generic and often conflicting financial information, and our objective in starting a blog is to provided useful, accessible, and balanced content.

As we considered alternatives, including sending a newsletter, we realized that the way people communicate over the internet has changed.  Most of us would say that we receive too many e-mails, some of which we would really like to read, but most we delete.  We want to avoid being “just another email” and our new blog seems to fit the bill.

A blog is great for a number of reasons.  For one, a blog does not clog up anyone’s inbox.  Fewer people seem to want information sent directly to them like newspapers or e-mail newsletters.  Instead, they prefer to go out and get it themselves by visiting online news, blogs, or other sites.

However, for our blog, the most important advantage is the accountability our audience will provide.  Often, organizations simply “blast” people with e-mails giving little thought to whether what they send is practical or effective.  Our blog will hold us accountable by measuring the traffic it generates, and in a few months we can track exactly how many people find it valuable.  If certain articles or sections of our blog only get a few hits per month, we are probably missing the mark.  On the flip side if we are seeing growing activity, we may be on to something.

Thanks for visiting, and we hope what you find is of value so that you are encouraged to make wise stewardship decisions.