The Great TFSA Race: Enter for your chance to win + MORE Sep 13th

Perhaps the federal government’s greatest gift to those who aspire to financial independence is the TFSA, or Tax Free Savings Account, introduced in 2009. With $25,500 cumulative contribution room rising to $31,000 as of January 2014, TFSAs have now attracted a significant amount of capital. Consider that between them, couples will soon have $62,000 available that will be largely free from the clutches of the tax person.
In the early days, the mere $5,000 that was available initially seemed so insubstantial that many tended to give the vehicle short shrift. Certainly, many baby boomers felt TFSAs were too little and too late for their purposes, although they would look with a certain amount of envy at millennials and young investors with a 40-year investing time horizon ahead of them—indeed, many financial gurus have calculated that merely by maxing out TFSA contributions over such a time frame, that alone would be sufficient to ensure a comfortable retirement: no RRSP or employer pension plan contributions necessary! (We would of course advocate doing all of those things, since saving too much is a far better problem to have than saving too little…

WestJet has launched a new promotion for their RBC WestJet MasterCard cardholders offering 2x the WestJet dollars when you use your card to purchase WestJet flights and vacation packages. The card normally offers up to 2% in WestJet dollars for those purchases which means during this promotional period cardholders will earn up to 4%. Add on top of that the up 2.5% you get on the actual flight for being a WestJet Rewards member means that you can get up to 6.5% WestJet dollars in total. The offer runs until December 15th and for more details please visit WestJet.

Last update for this week. Have a great weekend everyone! News, Tips & Tricks A few short term Air Miles bonuses to tell you about: Earn 10x Air Miles on V-Power® premium fuel purchases until Sep 29. (Max bonus 290 miles per transaction) Earn up to 20x Air Miles on Safeway purchases. TODAY ONLY Coupons here Reader Question: We received this question from one of our readers via email: “I need your help.  I can’t get either Thrifty Foods or Aeroplan to tell us if the daily shopping at Thrifty Foods would give us distinction points with Aeroplan.” Once again like yesterday when I read this I knew the answer would yes as I know that all my Sobey’s transacations count and since Thrifty is part of Sobey’s they should count as well. However I went right to Aeroplan to confirm and this was there response: Yes, Thrifty Foods counts towards Distinction accumulation. All direct accumulation count towards Distinction status (i.e. when a member earns with a partner program and chooses to earn Aeroplan Miles rather than the other program currency – the miles count towards Distinction status) Travel Deals iPrefer Flash Sale: Preferred Hotel Group iPrefer members can get 30% off rates at the Hotel Grand Pacific Victoria…

After dipping for two straight quarters, the national household debt to income ratio jumped to a record 163.4%, Statistics Canada said Friday. That means, for every $1 we’re earning, we owe more than $1.63. Not exactly financial independence. So where’s all this debt coming from? Our homes, mostly. Cumulatively, we owe $1.1 trillion in mortgage payments and $500 billion to various  lenders, largely banks and credit card companies. It’s this consumer debt that’s really taking off that’s worrisome. Growth credit market debt accelerated  from 0.5% to 1.6% during the quarter, StatsCan said. You can be sure much of that is not adding to household net worth (now standing at $205,900 per capita). Visit the Debt section of our newly redesigned website for tips on how to get back on track.
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