For somebody that travels the same route over and over again, what are some ways to save on airfare?
Yapta.com will track flight prices, so you can know when a good time historically is to make a bunch of reservations.  Also, Air India has a frequent flier program so I hope you have signed up for it... you could get free flights once you get enough points (although I would probably use your points for upgrades to business class). I remember when humorist Dave Barry discussed some guy who invented the software that guaranteed that no two airline passengers ever paid the same fare.  As with much of Dave Barry's stuff, it has way too much truth in it. Research when the best time frame to buy your tickets is.  It varies wildly with time of day, time of week, time of year, whether the plane is half-empty or not, which airline you're traveling on, etc. Beyond that, if you can rack up frequent flier miles fast enough, you maybe can offset the cost of one of those trips.
Doesn't most of the time either in this job market. Losing a job over 40 is a pretty big deal.  Even bigger when there's a real danger of being out of work for an extended period. Honesty as a young person you have no idea how rough it is on older people to reboot a career....on top of losing more than half of your wealth and having way fewer years to recover.     There's a lot f kids right out of college that can't get jobs and that's true, but when the economy recovers there'll be a lot of you in the same boat, meaning the hiring pools won't be able to be as sticklers about no experience. Just like when the economy recovers and banks want to start lending to homebuyers in bulk again...so many people ha e bad credit from the collapse that they won't be able to set über high standards across the board in lending or the simply won't have a big pool of eligible applicants.     At some point millenials will be hired en masse as the economy recovers. The same is not nearly true for a forty something with a big unemployment gap. Over 50, forget about it almost entirely. "If it is planned, then one can get a Bankers Check payable overseas; if destination is known. 1.) What will happen to the money? It will eventually go to Government as escheating. Unlcaimed.org can help you trace the funds and recover it. 2.) Will the banks close the accounts?   3.) After how much time will the banks close the accounts? Eventually Yes. If there is no activity [Note the definition of activity is different, A credit interest is not considered as activity, a authentic phone call / correspondence to change the address or any servicing request is considered activity] for a period of One year, the account is classified as ""Dormant"". Depending on state, after a period of 3-5 years, it would be inactive and the funds escheated. i.e. handed over to Government. 4.) Is there anything else to do? Any ideas? Before leaving? Try keeping it active by using internet banking or credit / debit cards linked to the account. These will be valid activities.  5.) Is there any way to send a relative to the US with any kind of paper of power, to unfreeze the accounts? 6.) The banks say they would need a power of attorney, but does that person actually need to be an attorney in the US, or can it simply be   a relative WITH a paper (a paper that says power of attorney) or what   is a power of attorney exactly, is it an actual attorney person, or   just a paper? 7.) Is there any other way to unfreeze the accounts? Although I can confirm first hand; I think there would be an exception process if a person cannot travel to the Bank. It could even be that a person is in some remote state, not well etc and can't travel in person. I think if you are out of country, you could walk-in to an US embassy and provide / sign relevant documents there and get it attested. Although for different purpose, I know a Power of Attorney being created in other country and stamped / verified by US embassy and sent it over to US. This was almost a decade back. Not sure about it currently." "(Since you used the dollar sign without any qualification, I assume you're in the United States and talking about US dollars.) You have a few options here. I won't make a specific recommendation, but will present some options and hopefully useful information. Here's the short story: To buy individual stocks, you need to go through a broker. These brokers charge a fee for every transaction, usually in the neighborhood of $7. Since you probably won't want to just buy and hold a single stock for 15 years, the fees are probably unreasonable for you. If you want the educational experience of picking stocks and managing a portfolio, I suggest not using real money. Most mutual funds have minimum investments on the order of a few thousand dollars. If you shop around, there are mutual funds that may work for you. In general, look for a fund that: An example of a fund that meets these requirements is SWPPX from Charles Schwabb, which tracks the S&P 500. Buy the product directly from the mutual fund company: if you go through a broker or financial manager they'll try to rip you off. The main advantage of such a mutual fund is that it will probably make your daughter significantly more money over the next 15 years than the safer options. The tradeoff is that you have to be prepared to accept the volatility of the stock market and the possibility that your daughter might lose money. Your daughter can buy savings bonds through the US Treasury's TreasuryDirect website. There are two relevant varieties: You and your daughter seem to be the intended customers of these products: they are available in low denominations and they guarantee a rate for up to 30 years. The Series I bonds are the only product I know of that's guaranteed to keep pace with inflation until redeemed at an unknown time many years in the future. It is probably not a big concern for your daughter in these amounts, but the interest on these bonds is exempt from state taxes in all cases, and is exempt from Federal taxes if you use them for education expenses. The main weakness of these bonds is probably that they're too safe. You can get better returns by taking some risk, and some risk is probably acceptable in your situation. Savings accounts, including so-called ""money market accounts"" from banks are a possibility. They are very convenient, but you might have to shop around for one that: I don't have any particular insight into whether these are likely to outperform or be outperformed by treasury bonds. Remember, however, that the interest rates are not guaranteed over the long run, and that money lost to inflation is significant over 15 years. Certificates of deposit are what a bank wants you to do in your situation: you hand your money to the bank, and they guarantee a rate for some number of months or years. You pay a penalty if you want the money sooner. The longest terms I've typically seen are 5 years, but there may be longer terms available if you shop around. You can probably get better rates on CDs than you can through a savings account. The rates are not guaranteed in the long run, since the terms won't last 15 years and you'll have to get new CDs as your old ones mature. Again, I don't have any particular insight on whether these are likely to keep up with inflation or how performance will compare to treasury bonds. Watch out for the same things that affect savings accounts, in particular fees and reduced rates for balances of your size." Before doing anything else: you want a lawyer involved right from the beginning, to make sure that something reasonable happens with the house if one of you dies or leaves. Seriously, you'll both be safer and happier if it's all explicit. How much you should put on the house is not the right question. Houses don't sell instantly, and while you can access some of their stored value by borrowing against them that too can take some time to arrange. You need to have enough operating capital for normal finances, plus an emergency reserve to cover unexpectedly being out of work or sudden medical expenses. There are suggestions for how much that should be in answers to other questions. After that, the question is whether you should really be buying a house at all. It isn't always a better option than renting and (again as discussed in answers to other questions) there are ongoing costs in time and upkeep and taxes and insurance. If you're just thinking about the financials, it may be better to continue to rent and to invest the savings in the market. The time to buy a house is when you have the money and a reliable income, plan not to move for at least five years, really want the advantages of more elbow room and the freedom to alter the place to suit your needs (which will absorb more money)...  As far as how much to put down vs. finance: you really want a down payment of at least 20%. Anything less than that, and the bank will insist you pay for mortgage insurance, which is a significant expense. Whether you want to pay more than that out of your savings depends on how low an interest rate you can get (this is a good time in that regard) versus how much return you are getting on your investments, combined with how long you want the mortgage to run and how large a mortgage payment you're comfortable committing to. If you've got a good investment plan in progress and can get a mortgage which charges a lower interest rate than your investments can reasonably be expected to pay you, putting less down and taking a larger mortgage is one of the safer forms of leveraged investing... IF you're comfortable with that. If the larger mortgage hanging over you is going to make you uncomfortable,  this might not be a good answer for you. It's a judgement call. I waited until i'd been in out of school about 25 years before I was ready to buy a house. Since i'd been careful with my money over that time,  I had enough in investments that I could have bought the house for cash. Or I could have gone the other way and financed 80% of it for maximum leverage. I decided that what I was comfortable with was financing 50%. You'll have to work thru the numbers and decide what you are comfortable with. But I say again, if buying shared property you need a lawyer involved. It may be absolutely the right thing to do ... but you want to make sure everything is fully spelled out... and you'll also want appropriate terms written into your wills. (Being married would carry some automatic assumptions about joint ownership and survivor rights... but even then it's safer to make it all explicit.) Edit: Yes, making a larger down payment may let you negotiate a lower interest rate on the loan. You'll have to find out what each bank is willing to offer you, or work with a mortgage broker who can explore those options for you. There's so much wrong in such a small space here...  Why do you think this is a component of working in government? Is it a component of working in the private sector? Non-profits? Military (Which is still government)?  If someone specializes in shale gas extraction commercial rate setting for the purposes of royalty calculation, why do they need to remember what it's like to be Joe Sixpack?  Why do NSA administrators who monitor foreign intelligence channels need to remember what it's like to bargain shop?  The argument is nonsense from the ground up.  At the same time, how is flying coach teaching them this *valuable* lesson? And why do you think they can't remember it without flying coach?  Plus, I'm not sure you understand what forms a bubble. I fly coach. I don't interact with anyone around me. And the government officials we're talking about are not so well compensated they don't have ordinary lives.  Instead, the concern you're really alluding to is that homogenous groups of professionals tend to develop institutional blind spots.  Flying coach won't solve that. Same could go for flying private. At the end of the day there is a cost benefit and what an employee's time is worth.  My employer doesn't give a shit, so I pay for my own business class out of pocket. People I deal with externally all fly business, which sucks when you are on the same flights. &gt; A few years back JetBlue offered discounted flights across the States. Reddit pooled money together and bought a guy tickets to destinations selected by Reddit.  The guy met up with local Reddit users who showed him around town.  This part is true. /u/77or88 iirc. The rest is fake news ;)  Soure: my flair I'm curious to hear what exactly you would do with these *decent ingredients for home-cooked meals at a good price* while you're driving to your next destination, and need to eat before you arrive? Do you actually journey to your home every time you eat?