I'm Hooked, Facebook Pay Is Amazing

I'm Hooked, Facebook Pay Is Amazing

I've been waiting for the day when I could conveniently (this part is important) pay friends back in exact change instantly. Sure, PNC has had it's POP pay feature for a while, but my friends would have to open an email and register through a website just to accept the money. Then if they wanted to pay me back, they probably had a different bank or something and it was annoying.

Then Snapchat added SnapCash and everybody thought it would change the way people pay each other back. But my friends are in their 30's and only downloaded Snapchat as a novelty to see what the college kids were raving about. And I don't know any college kids who actually use the SnapCash feature.

Now Facebook Pay is here, and I was instantly skeptical. Would I have to enter my bank and routing number and all that, and then have my friends open an email and register? I tested it out by sending my friend Kenny $1. All I had to use was my debit card. It was so simple! I was hooked. We started Facebook paying each other back and forth for little things. Sure there is a 2 day delay in actually receiving the funds in your account, but at least you can settle up instantly.

I introduced my brother to it and split a carryout order with him by paying him back. He was instantly hooked too. We talked about what college would have been like if we had the ability to instantly pay people back exactly what we owed them. Imagine how hard it would have been for that mooch friend to say "ooh, I'll get you back next week" or you buy my $11 movie ticket and I'll buy you a $4 soda -- even right?

The Best Compound Interest Calculator Widget Online

The Best Compound Interest Calculator Widget Online

Ok, this is pretty sad to admit, but I didn't know what compound interest was until about 3 years ago. I knew what interest was (that $0.02 addition to my savings account every month), but I didn't understand the power of compounding interest over time. I'm pretty sure my brother still doesn't know what it means, because he told me it didn't apply to stocks.

I think this might be a similar issue with millennials overall, or anyone who got their first 'real' job during or after the recession. I only have a vague memory of the time when savings accounts gave more than 1% APY. And I owned a mutual fund in the late 90's that basically did nothing, until I cashed it in for a 10-speed mountain bike (which seemed much more important at the time).

I'm sure I'll devote much more time to compound interest in the future, but for right now I wanted to share the best compound interest calculator widget I've come across on the internet. I was even thinking about buying a subscription just to embed it on my own site. It's very simple to use and doesn't just spit out a balance, it shows the balance over time in both a graph and a table.

Head over to CalculateStuff.com to check it out!