benrobb » me http://benrobb.com Wed, 14 Mar 2012 03:38:40 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Tips for 1st Time Home Buyers http://benrobb.com/2008/02/18/tips-for-1st-time-home-buyers/ http://benrobb.com/2008/02/18/tips-for-1st-time-home-buyers/#comments Tue, 19 Feb 2008 05:29:54 +0000 benrobb http://benrobb.com/2008/02/18/tips-for-1st-time-home-buyers/ HouseI think I found the Get Rich Slowly blog through the Google Reader recommendations, but regardless of how I found it, I like the way this guy thinks. My father and my father-in-law have very different philosophies on money and how to spend it, but my risk averse nature means that I tend to play conservative when it comes to spending thousands of dollars at a time.

Alison and I are saving money to buy a home. Alison shops around online and keeps an eye on prices in different neighborhoods around the valley. I rule the monthly budget with an iron fist to make sure that a few hundred dollars goes into a house savings fund every month. We’ve never bought a house before, and it’ll be awhile before we can afford it, but for anyone who finds themselves in this situation, this article at Get Rich Slowly offers some advice.

Some of my favorite tips are:

  • Get pre-qualified for the mortgage and spend only 75% of that amount
  • Make a list of priorities
  • Buy less than you can afford
]]> http://benrobb.com/2008/02/18/tips-for-1st-time-home-buyers/feed/ 0 How Well Does Your Name Google? http://benrobb.com/2008/02/11/how-well-does-your-name-google/ http://benrobb.com/2008/02/11/how-well-does-your-name-google/#comments Tue, 12 Feb 2008 04:31:09 +0000 benrobb http://benrobb.com/2008/02/11/how-well-does-your-name-google/ So if you’re anything like me, from time to time you google your name. I like to see how many of the top 10 results are actually me. Since I started doing this a year or two ago, I simply cannot compete with Benjamin Robison the apparently famous violinist. Though my blog gets a fair amount of traffic, I can’t make any headway against him.

Next in line is Ben Robison the director of an aircraft carrier fleet and then third on the list is me. Then you’ll find a link to Ardesco’s site and find out that Benjamin Robison the violinist is also a director (no wonder I can’t top him).

Then there’s the Blue Dwarf’s blog talking about my visit to the Web Analytics class at BYU. Whoever the Blue Dwarf is, he must be an SEO expert, cause my name is only on that page one time, and I was surprised to see it ranked so high.

The there’s ISLand where my blog gets resyndicated, followed by a few more blogs mentioning Ben Robisons that aren’t me. And finally my LinkedIn profile rounds out the top 10.

So that gives me 40% of the top 10. Not too bad, I thought until I googled my neighbor’s name just for fun. Dang Him! All top 10 results are relevant to him. Sure he’s got his own photography business. Sure Apple has spotlighted his work. Sure he’s got movies about him on YouTube. Sure his photography rep links to him. But does that make him more special than me =)

Anybody want to make popular movies about me and post them on YouTube? No takers?!

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