Unless you know where to look, missing money may never be found. Knowing that there is even something to look for is often a challenge. Money typically goes missing when someone dies and their heirs are unaware of accounts held by the deceased. As a result, money, property, and other funds due to the heirs often go missing, perhaps never to be found again.

For quite some time, states have had offices, departments, and websites to help consumers find and make claims against this missing money. Now, missingmoney.com has started to pull state-based information into more of a national database. 38 states, plus Washington, D.C. are currently included in the Missing Money database. Instructions for locating records from other states can also be found at the site.

While this site seems to be a great resource for locating missing money, it also highlights a problem that we should all try to avoid. Ensure that all of your accounts, no matter the size, are disclosed in your will, to your spouse, and/or to the executor of your estate. It’s great that missingmoney.com may help to find wealth you may have a right to claim, but even better would have been if the original account holder hadn’t let their money go missing in the first place.

We have long heard the positive benefits of getting more rest, yet many of us still get much less than we need. Trying to capitalize on this “reality”, Sealy Posturepedic, the well known mattress company, has a new print and media campaign urging you to “Get a Better 6.” Watch The Better 6 TV spots.

The idea behind the campaign is that if you can only get 6 hours of sleep a night, you should get the most restful sleep possible, presumably on one of their new mattresses. While I can’t fault them for marketing to people who have given up hope, their ads are akin to saying, “since I can’t give up fast food, I’ll try to eat at the healthiest fast food restaurant.” While that is better than the alternative, it detracts from the actual solution to the problem, eating healthy food (or getting sufficient rest).

You may wonder why I’d cover getting enough sleep on a personal finance blog. First of all,

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The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is warning consumers about a rise in products offering to boost fuel efficiency. It’s no surprise that so many products are being offered, considering the high price of gas. Those prices are blinding consumer’s better judgment and causing them to be tricked by claims such as those made by the much hyped Platinum Gas Saver that it can “boost fuel economy by 22%.”

The Platinum Gas Saver has been getting a lot of attention because of that outrageously high claim. The FTC talks about how to actually save gas, faulty advertising claims by gas-saving products, and lists products tested by the Environmental Protection Agency (including the Platinum Gas Saver) which show no improvement in gas mileage. The Consumer Report’s Platinum Gas Saver test also showed that it had no effect on fuel economy.

Instead of spending $119 on the Platinum Gas Saver, or any other device advertised to save gas, check the EPA’s list of products that don’t work and consider taking steps that have been shown to improve gas mileage time and again.

I’ve already covered how Vonage can save you money, but now I’m saving even more by paying for my service once a year. By paying for 12 months upfront, I get an extra 20% off! That means I’m getting all the phone service I need for 12 bucks a month. How can you beat that?

Now that I’ve used Vonage for a few years, I know that I love their service (and low prices) and that the quality of the calls is as good as the phone or cable company. That’s why I had no problem signing up for an extended period.

You can save even more by referring friends and family to try Vonage. Each person you sign up will get 2 free months of service and you’ll get a credit as well. If you’d like to try Vonage, send me an email ( service at spindage dot com) with the subject “Vonage” and I’ll send you a referral link for two free months of service.

Merrill Lynch’s recent report stating the possibility of a GM bankruptcy is another reason to ask the following question:

What company will still exist in 50 years? How about 25?

The trouble with buy and hold philosophies for long term investments is that there really aren’t any companies that will surely be around in 50 years. We have seen many giants of the industrial revolution and beyond crumble in recent years. It seems that no industry is safe. The automakers are in trouble. The airlines are in trouble. Banks and Financial Companies, Energy Companies, Telecom companies, and many more…no industry is immune.

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MyGallons.com is a new service that allows you to prepay for gasoline, “locking in today’s prices.” As more an more people come to the seemingly inevitable conclusion that gas prices can only continue to rise, it’s no surprise that a company came along to take advantage of this line of thinking. I seem to remember another item that could only go up and up in price: real estate. Prepaying for gas at today’s prices seems so savvy because the thought of a decline in gas prices is so unbelievable to most people today.

Obviously if gas prices start to fall, mygallons.com is going to start making more and more of a profit as people pay more than the market price for gas. Prepaying only locks in today’s “low prices” if prices continue to climb. If they fall, then prepaying is locking in today’s “high prices.” I suspect that mygallons.com is hedged for either move in the market. Since their public business model only seems to profit with falling prices, they are probably using some of the money you give them to buy oil futures expecting price increases. If that’s true, they stand to profit either way.

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Being frugally minded and debt averse I’ve always been proud to say that I pay cash for my cars. One of the cars in our household was bought new and the other one was bought used. After calculating the costs of buying a previous car for an upcoming post on the Lending Club blog, I’ve come to realize that paying cash may be costing me more for a number of reasons.

The main reason why paying cash for a new car costs more is the fact that new cars depreciate so quickly. As a result, leasing may be less expensive than paying cash and certainly less expensive than buying with borrowed money. To perform a reasonable comparison, I looked at the latest deal being offered at my local Honda dealer. Here’s what I found:

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