If you're looking to buy a plane ticket. Look to buy it on a Tuesday or Wednesday about 21-35 days from the departure date for domestic flights.

For international flights, do not buy the ticket sooner than 3 months from departure date. These dates have been demonstrated to be the cheapest time to buy.

Extended warranties are nothing but insurance.  You pay $X premium for a potential $XX loss.  That’s insurance in a nutshell, which is essentially like a stock option. 

My overall philosophy on all types of insurance is if you can afford the loss then you don’t need insurance.  Will you be able to replace the $2,000 TV if it goes bad?  If yes, then you don’t need insurance.  If you can't, then you need a larger Emergency Fund (TVs shouldn't be replaced with money from an emergency fund, but if it's college football season, you get the drift)!  Baked into the insurance premium is a profit.  So you’re protecting against the loss and also making somebody else money. 

Now if you can’t afford the loss though, then you need insurance.  Loss of car, home, health, long-term disability or liability lawsuit are all things that most cannot afford to replace if it were to occur.  Therefore, you need insurance on all of those items.  Just don't get the extended warranty on a car.  It's a rip off!   

Don’t forget that you are entitled to see your credit report from the three main companies (Experian, TransUnion, Equifax) that track your every financial move.  I suggest that you go view a different one every 3-4 months to check it for accuracy.  It will not tell you your credit score, but that’s not the point. 

The point is to make sure that it correct (so your credit score is correct) and to detect identity theft as soon as possible.  If you see something on there that you don’t know about or is wrong, be sure to report it to them immediately and while you’re on the phone with them, place your account on “fraud alert”. 

This makes it so that every company that needs to pull your credit has to call you personally and answer a series of personal questions in order to allow it.  You’ve probably heard of the company Life Lock.  This is essentially all that Life Lock does in order to protect your identity.  These fraud alerts last for 12 months, so all that they do is renew it for you and charge a fee. 

 www.annualcreditreport.com