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By Caroline Bennett
Daily Finance

Salacious shopping sprees, supersized bar tabs and parties that run well into seven-figure territory dominate the celeb gossip headlines. But not all of Hollywood's elite burn through money like it's going out of style.

There are some stars who have excellent financial track records, and you don't have to have a celebrity-sized paycheck to follow their lead. From saving money to making smart investments, these actresses are great role models for financial advice that anyone can use. Here's how they do it.

Clearly the best way to use aluminum foil is to fashion it into a cone-shaped hat to block aliens or the "Government" from reading your thoughts. However, aluminum foil has other uses -- even beyond cooking.

Here are a few ways to transform a cheap and durable kitchen staple into a marvel of home economy.




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I'm sorry to tell you this waitstaff, but a lot of people hate tipping.

It's confusing, with people inevitably hemming and hawing over how much to tip and how much is fair, it's awkward, as it's not like you have to, and it's extremely random. How much is enough? How much is too much? Why do some service industries expect to be tipped in some areas, while it's perfectly acceptable not to even think of tipping others in different parts of the same industry?

After all, we're expected to tip the baggage handler at a hotel, but not the person at the front desk. Plus, some people believe that tipping is downright discriminatory, since data shows that blondes are tipped more than brunettes and black customers actually do tip less than white customers, which has caused discriminatory blowback for black customers by the restaurant industry.

Stephen Dubner and Steve Levitt, of Freakonomics fame, recently tackled this issue in their newest podcast.

By Michele Lerner
Daily Finance

Did your new high school graduate just rake in a few hundred dollars from congratulatory friends and family? Birthdays, bar and bat mitzvahs, and confirmations can also be quite lucrative for kids.

Money gifts can be both a blessing and a curse depending on the age of the recipient and the money personalities of the parents and their offspring. While clearly an infant has no say in what happens to funds given in honor of her birth, older children may balk at having their gift cash controlled by their parents.

On Wednesday afternoon, the winner of the largest sole jackpot in U.S. lottery history stepped forward to claim her winnings. Gloria C. Mackenzie, 84, bought the winning $590.5 million ticket at a Publix supermarket in Zephyrhills, Florida.

Mackenzie will take a lump-sum pretax payout of $370 million. And while the odds of winning that much money are steep -- 1 in 172.5 million in this case, according to one estimate -- it's not uncommon for people to come into a sudden windfall, such as an inheritance.

By Chuck Saletta
The Motley Fool

This is not an article on how to invest $25 a week and turn it into a million-dollar gold mine. It's not even an article about how to turn it into half a million dollars, unless you have 40 years to wait and incredible investment returns.

This is a piece about figuring out a way to add just a little bit more to your savings plan -- say, $5 a workday, $25 a week, $100 a month -- to give your retirement years a nice little boost.

We're talking about the kind of money that'll afford you a couple of extra vacations, or a new car, or the ability to spoil the grandkids every now and then. You know, the little things that turn life from mere existence into a pleasurable journey.

With summers getting hotter and drier, homeowners should think about how they can conserve more water - in their homes and in the garden. It's easy to put these practices to work and that will pay off big time when it comes to your water bills. This is especially true now that many municipalities are moving to a consumption based model, where homes are metered and charged accordingly.

In Toronto for example, a typical water bill for a single family home runs about 600 dollars. The city has had a long-term plan to increase water rates by 9 per cent each year, so home owners are looking for savings anywhere they can find them. So heed our advice, and start saving with these easy-to-implement fixes.

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We've all heard how to be smart with our money: Save for an emergency, make more than you spend, pay down your debt, track your spending, create a budget and more. Most of us follow these maxims in an effort to fulfill both long and short-term goals, like a vacation, or a home or just to make our greatest dreams come true.

But, if you ask popular inspirational speaker and former think tank executive and business strategist Danielle LaPorte, too often we go after the goal only to discover we didn't really want that particular thing in the first place. In actual fact, we're not chasing a particular goal, we're chasing a particular feeling and she encourages all of us to get clear on how we actually want to feel in our lives, before we lay out our intentions.

She asks: "What if your most desired feelings, consciously informed how you planned your day, your year, your career, your holidays -- your life?"

Yes, Danielle LaPorte contends that we all have the procedures of achievement flipped upside down and righting them, she says, is only one way you can up your game when it comes to making money.

You think you know what he'd like for Father's Day. But you don't. You really don't. At least I didn't. I thought he deserved a massage. And he does. But that's not what he wants. A new shirt? Nope. This year instead of trying to surprise him, I thought I'd ask him what Father's Day gift he'd most like. It turns out what he really wants -- and claims most men want -- is to be independent for a day or at least an afternoon and a night. He may even want to be treated as if he were 12 years old again. The good news is that this can be accomplished at a very reasonable cost. Here are five ideas on how to let your husband roam free at a discount.

By Dan Caplinger
The Motley Fool

Retirement savings took a huge hit during the financial crisis and market meltdown five years ago, with savers of all ages feeling the brunt of plunging markets. But members of Generation X -- those born between 1966 and 1975 -- suffered the worst declines in their net worth from the crisis and saw the least recovery in the years that followed.

As a result, Gen-Xers are in bad shape when it comes to retirement readiness, as a recent study from the Pew Charitable Trusts concluded. With only enough financial resources to replace half of their pre-retirement income, the key question for Gen-Xers on the whole isn't how financially secure their retirement will be, but rather whether they'll be able to retire at all.