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When can you really justify making an expensive luxury purchase? Phyllis Furman, a business writer for The New York Daily News, recently wrote on an article on this topic and Clark has taken issues with some of her picks. For example, Furman thinks premium men's watches priced at $900 and up are worth it. Clark disagrees. He has an inexpensive Casio that has lasted him very well. He can't believe that The Financial Times -- a very upscale newspaper -- sometimes has ads for watches that cost $100,000. Furman also feels designer handbags priced at $800 and up are worth it -- something Clark just doesn't understand. On the subject of men's wool suits, the two once again have diverging feelings. Furman thinks suits priced at $300 are worth it, yet Clark has both a grey and a blue suit he got at J.C. Penney on sale for $149 each. There are, however, some areas where the two see eye to eye. Clark and Furman both agree that expensive built-in refrigerators, costly mattresses and designer jeans are not worth the price. When it comes to jeans, for example, it's the fit that matters, not the brand name. It's perfectly acceptable to pick up a pair for as little as $15.

The rate of delinquencies on mortgage loans is on the rise now that people who got adjustable-rate mortgages in the mid-1990s are being hit hard by interest-rate resets. This is a cyclical problem and it will probably continue through mid-2008 until it settles down again. Money magazine reports that calls to foreclosure counselors are up 1730 percent as people face massive increases in their monthly payments. Clark has advised people to call their lenders early and often if they're having trouble with their payments. Many folks have been complaining that the lenders don't want to hear it. Yet the mortgage lenders one by one are coming around and developing some workouts. A workout means that the lender will modify the terms and conditions of your loan to make payments possible for you moving forward. The lender gives up a lot of money on paper, but you win because you avoid foreclosure and can protect your credit rating throughout the process.

The Los Angeles Times reports that people who make the best candidates for mortgage workouts are those who made every payment on time before their interest-rate reset blew them out of the water. Lenders won't be inclined to help those who haven't been able to make payments from the very beginning of their loan. The second situation when you may be able to get a workout from a lender is if you've made timely payments and suddenly lose your job. Lenders will usually help you out for three months, but it's difficult to work things out any longer than that. Keep in mind that not every lender is willing to do a workout. But the smart ones will embrace workouts so they don't wind up paying to foreclose on a house they don't really want. HSBC, which was one of the big lenders of weirdo exotic loans, has been trying workouts. HSBC's model involves reset your interest rate based on a calculation of your basic expenses and how much other income is left to pay the mortgage. So Clark's advice stands. Call your lender persistently if you're in trouble. You do not, under any circumstances, want to just bury your head in the sand!

Clark's strategies for investing infuriate some people. They take issue particularly with the way he steers folks away from variable annuities and toward index funds or tax-managed accounts. But he's not alone in slamming variable annuities. The Wall Street Journal recently presented its reasons why they stink. But first, Clark wants to give some examples of index funds and tax-managed accounts so people know what he's talking about. Index funds can be things like the 500 Index or the Total Stock Market Index. With the former, you own one investment that owns small slices of the top 500 companies in America. With the latter, you own pieces of 3,000 companies in the United States. Tax-managed accounts, meanwhile, are for big spenders who have $10,000 or more sitting around. They offer low management costs and the management company is duty bound to balance your losses and gains so you don't have a huge tax bill at the end of the year. Both index funds and tax-managed accounts should be bought from no-commission, low-cost mutual fund companies like Fidelity Investments, Vanguard or T. Rowe Price.

There really are some stark differences when you compare and contrast Clark's choices of index funds/tax-managed accounts versus variable annuities. The latter has gigantic expenses each year, as much as 15 times greater than Clark's choices. The maximum tax you can pay on index funds/tax-managed accounts is only 15 percent, while it's 35 percent on a variable annuity. Variable annuities are also designed to be spent only when you're 59 1/2 or older. If you want your money earlier, you'll pay a 10 percent penalty. Clark's choices have no such age restrictions or penalties. Finally, you must pay a massive fee called a yearly surrender charge if you want out of a variable annuity before you've owned it for 10 years. Tax-managed accounts, meanwhile, may assess a one-percent fee if you leave with the first five years. The verdict is clear: Variable annuities stink!

Clark was recently getting a cheese-steak at a greasy spoon he likes to frequent. When the manager asked him for his frequent diner card, he couldn't produce it and missed out on a discount that he should have gotten! Clark is one of those people who has trouble keeping track of coupons and frequently loses them. He once had a coupon to get his oil changed, but it took him two days to find the coupon before he could use it! Meanwhile, Clark's TV producer is so obsessed with coupon-clipping that she has a big notebook sorted by categories like breakfast, lunch and dinner. When she's in the breakfast aisle at the grocery store, she simply looks in her notebook and voila! Now a company called CellFire.com allows you to get coupons sent directly to your cell phone. Even better, these coupons can be scanned at the register straight from your phone! This definitely helps address the flake factor. This technology is still in its infancy, but it promises to deliver advertising that you can really count on. For example, both Google and Nokia want to deliver targeted ads to your cell phone. So if you're driving down the street past a Dunkin Donuts, you'll get coupon for that store sent your phone. This will help advertisers track who redeems their coupons and help them avoid the expenses of printing and distributing old-fashioned coupons that could go unused.

Editor's note: While CellFire.com is free, your wireless carrier may charge a fee when you use the service. See the company's terms of service for more information.