Well, a while ago I had a contest called, $100 a Month.  How Would You Spend it? There were some great comments, and I’m going to share some before I announce the winner.

Forget saving, forget investing. With this found money I would totally use it for a beautiful date with my wife each month. It should cover a babysitter, flowers, and a nice meal or theater tickets.

You could look at it as investing : investing in our romance, connection, communication, love, and marriage. It think that will pay greater dividends in our finances and for our children than an money market interest.

-The Happy Rock

The Happy Rock takes a family finance twist, cool!

I would use the money to invest in my blog and some ideas I have for passive income generation. Then, when those started paying off I would spend most of my time slathering on sunscreen while enjoying tropical beaches!

-Maria

Maria is going to live on the beach, I wish she would’ve told us some of those amazing income generation ideas though.

Well, I can’t answer both honestly and creatively at the same time. So I’ll answer honestly, and then try to be creative with my honest answer.

I would use the extra $100 to reduce our debt. I ran the numbers with my trusty snowball calculator, and adding $100 to the amount we generally can put towards debt each month would allow us to:

1) Pay off our transfer to a 0% credit card well within the 12 months we have til that offer expires and it reverts to the purchase interest rate

and

2) Get out of non-mortgage debt completely a full 4 months earlier (August 2010) than our current target date of December 2010.

After August 2010, I would use said money to invest in my children and invest in me and invest in the world. I would divide the money into 1/4ths and invest 1/4th each in my retirement fund, my kids college funds (I have 2 kids) and I would give the other 1/4th away to a charity I chose. Maybe a different charity every month.

I just found your blog keep up the great posts

-Paidtwice

Paidtwice has a very detailed plan AND panders to my ego!  She also has more smileys than the other posts

Seeing as how it is unexpected money, then I’d assume that I already have my finances planned out safely with my regular wages, meaning that the extra $100 is expendable.

For that reason, I would give it to my kids/nephews etc. (Any young teenager with an entrepreneurial spirit). Not as a gift, but as an investment for them. Give them the challenge of seeing what they can do with the money.

Perhaps they’re looking at starting their own website? Forums? Blogs? $100 would mean an awful lot to them; they could buy certain scripts, good hosting, adverts etc. It’s a huge difference than trying to start a website with nothing, and it could really make a difference to their entrepreneurial skills.

-Michael from Pro Blog Design

Michael’s post I find very interesting too, taking the position of a Venture Capitalist.  Investing in teenagers like this is risky, but one Bill Gates in the group could mean millions for Michael in the long run.

So Who Won?

By coming up with an idea that I hadn’t thought of personally, and one with some very interesting possibilities, Michael from Pro Blog Design wins the contest!  Expect to see my 500 word review of his site tomorrow night! 

All of the bloggers here had great submissions, and I would love if you would follow all the links in this post since they all operate quality sites.  In fact, the reason this post came a day late was because I couldn’t decide (even with my wife’s help) which submission was the best, and had to bring in some friends to aid in my choice.