Welcome to The Money Raccoon
Raccoons are famous for one thing: they never leave anything valuable behind. They dig, they search, and they always find the shiny stuff everyone else missed.
That’s exactly what we do — with your money.
The Money Raccoon is a personal finance site dedicated to helping everyday Americans keep more of what they earn. We hunt down the best ways to make extra money, cut monthly bills, pay off debt faster, build credit, find better bank accounts, and start investing — even if you’re starting from zero.
What You’ll Find Here
Make Money — legit side hustles, career moves, and quick-cash ideas that actually work
Save Money — practical ways to lower your bills, spend smarter, and stretch every dollar
Debt — real strategies to pay off credit cards, student loans, and personal debt for good
Credit — how to build, repair, and protect your credit score
Bank Accounts — the best savings accounts, checking accounts, and bank bonuses available right now
Investing — plain-English guides to start building wealth, no finance degree required
How We Research and Write
Personal finance advice is only worth what it’s built on. Here’s exactly how every article on this site is produced.
We start from primary sources. Interest rates, contribution limits, debt statistics and regulatory changes come from the institutions that publish them — the Federal Reserve and the New York Fed, the CFPB, the FDIC, the IRS, Federal Student Aid, and the credit bureaus themselves. When we cite a number, we link to where it came from so you can verify it yourself.
We show the math. Where a decision depends on numbers — payoff timelines, interest costs, compound growth, transfer fees — we run the calculation and show it in full. No vague “you could save thousands.” You get the scenario, the assumptions, and the result.
We write for the situation, not the average. Advice that only works at $90,000 a year isn’t advice, it’s decoration. Our guides account for tight budgets, damaged credit, thin files, and starting from zero — because that’s where most people actually are.
We update when reality changes. Rates move, rules change, and programs get replaced. Articles carry a last-updated date, and the ones tied to changing data — bank bonuses, contribution limits, debt statistics, credit scoring rules — are reviewed on a fixed schedule rather than left to age.
We correct our mistakes in public. If we get something wrong, we fix the article and note the correction. Spotted an error? Email us and we’ll look at it the same week.
How We Make Money (and What It Doesn’t Buy)
This site is free, and it stays free because of advertising and affiliate partnerships. When you open an account or use a service through some of our links, we may earn a commission at no cost to you.
Here’s our hard rule: no partner pays for a recommendation. We choose what to cover based on what readers are actually searching for and struggling with, and we describe products the way we’d describe them to a friend — including the fees, the catches, and the cases where the answer is “don’t.” When something isn’t worth it, we say so, whether or not it pays.
Affiliate relationships are disclosed on the pages where they appear.
Who’s Behind It
The Money Raccoon was founded and is edited by Marcos M., a personal finance writer with 5 years in the industry and over 1,000 articles published in the finance niche — covering jobs, credit cards, banking, debt and money-saving strategies for American readers.
The site started from a simple frustration: most personal finance content is either written for people who already have money, or padded out to fill a page without answering the question. The Money Raccoon exists to be the opposite — direct answers, real numbers, and guides that respect the reader’s time and situation.
Every article here is researched, written and edited to that standard.
How to Use What You Read Here
Every guide on this site is built to help you make your own decision with confidence: primary sources, real math, and the trade-offs laid out plainly. That’s the job we take seriously.
What we don’t do is personalized advice. We’re not licensed financial advisors, tax professionals, or attorneys, and nothing here is tailored financial, tax, or legal guidance for your individual circumstances. For decisions that hinge on your specific situation — a complex tax question, an estate matter, a large investment allocation — bring in a qualified professional. Come to us informed enough to ask them the right questions.
Get in Touch
Questions, corrections, story ideas, or partnership inquiries — we read every message.