$ My Young Guns $

2008-01-04T12:08:00.000-08:00

Well, it has certainly been a while. I wanted to wait until I had something to post about.

We have been doing good this last year and managed to save around $18,000. We should be looking at getting a house withing the next year or year and a half. We have a wedding coming up in October and have planned a low budget wedding that will include tons of fun. :)

My girl has a great, steady job in copy editing. We have started a Roth IRA and have a quarterly CD rotation going on to help us save for the house.

Now we need to focus on going to a lawyer and getting all of our documents in order to protect ourselves from the government and our families, get some extra life insurance, keep on saving, getting me some short term disability insurance, and more with the saving.

Cheers to the new year and hoping we can meet our goals.

Things are starting to move along

2007-02-28T05:48:00.000-08:00

Vehicle is paid off. Savings is increasing. The lull in posts was mainly because all we could be doing for the past few months was save. save. save.

1. Jeep is paid off as of January

2. Savings has increased to $8000 total

3. Side jobs are bringing in about 800 a month for the time being.

4. Retirement accounts are slowing growing with now a total of $14,000

5. As of the Jeep being paid off, my month savings contribution has increased to $1,200 not counting any extra income from side jobs

5. The girlfriend will be pulling in a steady paycheck for the next 5 months or so. (now, most of this money will go to her paying off debt, but some will go to our savings )

I hate Bank of America

2006-12-12T14:21:00.000-08:00

I signed up with Bank of America to get the free 100 bucks for opening the checking/savings account. I wanted to try them out and see how I liked them. First of all they said I didn't enter the code for that promotion. I know I did. I saved the page to my desktop. That was the only reason I opened that account. I remember reading all of the small print as I was filling it out. Fine....so, I will close it. Most banks will send you a check for the remainder of what is in the account. No, they tell me to bring it to 0 and then close it. I go to transfer the money to my other bank account. It said it would be a 3.00 fee, so I cancel it. Somehow the transaction still goes through will meanwhile I already processed a transaction for the exact amount that was in my account. So, the process that I CANCELLED still goes through and bounces. Granted no money went anywhere from that bounced transaction, but they charge me 19 dollars. I call and ask them about this. They are rude and proceed to tell me that there is nothing they can do. Ok, I suck it up and make a transaction to transfer 10 bucks into that account so that I can close it. Well, now another transaction supposedly bounced. This time NO transactions are even listed in my tranfers. This one is a 33.00 fee. I call and ask what that is...that no transaction was scheduled to come out of my savings account. They don't know and said they would send me a letter in 5-7 business days. ??? This is a savings account. I never had any transactions coming out of it. I don't understand and they always say that there is NOTHING they can do about it. I am so mad. I never bounce anything and now I have to pay THEM 52 dollars just to get out of this account???!!!

My Christmas Shopping

2006-12-01T08:50:00.000-08:00

This is a list of my purchases or intended purchases

Bought:

Niece -$15 -Trouble (the game) and some fancy markers.
I got this cheap using a $10 of $10 or more promotion with google

Nephew1 -$5 - 2 videos
I got this cheap using a $10 of $10 or more promotion with google plus a discount code for PBS and they were offering $1 shipping

Nephew2-$15- kid's shirt from Threadless.com - they were having a $10 dollar sale (half off!)

Brother -$40- Gift card to Bass Pro Shop

Sister-in-law - I don't know!

Mother -$0- sonicare electric toothbrush that I got to either try out myself or give to someone else and report back on their reactions.

Dad -$5 - Bought his domain name and built him a website for his business

Grandparents1 - $17 - Fruit cake and macaroons from the baker my gf works at - 20% discount

Grandparents2 - $17 - Fruit cake and macaroons from the baker my gf works at - 20% discount

The girlfriend - She reads this! No way am I telling!

Don't buy stuff you can't afford

2006-11-22T07:01:00.000-08:00

This is just awesome!!!!

What Now ?

2006-10-25T06:06:00.000-07:00

I received a call from a headhunter two days ago. Here are my issues (well, some)...I had the preliminary screening interview yesterday and now they are going to set me up with an interview with the company.

Now, yes...the job I have now does not pay as much as I would like, but it is great experience. I do web application development and we get to keep up with new technologies, etc. For my first year here I was the only developer. Now, I have a Jr. Programmer under me. That has to be good, right? This is also a very stable job. I was planning on brining up the compensation, etc. with my boss on my year review. The review is in a few weeks.

Now, if this other company would want me...starting out I wouldn't be as high up of a programmer as I am now, but they said they have plenty of opportunity to move up. I just need a little more experience with that particular language first. This is a bit less stable of an environment, but the company has been around for 17 years. The instability is more in the tech market...I think things will be fine for at least a few years.

Ok, the money question. I have been asking myself. How much would I need to leave this job? I am thinking around $10,000 more a year. Then I think...well, I should stick it out here for another year and then I will have that much more experience and will have completed a few big projects...which could help me get more later.

Wow, it really helps to type all of this out. I am still a bit up in the air...but it seems that maybe sticking with my lower paying job may be better for now. I can hope for a bigger raise next year?...I guess...

Debt going down and Efund going up

2006-10-17T10:12:00.000-07:00

Slowly but surely. I have 2,500 dollars left to pay on my Jeep. Me being quiet doesn't mean I haven't been working hard. The past few months I have been paying $1,000 a month towards that debt. Soon it will be gone and I will move to putting $1200 a month into our savings. This will go towards our emergency fund and our house fund.

We already have roughly $7,000 in our emergency fund. I would like to have 15,000 for our emergency fund. This would cover a job loss for a few months.

I would also like us to have $25,000-30,000 down on a house. My partner will be out of school and brining in more income soon. Maybe we can sock away a little more. For now I will say we are looking at around 2.5 years. I hope houses don't go up too much more :(

I keep going back and forth on buying sooner and financing more or buying later and having house prices go up and up. Austin will be sure to go up in prices. Who knows.

The dog is coming along well in her training. I could not be happier with that whole situation.

Well, this is the state of my state. Over and out.

Dog training and more of the same

2006-10-07T09:06:00.000-07:00

I haven't written in a while....well, because everything is just trucking along. Every month we just shove money aside and try to live off the remainder. We don't get to go out and eat and drink as much as we used to, but at least we know we are saving for a house. Once recent cost we acquired was dog training. It usually costs 120 bucks a session and we are getting it for 30 bucks. She likes us and our dog and can tell that we are going to work with her. Sooo, same ole same ole around here.

Commitment and merging money

2006-08-28T06:27:00.000-07:00

It doesn't scare me...it is just weird when you know this person is the one. We know we are going to get married and last night we sat around and drank beer and ate pizza and talked about our wedding for three hours! Fun! Scary!

The girlfriend is still in culinary school and she is about to get a job at the place she has been doing her internship. (yeah! $$!) With this job will come the meshing of our money. With the meshing of our money comes the need to get our stuff together and visit a lawyer!

We need wills, domestic partnership, durable power of attorney for health and finances, living wills, hospital visitation authorization. I hope that is all. Our financial advisors, one of which is gay, are going to help us a bit. I want to know what I am talking about before I go to a lawyer.

Life without Quicken and other banking news

2006-08-24T07:11:00.000-07:00

My computer is currently dead. I am waiting until next month to take it in. I have been without Quicken for about 2 weeks! I am starting to go through withdrawals. Just this morning as I was closing my Etrade account, after getting my $50 bonus, I was thinking how I couldn't wait to go check all my balances on Quicken. Oh the agony.

I just opened a Bank of America account. They are running a free $100 bonus promo. I have been looking for an excuse to open an account with them. I like the savings plan where they round your purchases up to the next whole dollar and put the difference in your savings account and match it for the first few months.

Down for the count

2006-08-14T08:17:00.000-07:00

With Jeep repairs and my shoulder going out, we are at the end of our monthly money in the middle of the month! I have an injury that flares up 2 to 3 times a year. So, off to the doctor I go, but this time after spending 50 bucks for office visit + meds my injury has not gone away! My shoulder is still as stiff and sore as it was a week ago. I have a friend who is a masseur, but he is going away for a week. I might call the Dr. office and see what we can do without me having to come in again. I have a dentist appointment tomorrow that will run around 50 bucks. I only have $15 in my checking account. So, some of this will have to come out of savings. This won't really put us behind. According to our financial advisors, we needed to save $850 for a year and a half to meet our goal of getting a house then. This has only been in affect for 2 months. The first month I put aside $900. This month I put aside $885 plus we had an extra $68 in our accounts from an etrade bonus + interest in other accounts. So, pulling out for my dentist payment will still have us on track. I just scored a website project for $1300, plus have an extra $200 bucks coming from another. I won't get all of that $1300 payment at once, but should have it all in 2-3 months.

I had free movie tickets, so we used those last night. This Saturday one of our favorite bands is playing at Central Market for free (and you can BYOB). It is a task to keep ourselves entertained on the cheap, but we can always find ways.

Thanks for the help!

2006-08-04T06:18:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone who replied to my previous posts. While there is most likely nothing that can be done about the student loan situation (except for me to document everything and keep my notes more organized and don't throw things away so soon).

Now, the job bit. It looks like they probably won't hire someone on the high end of that pay range, just talking more about the position, my boss is thinking of getting someone right out of college-ish. I still am kicking myself for not asking for a few thousand more, but we live and learn. I really know how things work a bit more. This is only my second job out of college and I have really really learned. Raise time is coming up. Since we are government folk, the raises aren't anywhere near the corporate world, but I will see what I get and then go from there. I looked up the pay range for my job...that advice was awesome...I totally forgot that this would be public.

Deep breaths and onward ho!

Sometimes I hate myself

2006-08-02T06:35:00.000-07:00

I have always been a trusting person. In more recent years I am getting away from that, but it is hard. In 2003 I called to consolidate my student loans. I was to get a 3.x percent interest rate. I called and confirmed everything, but didn't keep notes. Well, today I was going through stuff online and saw my interest rate at 7.14% oh my jesus. So, I call. My loans were never consolidated.

So.freaking.pissed.

I am bad at raises- Need Help!

2006-07-31T06:18:00.000-07:00

So, I work for the government doing web application development. When I got hired on I felt like I should have asked for a bit more. I was a moron. Now, I am getting an assistant..I saw the request form for this position and the salary range was from $11,000 below mine to $1,000 below mine. I would feel pissy even if there were any less than 8,000 below me. I haven't been here a year, but our evaluations are in September and usually being in the government we get a set amount for a raise. Should I talk to my boss? What would you do? I need help.

It's a zoo in here!

2006-07-25T08:03:00.000-07:00

We have a dog, a cat, a parrot, and a canary. All in a two bedroom apartment. Well, this morning we awoke to animal trauma. The parrot sleeps outside in his cage. He likes the outdoors, plus there are some wild parrots around that he likes to talk to during the day. We are on the second floor and have never had any problems with this arrangement in 8 months. Well, as soon as I woke up this morning, I stumbled onto the porch to say hi to the plants and the bird. I saw tail feathers all over the porch and ran over to look. He had been attacked. His tail was plucked - nothing left and it looked like he had a gash on his side. It was obvious that he was tired and got no rest. Something must have climbed up a tree about 10 feet away and jumped onto the porch to get him! Poor bird. We rushed him to the doctor. His butt looks fine. The rest of the trauma was to his wing feathers, but the blood was mostly coming from a few blood feathers. The doctor plucked those out and checked him all over. I have to give him 2 shots a day for 5 days to make sure nothing gets infected. 90 bucks later and the bird is ok and all of us are tired. It was well worth it for a happy family. No more outside play/sleep without our supervision.

With all of these animals we really don't have many things like this come up. We have been lucky. Poor birdie was very lucky that he is still alive.

Over and out from the zoo.

How I scored .29 greeting cards

2006-07-24T06:16:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I was lucky enough to purchase enough cards to get me through birthdays and a few other holidays for the next 2-3 years. Each at a max cost of 29 cents each. How? Well, Albertsons is going out of business in our area. They had most food items at 30%-40% off, but even with that discount that just brought their prices down to our regular store's prices (HEB). No wonder they were going out of business. So, we were pretty disappointed upon finding that out, but then we saw that all greeting cards were 90% off. I bought bday cards for my mom, dad, niece, brother, and nephew. I found a father's day card or two and a few blanks. Awesome! Wine was at a pretty good discount too, but we were there before noon, which is a no-go in Texas. The girlfriend might be going back for two bottles. We don't drink much wine, but we have friends who invite us over and want us to bring a bottle. This way we can get away with only paying 5 bucks a bottle! :)

This whole experience really made me appreciate my normal grocery store.

Trying to stay on plan- obstacles!

2006-07-21T12:42:00.000-07:00

Our financial advisors said we should save $850 a month right now. This month I have put $900 in savings. I figure we will have up months and down months, but as long as it evens out in the end, then we are ok.

My check engine light came back on. I tried replacing the gas cap, so I am going to drive it 50 miles and give it the chance to let me know all is ok. If not, then I have to take Jeep to the shop! $$ oh no! I hope it won't be anything too expensive.
AND to top it off - my 14 year old Huffy bike has died on me. I have to figure out what I am going to do there. :( Sadness.

I have found a hybrid for $240 at one shop. I will go to all of the other bike shops and see what they have. I have been checking craigslist, but nothing in my price range (cheap) has come up. Austin is such a bike town and these people spend serious money on their bikes!

If it isn't one thing, then it's another.

The best frugal wedding!

2006-07-20T06:08:00.000-07:00

I officiated over my best friend's wedding. So many people came up after the ceremony, at the reception, and said this was one of the best weddings they had been to. It was done on a very small budget, and this is how:

One mother of one of the groom's worked in flower shop. She bought these very lifelike flowers and made all of the corsages and boutonnieres, as well as a few small table arrangements. There were a few other candles bought and some table covers...and a few tiny adornments, but that was all as far as decorating.
The father on this side is a chef and he made the rehearsal dinner meal.

The mother of the other groom is a cake decorator on the side and she made the wedding cake.

The ceremony was held at an old train depot and was free - just a 100 dollar deposit that was returned. The chairs were provided by the depot. Three big candle holder things were rented and the depot provided the rest of the charm.

The reception was held at the place of one of the groom's work-so, free reception rental. It is in a pretty, old building - it is a tap room and the place where they met. We got the whole upstairs. There were finger foods ordered from the pub for the guests. They met there doing karaoke, so they borrowed a mixer and mics from friends. One of the grooms used to do the karaoke at another bar, so he had all of the songs. They only needed to rent the speakers.

For gifts for the guests, they made CDs with their favorite songs, and using a special burner (not expensive at all) they were able to burn a picture of themselves on the top of the CD. Great idea!

Everyone had a blast!

And, of course, the officiator was free. :)

Getting Extra Disability Insurance - Do It!

2006-07-12T07:35:00.000-07:00

We had a meeting with our financial advisors last night. This was our second meeting and we got this huge folder of our "plan". We started in three areas: my insurance, getting private insurance for my partner, and budget.

My Insurance-
Health-
I have insurance through work for free. Work offers dental and vision for a small
monthly amount- I already took them up on those.

Life- free 10,000 basic from work - will add more next year before we get a house

Long Term Care- None

Long Term Disability- I already had this through work - starts 90 days after you stop work- standard 60% of pay, but WAIT. 60% of pay? I had never really thought about this. I figured since this was standard then we would be ok...right? right? no. This is 60% of pay that can be taxed. NOT ENOUGH. The advisors pointed this out and steered us to get more long term disability coverage for myself. I am the only one with a steady income at this point and we would be screwed without it. They said that pretty much everyone needs to supplement the long term disability plan included with work insurance. Additional cost- around 50-55 bucks a month. This gets an extra 1,000 a month in case I need LTD. This is also free from taxes.

Short Term Disability- None. We can handle a sucky 90 days.

Next, private health insurance for my partner. She is currently attending culinary school and will have no insurance at the end of August. She can't get any from school. Our advisors showed us a well established company. We can get insurance for her for $100 a month. She will most likely get 25 dollar co-pays. We are waiting to get back all the info from the company. This was good news.

Finally, the budget-
We gave them our numbers from what we have spent what on for the past 4 or so months. I told them that they weren't 100% on the money. More needs to be allocated for clothing, gifts, household, etc. Pretty much what we came out of this meeting with was this:

We need to save around 800-850 a month. This will allow us a $10,000 emergency fund in the next year (we already have around $5,000) and $10,000 to put down on a house.

This will be a bit of a stretch. It is going to hurt, but we will figure it out. They showed us having $1600 free at the end of each month, but we have only been saving, at max, $700 a month. Some of that extra that they show is from our numbers being off for different budgeting categories. My goal is to get that 800-850 dollars into savings each month. I might do it a little differently and keep putting some of that "savings" money onto my car note to pay it off faster. I did the numbers and we should come out at the same point. I will take the car payment amount, after it is paid off, and just drop that into savings.

Plans! Ouch!

Check engine light? Get it checked / reset for free!

2006-07-07T14:03:00.000-07:00

My check engine light recently came on (ok, a month ago). I put it off and put if off. Then someone told me that AutoZone would check it for free and tell you what your error code stands for. I went by my local AutoZone and was in and out in 5 minutes. Mine was a small emissions leak (which is usually a loose gas cap). They reset the light and if it comes on again, then I will try a new gas cap before going to an auto shop. How much do places charge to check your codes?? Usually between 45-75 bucks! All they had to do was just hook up a little hand held machine!

Cheap as free! :)

Saving money with a personal challenge!

2006-07-05T07:24:00.000-07:00

I hope to save myself from spending 150-200ish dollars this week. I am in my best friend's wedding (officiating it - eeeek!) He wants me to wear a suit. Great, no problem. Well, there is one problem. The only suit I have was from when I first graduated college and went on the job hunt spree. That was about 5 years ago. It is a classic suit, so it is still in style, but I didn't quite fit in it anymore. I was stupid and didn't go buy a bigger pair of pants before the store shut down for good (Casual Corner). I would have had a complete, fitting suit. So, I gave myself a challenge. I wanted to fit into that damn suit for the wedding. It has been 8 weeks and I have lost 14 pounds. I have been stuck at the same weight for about 2-3 weeks now. That is frustrating...especially since I haven't gone off the diet. I am increasing my exercise even more and decreasing what I eat a bit more and will see if that will budge me. I may still have to suck in a bit, but I should be able to get into that suit! I will make my final decision on Saturday. That way I will have a few days to find something else if need be.

Also, in my quest to lose weight, I have been biking to work more and more. I only live 5 miles away, so the savings my not be THAT great, but I can tell it in my Quicken reports! :)

Gas, Groceries, Dining, Entertainment

2006-06-30T06:42:00.000-07:00

So, how'd this month go? When I started this blog, these are the areas I wanted to get under control. Just putting everything into Quicken helped me to see exactly where everything was going. While this month was bad in other expenses, here are my big bad categories:

My past spending: Feb-April

June

Gas- $101.07

Dining-$106.04

Entertainment-$120.91

Groceries-$142.52

June numbers are good. Yes, we were pinched, but we still did good considering my birthday was this month :)

I didn't post May, last month...so here are the bad numbers

May

Gas- $108.63

Dining-$221.05.66

Entertainment-$114.07

Groceries-$162.09

May was a bad month in terms of spending on crap, but we had friends in and we went to two of our favorite restaurants. Ouch.

Nothing went to savings this month - discouraged

2006-06-27T05:51:00.000-07:00

I have pulled more money out of savings this month than in a long long time. Thank goodness the end of the month is approaching! I will post the numbers and see where it all went.
I have spent $420 on my new tattoo. I had $400 put away for it. I made that money through doing a little side work for the reason of getting this tattoo. So, I shouldn't feel so bad about that.

Next, $452 went towards auto insurance. Thank goodness I upped my premiums!

Next, $275 went towards our financial advisors (my other half paid the other half :) - and this lasts us for a year.

$1147 more than normal!!!

Total I took out of savings? ~~$1,100. Pretty on target.~~ I just saw that when I got paid I put $350 into savings. So, really I took out about 750 for this month. Not AS bad.

I also paid an extra $200 towards my auto loan.

So, savings went down this month :( and my check engine light is on. Can I get a break??? Please!!

I want I want I want....How I will get what I want

2006-06-19T08:39:00.000-07:00

That is what I feel like right now. Not that I want things, but I want to do! Like I have posted before, this is a craptastic month as far as money goes. I know we are going to get back on track next paycheck and adjust to not having the girlfriend's income, but man - it sucks.
This is my birthday week and I want to go to a semi-nice restaurant. I want to go see Nacho Libre. I want to go to Dave and Busters. I have basically 90 bucks to last us two weeks.

The meal - we can't go out on the night of my birthday. My team has a kickball game and we will go out like normal afterwards. I keep going back and forth on if I REALLY do want to go out to eat. I am on a diet now - and I just don't know if it is worth it. I think what I may be wanting is just to get out of the house.
My suggestion to myself: make a picnic - go out to a park without the dog

The movie- We usually go to the Alamo Drafthouse for movies. You can have a good meal and a pitcher of beer while watching the new releases - or wacky specials. I want to see Nacho Libre so bad. So, instead of spending more than we need to...
My suggestion to myself: I have a free movie pass from fandango. We can sneak in our own snacks - heck, maybe even a flask - to a "normal" theatre. The cost would only be one movie ticket instead of 2 tickets + beer at the Drafthouse.

Dave and Busters- I love this place. SO MUCH. I have $20 dollar in gift cards coming that I could use anywhere. I was going to put the $20 bucks towards D&B. I got a coupon from them for my b-day with free chips, plus they are having a June special where if you buy $20 worth of game play you get another $10 of play for free. I don't have my giftcards yet!
My suggestion to myself: Go ahead and shell out the $20 and get all the free stuff you can. I can take the giftcards and apply them to grocery or gas next month and just shift around our budget money. Suck up the cost for a few beers, cause it's your birthday!!

I got a new tattoo!

2006-06-15T13:28:00.000-07:00

Yup. I have wanted it for a year and was only going to buy it with money I got from outside of my salary job and after losing a bit 'o weight. I still have more color to go, but look!

This month is a hard one...

2006-06-14T06:23:00.000-07:00

With family birthdays and father's day, out goes money. Not tooo much, but still enough to make a difference combined with other June money issues.

My car insurance came up this month, so that was around 450.
We got our financial advisor - that was 550.
The girlfriend isn't working and I am trying to pay for more.
We haven't gone out toooo much, but with the World Cup on, it is hard to say no!

There will be no savings this month and some money will come out of savings to pay for the financial advisor.

Things will be getting back on track. Indeed. Sometimes it just feels like it is going to be forever.

My Young Guns on Money and Mates in Queercents blog

2006-06-07T06:05:00.000-07:00

Here is the link - Besides the horrible picture- it's not so bad.

We are getting financial advisors

2006-06-06T06:27:00.000-07:00

We met with a financial advisor last week. I was pretty skeptical going in, but I really liked these folks. We talked a little bit about where we wanted to see ourselves and what we wanted to get out of the advising. They told us the many services they offered. (and didn't push any one company's products/services) I really think this is a good thing for us. What about the cost? Well, I was very happy to find out that it is a flat fee for a year. I couldn't believe it. So, I said....well, if I call you with 3 different questions, will that use up my yearly fee. Nope. Flat fee- no matter how much I call - how many meetings - whatever. They took into account our age and lack of money , so it is very reasonable.

They are going to help us:

-find insurance for the girlfriend while she is in pastry school
-get smarter about how we save and how we spend
-work towards our goal of a house
-and much much more :)

One of the advisors is gay and has gone through all the legal stuff with several clients and can also help guide us through that aspect.

--------

I need to update my monthly totals. How about tomorrow :)

Less loans and paying off more debt

2006-05-25T14:07:00.000-07:00

Thank goodness we are not going to have to use any of our emergency savings for pastry school. The girlfriend had some stock that her grandmother gave her. It should cover the part that the student loans didn't take care of. She basically will just be loaning herself the money with the intentions of building that savings back up after knocking out her loans. We will be meeting with a financial lady to figure out what we need to do to sell the stock and to go over what funds my IRA is in. Apparently my bank put me in B shares and they aren't that good. We are going to just look over things and see if it would be beneficial to move it around and how much that would cost if it would be worth it.

At my job we are waiting to hear what our raise percentage is going to be. One thing that sucks about working for the gov't is the lack of good raises. We just had a study done by a firm that determined we were underpaid and now they are trying to figure out what kind of raise we will get. I am not holding my breath for anything over 4%, but it sure would be awesome to get more.

June is quickly approaching. In June I plan on putting 1,000 bucks toward getting Jeep paid off. I will have a 400+ car insurance bill to pay and I will be turning another year older. On June 22 I will have lived 26 years. Yup....turning the big 2-6! ;)

Ups and Downs

2006-05-23T18:08:00.000-07:00

The girlfriend got most of her pastry school costs taken care of through loans. We still have 4,700 to come up with. She has one more person to check with and then our options are:

-put half of that on a credit card with 6% interest and take half out of emergency fund
-put off pastry school (this would not make anyone a happy camper) so, we will see.

Of course we would start shooting 2500 on the credit card first thing and then build back up the emergency fund. It just sucks...but something has to work out.

In GOOD news...
I rode my bike to work! I live 5 miles away and most of that is downhill on the ride in, so we will see how happy about this at about 5 this evening.

We are taking things day by day here. Sometimes it seems like things are just moving along so slow.

Making corrections and going to pastry school!

2006-05-15T08:38:00.000-07:00

Turns out that I don't need to switch insurance companies. I have been with State Farm for 9 years now and there is a good reason! After we raised the deductibles everything came out to be about the same as Geico. It was a little more, but my renters insurance is also included. Now, no wrecks.

Also, I mentioned before about being -8,0000 some for my net worth. I was wrong...it actually is a positive 8,000 something. Awesomeness. I like that a bit better. Gotta keep building it up, though!

We are coming into a little hard stretch for a few months. The ever so loverly girlfriend will be going to patissiere school to become a Pastry Chef. Dreams will come true. She will start working as she goes to school, but all of that will go towards paying off her loans. We will have about a 6 month or longer stretch with pretty much just my paycheck. So, we may be staying in more and finding more cheap things to do, but we will have the best desserts around and the girlfriend will be in baking heaven! :)

Here's to happiness - Cheers!

I just saved a lot of money switching to Geico!

2006-05-12T05:45:00.000-07:00

I hope this is what I will be chanting in about a month.

I looked at different rates online yesterday. I still need to call my current provider to see if they can do anything better for me. I also have questions about what the heck the PIP thing is and how much I would need.

I pay about 630 or so every 6 months...now, I still need to see what it would be if I knock it up to a 1000 deductible.

Here is what I am thinking:

Bodily Injury: 100,000/300,000
Property damage: 100,000
MED: 0
Personal Injury Protection(PIP) 2,500
Uninsured Motorist BI: 100,000/300,000
Uninsured Motorist Property: 100,000
comprehensive: 1,000 deductible (eek!)
Collision: 1,000 deductible (eek!)
Roadside: No (I currently have it, but should get AAA instead)
Rental: $20??? I keep going back and forth!

Total: 393.00

The same package ended up being about 422.50 with Progressive.

Now, I do have my renters insurance through my current company and it ended up being free because of the multiple policy bit. So, that will be an extra 100 a year or so, but I would still get great savings.

I am scared that as soon as I change my deductible to 1,000 something is going to happen and I will be S.O.L. I guess that is just what emergency funds are for.

I had to face it.

2006-05-11T07:01:00.000-07:00

I shouldn't have student loan debt. My school was paid for from scholarships and my parents paid for my housing. I got involved in a bad relationship and was used and while I take responsibility...I was still very heavily coerced into taking out these loans...and I have nothing to show for it. While that relationship has long been over, the financial scars are very visible. I try not to get too bitter about it. I have learned a lot and perhaps if it wasn't for going through all of that, I wouldn't have forced myself to get a handle on my finances at such a young age. Better to go through it earlier than later, I suppose.

SOO... all that was to say that I have finally put ALL of my accounts in Quicken.
I will post a graphic tomorrow, I didn't think ahead.
The accounts I have are:
Checking, Savings, HSBC, E-Trade, 403b, IRA, Car Loan, Student Loan

The grand total comes out to be -8,000 something.

It'll be ok. I am the one in control of myself, now.

It was reading through the ENTIRE blog of Our Money that encouraged me

Climbing all sorts of hills.

2006-05-08T06:57:00.000-07:00

My goal of biking to work is getting closer and closer to a reality. One of my main hills is becoming easier and easier to climb.

On money news...I rolled my 401k a while back, but didn't really know what funds it was in, etc. I looked at my papers over the weekend and half of it is in the Growth Fund of America B and the other half in (oh crap...I forgot) something like Capital Fund B. I looked up more about them and I guess this is pretty good. I will just keep an eye on it every now and again.

Mother's Day and brother's b-day gifts will cost me about 50 dollars. Other than this I am just trying to keep things steady. Oh, but then we have the memorial day tubing trip. I won't be able to save as much as last month, but I will keep on track.

Sometimes you have to grit your teeth and keep working.

How did I do in April? numbers.

2006-05-01T06:23:00.000-07:00

Well, pretty good for my first pretty serious month of cutting spending. The main areas I am tracking here are eating out, entertainment, grocery, and gas. These are areas which I have more control over than any other spending areas. I don't shop too much , so my Misc category is usually anywhere from 25-50 dollars. I started tracking spending in Jan. Here is how it breaks down from Feb-April

Feb.
Gas-139
Eating Out- 330.00
Entertainment-234.71
Groceries-204.46
-this month's eating out and entertainment were quite high due to valentine's day

March
Gas-80
Eating Out-105
Entertainment-43
Grocieries-151
-this month is a little off due to being on vacation for a week...those expenses went under "vacation"

April
Gas-143
Eating Out-103
Entertainment-78
Groceries-103

-so..taking everything into account I think we did a good job this month!

I guess I need to start tracking my savings increases

-end of March I have

HSBC- $2,417.82
E-trade- $1000
Credit Union- $1,116.43
------------------------
$4534.25

Savings...reaching one unspoken goal

2006-04-27T10:26:00.000-07:00

I have worked very hard this month to put a little more in savings than normal. I got almost an extra 200 bucks put away.

One of my unspoken goals is to have 5000 saved. Now, this won't be my entire emergency fund, but just a start. I would like to have at least 12,000 for an emergency fund, eventually.

I opened my first online savings account with HSBC. I opened this account in the beginning of February with a 25 dollar bonus and 4.80 % interest until the end of April . This was a good way to get my feet wet and try out this whole internet banking deal. I have found that this works wonderfully for my savings account and there are many good interest rates to be found. My credit union doesn't even come close!

Next, I just recently opened an e-trade money market fund with a 50 dollar bonus and a pretty high interest rate for 90 days(which I am trying to figure out...when I signed up it was 4.something and now on their site it says 3.7). You have to do things like keep it open for 120 days and have an average monthly balance of 1000. Not bad. The more money I don't have in my credit union account the better. If I don't see it then things are great. :)

After changing my deductions so that I get more direct pay and less tax refund, I now put the difference into my HSBC account, monthly. I have to keep a certain amount in my credit union account to qualify for free bill pay...it is worth it to me.

Right now my total savings is up to: 4,529.25

I will be at 5000 next month! Baby steps!!

I've got gas issues!

2006-04-20T10:38:00.000-07:00

Yes, we are all feeling the squeeze. I have a Jeep Liberty (which I love) and this is what I have been trying to do to save on gas:

First, I drive like a bat out of hell. I have never really tried to slow down too much, but now I am. We are taking a 3 hour trip this weekend. Normally I would drive near 90 most of the way. This time I will stay around 65. It will hurt. I can do it.
I have already mostly broken my habit of starting fast from stop lights and such.

Second, tomorrow I am going to set aside time to check my air filter and tire pressure.

Now, if I were smart I would have been tracking my MPG to see what I have been getting. I do know this. I darn near go through a tank in one week.

My goal is to try to first stretch it to 1 week + 1 day before filling up again.

Also, I am still working on the bike thing. If I could ride that one day a week then that would already lead me to meet my first goal.

Handy links:
Tips to improve your gas mileage

10 car care tips that save gas

my trouble with grocery coupons

2006-04-19T07:57:00.000-07:00

The Sunday paper seems pretty hit or miss for me. We don't buy a lot of name brand prepackaged goods, and it seems that is what most of the coupons are for. We buy a lot of fresh meat and produce. In the frozen food section we either buy Morning Star products or Amy's products. I have never seen a coupon for either of these in the paper. I get Morning Star coupons from the checkout line. I recently wrote Amy's to tell them how much I love their stuff and they sent me plenty of coupons...even one for a free product! Most other things we buy store brand...ziploc, oatmeal, canned veggies, windex. I often get coupons for the cat food from the bag itself.

All in all, it just doesn't seem to add up in my favor. It has been a few months since I have checked...maybe I should get one this week and just see what they have to offer and compare that against my shopping list.

A good tip is to write companies whose products you enjoy. Amy's did me well. I have also gotten free sandwiches from Chick-fil-A. It never hurts to write. Next up...the dog food company. :)

State of my state...

2006-04-18T06:38:00.000-07:00

Things are puttering along here.

I have been working with using cash for eating out. I think after doing this for two weeks I can go back to using my debit card...now that I actually KNOW what a total of 65 bucks can buy me for entertainment/eating out a week.

Purchases out of the norm for this month:
I am buying a wireless router and wireless USB connections to finally stop dragging those wires around! We trip on them and have to share the connection and for gosh sakes, I am a computer person by trade! I have been doing more side work at home...so, this will be good.

Boarding the dog. We will be boarding our loverly little girl for what will be two days. This is a much needed trip to see some best friends. I will pay 35 bucks for that.

Sports Bra. Yippe! Those things are muchly needed and very expensive. It was hard for me to purchase this...I always feel so indulgent buying something for myself.

I have still been able to plug a tiny bit of money into savings.

----------

I said a while back that I wanted to try and ride my bike to work. Well, I am working on it. It is about 4.5-5 miles to work. The TO work wouldn't be much of a problem, as it is mostly down hill...it's the coming back FROM work that hurts. I am going halfway and back to shappen up and make this possible. Young Guns is in training!

I hate taking care of myself

2006-04-12T11:45:00.000-07:00

There. I said it. I am trying my hand at making myself go to all of the doctors I have skipped out on.

I finally went to the eye doctor today...after at least 3 years. I do have insurance, but I still had to pay 35 bucks for the exam. PLUS I need new glasses. Now, I am thankful for glasses. I am also glad that the doctor said I needed new ones. Maybe this eye strain will go away, but the way these frames are priced is just the funniest thing. I went into the frame room and there were 3 walls of plastic and metal frames from 79-99 bucks. They were hideous! My eye-space-thing (whatever) is kind of small and all of these were just too big! Then the other wall had glasses that were 145 and up. They, of course, were much cuter...and were also the rimless ones. I can't do those...I tried those in the past, but ended up cracking my lenses. So, off to some new place to look for more frames. You know, there aren't many accessories that you end up wearing EVERYDAY. I don't mind paying a bit more for a little bit of style. ;)

Next up- the dentist!

Take care of yourself! It is cheaper in the end to maintain yourself now.

Don't use a coupon on the first date.

2006-04-06T06:23:00.000-07:00

Now, I am well beyond that first date, but I have always stuck to this idea. I love coupons. Looooooove. My girlfriend also loves getting a good deal when we go out.

I think we had known each other a few months before I used a coupon for dinner. We had probably gone out as "going out" 5 or 6 times. I am a frequent user of those Entertainment books and also Restaurant.com. It may not seem like it should matter, but it does! I have heard many gals, who don't mind using coupons further on in the dating process, talk in disbelief about someone's first date with so-and-so and *giggle giggle gasp* they tried to use a coupon!

We now live together and attempt to use coupons whenever we can, but if there is a nice restaurant, with no savings, that we would like to go to, we don't let that stop us! We are quit the foodies and that is one of our major enjoyments.

Some people may spend 100 dollars on a hobby a month and sometimes we would just rather put that money into trying new places.

Plus, the girlfriend is going to be starting Pastry School in July. This is research!

First of the month changes and amazon sells

2006-04-03T11:48:00.000-07:00

I took out 45 dollars in cash. This was to fund my 25 dollar entertainment weekly budget as well as my 40 dollar eating out weekly budget. You do the math. Oops. I need to take out another 20. This is the first time I will be trying this cash enforced budgeting method. This are my two hardest areas to control, as well as my two most expensive areas.

Oh, this is also the first month that I am not overpaying on taxes as much as I used to. I used to have a much harder time saving and always claimed 0 on my taxes. I have now started claiming 1 and am putting the difference into my HSBC account.

This weekend was fairly cheap and fun. We only ate out once. This was on friday evening at our local cheap wings and cheap beer joint. We spent the rest of the evening strolling up and down the street looking at the antique car show.

Saturday we went to a free cake show in town and then took the dog out to a park and an outside event. We were tuckered and had an awesome free time! That evening we went to a friend's house for a gourmet potluck.

Sunday was cleaning up and cleaning out! We prepared the apartment for the girlfriend's moving in. We cleaned out the second bedroom that had been functioning as my study. In doing this I listed 8 books to sell on Amazon. I only listed ones that would brink me in at least 3 dollars in profit after Amazon takes their share. I have two that will hopefully bring me about 20 bucks each. All of the other books that needed to go away were taken to Half-Price Books where I got 2 bucks for the box. I had never really thought of selling my stuff on Amazon untill FearlessMoney talked about it here

I have already sold one book!

It felt good to get rid of so much.

Expenses/ Tighten that belt!

2006-03-27T11:36:00.000-08:00

I have got to do something about my spending. I don't know where it goes. Okay...I think I do. Eating out and having fun! I am going to give myself 40 a week for eating out (that seems kind of hard) and $25 dollars a week for misc. (drinks, entertainment, etc).

I will use the envelope system and whatever I don't use will roll over...I really have to cut down on drinking out. That adds up quickly.

We go out for free pizza and trivia at a local bar on Friday's. They have cheap beer and that usually only puts us back 10 bucks or so.

I have also started making a menu for the week. It is a loose menu, but at least we keep up with what we have and know we can eat at home. It makes me think ahead to what I need to bring out of the freezer, etc.

We are such foodies, so I will try hard to control our going out! I have an entertainment book and lots of coupons are available on restaurant.com

I get paid the 1st!

Rent-> 630
Car->376
Student Loan->120
Internet->36
Electricity -> ~70
Water-> ~30
Cell Phone-> 55
Car Insurance-> 100
Grocery->(split with partner) ~70
Auto Gas-> ~130 i think

Aiming for
Eating Out -> 160
Entertainment->100

When we officially move in together and she doesn't have her other apartment to pay for then some of these will go down for me.

I also just spent $60 dollars to join a kickball team and I could not be any more excited!

Time

2006-03-24T05:50:00.000-08:00

(This is where I refrain from singing out lots of lame 80's songs)

Whenever I make a decision to change things, I want to results right then! Who doesn't? I KNOW it takes time, but still...come on...give me something. Well, things are ticking along. We are making small changes here and there that will add up. Vacation this month put savings behind, but increased sanity! However, I can't spend any money until the 1st. Ow.

Last night we realized we let the pork chops go bad. I thought they could last longer than 4 days, but no. We resisted temptation to just go out and get more. I decided that since we screwed up, we should just eat something else we have in the house. Shrimp and rhubarb it was! Yum!

We have to go out of town for tonight, luckily I have a full tank of gas and the concert tickets are paid for. I also found a coupon for a free night of boarding for the dog!

I can't wait to get paid on the 1st and drop some of that cash into my savings. I look forward to it every month.

Auto Insurance Shopping

2006-03-20T13:30:00.000-08:00

I have not shopped around for auto insurance in 11 years...so, really...never. I am with the same company my parents have been with forever. I really really like them, but as I am trying to find my partner a good deal on moving her auto insurance off of her parents, I might as well get quotes for myself. This is just such a pain to figure out what you already have and put it into each companies online portal (all with different ways of explaining the amount and deductable and yadda yadda). I want to scream, but this could end up paying off...at least a little bit.

Any thoughts?

Free stuff and discounts!

2006-03-10T05:41:00.000-08:00

In the past week I have gotten a box full of Take 5 bars and a Scrubbing Bubbles automatic shower cleaner kit from Bzz Agent. My girlfriend tells me the candy bars are good and I just put up the shower thingy last night.

I booked our hotel a while back through some Seattle Super Saver site for a cheap 45 bucks a night! (and it is not a craptastic hotel) Plus, I had a coupon for a 1 night stay at the Spring Hill Suites from Bzz Agent. I only got a rental car for two days and there didn't seem to be any coupons you could use for only a two day rental, so last night, I just went ahead and applied the free upgrade one. For some reason this also brought my price down by 7 bucks.

I then went to Old Navy to buy some new khaki pants since I didn't have any...and they were one of those with the metal clip hook thing with a button that you can't see. Well, the button was missing (and I always forget that they are there) so, I asked for a discount and got 50% off! They were regular price to begin with! I felt like it was my day.

Now we are looking at Restaurant.com to see if there are any places listed on there that we would like to go to...with a coupon code from them in my email we can get a 25 dollar certificate to these places for 4 bucks! I use that site all of the time.

Ok, Ok, I will breathe and calm down now and get excited about leaving tomorrow.

out of the loop

2006-03-06T10:42:00.000-08:00

I am away at a conference for three days....then back to work for two....then off to Seattle for vacation for a week.

I took the time over the weekend to print out my expenditures for the past two months. Looking over the numbers, I am going to set a few goals to cut down in several areas.

1. Dining Out
2. Gas
3. Entertainment

Now, dining out will face the most drastic cut - I really had no idea how much was going to that! Gas, I won't be able to cut toooo terribly much, but in keeping with my goals to trim down a bit....I am going to aim to ride my bike to work. Not everyday. First, perhaps once a week...we will see from there. It is only about five miles, so this should be ok. Right? right.

We have been good lately with the entertainment, but there was such a variance over the past few months that I want to put a watch on this area and see what is an appropriate amount.

I am trying to start getting on track.

Oh, I also changed my tax info at work to stop giving more to the government than necessary. I opened an HSBC account and got the free $25 dollar deposit and put in about 2500 of my own money. I will take the difference in tax money on my paycheck and deposit that automatically into the HSBC account.

Now all I need to get done this week is to figure out my girlfriend's crazy gradschool taxes. This is not going my way.

I may be very MIA the next few days, but that doesn't mean I will be thinking about this any less.

IRA, Debt, and Budgets - oh, my!

2006-03-02T05:53:00.000-08:00

Earlier this week I said I had a goal to write the agencies about credit cards I paid. I have yet to do a thing about that and will force myself to get some stuff together on that today.

I have done several things that just kind of happened. First, the IRA is set up. Funds will be sent by Smith Barney. Second, I now have three months of data on how my money has been spent. I put everything into Quicken. Now, I am still trying to figure out the program, but I can read that colorful little pie chart quite well. I wanted to have a few months data before sitting down to make a budget. Now there are no excuses (eeek).

It is a bit hard to be in the beginning stages of it all....and easier at the same time. I find myself wanting to learn more about investing in stock...(and it is ok for me to learn)...but I have no money that can go towards that right now. I am trying to keep focus: pay car off, shove money into savings....pay car off, shove money into savings...

2006-03-01T14:19:00.000-08:00

This has just been one of those weeks. Scrapes and bumps at every corner.

Still reeling over all of Jeep's repairs yesterday. I also called about getting the papers to roll my 401k into an IRA at my credit union. They say they don't have any papers for that ...that I need to call up with who to make the check out to and my account number. Back and forth back and forth.

I am a web developer by trade and also do some side work for an old college buddy of mine. At least I received a decent check from him for this month...$350 bucks to go towards the repairs. Bad news is that one of our potential clients backed out for next month. It is my goal to put all of this "extra" money towards paying off the Jeep. I have been working way too hard.

Time to lift my chin up, go home, and walk the dog. It is such a beautiful day!

2006-02-27T16:43:00.000-08:00

So, yesterday I met with a gentleman about rolling over my 401k from my old job into an IRA. I need to get the appropriate paperwork, then this will be done. The money will be split 50/50 into two different mutual funds. One very aggressive and one not so much. The average will probably be around 8%ish between the two of them.

My rear passenger window also decided it no longer wanted to play along and will not roll up. I have paper shoved in to keep it from falling now. Today I get it fixed - 250 bucks not going towards the 1,000 month Jeep payment plan.

Well, there was also this thing leaking into my motor so I have to get that changed...another $300 bucks.

:(

Pay Day

2006-02-27T06:40:00.000-08:00

I get paid once a month...and immediately start to line up all of my bills in the Bill Pay deal with my bank and pop 500 bucks into savings (this is now going towards paying off my Jeep faster).

Paid off the plane ticket for our trip to Seattle and bought a new digital camera on the cheap since my last one was stolen 6 months ago. Our tip is in mid march and then we will be back on schedule with the money issue. At least our hotel is already paid for by some dog-sitting we did a while back. All of the trip will be paid in cash. We only do something like this once a year and I sooo look forward to it.

My goal of the week is to go write the credit agencies and dispute the ones I know I paid off and have them listed differently on my credit report. What do I ask for? They are listed as charged off...have them report them as settled? paid?

Today I have a meeting with the financial guy at the credit union who lets me know more about the Teacher Retirement System that I am in...even though I am not a teacher. I have a 401k from my last job with about 8000 dollars in it that I need to roll into something else. I know we have the option of a 403b here. I just really don't know what to do, so hopefully he will have some ideas.

Onward.

First Post

2006-02-24T06:26:00.000-08:00

I have been reading many a financial blog recently....and well, here I am on my own Journey. Time to be truthful, time to buckle down, and time to learn.

I am 25 and I want a house. I have been concerned about saving for a while now, but never really knowing what to do....and not really wanting to give up the pleasures the spending a few extra bucks here and there bring.

I have played around with budgeting, but never got serious.

Some first goals:
get a budget together
pay off car loan

I bought my car new...I can't believe my father encouraged me to do that. I have driven the heck out of it and have put 75,000 miles on it in 3 years. It has been a great time, though! Right now my payments are 376. I threw an extra 1,000 bucks in last month and hope to pay a total of 1000 dollars each month. Right now there is $7,368.34 left.

I don't have any credit card debt to speak of. I do have accounts in bad standing that will be off my report in about a year. From a horrible ex who did horrible things, I paid off thousands of it and not knowing how the credit system worked at a young age of 22...they show up as charge offs when I paid the full amount. Current credit score...a poor-fair 696

Yes, plenty of mistakes in my background, but I have been pretty good since...not good enough as to save as much as I should have.

Here we go.