Archive for the ‘personal finance’ Category
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I’ve been spoiled
For the last 2 years I’ve had access to a washer and dryer for free. For 1.5 years before that I had my own washer and dryer. In between those there was about six months in which I lived in a large building with lots of washer and dryers and it cost me about $3.50/load (washer and dryer).
Now I’m living in another large building where I can’t have my own washer and dryer and need to use the building’s laundry room. On the plus side they’ve switched to the card system which means no more saving change.
On the down side it costs more than $4/load (washer and dryer). I need to start budgeting for laundry again cause holy crap that’s a lot of money a month! I’ve gotten very used to buying laundry detergent and some dryer sheets and calling it day. Not any more. Budgeting for laundry SUCKS. I’m predicting (assuming I don’t lose my laundry card AGAIN) that I’ll be spending at least $40/month on laundry (approximately 10 – 11 loads per month). That’s $480 per year not including detergent and dryer sheets. Aye yi yi. Think of how many books that would buy!
I miss being spoiled.
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Personal finance blogs and stuff
I’ve been doing a lot of organizing etc this week. I’ve gone through my filing, shredded a bunch of stuff, started to organize my tax stuff (realized I hadn’t submitted some forms to work that I want to…).
I’ve been catching up on my feeds and through a blog was taken to Pear Budget – a free excel-based budgeting program. It’s pretty cool. It does pretty much everything I want it to do and I don’t have to sit there and figure out all the formulas. I think I like it. But the question is will I stick with it? If you only knew how many budgets and spreadsheets I’ve started. But back to Pear Budget – there’s also a Pear Budget Blog.
I’m giving myself a reality check this month. And hoping it extends into the coming months. I’m going to try really hard to NOT give up on this program (a girl can dream right????).
Did you know that I read a number of personal finance blogs? I do. Wanna know some of my favourites? Of course you do.
Debt Free Renee – Even when this blog went quiet for a couple of months I still kept in my feedreader. Renee is real and unflinchingly honest. She doesn’t have it all together and I can identify with that.
My Open Wallet – I think everyone likes Madame X. She has a good voice. And good advice.
Want Not – Where I go when I’m looking for deals even though since I’m Canadian I’m not eligible for a bunch of them.
Debt Hater – I just like her.
I have more than that but they are the ones that have stuck in my Bloglines folder the longest and that I always make a point of reading. I have a lot of flow in this folder as the blogs start to annoy me – like the one that indicated having pets was a horrid financial decision. While I may need to buy things for my cat (like cheese!) I don’t consider her an “expense”. She’s my fur-covered, cheese addicted, bitchy alter-ego.
Now…off to shower so I can sit down and do my expenses and submit next week. And print off a tax receipt for a donation I made last year.
(Yes, I realize that I’ve posted about 1. cleaning, 2. organizing, 3. de-cluttering, and 4. finances this week. No I have not been abducted and had a microchip implanted in my brain this week. At least…I don’t think so…)
Technorati tags: personal finance, blogs, budget
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Better late than never
I’m more than a month overdue for an update on my student loans. Not a truly exciting update as I haven’t been throwing any extra money on them. Alas. But I’m formulating plans. I’ll be getting a chunk of cash, aka a bonus, and shortly after that a small raise (not due to new position…one I earned before that). I need to figure out where I’m going to throw it. I have many options. I just need to think about what *feels* right to me. Ok, the raise is easy. I already know what I’m doing with that. As soon as I get the first pay that has the raise on it I’ll set up the excess to go into my savings account automatically until I get to an amount I consider to be a good safety net. Cause I actually have one of those now. It’s been growing since June or July. *grin* Actually I’ve started stowing money away for BlogHer 2007 in another account as well. And part of my bonus will be used to buy a new paid of glasses. I’ve had the ones I wear now (and that you’ll never see pictures of cause I hate glasses) for at least 4 years. Possibly longer. The lenses are cracked and really do need to be replaced.
Right, so student loans. Pain in the butt that they are but I love them nonetheless because they paid for my education. Amount in brackets is what it was January 2006.
RBC student loan $15,774.13 (17,090.26)
NSLC student loan $10,671.07 (11,473.69)
CIBC student loan $9, 925.26 (10,659.32)Total: $36,370.46 (39,223.47)
Total difference of $2853.01
Looks like I’m barely making a dent in it doesn’t it? That’s because interest sucks. On the RBC loan alone I’ve made $2484 in payments alone. But it’s only showing a decrease of $1316.13.
Oh what I’d do to get the same interest in a savings account as I do on my loans…
What else have I done since that original post? I’ve got an online savings account. Money goes in every pay period and I don’t touch it. I never take it out. I came close to taking money out once but found a way to do what I needed to do with cash. I also have a “short term” savings account that I can access easily. It’s good to see cash sitting there.
I also have an additional safety cushion. Near the end of the summer I found out that I was pre-approved for a line of credit. While I wasn’t crazy about the idea of having even more potential debt (because that’s how I look at it) on my record I also knew I was coming near the end of my contract at work and well…I wanted the safety net. My contract was renewed and my line of credit is still sitting there pristine as ever (admit it, you’re impressed with that).
I also called my two credit card holders and got the interest rates on my credit cards decreased significantly. I figured if my bank was pre-approving me for a line of credit my credit rating must have improved. I was right. And I found out that one of my card holders had seriously *OLD* employment info. So it was good that I called. Have I paid them off yet? No. But I’m still plugging away at them and there’s now the interest rate between them and my student loans is quite small.
This all sounds better than it really is in some ways. While I have way more debt that I’d like, I don’t feel like I’m drowning in it. And I’ve increased my income. While on paper the negatives still out balance the positives, the feeling is the opposite.
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Woohoo me!
And thank you Mastercard.
After they increased my limit last week, and thanks to the urging of Lav, I called them to see if they could lower my interest rate seeing as I’ve been getting dandy offers from other companies.
Old interest rate (obscene) = 24.98%
New interest rate (reasonable) = 11.99%
Nice improvement.
Edit:
I decided to try my hand with Visa. They set me up with a new card that they only give good clients. It’s 11.5% interest and they increased my limit by $3000. Since my old card had a points system I turned in 2/3′s of the points for two $25 gift certificates for La Vie En Rose (underwear!!! woohoo!!! y’all know I can’t resist underwear) and gave the last 1/3 of the point to the Canadian Olympic team which was the equivalent of a $75 donation. As well this new card has a lower annual fee.
Total time on phone with both companies? About 25 minutes.
Totally worth it.
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Holy Sh#t!
I just got a shock. One should not be shocked when they have a headache. It causes one to jump and that hurts one’s head.
I posted earlier this week about how things must be improving with my credit. I just checked my credit card balance because I put my surgery on it and wanted to see how scary the total looked now because lately I’ve been in danger of suffering from head-in-sanditis. It said that my balance available was more than my total available credit used to be. Somehow I’ve more than doubled the available credit on the card in the last week.
Also in the last week I’ve gotten the line of credit I mentioned earlier. On one hand I’m taking all this credit as a good sign that as far as the bank is concerned I’m a responsible grown-up type now instead of a starving student who uses her credit card to buy groceries so that she doesn’t starve. On the other hand, the amount of credit I’ve gotten in the last week makes me kinda nervous.
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Things must be improving
A few years ago I approached my bank about a line of credit. I just wanted an itty-bitty amount really – enough so that I could enroll in a few courses and get my wisdom teeth out (I didn’t have insurance then). Due to my lack on income, etc I was refused. Made sense. Still kinda stung though.
Then a couple of months I got a letter from them and ignored it. I opened it a few weeks ago and it was preapproval for a line of credit if I wanted it. I signed up for it, even though it’s for a lot more money than I really want to have available to me. Why? Cause I’m still on contract at work and the thought of having a line of credit if I find myself suddenly out of a job come Jan 1 is rather comforting.
It’s my goal not to use it…although it is a much lower interest rate than one of my credit cards and it’s very tempting to transfer a credit card balance to it. It’s something I’m doing to think about.
I also need to sit down and work out a “spending plan” – a devious way of saying budget. I so don’ t want to do this but I so have to. Sigh. Money has been tight around here for the last couple of months and I really need to batten down the hatches with Christmas, etc coming up. Oh and the possibility that I might not have a job. (lalalalalalalalalalalala not thinking about that…oddly I do the same thing *at* work sometimes…:lol:)
And I really do need to start thinking about Christmas soon. There’s only something like 7 paychecks between now and then. (You all hate me now don’t you?)
I’m still bruised. It’s fadind but one of my veins is very…apparent and I don’t like it. Stitches are driving me nuts and I hope they fall out soon. I’m finished with the antibiotics so I’m hoping that I’ll have a bit more energy cause I’ve been exhausted all week. Oh and I think I’ve figured out how I can eat meat since I’m still mostly on mushy foods (cause chewing hurts my stitches. I’m going to get some pate and some soft bread and enjoy the meaty goodness.
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Budgeting sucks
Right I think this is going to be my last update on finances for awhile cause umm money sucks.
Ok, I’m putting on my serious hat now. In response to my last post – no, I can’t do ALL that in 6 months with one job. There is the whole second job thing, but looking ahead over the next 6 weeks that would not be a good idea. I’m facing a publishing cycle and publishing cycles are intense. And this is a standard release which makes it a wee bit more intense because it means it’s customer facing (all the kinks *should* be worked out by now but there are always little things that make it through and drive us all nuts). And I really do want to try to get to Montreal at the end of August. So yeah, early September is the earliest I can handle that.
So tonight I spend a couple of hours going over things (this wasn’t planned, it just happened). I found a couple of excel templates on the Microsoft site that sped things up because I didn’t have to go through figuring out formulas and what not. Basically, if I do not use my credit cards at all (or if I use them for preapproved purchases and put that much more money on them) I can almost make my goal of zero balances on both by Jan 1, 2007. I would have my Mastercard paid off but Visa wouldn’t be paid off until Feb 1, 2007. That’s without any extra payments other than what I already have budgeted. If I stick on an extra $50 three months in a row I can have the Visa paid off on time. This does *not* include the money I’ve got coming in in expense checks and reimbursements for my massage therapy. That money can be thrown on these and get them paid off even faster.
Also none of this takes into account the extra paycheck that I get in December either (I love 3 paycheck months, seriously love them). I’m doing my best to forget about that because I don’t want to use it towards anything right now. I’m sure something will pop up over the holidays that I’ll need to have extra cash for (like suddenly finding myself unemployed on Jan 1…).
Savings – there’s no way to get my emergency fund to the point where I want to get it before the end of the year. Well…not if I want to eat. But I’m ok with that. I just need to
keepstart putting money into my long term savings account on a regular basis. I put some money in tonight. Aren’t you proud???I’ve been working to refine my non-budget budget so that it’s more like a real budget. But it’s hard because I just cancelled my veggie delivery so now I feel like I’m kind of starting from the beginning again. So I’m going to track things this month and see how it goes.
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Saving: The Emergency Fund
Oh the emergency fund. It’s more or less non-existent. To be quite blunt, for the last several months I have completely and totally SUCKED ASS at saving. That may be putting it mildly actually.
Ok, maybe I’m being a wee bit to hard on myself. True, my savings are dismal. BUT for the very first time EVER I went on “vacation” (does visiting family really count as a vacation???) and did not go into debt because of it.
Please commence your wild cheering.
Seriously. I did not. Yes, I did use my credit card to buy my plane ticket. But then I immediately paid it off. Yes I did use my credit card for a number of purchases while in PEI (think books and Paderno) but I used my credit card in lieu of my debit card and paid off that amount, plus a bit when I got back. Yes I did spend money on food while I was home but really no money than I’d spend during a regular week (and really, I spent barely any money at all the week I got back). Yep, I had to put money in the van for gas but my father saves his spare change for me and that was more than enough money for gas. So really, my vacation didn’t hurt me financially, even with the money I spent on taxis too and from the airport, yay me.
Right so savings. They need serious help right now. I did shuttle some money into my short term savings account with my most recent paycheck. I should be able to move it into my long term savings account when I get my next paycheck. I’m just holding it on my far more accessible short term account in case an emergency pops up. I’ll do the same thing with my next paycheck but the amount I’ll be able to set aside will be less.
What I *really* want to do is by the end of the year, and the end of my contract, have enough money set aside that I could live off for at least a month. Because really, it would make me feel much better. Ultimately, long term, I want to have enough in savings to live off of for several months but this is my hope (goal?) for the end of the year.
But then there are those damned credit cards. My goal, once upon the time, was to be credit card debt free by the end of this year. I’d like to keep that goal as well. So there’s a dilemma. Can I realistically put aside enough money for savings and pay off all my debt by the end of this year??? And yet still DO thing. True, I’m pretty much a hermit as it stands right now but you know, I do occasionally leave the house. And since I work from home, more often than not leaving the house involves spending money one way or another. And I really, really want to get to Montreal for a short visit sometime around the end of August. As long as I don’t shop too much it really isn’t that expensive.
On my current salary can I do this in six months?
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Six month update
I originally posted my student loan debt load at the beginning of January. It was scary putting it out there. Seriously. What scarier is how little it’s gone down over the last few months. Interest rates have gone from 5.75% (at least I think that’s what it was Jan 1…) to 8.5%. Ouch!
It’s the current status (brackets indicate balances as of Jan 1):
RBC = $16,506.57 ($17,090.26) = 583.69
CIBC = $10,365.52 ($10,659.32) = 293.80
NSLC = $11,072.18 ($11,473.69) = 401.51
Totals = $37,944.27 ($39,223.27) = $1279
I’ve paid more than $1500 in interest over the same time. OUCH!
Interest sucks.
In credit cards – at the beginning of the year I was looking at about $2500 in credit card debt. I paid off a lot of that, and then ran some up again and paid a bunch off again. It now stands, as of today, at $1200. I’m still waiting for a couple of expense/reimbursement checks to throw on that balance. I’m hoping to get them by the end of the month and that should take the debt down to about $800.
Now I could just throw all my “extra” money on my credit cards and be credit card debt free by the end of the year but then what about savings??? That post coming up next…
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That money thing…
Announcing the Canada Day Weekend Financial Update
I haven’t blogged about finances in awhile. For a variety of reasons. But it’s time for updates. I had started one long rant but I decided it had to be broken down into pieces. So expect several personal finance and debt related posts over the day couple of days. I have a lot of think about, a lot to say, and possibly a bit of weeping (interest sucks).
Why I’ve been avoiding the money talk
So it’s been awhile since I blogged about money. I’ve been avoiding it. I have not been budgeting (but I haven’t run out of money either, yay me). I’ve been doing a shit ass job of putting money in savings. I went shopping for clothes. (I kinda seriously needed summer stuff though for those rare days where I actually leave my apartment and I didn’t spend an obscene amount of money.)
Also…I’ve been waiting on my new contract. And honestly, stressing the hell out. You see, the week before my vacation we had a lovely company-wide meeting and were suddenly and surprisingly informed (well sudden and surprising for some and especially for many of us who work remotely) that the company was eliminating about 50 jobs. Some people would just plain be let go and others would be redeployed within the parent company. And it would mostly be contractors. I sat there knowing my contract was up in three weeks.
Shit.
During that meeting and afterward my immediate manager reassured me that I was fine. And at that point I was (although they let some people I liked working with go, sigh). When I got back from vacation I was assured that my contract was coming, that it had been extended to the end of the year (I gave up on any thoughts of a permanent position after that meeting). All week I waited. And worried. I worried that it wouldn’t be extended after all. I worried about a pay cut. I worried that I would lose benefits.
Finally yesterday it arrived. Same rate of pay and keeping my bennies. I wilted with relief. In reality I likely could have afforded a small pay decrease but um…really didn’t want one (who does) and it would have made me freak out. And I don’t use the bennies that often (and medical benefits are not as huge a deal in Canada as they are for you Americans) but there is a great amount of comfort knowing that they are there.
So now I know that unless our company has to downsize again (which they really, really hope they don’t because we aren’t an overly large company and they hated doing it) that I’m ok to the end of the year. But I’m not sure what’s going on after that.
So now I’m sitting here, needing to really get a handle on my finances and planning what I can do over the next 6 months.
And I hate it.
I hate it.
I hate it.
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