Week #35 - Some Good Deeds Go Unpunished...

Ok... I got almost nothing for you this week. Only thing I can really share with you is that sometimes helping people can turn into you saving some cash.

I have a bunch of friends in different bands and I do anything I can to help them out from making flyers, designing shirts etc. and sometimes they are able to return the favor. I did some backing vocals on a few songs for one of my favorite Rhode Island hardcore bands, HELD HOSTAGE. Now since I really like the band I would have bought the CD from them, but I was able to get a free copy for helping them out with backing vocals. You can check out Held Hostage here... at www.Facebook.com/HostageRIHC and I strongly suggest you pick up their CD to hear my awesome backing vocals!

On a grander scale I am friends with a few of the guys from the New York hardcore band Sheer Terror and they played in Boston last weekend. I offered up my services to help them at the show and I was able to get in for free. I also helped their merchandise guy bring in all his stuff and he gave me a shirt for 1/2 price. In a huge coincidence there were two more bands I like and am friends with playing in a separate room at the same club. I went up to that room and when the door man saw the all access wrist band I had from the show downstairs he let me in for free. So I was able to get almost $40 worth of concert admission for free, plus a 1/2 price T-shirt just because I try to help people when I can. You can check out my friends in Sheer Terror here... www.facebook.com/sheerterror and my friends in the Welch Boys can be found at www.TheWelchBoys.net

Unfortunately that's about all I got so here's what happened with money this week... I got a paycheck for $613.82 and had $39.12 put into my 401K. This is the last paycheck of August so its the big savings week! I'm going to put $25 in the account for future vet bills and I'm going to put $100 in my regular checking account. Then I'm going to take the remaining $488.82 and put half in my car account and half in my money market savings ($244.41 in each). I did my usual $20 vacation transfer and next week I will probably have some cans to return, but that's it for now!

Here is the week 35 wrap up:
$39.12 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund
$25.00 to the future vet bill account
$244.41 to my future car savings
$244.41 to the money market savings


Which makes the 2013 totals:
$1175.59 in my 401K
$700.00 in the vacation fund
$75.80 in the piggy bank
$450.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$175.00 in my vet bill savings
$1827.41 in my money market
$1277.40 in my car account

This weeks bonus has nothing to do with saving money at all. In fact its about spending money, but I want to make sure you don't miss out! Halloween season is coming and as usual the General Mills 'Monster Cereals' are out and available. However, not only did they reissue the usual, Count Chocula, Boo-Berry and Frankenberry, but this year they also brought back the Yummy Mummy and the Fruit Brute!

Here they are in the standard 2013 boxes...

But I also heard that Target stores will have the 5 Monsters in their original 1970's retro boxes...

 

stock up now or you will miss out!!!

Week #34 - Time For a Commercial Break...

So I don't really have that much to say this week and I'm kinda stressed out because I'm writing this before I take the final exam for my current school program so what I'm gonna do is give you a rundown of some cool stuff (or places to go) that are reasonably priced that I think you should check out!

1. If you're a big water drinker and you tend to buy lots of single serve bottles when you are out on the go why not invest in a filtered water bottle? I don't drink that much water, but I got one and now I don't buy water when I'm out at all. I just keep the bottle in my car and if I feel like stopping at a gas station for a bottle of water I just take the bottle in and fill it up at a faucet. The bottle with a filter was about $8 and the replacement filters are even cheaper! You can pay for the bottle after only 4-5 fill ups!

 

2. So lets say you're a business owner or you're in a band, running a softball league or you just have a really good idea that you want to see printed on a T-shirt. Well, you could go to the yellow pages and find some giant print shop that will charge you an additional fee for everything they do OR you can be a smart consumer and you can check out www.NewRepublicPrinting.com and get a higher quality print job and better customer service for close to half the price! New Republics head printer has over 10 years of experience and they can help you with everything from designs to picking your garments! Whether you want 1 color print or 10 color print, T-shirts or sweatshirts, stickers or buttons it doesn't matter because New Republic does it all! They have printed for the small bands, big bands, labor unions, multi-national corporations, local businesses, fund raisers and everything in between! They also offer low minimum orders, NO screen fees, NO set up charges and FREE shipping!! How can you beat that?? You can't!

3. If you're looking for some where to kill some time with your kids that won't cost you a fortune why not head to Bellingham, MA and check out Rubber Chicken Comics (15 N Main Street Bellingham, MA 02019)? Its a comic book store but they have tons of stuff to look at with prices ranging from high end collectibles to books that cost less than $1! The guys that work there are also great with kids and they will help you make sure that you're getting an age appropriate book that will help inspire your kids to want to read more and more! They also have regular events with big sales and lots of free stuff for kids and adults! Plus once you're done at Rubber Chicken (www.RubberChickenComics.com) you can head next door to Subway for a healthy lunch, then next to Subway to the Dollar Store for some cheap crap and then up the hill to Dairy Queen for a dipped cone!

 

 

 

 

4. Do you like to listen to lots of different music when you're driving but don't want to spend money on CDs? Well, if you have an auxiliary jack on your car radio and a smart phone you can listen to almost anything you want for either a low monthly fee or for free! I am an avid user of Spotify which is a music service similar to iTunes. You can pick a band and listen (stream) to any of the albums that are online. You can use Spotify on your home computer for free, but if you want to use it on your smart phone they charge you $9.99 a month. Spotify is totally worth it to me, but if you don't want to pay a fee then check out Pandora which is free! With Pandora you pick a band or genre and it will play you a custom radio station based on what you picked. There are some commercials, but they are short and you're listening to a radio station that you kind of programed so you can't complain about a few commercials!

Ok... so lets say you need something done around your house and you can't do it yourself. There is no reason to call the big corporate guy with the highest prices just because they have a commercial you remembered! There are plenty of small guys out there that are doing even better work and have even better customer service than the big guys, you just have to do your research to find them. I'm gonna give you a couple that you can put into your address book and use next time you have an emergency. 

 

5A. Lets say you have water damage, mold problems or you need any kind of clean up from general to disaster clean up... the place you're gonna call is www.PropropertyPreservation.com (508-883-7962) and Pete and his staff will make sure that everything is cleaned, repaired and 100% safe for you and your family before they leave your property!

 

5B. What if you just bought a new house and need the locks changed, you locked your keys in your car or you have a damaged lock... then you're gonna call www.ASimmonsLocksmith.com (401-274-2539) and Rob is going to make sure that every detail is taken care of and that everything is explained to you!

 

5C. Now lets say you have a leaky faucet, clogged up toilet or you want to redo your bathroom, well then you're going to call www.AnneThePlumber.com (1-508-523-7549) and Anne and her staff will make sure that all your plumbing needs are taken care of in a safe, clean and fully licensed manner!

 

5D. Looks like you saved so much money on things that you needed to have done by going with people that actually care about your business that you have some cash left over. Well, you know my suggestion would be to save it, but if you're feeling frivolous than maybe you want to commemorate this event PERMANENTLY. If that's what you want then check out www.HopeStTattoo.com (401-453-8213) where Mike and his crew will make sure you are comfortable and well taken care of in a completely clean and safe environment. They can draw up custom artwork for you, work from a picture you bring in or they can set you up with a piece of awesome flash art!

 

These are all good people that want to provide top quality service for you at a fair price that lets them take care of their family without taking advantage of you when you're stuck in a bad situation and taking every last dollar from your wallet! Support good people and they will support you!

 

Now I just gave you 3 small companies that I can vouch for as being great people that provide great service, but if you need a car mechanic, a caterer or you want to rent a sno-cone machine then I'm sure you can find something to give you a break on the price compared to 'the big guys'. Just do a little poking around and ask your friends for suggestions. If you have any others that you know of already then post them in the comment section here or on the facebook group (www.facebook.com/groups/OCDSavings)!!

 

 

 

All righty... I have to start studying for my exam so I'm gonna give you this weeks rundown and then the wrap up and I'll see you next week! My paycheck was for $612.82 and I had $39.12 added to my 401K. I should have deposited it all into the mortgage account, but I'm not. I took $100 off the top and put it in my regular checking account, actually I think this might become my new routine so that I don't have to stress about money I NEED to spend as much. I'm also putting $50 into my quarterly loan repayment account and of course I did my $20 vacation transfer! With all that being said it brings us to a wrap up that looks something like this....

 

Here is the week 34 wrap up:

$39.12 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund

$50.00 to the quarterly loan payment account

Which makes the 2013 totals:
$1175.59 in my 401K
$680.00 in the vacation fund
$75.80 in the piggy bank
$450.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$150.00 in my vet bill savings
$1583.00 in my money market
$1032.99 in my car account

 

 

 

I still owe you guys some details about how my wife booked our vacation so I'll try to put that together for next week. Hopefully I'll also be able to tell you all that I passed my exam and got my teachers assistant certificate, but we'll have to wait and see! Time to study!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week #33 - a day short and a dollar late!

Good morning ladies and gentlemen, welcome to week #33 of the world famous OCD Savings Blog! So what should we talk about this week?! I don't really have anything planned so I'm just gonna type about a few things that recently came up and see what happens!

So you all know about the issues I have with customer service right? Well, it happened again! It was with Sirius Satellite Radio who I have had MANY issues with over the last 7 years. This time they did not send me a bill even though I pay extra ($2 per billing cycle) to get a paper statement in the mail. What they did was just use a credit on my account to renew a radio and never notified me. May not sound like a big deal, but they renewed it at the highest possible rate rather than giving me a chance to change to a longer/cheaper per month plan. Well, after about an hour on the phone of yelling at a man with a very thick Indian accent who insisted his name was "Steve" I got the radio they renewed extended for 5 months for no additional cost. I did invest the time, but its actually kind of cathartic to yell at someone that you've never met and will never speak to again and then get something free out of it in the end!

I did spend some money in the last couple of weeks to do some necessary repairs to my car. I can't complain to much because the car has 125,000 miles on it and up until last week I had only changed the tires twice, replaced the windshield once and replaced the front brake pads once. Besides oil changes that was it! So last week I had to get another set of tires and I had to have the brakes done. It ended up that I only did the rear brakes, but he did the pads and the rotors. He also found a broken coil spring that needs to be replaced once I get the part and he suggested that I replace a couple of belts to be proactive. Its a friend that did the work for a very fair price and I trust all his suggestions. That being said, it still sucks to spend money on car repairs! Luckily, I just took the money out of my 'car savings account' to pay for the parts and labor!

I have been trying to track how many miles I drive to get to different places that I need to go. I recently found a new way home from work that cuts out about 10-15 miles, but I need to do it a few times and see how much longer, if any, it adds to the trip and see if saving the miles is worth it. With the price of gas its worth cutting out any miles you can unless its a huge inconvenience!

I think that's about all I got for you guys and no one has really been commenting with suggestions or giving me ideas on what else to talk about... so you should do that and help me out!! Ok... this week I got a paycheck, but it was only for 4 days of work because I had to skip a day last week in order to do something I needed to complete for my current school program. Unfortunately it could only be done during my work hours so I missed the day. It was my choice to take it unpaid because I could have used a personal day, but I like to save those for as late in the year as possible! So my check was for $495.73 ($31.30 to the 401K). I really should put the entire check in the mortgage account, but I'm going to take $100 and put it in my regular checking account so I can keep the balance in the black. I think that even though only $395.73 will go toward the mortgage I should be okay for the month, but worst case I still have last weeks 'extra check' stashed away in my checkbook register! Yes... I know you're waiting to hear it, but I DID do my $20 vacation transfer... I'm OCD do you really think I could ever skip it!? Here's the wrap up...

Here is the week 33 wrap up:
$31.30 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund


Which makes the 2013 totals:
$1136.47 in my 401K
$660.00 in the vacation fund
$75.80 in the piggy bank
$400.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$150.00 in my vet bill savings
$1583.00 in my money market
$1032.99 in my car account

For this weeks bonus I will tell you that my wife booked our vacation to Disney World for October of this year. Its kind of a vacation/anniversary trip and almost like a replacement honeymoon since last year when we went on vacation around the time of our wedding Hurricane Sandy kind of killed most of our plans! So maybe for next week I'll try to have some more details on what we booked and how we saved in the process! What are your vacation plans this year and did you cut any costs on it? Coupons? AAA Discount?

Week #32 - the extra week!

So August has 5 Fridays which means 5 paydays based on how I do my budget that means an extra paycheck! The first 'extra' paycheck of the year went toward the medical bills when I had my gallbladder taken out. The second 'extra' check went toward a trip to NYC I took with some friends. Well, except for having a very low checkbook balance, August hasn't shown any signs of an emergency so I don't have any concret plans for the check yet.

Since I don't have any plans for it what I'm gonna do is just set it aside uncashed in my checkbook until either I decide or I'm worried about the check being past its valid date. So with that being said I really have almost no news at all for this blog! I'll give you the details... the check is for $613.83 ($39.12 to the 401k) and thats about it for payday news!

I did cash in some cans this week and I was able to add $10.50 to the piggybank and even though my checking account balance is low I still did my $20 weekly transfer. So here is the wrap up...

Here is the week 32 wrap up:
$39.12 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund
$10.50 to the piggy bank

Which makes the 2013 totals:
$1105.17 in my 401K
$640.00 in the vacation fund
$75.80 in the piggy bank
$400.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$150.00 in my vet bill savings
$1583.00 in my money market
$1032.99 in my car account

I dont really have any bonus news either, but I'll let you know in advance that I missed a day of work this week so the paycheck I tell you about next Friday will be short 8 hours of pay.... GASP, what ever will we do!?

 

Week #31 - negative balances & weekend plans

ok... so I've always known that my budget has some flaws in it, but doing this blog for the last 30 weeks has helped highlight them even more for me. If it wasn't for the 'hidden' money in my checking account I would have been overdrawn multiple times over the last few months, but having that cushion means that if my checkbook register says I'm negative $37.72 I'm actually still okay. Every once in awhile if things get real bad I'll take a bit of money out of my 'hidden' money and add it to my balance, but I haven't done that in a long time. Generally if I even have to borrow the 'hidden' money for something I make sure I replace it.

Well this month the budget holes are pretty obvious because when got my paycheck this week and looked at what I owed on my credit card (which was used only for gas last month) and the little bit that my checkbook was in the 'negative' it looks like I only have a couple of hundred dollars for the month and that would mean paying for everything I need to do for the next FIVE weeks! I'm pretty sure that I can't make that work, but I haven't figured out what I'm going to do about it yet. One idea is to take a little bit of cash from each of the other monthly paychecks and put it in my checking account. It will mean I don't save as much, but its what I will probably have to do.

I've got a couple of things coming up this weekend that will all cost money and I've been so wrapped up with being in school that I didn't really prepare for them like I usually do. This Saturday my wife and I will be getting up early and heading to Boston for the comic-con. Usually I only go to things like that where there is something very specific that I want to see or do and I didn't plan to go this year, but then they added my favorite artist, Terry Moore to the list of guests. I bought a book that Terry did a couple of years ago and each was supposed to come with a sketch in it, but he ran out of time and shipped them without the drawings. Because of that he said that anyone that has the book and can meet him will get a free sketch in the book. So I will be going to the comic-con mainly to get my original Terry Moore sketch.

After the comic-con we will be heading to a birthday party for one of my friends. He is turning 8 years old and the only thing he wants for his birthday is an XBox 360. Most people will be getting him gift cards to go towards getting the XBox, but I haven't decided what I'll be getting him yet even though the party is only 2 days away! I really need to figure that out asap!

That is all for this weekends plans, but there are other things coming up that sadly I will most likely skip because I'm being cheap with myself. I wanted to go to a Monster Movie convention in New Jersey this month to meet a few people that I would like to have sign a movie poster I have, but its a long drive and a very expensive day just for something like that! There is also a great music festival that I wanted to go to next weekend, but again its so expensive to be away and out of the house for 2-3 days plus the price of tickets to see the bands.

Ok... enough complaining... this week I got a paycheck for $613.82 ($39.12 to my 401K). I already mentioned that the check would be going into my regular checking account and the only money I really saved at all this week was my $20 vacation transfer. August is a 5 week month so we will see how that plays out when we get there. I know I have to miss a day of work (probably unpaid) next week because I have to complete a job shadowing at a school as part of the grade to get the certificate for the program I'm in right now. That will probably effect what I do with the check that ends up being short, but we'll deal with that when it happens. Also, I might have some cans to return for next week! So here is the wrap up for this week....

Here is the week 31 wrap up:
$39.12 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund

Which makes the 2013 totals:
$1066.05 in my 401K
$620.00 in the vacation fund
$65.30 in the piggy bank
$400.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$150.00 in my vet bill savings
$1583.00 in my money market
$1032.99 in my car account

For this weeks bonus I will just ask you a question. If you are paid weekly then there are 4 months per year that you get an extra paycheck (5 week months), what do you do with that 'extra money'? I've given you examples of how it works out for me. In March I used my 5th check to help pay for the bills from my gallbladder surgery. Then in May I used it to pay for a trip I took to New York with some friends. I'm hoping the one for August can either be officially saved or at least set aside for something unforeseen as of now, then I get another one in November that I will probably save for Christmas shopping bills! So, if your budget is usually based on 4 weeks worth of pay then what do you do with the 5th week? If August is 5 weeks for you (if you're paid on Fridays) then why not try and save at least a portion of that extra check! Whether you save it or not leave a comment with your plans for that extra check & let me know how it works out!