Week #17 - Time for a splurge!

If you read my little blogger profile I refer to myself as a 'hesitant hoarder'. What I mean by that is you're not going to see me on a TLC show anytime soon, BUT I do have issues getting rid of things. I call most of them collections, but in a few circumstances I know its just me being crazy. Well this past weekend was the annual collectors holiday known as 'Record Store Day'. Every year all the big record labels get together and come up with a bunch of manufactured collectible/limited edition versions of records (yes actual vinyl records that you play on a turntable) that people like me just 'NEED' to have! I've been going out and buying stuff on Record Store Day for the past 4 years and its usually a pretty expensive day out.

This year looked to be no different as I had my list put together from different internet sites telling me what bands had releases and what color vinyl they would be on and what they were limited to etc. I also got a little insider help from a friend that works in the warehouse of a certain chain store and he told me how many of each record I was looking for would be at the store I was going to first. I had planed to spend a good chunk of money on things for myself when I got a big idea. It was a scummy thing to do, but I was going to pick what I anticipated to be the biggest collectible of the day, once again based on internet research, and I was gonna buy it to resell. Well, at my first stop (yes there is more than 1 record store, I went to 3 on Saturday) I got a bunch of the stuff I actually wanted and I spent an additional $83.99 (tax included) on a limited box set of a band I don't care for. I used my handy internet ready smartphone to place a 1 day eBay auction for the records while still sitting in the parking lot of the store. We'll exactly 24 hours later my my $84 investment sold for over $300 netting me a profit of around $200 after factoring in the cost of the item and the fees for placing the auction etc.

I'm happy, but a little embarrassed to say that my $200 profit covered MOST of what I spent on records for my collection. Yes I spend a lot of money on music, but its one of my few vices so I won't beat myself up over it. I will also say that I feel a little bad that I bought something I knew I didn't want just so I could sell it to someone that couldn't find it for a hefty profit. It's no different than someone buying up all the tickets for a concert and charging a premium for actual fans to get seats. That being said... I got to the store 3 hours before they opened and waiting in line so I could be one of the first people in (I was second in line) the store to be sure I got the things I wanted.

Here's a little instragram of the stuff I added to my collection...   : )

 

Ok... so I wrote up a paragraph explaining what the 'moral of the story' was and then realized that I was encouraging you readers to go out and scalp anything you could make a buck on. I feel a little guilty for what I did, but it was the only way I was going to be able to buy the stuff I wanted to get for myself. I wouldn't do it every day, but I'm not afraid to think outside the box on an 'investment' sometimes and you shouldn't be either.

 

 

All right, now for this week in money! I got my paycheck for $630.74 ($40.23 taken out pretax for the 401K) this week and this being the last paycheck of the month its time to do some real saving! I'm going to take $25 and add it to the 'vet bill savings' and then I'm going to take the remaining $605.74 and divide it between 2 accounts putting $302.87 in my money market savings and $302.87 into my future car savings. Obviously I also did my weekly $20 vacation transfer! Not a bad week even though I did splurge on some new music!

PS. I also rolled up $18.50 in change I had around the house and deposited it in the bank account I use to buy stuff through Paypal. I'm not counting that as a 'savings' because I'll just use it to buy something I dont really need on eBay anyway!

  

 

 

Here is the week 17 wrap up:

$40.23 to my 401K

$25 to the vet bill savings

$20.00 to my vacation fund

$302.87 in the money market

$302.87 in my car repair/savings account

which makes the 2013 totals:

$523.70 in my 401K
$340.00 in the vacation fund
$30.25 in the piggy bank
$150.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$75.00 in my vet bill savings
$562.82 in my money market
$562.81 in my car account

 

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned how because of the relationship I have with the people at my bank I was able to switch an account over from the money market I had to a newer money market that was supposed to be for 'new customers' with 'new money' that paid a much higher interest rate. Well, I finally got a full months worth of interest and the dollar amount is obviously based on the balance of the account which is more than what this blog shows I've saved, BUT what I want to tell you is that the interest I got in one month on that account was over 13 times the interest I had gotten with the old account just one month before. That means that in ONE month I got more money in interest than I got all of last year combined! Don't get me wrong, its not gonna get me to early retirement or pay off my mortgage (or even buy me a nice dinner) but its free money and I'm getting the new higher % because I pay attention to my banking and what my bank offers so please, just take a few minutes a month and make sure that you're money is working for you in the best ways it can! Even the interest on a very small savings can be drastically increased when your talking about multiplying it by 10 or more times!

I should wait till next week to share this, but its to funny to hold back. I was just balancing my checkbook in the checkbook register (yes I actually use it and write down every transaction) and I found a mistake. Since I use pen I had to find a way to correct the error so I used 'white out' tape to fix the mistake. In this photo you can see my completed checkbook registery, my 3 pens (blue, red & green), the depost slips for todays banking, the bills & other papers I carry with my check book, the correction tape and the 2 elastics that keep it all together.... I'm nuts!

Week #16 - Charge It!

If you read last weeks blog then you know that I gave you a little bit of homework. I asked you to think about the credit cards you have, why you use them, when you use them and what you get out of having them. Credit card debt is a huge problem for a lot of people and usually once someone gets out of debt, IF they learned their lesson, they are very hesitant to ever use cards again. I realize there are some people that can't handle the huge responsibility of having credit cards and if they know that a certain amount of credit is extended to them they are going to max out the card, but there can be a happy medium.

I actually started applying for credit cards before I was even of legal age to do so because I would be at the mall with friends and there would be some table set up where if you applied for a credit card you could get some kind of free gift. Usually it was some kind of candy or coupon for something free, but at 16 years old anything free was awesome! I remember the first credit card I had as an 'adult' had a $300 limit and at the time it may as well have been a million because I could never have paid a $300 bill! I think I only used the card a couple of times, the first being to buy some action figures that I really wanted but didn't have the cash for. When I got the bill, a whopping $35, I was panicked, but I paid it and didn't touch the card again for a long time.

For many years I continued to apply for every card just to get something free. I would be even more excited if it was a card that had a cool picture on it or had some gimmick to it. At some point I stopped getting new cards but never did anything with the open accounts until someone suggested I close the ones I didn't actually use. In one day I canceled over $40,000 in open credit card accounts! It was around that time that I smartened up and decided that I would keep credit cards for emergencies the occasional purchase. I kept only 2-3 cards with higher limits thinking to myself that if need be I could get out of almost any situation using the credit I had.

 

 

Currently my credit card use is a weekly occurrence, but it because I have finally smartened up to the point that I only use credit cards that pay me to use them. I use my cards for things that I would normally use my debit for, like gas and food and I just pay the card off before any interest is accrued. I use either my Discover or my new Citizens Master Card that offer cash back of 1% or more on every purchase. After only a little over a year of using my Discover card I had earned over $300 in money that was completely free because I had never paid interest on any balance on the card. I recently switched from the Discover to the Citizens Master Card because the Master Card offers 2% cash back on all gas purchases and 1% on everything else where the Discover is 1% across the board and why not get an extra 1% on some stuff if I can!

What I'm suggesting to you is that you use your credit cards, don't just keep them locked up for emergencies and don't fear them! You can be responsible enough and you owe it to yourself to earn free money when ever you can! Start slow and pay the card weekly pretending like it was your debit card if you have to, but don't let the free 1-2% slip through your hands!

 

 

Ok... that was kind of long, but hopefully you take something from it. Now lets get down to this weeks nitty gritty. I got a paycheck for $602.79 this week, with $38.26 taken out pre-tax for my 401k. It being the 3rd check of the month I decided to put it in my mortgage account, but I'm also going to take $50 off the top and put it in the account I use to pay the interest free loan I've told you about. That left $552.79 going towards paying my mortgage for the month. As usual I also made my weekly $20 vacation transfer and since I had Monday off for Patriots day I made a trip to the supermarket with my deposit bottles and added $3.35 to the piggy bank on top of the fridge. It was not a bad week savings wise actually!

 

Here is the week 16 wrap up:

$38.26to my 401K

$50.00 to the quarterly loan payment account

$20.00 to my vacation fund

$3.35 to the piggy bank

which makes the 2013 totals:
$483.47 in my 401K
$320.00 in the vacation fund
$30.25 in the piggy bank
$150.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$50.00 in my vet bill savings
$259.95 in my money market
$259.94 in my car account

 

 

Last weeks blog had mentions about being prepared if you lose your job because we just experienced a lay off at my work. There were some suggestions made by readers that I wanted to share with you...

 

- Try to pay ahead 2-3 months on your mortgage

- Stock up on non-perishable dry goods (toothpaste, toilet paper, shampoo, cleaning products, etc)

- Don't make any huge purchases if you fear a potential lay off or downsizing at your company

- Try to keep credit debt as low as possible

- Keep an active and updated resume on hand

- Try to keep a couple of months worth of cash on hand if you can

- Grow your own food

- Can or prepare your harvest for future use

- Compost your waste

 



Week #15 - are you prepared to lose your job??

So last week at work there was a pretty major lay off and many people lost their jobs. They laid off out of the departments that were slow on work, but because its a union shop if the people whose jobs were eliminated had seniority over some unaffected people they were allowed to 'bump', or take a job from a more junior person. When the dust settled 20 people were walked out the door and forced to head the the unemployment office.

It's almost impossible to be prepared to completely lose your main source of income, but since it can happen to anyone at anytime its something that you should at least try to keep in the back of your mind. I have 11 years in at my job so I was not effected by the lay off, but after last week I am 20 people closer to the bottom of the list and if there is another lay off I could lose my job.

I definitely don't have enough money to stop working (or I would) and I probably couldn't pay all my bills on only unemployment, but thanks to money I save I could make do for a short time and still pay all my bills. I'm not saying that I'm going to start another bank account labeled 'lost my job savings' but its just something to keep in mind. I have money set aside for a future vacation, but that money could have easily gone toward paying my mortgage if I had lost my job last week.

With all that said, I was one of the lucky people that did get a paycheck this week. It was my 2nd paycheck of the money but last week I deposited the first paycheck of the month into my mortgage account (see Week #14's blog). This week the check for $611.29 is going into my checking account to pay my credit card and other bills. $38.83 went into my 401K & as always I made my $20 vacation transfer, but that's all for saving this week.

So I didn't save that much money this week, but the as soon as I knew how much my paycheck was for I paid off both credit cards that had balances on them. It wasn't that much, but I avoided another month of interest

Here is the week 15 wrap up:
$38.83 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund

which makes the 2013 totals:
$445.21 in my 401K
$300.00 in the vacation fund
$26.90 in the piggy bank
$100.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$50.00 in my vet bill savings
$259.95 in my money market
$259.94 in my car account

For this weeks bonus, I want you to think about the credit cards you have and why you have them. Next weeks blog will be focused on credit cards because I made a change in my cards this week but wanted to focus on the lay off for this weeks blog. Just think about the number of cards you have, the balances (if any) that you carry on them and what you get from the cards that you use.

Week #14 - Same Saving, Same OCD, new look!

So here we go with the first week of the 2nd quarter of 2013. I didn't acomplish as much as I hoped to in the first 13 weeks of the year, but it definitly could have been worse and there are still 39 more weeks to go before the end of the year!

This week is the first paycheck of April and usually that check goes into my checking account for the months bills. Unfortunantly this weeks check was actually a little short because I took last Friday off as an unpaid day out. Because my checking account is running low and I fee like I need to deposit a full check for Aprils bills I'm going to deposit this weeks check, which was for $493.26 and put it into my mortgage account. Next week will be a full 40 hour check so I will put that one into my checking account and may my Discover card bill then.

So the full $493.26 is going towards paying my mortgage bill this month, but I still had $31.04 go into my 401K and I also did my usualy $20 'vacation' transfer. I already mentioned that I deposited my federal tax returns into a new money market getting a higher interest rate, but I also recently got my Massachusetts and Rhode Island return checks. Currently they are folded up in my checkbook until I decide what to do with the money. I think I might stash a little for a splurge sometime this summer and give some to my wife since it was a joint return!

Here is the week 14 wrap up:
$31.04 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund

which makes the 2013 totals:
$406.38 in my 401K
$280.00 in the vacation fund
$26.90 in the piggy bank
$100.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$50.00 in my vet bill savings
$259.95 in my money market
$259.94 in my car account

*At the suggestion of a reader (and the inspiration for this blog) I decided to try and spice up the blog by adding some pictures. I'm sure that some weeks the pictures will be more relivent, but if nothing else hopefully they add a little to the weekly stories and break up the text making it easier to read. Please leave a comment here or on the facebook link and let me know what you think about the new format (good or bad!).

Week #13 - The First Quarter Wrap-Up!

Welcome to week #13 which is exactly one quarter of the way through my year of saving. I have to admit that I'm no where near where I would have liked to be at this point, but only getting 1/2 my pay for a month while I was out for gallbladder surgery and then getting medical bills on top of the time out didn't help. That being said, I still have a decent amount to be proud of in terms of my savings achievements so far this year.

So this is week I got my 5th paycheck of March which will go towards making my mortgage payment (which I already scheduled online). The check was for a total of $645.33 and I'm going to take $50 off the top to put into my loan repayment account and the remaining $595.33 is going into the mortgage account. Now with next week being the 1st paycheck of April it usually goes into my regular checking account for bills, but I actually took off today (April 29th) from work because its 'Good Friday' and we are allowed to miss 'Good Friday' without it counting as an unexcused absence. I figure if you have to work it might be 'Good Friday' but if I can stay home then its 'Awesome Friday'! So because next weeks check will be missing 1 days pay I'm going to alter the budget a little, but we will go more into that next week.

So this week I made my standard $20 weekly transfer into my vacation account and I also made a trip to the supermarket with some deposit cans/bottles from the soda my wife drinks. Its been awhile since I went because I still haven't been drinking any soda, but no matter how little it is, its still free money and this week I got $6.85 in free money! Not bad for stuffing cans into a crushing machine for 5 minutes. Ok, so lets get on to the fine points....

Here is the week 13 wrap up:
$41.13 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund
$6.85 into the piggy bank
$50 to the quarterly loan payment account

which makes the 2013 totals:
$375.34  in my 401K
$260.00 in the vacation fund
$26.90 in the piggy bank
$100.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$50.00 in my vet bill savings
$259.95 in my money market
$259.94 in my car account

Now for the the end of the first quarter I can say that I have saved a total of $956.79. A lot of that money is kind of set a side to be spent at a later date, like the money in my vacation account, loan payment account and the vet bill account, but what is important to remember is that now when I want to take a vacation or some kind of emergency comes up I have money specifically set aside for it. I also have added $259.95 to the savings that I generally never touch and $375.34 to my 401K which will sit till I retire, but I could always get a loan from if really need be. All and all I don't think the totals are to bad. How did you do saving so far this year?


*added bonus:
So as much as people make fun of me for actually going to the bank sometimes it works to my benefit. I have had the same money market account for awhile now and it was literally getting .05% for an interest rate. My bank recently had a promotion for customers with a certain amount of 'new money' to open a money market at 1% interest. Because I have a good relationship with the bank and I do all my banking there they considered my federal tax return to be enough 'new money' even though it was automatically deposited to my checking account and it didn't meet the minimum amount of  'new money' required to open the 1% account. So they took my tax return plus all the money in my current money market and combined it into one of the new 1% money market accounts. Its not going to make me millions, but the interest % difference is substantial and will definitely be noticeable by the of the year. So no matter where you do your banking, just keep an eye out and see what they are offering. Even if you have direct deposit maybe just head to the bank once every few months ask if there is anyway to get more interest or anything they can do for you. It never hurts to check!

Week #12 - how many bank accounts do you have?

Well its Friday again which is always nice. Not only is it the weekend, but its also payday! When I first started working at my current job (11 years ago) we actually got paid on Wednesdays which to me was really nice. Usually Mondays suck just because its Monday and the rest of the week is just spent looking forward to Friday. When we got paid on Wednesdays, Monday still sucked, but on Tuesday you could look forward to the next day being payday. Then Wednesday we would get paid, Thursday would be the day before Friday and then Friday was the start of the weekend. So anyway, now we just get paid on Fridays and pretty much the whole week sucks.

This is the week you've all been waiting for! I got my paycheck which was for a little less than usual because I had to leave work early for an appointment one day last week. Its only a few hours short and it had a correction for a bit of time I was shorted last week so in total my check was $569.89 This is the fourth paycheck of March and so far I have deposited 1 into my checking account for bills, 1 into my mortgage account and 1 has been set aside to pay the bills from my gallbladder surgery when they come in.

This weeks paycheck will be the first significant saving of 2013! I promised lots of monthly saving when you first started reading in January and hopefully you stuck with me because here comes the pay off! I already mentioned that my paycheck this week was for $569.89, usually I just take the monthly check that I want to save and split it 1/2 in my money market account and 1/2 in my savings for car repairs/a new car. Since I haven't saved much money so far this year I'm going to take $50 off the top and put it in the savings account for in case my cat gets sick. That leaves me with $519.89 to divide up and put $259.945 into my money market and my car savings account. Obviously I can't put 1/2 a cent into each account so one will get a penny more than the other this week.

I also made my weekly $20 vacation transfer to my vacation fund. If nothing else what you can see here is that just by transferring $20 a week from my checking account to a savings account I have saved $240 since January! If you were only able to do half of that you would still have $120 set aside for a vacation, a car repair or some kind of unforeseen emergency that pops up! Even at $5 a week you would have $60 that you could keep adding to or use for a night out to dinner. What I'm trying to show you is that you don't have to save much for it to add up, you just have to commit to saving and keep up with it!

Here is the week 12 wrap up:
$36.10 to my 401K
$20.00 to my vacation fund
$50.00 to my savings for Beetus' potential vet bills
$259.95 to my money market
$259.94 to my car savings account

which makes the 2013 totals:
$334.21  in my 401K
$240.00 in the vacation fund
$20.05 in the piggy bank
$50.00 in the quarterly loan payment account
$50.00 in my vet bill savings
$259.95 in my money market
$259.94 in my car account

*added bonus: Here is a reminder about how many accounts and different savings I have, exactly what they are called in my online banking & an explanation of each one...

Beetus Money - Checking 
     money set aside for my 20 pound, 12 year old cats potential vet bills
Car Money - Checking
     money set saved for potential car repairs or a down payment on a new car
Checking OG
     my original checking account that I use for all my debits and monthly bills
Married - Checking
     wedding gift money my wife and I had left over after the whole thing was paid for
MM Savings - Checking
     my main savings, money goes in and does not come out
Mortgage - Checking
     used only to pay my mortgage each month. I usually try to keep an extra payment on hand
Online Spending - Savings
     account linked to my paypal for online shopping
Loan Repay - Savings
     money set aside to pay an interest free loan that I make quarterly payments on
Vacation Fund - Checking
     this is the one I transfer $20 a week to for a future vacation


Plus I have...
The Piggy Bank full of deposit can/bottle money
A small bank of loose change that I should roll & deposit into the real bank

Week #11 - Monthly or Weekly... just be prepared!

Welcome to week #11 of my obsessive compulsive savings blog. If you've been here since the beginning then you have seen the lunacy that is my budgeting and you know that I like each weeks paycheck to go into a specific account for a specific purpose. Usually its like this...

week 1 - deposit into checking account for monthly bills
week 2 - deposit into mortgage account
week 3 - deposit into mortgage account
week 4 - deposit into 2-3 different accounts for saving

In addition to this month being different because March has 5 paychecks for me, last week threw a small wrench into my works because I missed a day of work due to a snowstorm. So the paycheck I got this week is only for 32 hours instead of the normal 40 hours. I also had to leave work after only 5 hours (instead of the normal 8 hours) on Wednesday of this week so next weeks paycheck will be  a little short as well. Ok.... today's check would normally go towards paying my mortgage, but since its not a full paycheck I'm going to alter my usual plan to this...

week 1 - deposit into checking account for monthly bills
week 2 - deposit into mortgage account
week 3 - extra paycheck held aside to pay hospital bill
week 4 - deposit into 2-3 different accounts for saving
week 5 - deposit into mortgage account

I usually like to save extra money on 5 paycheck months but because of my gallbladder surgery I'm going to have some hospital bills coming in soon. I actually just got a huge envelop of those 'This is not a bill' explanation of benefits things from my insurance company and based on those the total amount I may owe my providers is $615.90. As much as that sucks it could have been much worse so I can't complain to much. Hopefully the paycheck for next week covers a good portion of that and I don't have to stress about where to get the money for the rest of the bills to much!

Even though this weeks regular paycheck ($477.60) is 'extrta' and being set aside to pay some bills I'll probably get next month some still went to my 401K and I did still do my $20 vacation transfer. I also got a small bonus check that was part of an incentive program my job offered based on last years production. The company didn't do very well, but we still got a small bonus and since its free money I'm not complaining at all. My bonus check is for $264.61 and I will be setting that aside with today's regular paycheck for my medical bills. That means I have $742.21 which should be more than enough to pay for all my surgery related bills without negatively effecting my regular budget. 

Having that 'extra' paycheck & bonus set aside is a good example of how pre-planning your budget on a monthly basis can be helpful. Most people find a weekly budget to work better & they just take a certain amount of each weeks pay and put it towards all their large bills, but looking at things on a monthly basis just works better for me. Which ever you do just make sure you're covered for all your bills by the end of the month!

Sadly I haven't really had any deposit cans/bottles to return because a little over a month ago I stopped drinking soda. We do still have some cans from the soda my wife drinks, but I was drinking 5+ cans a day so there hasn't been enough cans to make a trip to the recycling machines worth it yet so no new money has been added to the piggy bank in the last few weeks.

Here is the week 11 wrap up:
$48.16 to my 401K (total from this weeks regular & bonus checks)
$20.00 to my vacation fund

which makes the 2013 totals:
$298.11 in my 401K
$220.00 in the vacation fund
$20.05 in the piggy bank
$50.00 in the quarterly loan payment account


*Last week a friend of mine was making fun of me because I actually use my checkbook register and I go to the bank instead of having direct deposit, so as this weeks added bonus I'm going to show you a picture of the insanity that is my checkbook.

What you see below is pretty much my entire budget. Inside the checkbook cover is the register to keep track of my balance, some actual checks, the yellow paper I keep track of my weekly pay amounts on, the yellow paper I keep track of my vacation transfers on, a few random but relevant notes & a book of stamps. The yellow paper on the outside is a list of what I owed to my credit cards and a few other bills, that paper is thrown away or updated as bills are paid off. The envelopes behind the checkbook are bills that were not paid yet. I keep them with my checkbook until they are paid and then I throw them away. Lastly the 3 pens (red, blue, green) are to help me keep my checkbook balanced. I write in all my deposits and withdrawals in blue. As things clear to & from the account I check them off with the green pen. When things go badly and my balance is negative (even though its not actually overdrawn because of the 'hidden' money in the account) I write the balance in red. Once again folks... I admitted from week #1 that I'm crazy!

Having 3 pens and using a checkbook register may not work for you and that's fine, but I still can't stress enough that no matter if its in a jar, envelope, bank account or under your mattress you should try to save some money once a week. Cut out one meal out, trip to Dunkin Donuts, a pack of cigarettes or a soda. Any little bit you can save will help and probably motivate you to save even more!