Archive results for “January 2007f 2007”
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I missed announcing the second Quicken giveaway at Free Money Finance, but I caught the third one!
Free Money Finance is giving away a copy of Quicken 2007 Basic on his blog. All you need to do is visit over there and leave a comment to enter. I would also encourage you to browse around his site as well. There’s lots of great information over there.
I could go on and on about how Quicken has helped me (and will REALLY help me during this lower income time), but I’ll spare you. Do enter if you can because it is a good product and it’s FREE if you win!
Good luck! 
I haven’t written earlier today because I have been thinking about our recent bump in the road with our reduced income. I found myself trying to think of the possible ways one could react to a bump in the road. I came up with a few that I would like to share with everyone.
For a visual here, you are riding a bike and you hit the bump and fall off. You are not injured too bad, but you need to shake your head a little bit to gather your wits.
Here are a few things I thought of that can happen when you are at that point:
1.) After you stop shaking your head, you look back at the bump you hit. Think about why you hit it and how you will avoid it next time. You get back on your bike, take another look at that bump behind you, shake your head one last time, and pedal on your way on the path you were going.
2.) With your head still shaking, you go to that bump in the road, kick and yell at it a few times and as you whip around to walk away you shuffle some rocks on it for good measure. You grab your bike, slam it upright so it does a little bounce, and then go on your way.
3.) Your head doesn’t shake long and before you know it you are grabbing some sticks to help level out that bump you hit. Yes, you already hit it once and may not hit it again, but you know you’ll come back around these parts again and you know others do too. So, you take that stick to fix the bump. It doesn’t take long, and when you are done you dust off your hands, get back on your bike and continue on your path.
I’ll admit, I’ve done #2 many times. Anger, I found, never did me that well. Before I knew it I was hitting the next bump because my vision was clouded by madness. I think as I’ve gotten older, I have gotten wiser so I am less angry overall.
#1 is the one that I relate to now. I reflect back on what happened in a calm manner and then head on my way.
I think, though, that I want to be at the point where I do #3. It may take longer to smooth out that bump so it doesn’t make you fall next time, but the time spent may be well worth it.
I’ll have more to say about #3 tomorrow. In the meantime, do you have any thoughts? Any other options to add?
It’s Carnival Time!
The Carnival of Debt Reduciton is over at Debt Hater.
The Carnival of Personal Finance is up at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity.
Enjoy!
My husband was losing his job (his employer cut his hours way down which is a way to get people to quit) and my husband did indeed quit yesterday. We are going to tough this out and work hard to get him going working for himself. He has the skills, and now he has the time to concentrate on making it happen. With him working at his old job, it was comfortable for us. It was time to rock the boat to make bigger and better things happen for us.
It will be rough. We likely will not have extra money to put towards our debt for a while. But – we will make it.
So…we will be taking a look at all of our spending and figuring out things we can do to cut our costs. First up, UTILITIES.
1.) CABLE – Our cable service runs $15/month for the basic channels. This is the lowest plan we can possibly get. With this plan we have the major networks as well as a few other channels we enjoy (Weather Channel, TBS, Lifetime) so we will be keeping our cable. Without it, we are unable to get any local channels using rabbit ears because our area is too remote. Worse comes to worse, we will cut the cable. But for now it will stay in place as our form of entertainment with our cold snowy winter. We will not be making a trip to the video store for quite a while.
2.) CELL PHONE – Our current phone is one of those Tracfones. We pay $20 every two months for 60 minutes of call time and that keeps our phone working. Total cost yearly = $120. We purchased it for emergency use only, and it basically has been for that purpose. We have, however, used some of our cell phone minutes (they roll over) when the balance is over 100. We call our parents with it. I’m not sure about cancelling it, though. I like having it for emergencies and I feel better having it in the car when we are driving around. I believe this is the lowest priced cell phone I can possibly have but I can lower the yearly cost by $21.00 by purchasing a yearly card with 500 minutes for $99.00. I would do that, but we don’t have the money at the moment. Perhaps soon we can. Worse case scenario, we will drop the plan.
3.) ELECTRIC – This is the one where I know we can cut costs. Our bills runs 60-85/month for our small home. I’m not sure what is eating up all of the power, but I have a feeling it has to do with our computers, electric dryer and lights.
We have an area in our bathroom where we can dry clothes. We rigged that when I was out of work in late 2005. Once I found a good job, we started using the dryer again all of the time because it was convenient and our clothes came out soft. We will be going back to hanging our clothes to air dry, except we will use the dryer to finish off drying socks, underware, jeans and towels. They are stiff as a rock when you air dry them completely. Come summer we will hang clothes outside.
On the note of laundry, we will keep washing all clothes in cold water and use less soap/fabric softener per load than we are using now. Time to make everything stretch a little longer.
As for the computers, there isn’t much we can do while we are working on them. BUT, when they are off we will turn off power strips OR unplug things. I may look into those Smart Strips that supposedly cut power to things when they are turned off. I’ve been reading a little bit on them, and it’s surprising to read how much power electronic equipment can draw even when turned off.
As for our lights, I have looked at those bulbs in the store that claim to use less energy and last for 5 years. As far as I know, they will help cut our energy costs, but those bulbs aren’t cheap. I’m still thinking about buying a few to try them out. In the meantime, I plan on using some candles we have at night in the kitchen at least. I don’t feel comfortable using them anywhere else in the house.
4.) GARBAGE – We pay $27 every three months for garbage pickup. That is the best price in the area. Any extra you see within this category when I post my monthly spending is for garbage bags. We will continue to purchase kitchen garbage bags, but we will purchase the cheapest we can. We will also reuse plastic bags from grocery shopping for other garbages in the house.
5.) GAS – We do keep our heat fairly low (around 65-66) but it’s time to drop it back down again. We have purchased a programmable thermostat and we will tier the heating so it will be around 58 at night and in the morning go to 62. When my son comes home from school we will have it go up to 65. That’s the plan for now, it probably will change a little once we see how it goes. I am hoping the programmable thermostat will help because sometimes I would forget to turn down the heat at night.
We will also turn down the termostat on our hot water heater since it is heated by our gas. Just a few degrees can save you money, but not be that noticeable when you are using the hot water.
6.) INTERNET – I work at home, and I have to have high speed internet. AT&T DSL in my area is the cheapest deal at $24.95/month. Unfortunately, that means I must have AT&T as my telephone provider to get a discount on the DSL. However, this is supposed to change in the future so I will be keeping an eye on things. It would be great if I could get the “naked” DSL deal and reduce my internet costs to $20/month.
7.) TELEPHONE – Our telephone charges run $29/month. We do not have anything fancy on our phone and I thought we had the lowest plan possible. I decided to call them last week and tell them specifically that I want the cheapest plan available. While the customer service gal was super friendly, somehow me asking for the cheapest plan available prompted her to plug three way calling. I don’t get it. Anyways, I was able to take long distance completely off of my phone (it will cost me $9 to do that – silly charge if you ask me!) but it will save me $2.00 a month in monthly charges. I also reduced the amount of local calls we have available. We use our phone to make approximately 15 calls/month, so we went with the lowest local call plan available. We will be saving another $2.00/month. So, overall we will be paying around $25/month for our telephone bill now.
Every now and then, you probably see our telephone bill higher than $29/month. That means we purchased minutes for our telephone card. We sometimes receive calling cards from Sam’s Club as presents. We’ve taken one and have adopted it as our permanent calling card for long distance calls. Whenever the minutes get low I recharge the minutes. That’s handy for us, because we do not have a Sam’s Club around us and the minutes run less than 4 cents each. That’s a pretty good price.
There is a site I found where they claim you can earn free calling card minutes and perhaps I will look into it. I am always super-cautious about things like that because I don’t want to get suckered into anything.
There are also VoiP plans (like Skype) that I plan on looking more into for our long distance calling. The only problem there is that we’d have to have our computer on to make calls. Anyone use Skype and care to share their experience? $14.95 for a year of long distance calling isn’t bad at all.
8.) WATER – We pay about $52 every two months for water. Since we have been living in our current home, we have never used over the minimum amount charged for water. We cannot lower our water bill at all since we already have it as low as we can go. We can only make sure we keep our water usage constant so we never go over the minimum.
CONCLUSION
I thought there would be more pennies to pinch from our utilities, but there really isn’t that much unless we spend money to save money. We are already spending the least amount possible on a few of them. I am hoping the changes we can make will save on average $30/month. If it saves $50/month I would be jumping off the walls
My husband is losing his job. Our net income will be reducing by about $900/month. Ouch.
My husband is one of those guys that tells things like he sees them and if someone belittles him, he won’t take it. Now, there are always two sides to the story and I’m only hearing this from my husband and one of his co-workers. I haven’t heard her side yet and I’m not sure if I ever will.
By her, I mean the wife of the owner of the business. She works alongside my husband and often she would belittle him and start treating him like a child. Knowing her (I used to work there years ago), I can see that happening. She treated me the same way but I’m quiet as a mouse and won’t speak up. I did my job so I could earn minimum wage and that was it. My husband is just the opposite. He’s brave enough to speak up to try to change the situation.
My husband got upset at the boss’ wife not too long ago for treating him like he didn’t know anything, which I feel is unfair. My husband has been there over 3 years in a business that has a high employee turnover rate. She does that often, but this time when my husband said something a heated argument ensued.
Not good.
The boss sat my husband down and talked to him. He asked, “What am I supposed to do, fire my wife?” When my husband told me that, first thing that crossed my mind is that he is going to get canned.
After that meeting, my husband was dead silent to the boss and his wife while working. He didn’t say a word for fear that he would get fired. Well, he basically is…but isn’t.
My husband looked at his schedule last night and noticed that he was no longer working 5 days a week. He was down to three. And the three he was working his hours were cut in half and he was given the worst shift because it’s the one where people get sent home early a lot. He went from 34-36 hours to probably 9-12. If you’ve ever worked minimum wage jobs – having your hours cut way down is the kiss of death. That’s what they do when they want to get rid of you. Your hours will continue to get lower and lower for their goal is to get you to quit. I know for a fact that this is a tactic that my husband’s boss uses often because he’s told me so.
My husband will make his own choice in the end, because it’s his job. My opinion is to quit. Although that is what they want him to do, let it serve as motivation to find something better. He’s been there too long, and the way the boss’ wife has been treating him has not done well for my husband’s self-esteem.
I can’t say that I’m happy about this, but I do think things happen for a reason. My husband does have a college degree, but there are no jobs for him in the area. It’s time for us to get creative and I believe the end result will be him making more than he is at his current job. We were getting used to him earning low wages at a dead end job because it was income. Him losing his job will force us to make changes.
What this also means is that we REALLY have to curtail our spending. I’m talking drastic cuts. Expect to hear more about our gameplan after my husband and I have another financial meeting. I am glad about this in a way because I will pass this information onto all of you.
When life gives you lemons…make lemonaide.
Oh, and don’t work somewhere where you will be working with the boss’ wife 
I noticed an upswing of visitors stopping by from searching for things like “strangers paying for debt”, “begging”, “cyberbegging”, “2020 show living with debt”, “karyn debt book”, “karen debt” and “debt blogs”.
Because I watched ABC’s 20/20 special tonight, Flat Broke: Begging and Borrowing in America, I know you are searching for more information about the show and found me.
Chances are…you are in debt just like me.
My husband and I had over $37,000 in credit card debt back in February of 2006. I started this blog and really started hitting the debt hard with our income of $48,000/year. We managed to pay off $13,000 of our debt so far and I’m blogging about what we are doing to make that happen. For a great snapshot of our debt reduction journey, please click here.
We paid off that amount by working hard and cutting as much as we could. This isn’t a cyberbegging site because I do not accept donations. I do have advertising on this site and the income fluctuates between $200-300 a month. That income is included when I say $48,000/year. That’s the thing about my blog – I let you know how much we make and how much we spend.
I tend to be pretty optimistic and I know there is a light at the end of the debt tunnel. Sure, I have my bad days, but overall I am keeping my head from looking at the ground when I walk. Debt isn’t something to be ashamed of, and as long as you pick yourself up after you fall, you can make things right. A positive attitude can work wonders.
I would like to invite you to follow me on this journey and you can do that by bookmarking this site and stopping by every now and then. You can also subscribe to my feed via email. What that means is that you will receive one email daily with everything that I wrote for the day (as long as I did write something, which I usually do). Or, if you have a feed reader, you can subscribe to my feed here.
Thank you for stopping by
If you missed the ABC 20/20 Special on Flat Broke: Begging and Borrowing in America, you didn’t miss much. It’s so sad when shows like this try to cram so much into one hour that they just skim the surface of things. What could have been a great show that could have helped many people ended up being like a water spider zipping across a pond aimlessly.
The show was broken down into segments:
The Spenders
Matt and Suzie Peterson have three little girls, a big house with a pool, two timeshares, nice cars and $60,000 in credit card debt. Their financial situation really went downhill when Matt lost his job and he was unemployed for a year. Suzie tried a scrapbookking business only to have it fail. All that time of limited funds, they kept spending like they were before except it was being finances with their credit cards.
One statement that Suzie made that sticks out in my mind is that she doesn’t regret spending money. Even Elizabeth Vargas seemed a little surprised at her comment. Suzie argued that you could be gone tomorrow and you should live life now. I agree you should live life, but if you have to claim bankruptcy and you lose everything…well, I shudder to think about that happening to us. There is a healthy balance that needs to be found.
To help the Petersons, they brought in Robert Pagliarini, a financial advisor, to help them. After Robert took a look at the Peterson’s finances, it was determined they had a net worth of $8,000. In Robert’s words, this family was close to the edge of financial ruin. The Petersons were hoping to win the lottery but Robert gave them a pretty strict set of things they need to do to make things better. It was an all or nothing plan. On it, they had to sell their house and their timeshares and the rest of the list I couldn’t catch because they didn’t discuss it only showed it quickly on the screen. While Suzie wasn’t really enthusiastic about the plan, both husband and wife agreed to do it. I wonder how the Petersons are doing now, and if they kept with it.
The Savers
Steve and Annette Economides (what a last name, eh? ) and their 5 children live debt-free on an income of less than $35,000/year. They attribute their success to careful planning. Their monthly trip to a grocery store is planned down to bringing walkie talkies so Steve and Annette can talk and compare prices on different sides of the store. They shop monthly because Annette plans their meals in a 30-day menu system. And coupons? They use lots of coupons. They say that the pennies you save all add up. Very true.
We actually have a lot in common with the Economides. When they find food at a price that is low enough, they stock up and buy a lot. I love to do that. They also purchase lunch meat (pre-packaged) that is about to expire. Annette claims they do that because they have never gotten sick. Well, as someone who worked in a grocery store I can tell you that the expiration dates are the dates that the stores need to pull product from the shelves. Most products are still good for a while after those dates. I wish they focused more on the other things they do to live on so little, but the show didn’t.
Debt Collectors
The next segment of the show was about Debt Collectors. Wow, this part made me feel sick to my stomach. One of the recorded calls they played on a show exampled how crazed some debt collectors can get, “Why don’t you just go jump in front of a train…get it over with.” Man, that made my blood boil. They played more and more calls that again showed how agressive, mean, and ILLEGAL some of these calls can be.
Consumer complaints about collection calls have risen 14%. If you happen to be a victim of overzealous debt collectors, the show gave a few tips: 1.) Contact the Federal Trade Commission 2.) Contact a lawyer and 3.) Tape the conversations. Debt collectors have no right to call you at work(EDIT – A commenter mentioned that they CAN call you at work. I’m striking that statement out until I can take a look. What I wrote was information I obtained from the show), threaten dire consequences or say that you have committed a crime. This was good information from the show, but I barely wrote it down because they went so fast!
Beggars, a.k.a. Cyberbegging
Dustin Diamond, before recently, was best known for his role playing “Screech” on the teen show, “Saved by the Bell.” Now that Screech is all grown up, most of the money earned while on the show has been spent due to mismanagement by his father. He left the limelight and bought a home in Wisconsin and found himself in a shady land deal. They gave Dustin 30 days to pay $250,000 or he would lose his home. Since he didn’t have any money, he started up a website where fans could buy T-shirts for $15.00 each to help save his house. He ended up selling 22,000 shirts and he still has his house.
Dustin also had some “adult” things surface on the internet that has since helped his financial situation but we will not go there. Not sure why they mentioned that in the show. I always wonder about things when they “leak” out.
The next gal they mentioned I have heard of before, Karyn Bosnak. She admits she is a shopaholic and wracked up some credit card debt. She created a site, Save Karyn where she asked people to donate a dollar each to help get her out of debt. Well, it worked. Strangers paid off her debt and now she’s published a book and a studio has movie rights to the book.
I checked Karyn’s site tonight to make sure I spelled her last name correctly and I found this tidbit:
That was something important that I feel ABC left out and I’m glad Karyn put that on her site for clarification. There’s always a part of the story missing.
Dave Ramsey
I didn’t catch everything with the little bit they have about Dave Ramsey. I became upset when they played a clip of him on his show demonstrating “tough love” by using the word stupid. It sounded just like the nasty debt collectors. That’s all I’ll say about that.
Debt Collectors…Again
Here’s the other side of the debt collectors story on how they do good for the economy. After all, the small business owner who has to write off bad debt will have to raise prices to make up for the lost money. I do believe that debts should be repaid, and this part of the show made me feel a little better about debt collectors. The ones the showed here worked with people to try to pay the debt and make things right. They even gave options for payment plans or offered to lower the total amount due to settle the amount.
Easy Formulas
As an afterthought as a conclusion for the show, John Stossel and Elizabeth Vargas took turns explaning two formulas to use to see how you are doing financially. Seriously – those forumlas were on the screen for a few seconds! I was getting accustomed to scribbling notes as fast as I could through the whole show, so I was able to catch them.
- Add up all of your monthly debt payments. They should not be more than one third of your monthly pre-tax earnings.
- Take your age and divide by 2. That is the percentage of your income that you should be saving.
MY CONCLUSION
The show had interesting tidbits, but it was a lot thrown at you yet not enough (if that makes sense). I think it would have been much better if they took each of the big segments (the two families, the debt collectors, and the cyberbeggers) and made one show on each. I was left wanting more after the show but that was it.
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About This Site
My Debt
- Original Debt: $97,293.06
- Paid: $1,927.89
- Remaining: $95,365.17
- Emergency Fund: $1100
- Broken Down
- Line of Credit 2: $0.00
- Line of Credit 1: $0.00
- Credit Card 1: $0.00
- Credit Card 2: $245.00
- Credit Card 3: $405.00
- Credit Card 6: $1,785.00
- Credit Card 7: $2,381.17
- Consolidation Loan: $11,000.00
- Credit Card 10: $14,519.00
- Auto Loan 1: $16,093.00
- Credit Card 11: $23,873.00
- Auto Loan 2: $25,064.00
Finance Blogging Buddies
- Beachgirl’s Budget Blog
- Becoming and Staying Debt Free
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- Debt Kid
- Debt Reduction 101
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- Everybody Loves Your Money
- Financial Hack
- Free Money Finance
- From the Brink of Bankruptcy
- Generation X Finance
- GRACEful Retirement
- Grad Money Matters
- It’s Your Money
- Josephsangl.com
- Kick Debt’s Butt
- Lazy Man and Money
- Low Income Life
- Make Love Not Debt
- Mapgirl’s Fiscal Challenge
- Mighty Bargain Hunter
- Money, Matter and More Musings
- My 1st Million at 33
- No Credit Needed
- One Million and Beyond
- Personal Finance Advice
- pfblogs.org
