First, and most important, we rarely do work for people we, or someone close to us, doesn’t know. I do not trust Craigslist for anything other than used doggie kennels and throw rugs. My husband mainly does work for friends and family – someone always needs a sink fixed or a toilet repaired. Let people around you know you’re willing to help.

I do accounting work for the company I worked for a few years ago. They are often short staffed and need an extra hand. I let them know I’m always available. It makes it easy when they already have my tax reporting information and I don’t have to keep records.

Second, if we do work for someone we don’t know, we keep it under $100. My husband is sometimes approached by fellow customers in home repair stores. There’s something about him that radiates honesty and good heartedness – maybe it’s because he is. If the job is too large, he refers them to a reputable company. It’s not worth the risk of not getting paid.

Third, be good at what you do, stay on top of trends in your industry, and be honest. My husband is extremely talented and is always reading construction magazines. He is never dishonest and will likely throw in work for free. Ninety percent of his work is from referrals. Happy people will tell their friends about you.

Fourth, pay close attention to the laws about certain types of work. California is stringent on almost everything. Working here without some sort of licensing is illegal for many trades. For example, construction work is limited to $500 (including material) if you do not have a contractor’s license. It’s also important to report all income when tax time rolls around. Nothing is worth the risk or penalties of an IRS audit. Also, if you are on unemployment, money from side work MUST be reported and will likely result in a reduction of benefits.

Fifth, don’t expect to make a ton of money. Usually, we make just enough for groceries or to cover what we’re short on an electric bill. It takes a lot of time and the money is little.

Again, I’m no expert. Before doing any type of side work, check with your local government authority and your tax advisor.

We don’t see each other often. Perhaps that’s why our marriage is so great. We don’t have time to fight – heck we’re just so darn excited to see one another we don’t really… um… talk much.

He took a rare three nights off last week and we went running and cycling together every day. We made dinner. We walked the dogs. We watched movies. We remembered what it was like to be married.

I couldn’t help but think about how wonderful it was to have him around – to see him relax, even for just a night or two. He must have been thinking the same thing. He said, ‘I want to work less and live my life more.’ He has decided to work 6 days per week and 2 nights per week – and yes, that’s a cut-back (he was working 6 days and 6 nights).

I can’t agree with him more. As he toils to pay our debt, I can’t help but wonder if our self-inflicted punishment of hard labor is worse than the crime of spending. I wonder if one day, we’ll look back and regret the time we missed when our life was just us. We can cover our bills plus some without the extra work so we’ve decided to slow down.

So… we will pay things off more slowly BUT I have my husband back – and I’ve missed him dearly.

We were elated when he received a call back and a position test date… that is, until they dropped a bomb. The job market in Southern California, like in most places, is a tight one. They are only offering the very bottom pay bracket. If my husband received the position, he would take a 25% pay cut.

Short term, this is a bad decision. This job would put us back to making minimum payments on our debt. Our finances would become the tightest they’ve ever been.

Long term, the position offers a retirement and health package unrivaled by the private sector and offers more stability. On top of that, my husband is at the highest position he can go with his current employer. The new job is one he can stay at and grow in for the next 30 years.

What would you do?

For the first few years, we didn’t need the money to clear our bills and we certainly enjoyed using it on dinners out and hotel stays. When I lost my job last year, the rent from our two roommates was vital in keeping our heads above water. Sure, it’s awkward to be nearly 30 and referring to ‘my roommates’, but it’s significantly less awkward than saying, ‘My debt collector’, ‘My bankruptcy attorney’, or ‘My foreclosure officer’.

If times are tough, maybe roommates should be a consideration.

Fortunately we haven’t had a bad experience yet, but this is a very serious decision and should be heavily thought out. We’ve stuck by some clear, yet simple, guidelines:

1.) Write a lease agreement – even if (and especially if) it’s a friend and you only expect them to stay a month or two.
2.) Have very clear rules – i.e. don’t go into my bedroom, don’t eat my food, don’t leave messes in common areas.

Some recommendations for roommates:

Firefighters: Their 24 hour shifts give you some much needed space – plus they are good to have around when you accidentally set something on fire.

Guys with girlfriends: I saw our roommate’s rent check more than I saw him.

Brothers/Sisters: You survived growing up with them, what are a few more years? Plus, it’s easier to yell at family about dirty dishes in the sink.

Some people you should never consider:

Perfect Strangers: I’d rather my family not appear on Dateline talking about how the new roommate seemed so nice… until he killed me.

College Girls: I lived through that once and it was enough. More drama than Jerry Springer.

College Boys: Not a lot of drama but I was over keg stands and frat parties eight years ago.

People with animals and/or children: Who needs pee on the floor and chewed shoes – oh, and animals are destructive too.

Do any of you have roommates? How is it working out?

We dug around our garage for a few hours and it taught me three very important things:

1) I’m a pack rat.

In this day and age, no one… and I mean NO ONE… should still have a Tae Bo video or a Chia Pet.

2) If I don’t see it, I don’t care if it’s sold.

I can’t remember what is out there. If my husband sells it before I see it… it’s fair game.

3) The things I thought were so important to me… aren’t.

There are very few things I use on a daily basis. I don’t need the rest. It’s time to simplify.

What are you selling?

I smiled and said, “The machine isn’t reliable. I am, so they send me out here.”

One of the men looked down at my dirty hands and scuffed tennis shoes and said, “That’s when I’d tell the boss to take his job and shove it. I’d never push shopping carts for a living.”

The other man laughed and said, “Oh geez, no!”

They pushed their cart toward me and left. I stacked ten carts in a line and began to push them to the cart corral. As the tears started to trickle down my face, I couldn’t help but think that those words were probably something I would have said before I lost my job. I have a university degree with high honors and over a decade of management experience. I would have never seen myself at this point either.

I stopped, leaned my head on the cart handle (I know – germs – but I was distraught), and thought, ‘I have two options. I can either quit and go home OR I can bust my butt and get a paycheck – tiny or otherwise.’

I wish I could say it was an easy decision – but I had my head on that darn handle for at least 5 minutes.

I finally wiped my face and got back to work.

If this is what it takes to pay my bills, THIS is what it takes.

Our successes and failures are based on our attitudes. We can give up and fail… or we can decide that enough is enough and bear down for a fight.

I’m ready to fight.

Are you with me?

Making Extra Money Without Getting a Second Job

I like their idea about Etsy. I didn’t know too much about the site. If you are crafty, it’s a place where you can sell your crafts. Back in the day, I used to paint. My dad would sell my creations at a local farmer’s market and I’d make a few bucks from it. Of course, once I had a taste of the money I could earn, I turned my painting into an assembly line so I could mass paint to produce more sellable items LOL. I wouldn’t mind getting back into it when I have time. Overall, it was relaxing to do and thanks to Etsy maybe I could sell them online.

If you read the article, make sure you read the comments too! There are some spammy comments, but some readers gave some great suggestions as well.

NOTE: The Yahoo site was acting a little funny for me and not finding the page. I had to refresh to get it to come up.

I received a gift certificate to Amazon.com so I decided to purchase it (this was a while ago). I’m glad I did.

I was going to do a book review, but I agreed with the review that originally led me to purchase the book. So I am going to provide a link to that review for everyone to read and then just discuss how the book has affected us.

The 4-Hour Workweek Book Review at Get Rich Slowly

Like JD, there were parts of the book that I wasn’t interested in, but there were many parts that I was interested in. It gave me a lot of food for thought when thinking about certain aspects of our business.

Ferris talks about becoming an expert in a certain area. I don’t agree with the suggestions on how to become an expert. Joining some organizations and reading a few books and then promoting yourself as an expert doesn’t sit well with me. It makes me question every “expert” out there. I think to be an expert you have to really immerse yourself in a subject.

Even before I read this book, my husband was doing that. He hasn’t always been paid for all of the work he has done, but he is becoming respected among peers (including a person who works for someone my husband would love to work for). Others are coming to him for answers so he is very close to becoming an expert. That is thanks to all of the studying he has done the past three years. We knew his expertise would help the business, but reading about it in Ferris’ book gave us more ideas on how to utilize it in other ways.

Ferris also talks about outsourcing your life. Our business was geared towards outsourcing some tasks to keep our time commitment low. But after reading this book I realized that we could outsource even more so we shifted our business model a little bit. As it works now, we create products and then some of the products are produced & shipped by a third party. After reading the book, we realized that we could outsource more. You do pay for that outsourcing in terms of a lower profit margin, but you have more time to work on the more important parts of the business. I also got some ideas on how to automate some of the administrative parts of the business as well.

So our business is not traditional. There is no physical store front. Is a path like ours right for everyone? No – just like I believe that this book is not right for everyone. I chuckle because I know someone who would call the book rubbish. I think it depends on what you where you are in your life and what you want. For us, we read the book at the right time. If I had this book in my hands fresh out of college I probably would have called the book rubbish too.

It only affected it a little bit.

Since my husband works a minimum wage job and I earn about twice as much at my job – there wasn’t much of a change. It fluctuated some since some weeks I worked more hours and some weeks he worked less. The big thing is that we were pulling in about the same amount of income working more total hours. That is the part that bothers me since it is not an efficient use of time.

On the flip side, since my husband has a fairly recession-proof job, there is a some sense of security. But it still bothers me. Not only because of the more total hours, but because the effect it is having on our family.

We no longer have regular dinners together everyday like we used to. We haven’t been able to go out snowshoeing together at all this winter or even take a trip to the lake. Our family unity is suffering. Not sure how else to put it except to say that it stinks. I don’t like to sound like I am whining about it, but I have to say what I really feel about this arrangement. We’ll deal with it – we used to work opposite shifts way back when, which was even worse. I guess once you have a taste of being able to have time together, you don’t want to go back to not having it.

As for the business, it is still making a profit and it is growing. When I talked about income above, I was not including the business in there. All net income from our jobs and the some of the profit from the business goes to our expenses and towards our debt (I haven’t added to our savings account in a while). Some of the funds from the business have already been used to pay off start-up debt in full and to contribute to the business savings. We are being conservative right now with the money we pay ourselves.

There have been questions about our business and I’ve decided to talk a little bit more about it. I’ll start tomorrow with reviewing a book that was very inspirational.

I have enough for now – I will let you know when I need more.

I have been out of my links for a while, so I host ING Orange Savings referral links for others on my referral page. Every now and then I ask for more referrals on here so I can keep up the supply. The last time I did it was in October.

Thanks!

P.S. Celticbuffy and Rachel – I have tried three times to contact you from the last announcement I made. If you are reading, please check your spam filter

AOL Article

While there are some companies on the list I am familiar with (Alpine Access, Sylvan Online and Working Solutions), there are some that I have not heard about yet. With any work at home company, really check it out to make sure it is valid. And never pay a fee unless you are really sure you will receive results. A great place to go to ask others about companies is the WAHM Forums.

Thanks Beverly for the tip!

With the economy squeezing the budgets of more Americans, some people are looking for creative ways to pay their monthly bills. Selling hair on the Internet is just one of those unusual methods.

[Via CNN]

I doubt I would do it. I have too many gray hairs showing up now LOL. But it is a very unusual way to make money and it was interesting to look at the hair that has sold (the site is TheHairTrader.com).

The other ideas were ones I discussed before: becoming a lab rat and selling gold at a gold party. If we had gold to sell I’d probably be all over that one. But I am not a jewelry collector.

Thanks Dawn for the tip!

Whether you are an amateur or professional videographer, the site’s premise looks very interesting. You shoot the video they need, get paid, and then the company assembles a finished product for the project they are working on.

Here’s the site: Elasticlab.com

They do have some requirements regarding equipment, so make sure you read through the fine print. This would have been perfect for us since at one time we had the equipment to do it. Alas, the equipment was sold to pay off debt or we would have jumped on this one

Since I cannot verify the site and use it, I found one blogger who wrote about earning money with them.

Charlie Hoehn

Anyone reading have experience with Elastic Lab?

Yahoo Finance Article

I checked a few gadgets I am familiar with. We recently sold our Playstation 2 so I plugged that into Gazelle.com. Their offer to buy? $23. Yikes. Pretty low. We ended up selling it to someone direct for $75.

Out of curiosity, I checked how much you could get for selling a Wii to them. From what I’ve read, they are still in high demand. Their offer? $130. Again, it’s pretty low considering a friend of ours sold his used console with one game for basically the new price.

We do have a couple other older gadgets around that we might try to sell. I’ll probably check a few of the sites in that article first to see what they offer. That could be used as the lowest possible price to sell something at if a potential buyer tries to lower your asking price. It could also be a last resort if a buyer cannot be found.

On another note, some will even take gadgets to recycle which is nice if you cannot find a buyer and you don’t have good recycling facilities locally. That’s probably what we will end up using sites like these for since the buying prices seem really low.

It is different having him working outside of the home since we both were working from home before. Now we have to coordinate schedules. Our trusty wall calendar is back and notes are constantly being written in it. Already we’ve come across a minor conflict and we’ll have to bring a bike out of winter storage (it always happens – it gets colder so we put everything away – then we have a beautiful warm spell). But I am thankful for having a bike and thankful we both are in good enough health to be able to ride one.

I need to be more thankful for the positive things we have. Sometimes it is so easy to forget about that and concentrate on what we don’t have. Or maybe think too much about something negative we have too much of (like debt). After two and a half years at this, I still need to remind myself of that every now and then.

I have enough links for now! Thanks!

I have been out of my links for a while, so I host ING Orange Savings referral links for others on my referral page. Every now and then I ask for more referrals on here so I can keep up the supply. The last time I did it was in August.

Thanks!

How I Make $2,000 Every Year Without Doing Very Much.

Upon reading the article, my mind was put at ease and I was a little inspired.

The author of the article discussed how they have a few illustrations listed at iStockPhoto.com. People looking for illustrations go to the site and purchase what they need. They also have photos, sound and video that you can sell or purchase.

We have experimented with photography and have some pictures sitting around that could qualify for this site. The downfall is that you only get 20% commission for each sale. That’s pretty low. But you can get volume/exposure if your work is good enough – a lot of people go to iStockphoto to purchase pictures. There are some photographers on there that make six figures a year. Then there are some that probably only make a few bucks a month (if that). I like the fact that we could possibly make some money for photos that were just going to be for personal use.

So I went through the application process this weekend (which included reading some material, taking a quiz and uploading three sample photos) and am waiting to see if my application will be approved. They really want to keep the quality of the site really high, so they check every picture/illustration/sound/video that comes in. Sort of nerve wracking, but I thought it was worth a shot. Even a few bucks a month is better than nothing and once you upload your photo and it is accepted – there isn’t much more work on your part.

If you happen to be into photography and can create some business related photos (especially with people in a business setting), they are selling like hotcakes. Some of the people who make the most money on the site have business photos on there. There are categories of pictures they are not accepting right now. One good example is trees. They have enough of them right now.

In a few weeks I should receive a reply on whether I was accepted or not. We don’t plan to pursue this heavily, but it could be a way to make some extra money with a hobby both my husband and I share and hope to get back into at a later date.

Here are a few articles I came across that were interesting to read about selling on iStockphoto.com:

Selling Photos on iStockphoto
Freelancer Sellings 500,000 Photos on iStockphoto.com
iStock Earnings

Thought I would share in case there are any hobby photographers out there

There’s another thing we could do. We could use the funds to invest in our future. That’s what we decided to do.

As you know, we have a budding business that is bringing in a small amount of income, but it is no where near full potential. We aren’t quite ready yet for full blown business, but we are close. Both my husband and I believe in this business. My husband has been doing a lot of the work right now with tasks that pertain to his specialty and he is almost done. That leaves the tasks that pertain to my specialty. I am so very far behind. I’ve been picking at it when I can, but there are not enough hours in a day. Without the completion of my tasks, we can’t go full blown. Once we go full blown, I’ll need to commit about 10 hours/week and my husband will need to commit about 30 hours (about 10 of his hours either of us could do).

I started seeing the funds from the sale as a way to help us get that business going. I would cut my hours at work and my husband would get a part-time job. So we both would be working part-time jobs and working the rest on our business. The sale funds would help fill the gap to keep us afloat until the business kicked up full steam.

So that is what we are doing. I’ve already gave notice about my hours and my husband already has a job lead. I tend to believe that things happen for a reason. I was struggling to try to keep everything together (as some of you noticed with my lack of daily posts and delay in email responses). I like to think that I can do it all, but I can’t. So with everything coming together as it has…this is our chance!

There will be no spending spree and I’ll have to just drool but don’t buy when it comes to those LCD TVs. The sale money is going to sit in a savings account and earn interest while we pull what we need each month to bring us to our normal income level with our new schedules. That means our business is going to be a big driving factor behind paying off the rest of our debt. If the business doesn’t succeed, we’ll be in debt for a while longer. It is a risk, but one that has been lessened thanks to the sale funds and because I am only going part-time at work (meaning chances are good that I can go back to full-time if needed).

We want this, though. There was no lack of passion, only the lack of time and resources. We can have that now, at least for a few months, so we are going for it. You can’t succeed if you don’t try. We want to succeed…we want this. I believe it’s time to make it happen.

I was wondering, besides garage sales, where do you go to sell your stuff? We still live in an apartment, and are not able to have a garage sale. So, I am always on the lookout to sell more stuff.

Here are a few places that I know of. Feel free to add more suggestions for Jessica in the comments!

1.) Craigslist.org. Craigslist has grown leaps and bounds as a great place to buy and sell stuff. If you live near a major city, chances are good you have an active Craigslist community in your area. It is free to list your stuff for sale. One word of caution – keep sales local! According to Craigslist, that will prevent most of the scams on the site.

2.) Ebay.com. I haven’t used eBay, but it’s on the back of my mind. I do have some things that would sell well. If you have something collectible or highly desirable, you might be able to make more money from it by selling on eBay.

3.) Local paper. Our local paper runs deals every now and then where they have a special to list items for sale. Otherwise it’s a little pricey unless you have something big to sell.

4.) Flyers. Some stores by us have community boards where you can tack up flyers. Take a picture of your item, make a flyer with your number (with easy tear-off ones interested people can take with them) and post them.

5.) Amazon.com. A few readers here have had success with selling books through Amazon.com. I’ve never done it though.

6.) Ask family/friends/coworkers. It’s funny how a potential seller may be right in front of your nose. I’d personally never ask someone if something they owned was for sale, but if they mentioned that they were going to be selling something I’d definitely pipe up if I wanted it!

If you have more ideas, feel free to leave them in the comments

EDIT: Thanks! I have enough links for right now. I will be updating this post as I work through the links so you can keep an eye on it to know when I’ll be asking for more.

I have been out of my links for a while, so I host ING Orange Savings referral links for others on my referral page. Every now and then I ask for more referrals on here so I can keep up the supply. The last time I did it was in April.

Please just leave a comment saying you are interested. If for some reason you submit a comment and don’t see it right away – please contact me and I’ll fish it out of my spam filter (it gets a bit hungry sometimes).

Thanks!

ABCnews.com

According to ABC News, about 15,000 stimulus payments were routed into the incorrect bank account due to a computer error. It didn’t give more detail than that.

If you should have received your payment but didn’t, there is a hotline number to call at the bottom of the stimulus payment info page at the IRS website.

EDIT (11:14 p.m.): Here’s a link to a Yahoo story that claims that the number is 1,500. It also notes that some households did not receive the $300 for a child refund.

It looks like ING Direct is still at 3% but I have to wonder for how long. Right now we don’t have that much money saved (just what you see to the right under savings account) but I still want to maximize what little we do earn.

A while ago I did move some of our money out of Virtual Bank and into ING. I guess I will go ahead and move a little bit more out of it, but not all of it. Sometimes I get uncomfortable having all of our eggs in one basket.

As a note, ING still has a great bonus going on where you can earn $25 if you open up a new savings account with at least $250. For more info, you can check out my page with ING Orange savings account referral links. Right now I am hosting some referrals for Phil.

Of course, just because it is scheduled that doesn’t mean we will get it. But I can’t help but be excited. We may be under the $10K mark with our credit card debt in less than a week!

Sometimes it seems like it is taking forever to pay off our cards. But these little milestones really help to keep me going. Every milestone we hit gives me a little more “oomph” to keep attacking our debt.

I’m not one to try things out first. I tend to sit and observe and then perhaps give something a try. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that they are giving out $25 bonuses right now until May 15th so I kept a very close eye on things I finally felt good enough about the company and their reputation, so I signed up.

Signing up was easy and setting up my web account took less than two minutes. Right away, there was a $25 deposit into my account. In order to access that money, I had to set-up account information and had to give my social security number. That was the big reason why I was sitting back and watching this one.

In full disclosure, I make $10 each time someone signs up using my link. I have my Revolution Money Exchange account tied to one of my savings accounts so any money earned from this will go directly towards our emergency fund. Thank you in advance to anyone who signs up using my link!

Anyways, I found a section on the IRS website where you can “Get the amount and date of your Economic Stimulus Payment now!”:

Where’s My Stimulus Payment?

Big note on this, from the site (I added emphasis):

We recommend checking the Payment Schedule prior to using this application since your payment information will not be available on this tool until the time that your payment is scheduled.

So, if you are scheduled to receive your payment via direct deposit next week, you probably won’t show up in their system until next week.

From the BaltimoreSun.com (April 29,2008):

Democrats in Congress have said that the tax rebates aren’t big enough and have been pushing for a second stimulus package.

The package that they have been pushing may be the one referred to here at Boston.com (April 9, 2008):

Hoping to build on a $168-billion economic stimulus bill already enacted, Hoyer said new legislation would focus on broadening food stamps for the poor, extending jobless benefits for the long-term unemployed and investing in construction and other public works projects to create domestic jobs.

The legislation would be in addition to a series of steps Congress wants to take to shore up the U.S. housing industry, which is plagued by foreclosures that threaten to undercut the global economy.

That’s all I could find at the moment. It looks like there may be discussion about it but nothing more than that. Have any of you heard anything more about a possible second stimulus check?

President Bush said tax rebates will start going out Monday, earlier than previously announced, and should help Americans cope with rising gasoline and food prices, as well as aid a slumping economy.

Via [sfgate.com]

It looks like the official IRS payment schedule site has been revised as well:

People who use direct deposit also will be among the first to receive the payments starting April 28.

Via [IRS.gov]

The payment schedule itself appears to be the same as before President Bush’s announcement. If all goes well, it looks like we will have our check by mid-May. That’s exciting, because that will put our debt under the 5 figure mark!

To be honest, though, I’m starting to feel a little uneasy about food prices. We may spend some of that payment after all, to stock up on necessity/pantry type items. I’m still considering it.

Way back when I was in college a very smart American History professor required that my class read a novel by Horatio Alger called Ragged Dick. The story, originally published in 1926, concerns a fourteen-year-old bootblack named Dick living on his own on the streets of New York. He works hard but is a spendthrift so he is always living hand to mouth. When circumstances result in his meeting a wealthy businessman who encourages Dick to go to school, work hard, and save his money, his life begins to turn around. He works diligently, opens a savings account and makes consistent deposits, and as opportunities befall him he is able to move away from his life on the streets and toward a life of productivity and security.

In the early part of the 20th century, Alger wrote many books with tales similar to the one in Ragged Dick—so many, in fact, that Horatio Alger’s name became synonymous with the “rags-to-riches” phenomenon that Americans love. Somewhere along the line, however, that phenomenon seems to have gotten a bit distorted.

These days we tend to equate rags-to-riches success with overnight success. We think of the American success story as winning American Idol at the age of 17, cutting a major deal with Donald Trump, or scoring a multi-million dollar windfall in the lottery. We’ve come to think of wealth and success as something that comes instantly, with little or no effort, or as the result of one big winner-take-all gamble.

But Horatio Alger’s kind of success was anything but instant. Alger’s philosophy, which fueled the incredible productivity of the 20th century, preached the benefits of hard, steady work and consistent saving as a way of being prepared for the incredible opportunities that life sometimes drops in your lap. For the most part, Alger’s heroes didn’t get many breaks, but the few that did come their way were useful only because the heroes had worked hard enough in advance to be able to jump at those opportunities.

Is it possible for Americans to re-embrace a Horatio Alger kind of outlook? Maybe. When I read blogs describing people’s diligent efforts to pay off debts and build savings, I think that perhaps we’re beginning to see the light again, that Americans can turn away from debt and build a future that is secure and ambitious. And with every post I read about snowflakes, e-funds, and debt-free living, I think somewhere Horatio Alger is smiling.

Thanks Nine Circles for the guest post!

One job, though, he heard back from and had a telephone interview for. It was for a company not too far from where we live in a location that we are familiar with. We would still be able to enjoy many of the things we enjoy about the area we live in now and we would be closer to our families.

Well, it’s been three weeks and no word from them. It’s safe to say that my husband didn’t get the job. It’s no longer listed anywhere.

There are other jobs that my husband is waiting to hear back from and there are more resumes going out. In the meantime, he is still working his temporary job and will look for a “in-between” job once that one is almost over.

So the job search continues…

“Patty Miller, 40, of Grand Blanc, said she went to a gold party a few weeks ago, taking some gold rings and necklaces that were “just sitting around” and didn’t expect much.

“I ended up making $320,” said Miller.

[Via The Flint Journal]

I have looked around my house for any gold pieces I could find. Unfortunately, I only have a couple of rings. I’ve never really been into jewelry and the stuff I did buy was the cheap imitation stuff. If you have gold jewelry laying around, it may be an option to sell some of your gold to have more money to use to payoff your debt.

But do your homework first, though. While some gold parties may be hosted by reputable jewelers, the sudden popularity of these parties may bring out some people buying gold that may undervalue your gold (intentionally or unintentionally).

“We are professional jewelers,” Fregoli said. “Now you have some incompetent people doing this business who don’t know the difference between gold and a brick.”

So sellers beware, they caution.

[Via The Macomb Daily]

As with many things, it may be worthwhile to get a few offers before you sell. We don’t have any gold parties near where we live, but I may bring along my gold jewelry next time we go shopping and are near some jewelers.

Well, you learn something new every day. My husband gave the penny rolls to the bank teller and she told him not to roll the change. They plop them in their coin counter machine and it does all of the work. My husband asked the question that was on my mind when he told me about this…”Does it cost anything?”

It turns out that it doesn’t cost anything at my bank. I’ve heard that some banks do charge for cashing in change, so we are fortunate. Especially because we do not have any Coinstar machines near us.

So before you spend the time counting (and double counting if you are like me!) and rolling your change, give your bank a quick call to see if you need to do that. I could have saved some time if I had known about my bank’s change cashing policy.

How much did we cash in? $9.00 worth of change ($7.00 in pennies). Now we’ll have some cash on hand for my son’s allowance

Some things that I have are probably better suited for selling on eBay. There’s nothing quite like having buyers get into a bidding war. I should know…I’ve been a buyer caught up in that before and I ended up spending a little more than I was planning to on an item. I just read today that there is an eBay boycott going on. I guess some sellers are very unhappy with the listing fees and changes to the feedback system. I’m not in the loop, so before I list anything I better research what this is all about.

There is always the option of having another garage sale. In less than two months, enough snow should be melted to have one. I still think that is the best bet for selling many of the things we have. Even though we had a lot of credit card debt, we do not have many brand name or high-demand items.

Even if we don’t bring in a lot of money, it still feels good to get rid of things! Reducing clutter is awesome!

We are also experiencing some bitter cold weather. The blizzard conditions outside even lead to the closure of a part of the main highway. That doesn’t happen very often. So, we ended up getting sick on a good weekend to stay put in the house.

Anways, here are some links that I found interesting this week:

Jim at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity has a couple copies of TaxCut Online to give away.

MyMoneyBlog gives some info on how you can get paid to interview for jobs. Pretty interesting!

Lastly, NCN shares how he has been a debt-free blogger for two years. One day, I hope to join the ranks of being a debt-free blogger

Kevin sent the last little bit needed to pay off his credit card. Congrats!

Mighty Bargain Hunter shares some funny money celebrity-style. My favorite is the first Brad Pitt one.

Lastly, this blog isn’t necessarily personal finance related, but I wanted to point it out to you because I will definitely be keeping an eye on it. Why? Because it’s about selling on eBay and that’s something I have been wanting to do for a while now. Texas Tracy’s goal is to help you start making an extra $250/month by selling on eBay. She’s even going through the steps to sucessful selling.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend!

Imagine her surprise when she started receiving emails from people wanting to order products on her site.

What is she selling? Assorted sizes of tumbleweeds.

Linda Katz finds her tumbleweeds right outside of her house and she is making thousands of dollars a year as income from them.

…the orders just kept coming — an average of 15 per week. Though she’s coy about her annual income from tumbleweed wrangling, she says it is over $40,000 a year.

[Via People of the Web Story (warning - a video will start right after the page loads)]

I imagine the press her company has received lately will help bring that income up a little bit. Even if it stayed at $40K/year, that’s pretty good money from something that started out as a joke!

My love for music really blossomed in high school band. I did it all…jazz band, marching band and concert band. There is something truly magical that happens when you play music with others. I’m sure others who play will understand what I mean. It’s something that is difficult to describe.

A survey recently conducted shows a relationship between people with a musical background and those who have a higher education and higher earnings:

The poll by Harris Interactive, an independent research company, showed that 88 percent of people with a post-graduate education were involved in music while in school, and 83 percent of people earning $150,000 or more had a music education.

[Via Yahoo.com]

I am part of the 88% because I have a college degree. But, I don’t make anywhere near $150,000 a year. If I did end up majoring in music and perhaps become a music teacher at a school, I doubt I would have made more than $150,000/year. It would be interesting to read about what professions those with music lessons ended up in.

I’ve thought about enrolling our son in music lessons, but they are costly and he hasn’t shown an interest in any of the instruments we have in our home. But he’s still young and of course I will be ready and willing to share my love of music with him if and when he is ready. But it won’t be because he might end up making more money in his lifetime…it’s because music is such a beautiful thing.

I read an interesting tidbit this week. It said that if you earn an additional $100 (from a part time job, for example), after taxes and working expenses you net about $60. But if you cut expenses by $100, you have $100 extra. I thought that was food for thought…

Karen’s right. That does give some food for thought.

It made me pause and think about how we could reduce our expenses even more. The most likely culprit for us is with our groceries and dining out. I believe with some planning we could cut our grocery bill by $100/month and we are already starting to work on a plan. I’ve said that in the past, but it never came to be. This time, though, I’m really making some progress with getting it ready. (If my plan ends up working to reduce our spending, I’ll share it with all of you. I think it will work…but we’ll have to see.)

Thanks Karen for the food for thought

Lately, I’ve been on a money-making kick. More income will greatly help our debt reduction progress. Here’s what I’ve been doing:

• Listing for sale domains that I purchased but never developed – I am hoping that they will sell, but you never know. It depends on if someone else thinks they are as neat as I did when I purchased them.
• Reading more about eBay – I have quite a few things that will sell well on eBay if I can get the courage to just do it. I’m so nervous about selling on it for some reason.
• Looking through Craigslist for gigs – I say “gigs” because I don’t want another job. I’m happy with mine. I’m just looking for little things I could possibly do to bring in a few dollars here and there.
• Looking at the WAHM forum for gigs – It’s another good place to look besides Craigslist.
• Keeping an eye out for contests and entering them – I’ve had some decent luck lately with contests. I won a $200 gift certificate (to be used for Christmas) and I won a book. Might as well try for any other ones that I come across.
• Studying for increasing my education with my full-time job – Okay, I haven’t actually started yet…but it’s on my list!

So, that’s what I’ve been doing. I’ve been working on making some more money. I have a thirst for debt reduction that cannot be quenched (<- not sure where that came from…must be because I’m pretty tired right now!).

With that, I am going to take care of a few things and go to bed.

It is difficult to not think about how much we could have done with that extra income. Our credit card debt would have been gone in a year. Within three years, we would have been able to pay off all of our student loans and our mortgage. Sometimes, it is too easy to get caught up with thinking about what we could have done with the money.

Then you get a letter in the mail that says it was not meant to be. At least, that’s what I tell myself because it is supposed to make me feel a little bit better. I can’t sugar-coat it. My husband not getting a job that he was clearly qualified for stinks.

Anyways, that job was a deciding factor on whether we were going to pack up and move. Where we live now doesn’t have much in the way of jobs that my husband is qualified for. We are very fortunate that my job is portable and as long as I have high speed internet access I can go anywhere. But for him, it’s a little harder.

It’s tough, though, because if we move we could have a whole new set of problems to deal with. We know the area we live now and it is dirt cheap to live here (our home only cost $35,000). Then there are the things you can’t put a price on. Things like taking a short drive to the lake to build a sand castle. Or standing on my porch and seeing a sky full of stars and the northern lights shimmering across the sky. I could go on and on why where I live is special.

C’est la vie. It wasn’t meant to be and it’s time to move onto another phase of our life. Who knows? Maybe we’ll find another spot in the country even better than where we live now.

If you are male and over the age of 18, then Pinecone Research could use you for some surveys! An email that they just sent me explains how they are growing and need more members in this demographic.

If you are unfamiliar with Pinecone Research, they are a very desirable company to do surveys for. I’ve been a member there for a few years now. The surveys are pretty easy and you get a flat $5 via PayPal or check for each one you do. Sometimes, you even get to try new products and give your thoughts about them before they hit the market. I’ve always been paid in a timely manner.

If interested in signing up, please contact me and I’ll send you the email with the referral link. I am not compensated for sending you the referral link, but I’ll be pretty happy that I helped someone make a few extra bucks

An important note…only one person per household may register. So, if someone else in your household is registered, you cannot also register. The email with the referral will give all of the details.

Books – We had a ton of adult and children books to sell and we only sold a few of them. Most people strolled right by the section without stopping. Sort of a bummer because we have so many books. That could have been part of the problem, though. The next garage sale we have I will try to display them better (out on a table versus a shelf) and see if that helps.

Christmas Items – I knew this one wouldn’t be a big seller because almost all of the garage sales I go to have Christmas items left late in the day. I’m not sure how to get rid of these except for maybe offering them dirt cheap or putting them in the “free” bin.

Clothes – I had done a lot of what I said when I wrote about selling clothes. The major thing I couldn’t do was hang everything because I ran out of hangers and room. I think there was too much there and that lead people to pass right on by. Yesterday, I boxed up a lot of the clothes and gave them to St. Vincent de Paul. By thinning out the clothes, I hope that will help highlight what is left and help them to sell. I can also get all of them on hangers now.

I want our next garage sale to be awesome in terms of getting rid of what we have left. Since most of our “hot” items are gone, we are going to have to try to make these “not so hot” items more attractive. I think a major part of that will be the presentation of these items to where it works to make people to stop and look versus passing them by.

I’m not sure exactly how to do that, though, so I’m glad I have some time to think about it. If you have any suggestions, I’m all ears

There were definitely the “hot” items, though. I’m sure a garage sale “hot” item list will vary by location, but here’s what I found were the best sellers after having two garage sales:

Wild Bird Items – I had some wild bird seed dumped into a container. I never used all of it so I decided to put it in plastic bags and sell it. Another person’s trash is another person’s treasure, right? Well, those baggies were one of the first things to go. I sort of wish now I put a higher price on it. I also had some hummingbird feeders in a very used condition and they were gone within the first 1/2 hour.

Electronic Equipment – We had a speaker and receiver set priced to sell and it did within 1/2 an hour. There was even a problem with one of the speakers but the buyer didn’t care. Again, I wish I had priced the set a little bit higher but a part of me is glad to see them go. We hadn’t used it in over 6 years.

Tool-ish Type Things – My husband decided to sell his work light kit and the first male to arrive at our sale snatched that up. I wish that we had more tools to sell because a few people asked if we had tools. A big project for me before our next sale is to go through all of our tools and see what we have duplicates of. We have a bad habit of buying something that we need only to find out that we already had it. That’s due to bad organizing of what we have.

Halloween Goodies – For a while there, I wanted the coolest house on the block at Halloween time and I bought some neat Halloween decorations. That lasted for a year and then I didn’t put up the decorations anymore because it became too much work and we weren’t even home on Halloween to give out candy. We decided to get rid of everything except for one light-up pumpkin and one battery powered light that goes inside a carved pumpkin. I’m glad we did that because those items sold quite well. Even the Halloween-themed stuffed animals I had sold.

So there’s my “hot” item list for my garage sale. I still have a few things left in my home that fit those categories so I plan on putting more out for our next (and last) garage sale of the year. It feels so good to be getting rid of the stuff in our life that I might as well put out some more of it that will sell

Next up, I’ll go over the “not so hot” items.

Here’s the top 4 comments/questions we received:

4.) You have a lot of nice stuff for sale.

3.) Someone sure likes eagles!

2.) You moving?

And the number one thing…drumroll….

1.) (Pointing to our house) Where did you fit all this stuff?

I worked really hard to get as much stuff done as I could so we could at least have a sale yesterday to start getting rid of things. I was up until almost 3 a.m. on Friday night and got up at 6:30 a.m. on Saturday morning. We started setting up around 7 a.m., thinking it would take an hour or so to get everything set up.

Boy, was I ever wrong.

We weren’t ready to go until close to 10 a.m.!! The sheer amount of what we had was overwhelming. We were scrambling trying to figure out more tables because what we had wasn’t enough. I ended up turning over boxes and setting them down for makeshift displays. And some items stayed in tubs because we ran out of room.

It was insane. I always thought that we didn’t have a lot to show for our debt. Looking across our sale I see what definitely contributed to it. Too much STUFF!!!

By 2:30 p.m., traffic slowed down to a trickle so we decided to close up shop. The last few visitors we told them 1/2 off so they lingered around a little longer and ended up buying more. Still, we had so much left.

Once everything was packed back up and brought back into the house (that took a good hour and a half to do!), I sat down and counted the money to see how we did. I wasn’t expecting too much because we weren’t open for the hard core garage salers. We also didn’t sell anything that was over $5.00.

I was so amazed to see that we made $200.90. I’m not sure what a great take is for a garage sale, but to us…that is a lot. The last one we had we only made $65 and one year we made $350 (but $250 of that was for a bass guitar that I sold). It is the biggest take we have ever made and we still have so much stuff left!

We will definitely be having another sale once we can figure out how to have more tables so we can make sure everything can be displayed. I also plan on waking up super-early next time because I know how important presentation is. It bothered me that alike things were not together so I want to remedy that problem next time.

I learned a lot from this sale, so I know we will do better next time. I also realized how exhausting a sale of this size really is. I went to bed at 9:30 p.m. last night. I’m barely ever in bed before midnight. When I woke up this morning around 7:30 a.m., I felt like I slept like a log. I barely ever drink alcohol now, but the way I slept felt like how I used to sleep after a night of heavy drinking (during my first year of college). You hit the bed and konk right out and sleep for 10-12 hours without stirring.

Today, I was back at it with getting more stuff ready for the next garage sale. When that will be, I’m not sure. I think I’m playing it by ear and watching the weather forecasts. I want to be ready for the next one and have a much better sale so I’m working on it now rather than later.

As for what I learned? I’ll be writing about that this week.

There are key things I will keep. Mainly the things that I use on a regular basis. No more of this, “I better keep it because I might need it someday.” Something I’ve realized lately is that the more stuff you have…the more things you have to take care of. I don’t want to spend my time taking care of “stuff.” I want to spend my time enjoying my life with my family. That has been the biggest revelation I have made in the past few days, much of it brought about by the book I will be reviewing tomorrow.

That said, I am getting rid of things I never thought I would part with. Ever since I was younger, I have had a love for bald eagles. Slowly, I started collecting little eagle figures. After a while, I started buying other things with eagles on them. Everything sits in a cabinet in our living room and I admit, I barely look at them. In fact, I stopped acquiring new items since starting our debt reduction journey because I no longer wanted to spend money on them.

Yesterday, I spent a good portion of the night going through my collection and adding price tags. The sheer variety of eagle things I had collected amazed me. Here’s just a few tidbits: bandaid, air freshener, knives, lighters, buttons, pins, spoon, bald eagle in a can, necklaces, watches, etc. The more unusual it was, the better.

I thought it would be harder for me to go through my bald eagle collection and price everything. But it was pretty easy. I thought long and hard about my collection, and I came to a few conclusions:

1.) I received no enjoyment from that collection except to say that I collect bald eagle items and have them for display (show). After I purchased something, it went in the cabinet and the only time I’d touch them was if we had to move the cabinet or we moved to a new home.

2.) It takes time to dust and clean things. Even sitting in the cabinet, they still would collect dust. Having them there was one more thing to clean and one more thing taking up my time.

3.) The collection cost me a bit of money, but for resale it is worth very little. Most of the items were purchased at “tourist trap” type areas and were very overpriced. Except for a few pieces, the likelihood of my collection going up in value was very unlikely so it was no where near to being an investment.

4.) Instead of spending money on my collection, I would rather work a little bit less and go out in nature and enjoy watching the real thing in the wild. I haven’t seen a bald eagle in some time, mostly because I am not out and about as much as I would like to be.

Overall, I had a display cabinet full of items. Now, I only have a few items left. They include a picture that I drew and one eagle my mom gave me along with a few bald eagles that she painted. Everything else is up for sale. I’m not sad, though. It actually feels a little liberating because I feel that simplifying my life will provide more pleasure than any collection could.

Of course, I’m not saying that you should go out and sell your collection(s). It’s a very personal choice. For me, though, I feel very good about my decision. It feels wonderful to be simplifying my life.

More about this tomorrow with the book review…

Taking from my own garage sale habits, I hope to have the best garage sale ever in terms of selling most of our clothes. Here’s my gameplan:

1.) I am going to hang as much as I can. Unfortunately, I don’t have enough hangers to hang everything so some of them will have to be on a table. As items are sold, I’ll use those hangers to turn around and hang some of the clothes on tables.

2.) I am going to organize the clothes by size. I haven’t figured out the logistics yet, but I’ll probably use a piece of paper to sort of mark where size changes occur. That way, people can see right away what sizes things are.

3.) I am going to mark the size with the price. I’m using masking tape for pricing items since I’ve had horrible experiences trying to get off those pre-made stickers from items. Masking tape always seems to come off with no problems. It takes a bit longer to put the size on there, but thinking as a shopper it would save me time and also make me think, “This person took a lot of care with setting up this sale…they probably also take great care of the stuff they own.” Or, they’ll think I’m crazy. But as long as they buy more clothes…it’s all good!

4.) The clothes will be situated where people have to walk by them for the flow of the sale. If your garage sale set-up is a “U” shape (which mine will likely be at this point), I’m having the clothes at the bottom of the “U” so they have to walk right by them to get to the other side of the “U”.

5.) Related to #4, I am going to place a few stellar articles of clothing on display so you can see the front of the item. Probably bright articles of clothing to catch their eye or something that is so cute that you walk by it and go “awe…” Anything to grab attention to hopefully draw people into looking through all of the clothes.

6.) About an hour or so before I close shop, I am going to offer a paper bag sale on the remaining clothes. I haven’t figured out a price yet (any suggestions?) but it seems like a good way to reduce the remaining items.

7.) I’m going to post a sign saying the children’s hangers are available for purchase after the sale. I have no idea why I purchased so many hangers for my son’s clothes. Since he’s older now, his clothes can be hung fine with adult hangers. When setting up for the sale I’ll get a count and then come up with a price.

8.) All remaining clothes will be donated to St. Vincent de Paul. I do want to make as much money as I can with this garage sale, but I also want to rid our lifes of all of the unnecessary stuff. St. Vinny’s helped us with having their clothing at such a low price (25 cents/each) so it is only fitting to donate the leftover clothes. That way they can help the store and help someone in need of children’s clothing.

Of course, a lot must be said for getting people to visit the sale. I can’t sell anything if I don’t get people to stop by. I still am working on the gameplan for that.

I haven’t seen the movie yet (I’m waiting until it goes to 99 cents at my local video store), but I have watched Chris Gardner in interviews. Something always struck me about him. You hear him talk and you want to listen. I thought it was because of his rags to riches story. But after reading an article on Yahoo today, I think there’s another reason.

Passion

Passion defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary is

Intense, driving, or overmastering feeling or conviction.

Chris Gardner was so intense when he spoke. You could tell that he loved what he accomplished and he loves what he does. He credits everything to one simple thing…passion.

Quoting from the Yahoo article

“Passion is everything. In fact, you’ve got to be borderline fanatical about what you do.” Gardner says he was fortunate to find something he truly loved, something where he couldn’t wait for the sun to rise so he could do it again.

After reading the article, I started thinking about my passions. I had an opportunity to follow one of them, but I let money affect my decision and I didn’t pursue it. I followed dollar signs instead of my heart. Of course, if I followed that passion, my life would be completely different today and I wouldn’t have my husband or son. So I am glad life turned out as it did.

Sometimes, though, when I close my eyes at night I think about that passion and try to brainstorm ways to make it come to life. It would be difficult at this point in my life, but still possible.

If you haven’t already, read the Yahoo article. It is a very good read.

Since I forcast ahead in Quicken to make sure we have enough cash for everything, to have a source of income taken away for a few weeks could be tragic. Even a smaller check like that one (it’s for a part-time job) can send our bank balance into the red zone because I run our checking account so low.

My husband’s boss apologized for the error; he’s not sure what happened. He even offered to give my husband a loan for the amount until the next paycheck. It still feels weird to say it, but I looked at my husband and told him that we can wait until his next payday for that money. Why? Because we can pull from our savings. It wasn’t a problem.

If something like this had happened a year and a half ago, I would have been pacing the house back and forth trying to figure out what to do. I wouldn’t want to take up his boss’ offer of a loan (too darn proud to do that). I would have been thinking of how we could make some money fast. I’d also be calculating how much we could possibly put on our credit cards (groceries, gas, etc.).

Oh how things have changed. I’ll just initiate a balance transfer from one of our savings accounts and pay it back as soon as we can, probably when some more money comes in. Slowly but surely, we are getting closer to living a life that doesn’t involve living paycheck-to-paycheck.

We’d have a problem if this happened with our major paycheck (don’t quite have enough in our savings yet to cover that one), but it felt nice that we were able to do it with this one. Actually, it feels more than nice…it feels pretty darn good.

I have found toys like these for sale or for free at garage sales and usually there is quite a selection by the time I get to a sale (around noon – I’m a late garage-saler). In fact, the last time I had a sale I had a tub of them and was asking five cents each. I still had almost the entire tub left, except for a few furby happy meal toys that two grown-ups started fighting over (that was pretty interesting to see!).

Anyways, I came up with an idea that I think will help us sell the toys since even when you put a “FREE” sign on them they still hang around.

We have some paper lunch bags around and we will fill the paper bags with the toys. They will be little mystery grab bags that my son can help sell. We’ll mark them for a quarter each or 5 for $1.00 and have a box of them by my son’s toys and also a few near where I will be stationed for people to pay.

I think everyone loves a little surprise and for the price they could sell. Thinking of being at a sale with my son, I’d pull a quarter out of my pocket so he could purchase a little surprise bag of goodies.

Next month, after our sale, I’ll report back on here how well it worked. In the meantime, if you have any other suggestions I’d love to hear them. My goal is to get rid of all of these cheap toys and make a little bit of money doing it.

“Yochim, a self-described “lab rat,” says she has made more than $3,000 by participating in more than 30 medical studies at Boston’s world-class research hospitals.” [via Yahoo.com]

That’s some serious cash. They don’t say how many hours total the woman interviewed spent participating in these studies, but from the ones that I have seen they pay fairly well for your time.

I did a bit of research and found that for healthy individuals who want to participate in drug research, they can make a decent amount of money. It’s also possible to participate in other non drug studies that still pay well, but not as much as the drug research studies.

I have been tempted to participate in medical research before for the University of Michigan. They were looking for adults who smoke and their parents who smoke/used to smoke. All they needed was some blood from everyone and a few questions answered and I believe everyone involved received $100/each. We never pursued it any further than discussing it.

When I’m bored, sometimes I check their research page to see if there is anything I would be interested in doing. I don’t think I could ever do something that involved taking new medications or having them cut me open. But they can draw blood or ask questions. I’m fine with that.