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Apr 25, 2006    |       3 comments

Warning – Wife Rant (Guys Don’t Need to Read This)

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We are driving around and see a house with a few “junk” cars in the yard. My husband comments, “How can people have cars like that sitting around not working?”

My reply, “I dunno Dear, how can they?”

He was silent for a moment, then another moment. He knew the sarcastic undertone of my remark meant something.

Then he replied, “No, that’s different. It’s in the garage.”

“It’s no different. It’s not working and its been sitting there for almost a year and a half.”

– Silence.

Ok ladies, does your man have some “project” around the house that they say they are going to work on and never do? I actually called a junkyard and they offered $100 for our old vehicle and they would tow it away. I thought that was a great deal to get the hunk of junk out of our garage. Hubby said no, because he was going to fix it.

A year and a half later, how many times has he touched it? Only once when his dad was visiting. They tested the battery to see if that is why it won’t start anymore. The battery was fine…hmmmm…

I’m not a mechanic, but it is probably going to cost a bit of money to fix the vehicle. It was a $600 vehicle to begin with and was just meant for scooting around town when we needed two vehicles. We really got what we paid for, and it lasted about four months before it died. I guess if you look at it this way – it could be considered a deal compared to renting a car during that time.

My thoughts are to get rid of it and be done with it. He still wants to keep it. I dunno, must be a guy thing (and if you a guy and you’ve read this far – I warned you) 🙂

Ok, whew…I feel better just getting it out there 🙂

Tags: junk+cars, car
Apr 24, 2006    |       7 comments

A Tip for Tracking Rebates in Quicken

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I love using Quicken to keep track of my finances, and I cannot say enough great things about it. I thought it would be great to share some of my knowledge of the program here.

Today’s tip revolves around Rebates! Rebates can be great, but they can be problematic. I know I have forgotten about rebates that were due to me, so I set up a system to help me remember 🙂

First of all, you will need to create a new account within your Quicken file. Name it “Rebate Receivable” (or whatever you’d like) and make it an Asset account.

When you make a purchase, fill in the information as you normally would, including the split detail and breaking down your expenses.

After you finish entering things normally, go to the next line and enter your Rebate Receivable account. Insert the value of the rebate.

In the next line, choose what expense that rebate is going towards. Make sure that it is a negative amount. Making it a negative amount reduces the amount of your expense, which is what the rebate is doing.

When both lines are entered correctly, the total showing in your register will equal how much you spent and now you will have your rebate showing as an asset. It even has it’s own register that you can open and review and make sure you have been receiving your rebates.

Now, when you receive your rebate check, you need to do the following to record it (and remove it from your Rebate Receivable account).

Enter your deposit as you normally would. On the next line, choose your Rebate Receivable account and enter the amount of the rebate check.

Once you save it, that rebate amount will be removed from your Rebate Receivable account.

And that’s it! Just a few simple steps that can help you keep track of those rebates! 🙂

Post included in the Carnival of Personal Finance #46 at Consumerism Commentary.
Tags: quicken, rebate, tracking+rebates
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