Monday, March 2nd, 2009
Some friends of mine, who married very, very young, are going through marriage problems—pretty serious marriage problems. They have four kids.
Part of the problems began when the husband’s business was struggling, and their money was tight. They were building a house, and there were a lot of costs, and there was a lot of stress. (This is just one of the issues, as you can imagine, but it was a big one.)
When they separated, he as the breadwinner had control of the finances, not that there were a lot of finances to go around.
And he cut her off. From everything.
At first, he arranged for her to receive $50 a week—for food, for gas, for diapers, everything. I tried to imagine a job where you’d get that kind of pay, where $50 a week would be considered fair. Then, as conflict built between them, he decided $50 wasn’t too little but too much, and he stopped that, too.
As a single person who is not a lawyer, I guess I really don’t know a lot about the laws of situations like this, but I’d guess (from TV and hearsay) that she’ll get some help when this goes to court, as it will soon? The past months have been very frustrating, and, for my part, I’ve seen how ugly people can get when they think only about themselves. I’ve also seen that, no matter what anyone tries to tell you, marriage is hard and sometimes, money fools people into thinking they’re powerful.
Saturday, February 14th, 2009
Because movies deal with life, and how characters live it, they always, you could say, deal with money. When I saw He’s Just Not That into You recently, for example, it was the real estate, mostly, that stuck out to me. These young, mid-level (if that) careers were providing gorgeous apartments/houses in Baltimore (I think?). I always notice that kind of stuff in movies—how expensive the clothes look, how nicely they’re able to eat out, etc. Then I remind myself these are just movies, after all. We don’t all look like the actors and actresses, either, but part of the fun of movies is pretending, enjoying their lives as shown on the screen.
But then there are other movies that come right out and say they’re about money.
Take Confessions of a Shopaholic, which I saw last night. The main character is a shopaholic, and about 85% of the movie is spent showing all the fun of a spend lifestyle: the pretty clothes, the gorgeous people, the stores, the way you feel when you buy something, how you impress people with your stuff—and then tries to wrap everything up neatly, easily at the end.
It’s just a movie. But why is it that, a day after I left and as someone who is financially aware, all I want right now is to go buy myself some new clothes? If I’m feeling that way, how could teenage girls—of which most of the audience was composed in my theatre at least—feel any differently?
Where is the engaging movie about a beautiful girl who works her butt off to get out of debt and stay that way? Someone who faces obstacle after obstacle—not going out to eat and not shopping and studying real hard and working a lot, for a long time—for the sake of something greater. Maybe it’s not as easy of a story, but it’d at least be worth part of the $10 those teenage girls spend to see it.
Monday, February 2nd, 2009
First of all, and I really mean this, I never expected so many kind comments on that last post. At a point when I was ready to click delete and pretend these almost-two-years never happened, a whole lot of you wonderful people reminded me what makes blogging worth anything.
One thing’s decided, at least for now: This Writer’s Wallet will stay - in some form, somewhere. I have a month or so to make a decision, and I’m leaning towards keeping the domain now, particularly if I can find a cheaper host. Green Panda suggested nearlyfreespeech.net, so I’ll look into that. Any other suggestions? If we can get it down to less than a monthly latte, I’ll do it. I mean, I’d buy you all monthly coffees if I could, so it only seems fair.
Meanwhile, I’ve changed the theme here just because it seemed time and, well, I think this one is more me. It’s simple, clean, complete with a happy tree, and while it’s not especially conducive to huge advertisements, neither am I.
Wednesday, January 28th, 2009
When I think about all the time I’ve put into this little blog over the past year or two, I feel a little sad to be saying this, but nonetheless:
I may be shutting This Writer’s Wallet down.
My domain registration comes up for renewal in April, and I don’t know how I can justify paying $60ish for another year, blogging once a week (if that) and not actively seeking new advertisers. I don’t really have the time to devote to the site, and I don’t want to keep up with it.
As far as what I’d lose by deleting the site, beyond memories:
(1) Contact with all of you financially savvy folks, although I guess I could still be reading, just not writing.
(2) A one-stop place to chart my financial goals.
(3) Archives of my financial journey.
Those losses are significant enough to give me pause, but I’m not sure they’re significant enough to tempt me back. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?
Wednesday, January 21st, 2009
Sometimes, when it’s January maybe, and you’re feeling a little discouraged, a little same-old-budget with your finances, it’s easy to get bored with your money. Or, better, it’s easy to get bored with caring how you spend and save it. At least for me. I notice this feeling comes in cycles, where I just start to think, Who cares? about it all. I have a fully funded ER fund, no debt, a significant amount of money towards a down-payment fund (even if it is less than I’d wanted by this point, thanks to the economy). All in all, it’s the same as it has been and will be, probably.
But then sometimes, when you’re listening to a financial radio program maybe, and you hear not just another caller say how he’s in credit card debt but doesn’t want to give up his fancy car, but you hear a genuine, hard-working, honest guy, with a baby crying in the background. And he’s saying how he drives a beater and lives in a $54,000 home and just doesn’t make much. Then he lost his job. And he’s struggling—who can blame him—with how he will pay the $600 in back payments on his mortgage. He has nothing to sell, no possessions but his clothing and the kitchen appliances and so on. That’s when you start to think, Wow. I could pay his payments just like that, and it wouldn’t even affect my day-to-day life.
You start to think, Gosh, how am I such a selfish, self-centered, me-driven person, so ungrateful and unjoyful and unwilling to rejoice in the blessed monotony (!) of my financial planning. You realize, seriously, that the boring, everyday, spending and saving of your life is actually incredible. It’s valuable. It’s worth staying faithful to.
Wednesday, January 14th, 2009
First of all, a very big THANK YOU to those of you who gave input on the savings questions I recently posted. Honestly, I am still thinking, both about your opinions and about my own. I have made no major changes yet, but when I do, I’ll tell you.
Second, and this is the real subject of the post, I have discovered an unhappy truth about myself, and I wonder if any of you struggle with it too.
Because of my personal finance goals and attention to budgeting and knowledge of the PF community, I have a really hard time keeping my mouth shut about it.
Example #1: A nurse-friend of mine tells me how she didn’t put 10% down on her home purchase, how she has monthly mortgage payments that take a huge chunk of her paycheck and how she isn’t able to put anything into savings anymore.
How would you respond? I told her about budgeting, pointed her to Mint.com, told her that knowing where your money’s going makes you feel like you’ve gotten a raise. I said this, all while writing my debit-card payment in my checkbook, after paying for my dinner. I didn’t say anything about her house because, well, she already bought it. Anyway, point is: I’m not sure the advice was welcome.
Example #2: A friend tells me how she hasn’t been able to save money for quite a while, and, with the possibility of layoffs, she wonders what to do.
How would you respond? I ask her about her car loan and try to find out if she’d be willing to sell it if she needed to. This leads to a conversation about her car payments and how she pays more than the monthly bill to buy her more time, which leads to a discussion of her interest rates…. Again, I’m not sure this was really welcome input I was offering.
Seems like, sometimes, I forget that not everyone subscribes to the same financial principles I do. Also, I have a hard time not offering advice, which I kind of HATE about myself.
Wednesday, January 7th, 2009
For the past year or two, I’ve been investing money in one of two places: an ING Orange Savings Account (of which I have three, earmarked for different purchases: ER fund, downpayment $7K and vacation $1K) or in the stock market (via Scottrade, where I have two accounts, a Roth IRA and a regular account).
Here are the things I’m thinking about, and I’d appreciate your input:
1) Do I want to move any of the ING accounts into a money market? I’ve heard a lot of financial advisers recommend this approach as a conservative but steady investment. However, I know almost nothing about money market accounts, so I’d need to find out how to get one (can I do it through Scottrade?) and if there’s any downside.
My ING accounts currently have a 2.50% annual percentage yield.
2) Should I do something else with my general stock portfolio? I have no qualms about investing my Roth IRA in stocks. I have a diversified portfolio, spread out amongst different types and sizes of companies. And, mostly, I will not need the money for a long, long time—retirement is so far away. By the time I do need it, I am sure I will have made a profit. So that stays as is.
On the other hand, my regular stock account has been sad and discouraged for months, and I have been iffy about things the whole time. Would it be smarter to put that account into a money market as well? (given that those are supposedly “safer” and admitting that there is no such thing as a truly safe-safe investment)
[P.S.: I apologize for not announcing this sooner, but the College Money Network Frugal Giveaway did end last month, and prizes were awarded! For more info, head over to the CMN site.]
Monday, January 5th, 2009
I have this friend, we’ll call her Annie, who has been very discouraged about looking for a job. She’s not out of work or anything, but she’s young—early 20s—and has only found a part-time job in her field. [That job happens to be at my office; she works for me.] Anyway, to compensate for her part-time gig with me, she also works another job, unrelated, mostly nights. Between the two, she does OK, but she, as you can imagine, wants to find something full-time, in her field, and it’s tough right now.
So a few months ago, I did something I don’t think you should ever do: I gave her the link to my online portfolio.
You may remember my mentioning this portfolio before. It was my good friend while job-hunting because I could track what employers had looked at it, which was a lot better than waiting for the phone to ring. Some of you have e-mailed me before to ask if you could see that portfolio, and I’ve always told you that, no, sorry, I would love to, but it’s too risky because I don’t want people copying it. You’ve all been very nice about that and understood.
Annie thanked me and never said a word about it again, but I found her own portfolio, by guessing at the URL, which was similar to mine and also, because I knew she’d spent a lot of time looking at mine (Sitemeter = awesome) and was curious what she’d done with that looking. She copied it. Full-on, exact-same-thing copied it. She took my paragraphs and changed the info to match hers, she chose the same layout and design, she did everything possible to make it mine, but hers.
I was frustrated, but I felt bad for her. I mean, I’m not actively looking for a job right now—hadn’t even updated the site for Pete’s sake—and maybe she was just unsure of how to make one, so she copied mine. I waited two months, after my Sitemeter showed she hadn’t gone on for a while, and I redid mine. Changed the layout, changed the descriptions, etc.
This week, I discovered she copied it again.
This, surprise!, is the very reason you don’t give your friend your resume when he or she wants to know how to make one. This is why you don’t give out your portfolio URL. This is why I am now deleting mine and starting over, with a site she won’t be able to guess. Please, take a lesson from me, and don’t make this same mistake, OK?
*BTW in case you’re wondering if I’m going to confront her about it, no. I thought long and hard and, honestly, I know her well enough to know she’ll apologize and feel bad, but I will have already moved mine, so what would it matter? It’s really more my fault than hers, because I made it so easy. Lesson learned!
Saturday, January 3rd, 2009
I’m a few days late, of course, but it’s time for a yearly review of my financial state and a setting of goals for the year to come. It’s what we do every year, yes? In my personal life, I have grand plans to cook more, workout more, make more time for people. Those goals seem vague, I know, but they aren’t so much resolutions as directions I am pushing my life. They are things I’m working towards always, not just as the calendar changes.
In my financial life, there are also some general goals, probably not unlike yours: spend wisely, save/invest as much as I can, take the right steps career-wise. But yearly, because money is such a, well, tangible thing, I set specific goals, too. For 2008 (I was much, much later then), I set four specific goals:
1. Max out my Roth IRA (done!)
2. Save $1K for a Cali vacation (done!)
3. Finish an $8K emergency fund (done!) and
4. Put $5K into a downpayment fund.
That last goal was never reached, but I’m OK with that. I’ll get there, and it’s not an emergency. Over all, I’m pretty happy with what did get done, and, I suppose, without setting those goals, I wouldn’t have gotten myself to work towards them.
So that was the year overall. As far as for December, I’m happy to report I was under-budget in every category but giving, but, come on, it was the holidays. I may revisit my categories and move things around a little in February, but I’ll wait and see how this month goes. Also, I was thinking I could take gift purchases out of other budget categories, if I wanted. I mean, it is MY budget after all, right?
(P.S.: My 2009 Goals will be posted, in page form, today. Look for the link at the top righthand corner of the site.)
Monday, December 29th, 2008
You guys are great. Really. This has been an interesting Monday, and you’ve helped me learn some things.
First of all, I learned doubling $25 in 10 years is actually a fairly good deal. Even with compound interest on my side, putting $25 in an ING for the same amount of time would give me much less. I really wish I were better at math.
Second, and here’s the BIG BUMMER: the bonds have turned out to be 30-year bonds, and they’re not from my aunt, but from a credit card company that awarded them to my mom (!!). This, folks, is why you should always know what’s going on with your money, so you don’t get your kids’ hopes all up.
And, actually, since the bonds seem to be accruing at 2.6% per year, which is better than an ING, where I would have probably sent the money, this is in a way good. I mean, neither of us would have used the money right away, and at least I know the money is doing well for itself.
I hope your days are just as eventful. In a good way.
