Turns out I outsmarted myself at tax return time by setting up my refund to be direct deposited straight into our emergency fund at HSBC. My refund was deposited on Friday which brought our total to $9950 and change. I couldn't bear to see us $50 away from our goal, but cash flow in the checking account was too tight for me to fix that. Seriously.
It hit me last night...the reason cash feels so tight is that my company is "borrowing" about $1600 from me (un-reimbursed business expenses...the bulk of that going back to the first week of December) and I had begun a balance shuffling process to consolidate those expenses on one low rate card that I had yet to complete. When the dust settled from the rest of moving money around, the checking account once again looked healthy. My minimum payments (out of pocket...ugh) will be smaller and the interest that my company will have to reimburse will be a smaller amount. Win-win I suppose.
But the net effect is that I was able to transfer in the final $50 so that we have officially met our emergency fund goal, and technically ahead of schedule. w00t!
But honestly we are feeling some savings fatigue so I better take Singlema's advice and celebrate by spending a *little* so we don't feel so pinched. So we're going to splurge a bit while on vacation in San Francisco. Nothing too crazy mind you...just maybe a meal or two to write home about. Oh, and we thought we might pick up the stuff we need to start playing DDR. You know...for the exercise. Ahem.
Now we have to decide where to park that money....
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
Google Finance Launches Beta
Travelgnome alerted me to the news that google has finally launched a beta of their financial news service, Google Finance. They certainly have a long way to go to catch up to Yahoo! Finance, but I like the looks of where they're going.
Right now, their initial offerings seem aimed at investors in research mode and not much else. But the "web 2.0"-ness of the integrated research tools are impressive to me as a n00b investor.
The chart of stock prices is particularly slick looking and my favorite feature of this view is that recent news items are pegged to the stock price so you can see the impact (if there is one). This doesn't seem to appear on all stocks (yet?) ... I didn't see the news items represented on the price chart for CompuCredit (CCRT), but it was there for both google (GOOG) and Coca-Cola (KO).
Another feature that is technically "cool" is that when you hover over each person in management you might get a picture. I don't really think that's of value to the everyday investor, but it *is* pretty neat in a geeky-integration-of-data way.
After you have completed a few stock searches, the main page is updates with your recent searches and news that is relevant to those ticker symbols. The main page is pretty sparse and useless until this change...and even then it's not terribly exciting.
The portfolio tool is sort of sad, but I'm glad they launched at least enough of it to enable data entry. At this point you can enter the symbol, cost, and number of shares and the portfolio will show you all the totals. I can't wait to see what they do with this though, it is what I am most excited about. Google, get yer graph on and make that portfolio sexxxxxy!
I'm only just beginning to learn about investing so that has colored my opinions. More than anything I am excited to see how they improve the overall service, but I'm glad they got it out the door so we can all take a peek.
Right now, their initial offerings seem aimed at investors in research mode and not much else. But the "web 2.0"-ness of the integrated research tools are impressive to me as a n00b investor.
The chart of stock prices is particularly slick looking and my favorite feature of this view is that recent news items are pegged to the stock price so you can see the impact (if there is one). This doesn't seem to appear on all stocks (yet?) ... I didn't see the news items represented on the price chart for CompuCredit (CCRT), but it was there for both google (GOOG) and Coca-Cola (KO).
Another feature that is technically "cool" is that when you hover over each person in management you might get a picture. I don't really think that's of value to the everyday investor, but it *is* pretty neat in a geeky-integration-of-data way.
After you have completed a few stock searches, the main page is updates with your recent searches and news that is relevant to those ticker symbols. The main page is pretty sparse and useless until this change...and even then it's not terribly exciting.
The portfolio tool is sort of sad, but I'm glad they launched at least enough of it to enable data entry. At this point you can enter the symbol, cost, and number of shares and the portfolio will show you all the totals. I can't wait to see what they do with this though, it is what I am most excited about. Google, get yer graph on and make that portfolio sexxxxxy!
I'm only just beginning to learn about investing so that has colored my opinions. More than anything I am excited to see how they improve the overall service, but I'm glad they got it out the door so we can all take a peek.
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Save-O-Meter Updates
The emergency fund got a sexy bump today of $1000, courtesy of LaLa, bringing us to 88% of our goal. With the tax refund due in a couple of days I think we may be able to meet this goal this quarter if we stretch a bit. I suppose we should start making a specific plan of where to park this money once the promo rates start expiring for online savings accounts. We want to keep it fairly liquid so we'll be considering options like: online savings, Fidelity Mass Muni fund, CD ladder, & short term t-bill ladder. Stay tuned.
It was also the mid-month payday today and that's when I make Roth contributions. I officially started my 2006 Roth today with a $400 contribution. My plan is to contribute $400 each month so that by mid-December I'll reach the maximum contribution of $4000. I've made a new 2006 Roth-O-Meter to monitor my progress meeting that goal.
With the emergency fund goal in sight and the Roth chugging at a solid pace, it's time to think about re-instating my 401(k) contributions. I feel ready to do this in time for the end of month payday, but the financial condition of my company gives me pause. Even when the cash was actually flowing they were pretty pokey about moving money into my account -- sometimes brushing up against (past?) the legal time limit. So...it's complicated.
It was also the mid-month payday today and that's when I make Roth contributions. I officially started my 2006 Roth today with a $400 contribution. My plan is to contribute $400 each month so that by mid-December I'll reach the maximum contribution of $4000. I've made a new 2006 Roth-O-Meter to monitor my progress meeting that goal.
With the emergency fund goal in sight and the Roth chugging at a solid pace, it's time to think about re-instating my 401(k) contributions. I feel ready to do this in time for the end of month payday, but the financial condition of my company gives me pause. Even when the cash was actually flowing they were pretty pokey about moving money into my account -- sometimes brushing up against (past?) the legal time limit. So...it's complicated.
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
Blogger Locked Me Out
After a full week of just not having the time to post due to a work commitment, I came to find that my blog had been "locked" by robots on suspicion that I was a "spam blog" (aka "splog"). Regardless of how you feel about my writing or grammar ;) my content is indeed created by a human (and not robots), my links don't all point to the same site, and I'm really not pulling in adsense worth mentioning at all.
So I gotta wonder why my site got flagged. Because they don't tell you why it got flagged. Nor do they tell you how long the queue to get whitelisted is, or where you are in it. They just tell you that a human has to review your site and that it usually takes 24 hours. My site took more than 48hrs but some people have had to wait longer, and some have even lost their entire site in the process.
I'm just flummoxed. I applaud efforts to fight spam but this process is broken. Many real bloggers are having their blogs locked down and the only option is to submit to be reviewed and then wait. The review process clearly takes too long (due to an uneccessarily long queue of incorrently flagged blogs perhaps?) and the robots apparently aren't very smart. And they hate freedom.
I suppose the good news is that I no longer have to type a captcha every time I post. I thought Blogger had turned on some blogger-wide anti-splog mechanism and it turns out that is turned on in blogs that are initially suspected of splogging. And theoretically there is a way to get whitelisted at that point, but I suppose typing in gobs of pull-your-hair-out-annoying captchas correctly (and quite a few incorrectly...is that two v's or a w? a g or a q? aaaargh!!!) over the past couple of months was not enough to prove I'm human.
I couldn't even update my template to somehow alert the 3 people who might care what was going on. Anyway, I'm back ... and woefully behind so i better get to it...
So I gotta wonder why my site got flagged. Because they don't tell you why it got flagged. Nor do they tell you how long the queue to get whitelisted is, or where you are in it. They just tell you that a human has to review your site and that it usually takes 24 hours. My site took more than 48hrs but some people have had to wait longer, and some have even lost their entire site in the process.
I'm just flummoxed. I applaud efforts to fight spam but this process is broken. Many real bloggers are having their blogs locked down and the only option is to submit to be reviewed and then wait. The review process clearly takes too long (due to an uneccessarily long queue of incorrently flagged blogs perhaps?) and the robots apparently aren't very smart. And they hate freedom.
I suppose the good news is that I no longer have to type a captcha every time I post. I thought Blogger had turned on some blogger-wide anti-splog mechanism and it turns out that is turned on in blogs that are initially suspected of splogging. And theoretically there is a way to get whitelisted at that point, but I suppose typing in gobs of pull-your-hair-out-annoying captchas correctly (and quite a few incorrectly...is that two v's or a w? a g or a q? aaaargh!!!) over the past couple of months was not enough to prove I'm human.
I couldn't even update my template to somehow alert the 3 people who might care what was going on. Anyway, I'm back ... and woefully behind so i better get to it...
Sunday, March 12, 2006
Media Mail
If you are sending books or other media through the USPS, media mail can be an inexpensive shipping option, but there are restrictions on the service that aren't always obvious. Jack at the WROX P.O. gave us the lowdown on Media Mail when we asked why it wasn't available via the self-serve kiosk in the lobby (causing us to endure a 20 minute wait in line).
Media mail can be used to send *only* appropriate media (so don't mix your packages...one book in a box of stuff doesn't make the package media mail eligible) and what surprised me was that media that contains advertising is NOT eligible for media mail. This means you cannot send magazines via media mail (and if you add magazines to a package with books...no media mail!) which was news to me.
Sure enough the USPS website does state the no-advertising restriction:
The media mail stamp now contains a notice that media mail is subject to inspection so they can enforce these restrictions. Which makes a certain amount of sense, but the bears are really out of control lately.
Media mail can be used to send *only* appropriate media (so don't mix your packages...one book in a box of stuff doesn't make the package media mail eligible) and what surprised me was that media that contains advertising is NOT eligible for media mail. This means you cannot send magazines via media mail (and if you add magazines to a package with books...no media mail!) which was news to me.
Sure enough the USPS website does state the no-advertising restriction:
[Content:] Generally used for books (at least eight pages), film (16 mm or narrower), printed music, printed test materials, video and sound recordings, playscripts, printed educational charts, loose-leaf pages and binders consisting of medical information, and computer-readable media. Sound recordings may include incidental announcements of recordings and guides or scripts prepared solely for use with such recordings. Books may contain no advertising other than incidental announcements of other books.[emphasis mine]
The media mail stamp now contains a notice that media mail is subject to inspection so they can enforce these restrictions. Which makes a certain amount of sense, but the bears are really out of control lately.
Sunday, March 05, 2006
The Taxman Cometh...With Good News
I started doing my taxes on January 31st and only just finished them tonight (whew!). I had started by entering my data into TurboTax Online so I could assure myself I wouldn't owe. But after doing a price comparison of several tax filing services, I chose a cheapie cheap mccheapster option to give it a whirl. Well, eSmartTax left me high and dry unable to serve up their own pages even in early February (and I absolutely hated their interface), so I chose to go the lazy route and finish what I had entered into TurboTax Deluxe.
All I had left was to enter in all our non-cash donations to hopefully beef up my $500+ refund. I had no idea we had donated so much stuff in 2005! We made 8 donation trips last year and according to ItsDeductible! donated goods worth $1881 (we always used to undervalue goods, now I make sure to use ItsDeductible).
Putting in the detail on our non-cash donations basically doubled my refund and I'm now expecting a federal refund of a little over $1100! I chose to e-file in hopes of getting that money via direct deposit very quickly. I entered my HSBCDirect account so it heads right into an interest bearing account, but I'll have to make a decision about whether to use it for the emergency fund or jump starting my 2006 Roth (you know how I love to get my Roth-O-Meter on).
Oh! And right before I paid TurboTax, I found out that as a Fidelity customer I could get $10 off the federal preparation fee. So my total tax preparation costs were $34.90 total which wasn't too bad. (I had to log in via the Fidelity link a few times before the right price registered).
Unfortunately I do owe state taxes but I won't have to pay that $297 until April. I know your heart bleeds for me ;)
All I had left was to enter in all our non-cash donations to hopefully beef up my $500+ refund. I had no idea we had donated so much stuff in 2005! We made 8 donation trips last year and according to ItsDeductible! donated goods worth $1881 (we always used to undervalue goods, now I make sure to use ItsDeductible).
Putting in the detail on our non-cash donations basically doubled my refund and I'm now expecting a federal refund of a little over $1100! I chose to e-file in hopes of getting that money via direct deposit very quickly. I entered my HSBCDirect account so it heads right into an interest bearing account, but I'll have to make a decision about whether to use it for the emergency fund or jump starting my 2006 Roth (you know how I love to get my Roth-O-Meter on).
Oh! And right before I paid TurboTax, I found out that as a Fidelity customer I could get $10 off the federal preparation fee. So my total tax preparation costs were $34.90 total which wasn't too bad. (I had to log in via the Fidelity link a few times before the right price registered).
Unfortunately I do owe state taxes but I won't have to pay that $297 until April. I know your heart bleeds for me ;)
Saturday, March 04, 2006
Our Credit Card Debt Story
Debt Hater recently asked me how I paid down my credit card debt so quickly. First let me correct what I stated in that post about how much debt got paid off when. At the end of 2004 we had over $11,000 in credit card debt...most of it had been aquired in the preceding 3 months. By March I had it paid off, but I added $3000 in order to fund a Roth. This took another 3 months or so to pay off (at a very low promotional interest rate) so the net effect was paying off $14,000 *total* in about six months.
Clearly that's not typical and I am no saving superhuman so let me explain the circumstances that led to the quick debt paydown and payoff.
Backstory
I won't blather on about the two preceding "lean" years that led up to 2004 but let's just say that we were used to carrying credit card debt. We always had some lurking around. For example, the year I was unemployed and LaLa was a shuttle van driver (here is her illustration of what she had to wear that winter) we methodically paid off an $8000 credit card bill (the roof was leaking...what could we do?) only to realize we'd gone about $8000 in debt on other cards in the meantime. Sigh. I landed a well paying job at the tail end of 2003 and 2004 was mostly spent reducing our credit card debt and apparently buying all the stuff we couldn't afford for a while. We were about a month or two away from paying off our final $1500 credit card balance in the summer when we reversed directions.
Debt Spiral
We did purchase some things we truly needed and several things that while pricey I do not regret buying...but clearly spending was out of hand for a few months (mattress, iMac, Christmas presents...and on). To this day I'm not sure what caused the perfect storm, but maybe someday I'll go Quicken-diving and figure it out. So, December 2004 and credit card balances totaling over $11k ... and no savings other than retirement.
Bonus
While I didn't get the large cash bonus I had somehow convinced myself was coming at the end of the year...I did still net about $4,000 (after taxes etc) as a bonus and within a week or so I put it towards the credit cards. All of it. We really curtailed credit card spending so we wouldn't be spending what we were paying down elsewhere.
Tax Refund
I did my taxes in late February expecting a modest refund. When done, I realized I was due a refund of over $6000. While I was thrilled to have that sort of windfall coming our way at a time we were so committed to paying down debt...I was beyond irritated with myself for loaning Uncle Sam $500 a month. I had neglected to adjust my W-4 in January 2004 after aggressively paying taxes in Q4 of 2003 to help pay off unemployment income tax I had not had deducted. As soon as I received my refund in March I put it all toward the remaining credit card debt. And I promptly fixed my paycheck so I had $500 extra each month to assist my savings goals.
The Last $3000
With our credit card debt all but payed off in March I was loathe to take on more debt, but I saw an opportunity to fund a 2004 Roth with $3000 borrowed at 1.9% using a promotional offer before the April 15th deadline. We paid our daily use card off every month at this point and I would pay down the $3000 with a large portion of my 2nd paycheck each month. Even so this amount took longer to pay off than I had originally intended because we had some work done on the house (and I still had no savings!)
Debt into Savings
Those large unexpected windfalls allowed me to pay down my existing credit card debt very quickly. You might think that was lucky, but if we hadn't truly committed to paying it off we probably would have spent that $10k on pimping LaLa's '78 pickup or some other dumb thing. We had slowed the more radical spending in the beginning of the year but had not changed our monthly spending drastically.
But when my net takehome was cut by $800 a month starting in July we had even less to spend each month because we were now...wait for it....SAVING! I was putting at least $500 a month into my 2005 Roth IRA to try to meet the maximum by the 4/2006 deadline. And we were trying to start an emergency fund of 3 months expenses in a liquid account. So we really did have to try to cut spending so we could continue to pay off our credit card balance each month AND continue to make our savings goals.
Even though my story probably looks like I had it easy because I was able to pay it all off in a very short time, I think the principles are the same:
At least that's what I think. And of course I'm no expert :)
Clearly that's not typical and I am no saving superhuman so let me explain the circumstances that led to the quick debt paydown and payoff.
Backstory
I won't blather on about the two preceding "lean" years that led up to 2004 but let's just say that we were used to carrying credit card debt. We always had some lurking around. For example, the year I was unemployed and LaLa was a shuttle van driver (here is her illustration of what she had to wear that winter) we methodically paid off an $8000 credit card bill (the roof was leaking...what could we do?) only to realize we'd gone about $8000 in debt on other cards in the meantime. Sigh. I landed a well paying job at the tail end of 2003 and 2004 was mostly spent reducing our credit card debt and apparently buying all the stuff we couldn't afford for a while. We were about a month or two away from paying off our final $1500 credit card balance in the summer when we reversed directions.
Debt Spiral
We did purchase some things we truly needed and several things that while pricey I do not regret buying...but clearly spending was out of hand for a few months (mattress, iMac, Christmas presents...and on). To this day I'm not sure what caused the perfect storm, but maybe someday I'll go Quicken-diving and figure it out. So, December 2004 and credit card balances totaling over $11k ... and no savings other than retirement.
Bonus
While I didn't get the large cash bonus I had somehow convinced myself was coming at the end of the year...I did still net about $4,000 (after taxes etc) as a bonus and within a week or so I put it towards the credit cards. All of it. We really curtailed credit card spending so we wouldn't be spending what we were paying down elsewhere.
Tax Refund
I did my taxes in late February expecting a modest refund. When done, I realized I was due a refund of over $6000. While I was thrilled to have that sort of windfall coming our way at a time we were so committed to paying down debt...I was beyond irritated with myself for loaning Uncle Sam $500 a month. I had neglected to adjust my W-4 in January 2004 after aggressively paying taxes in Q4 of 2003 to help pay off unemployment income tax I had not had deducted. As soon as I received my refund in March I put it all toward the remaining credit card debt. And I promptly fixed my paycheck so I had $500 extra each month to assist my savings goals.
The Last $3000
With our credit card debt all but payed off in March I was loathe to take on more debt, but I saw an opportunity to fund a 2004 Roth with $3000 borrowed at 1.9% using a promotional offer before the April 15th deadline. We paid our daily use card off every month at this point and I would pay down the $3000 with a large portion of my 2nd paycheck each month. Even so this amount took longer to pay off than I had originally intended because we had some work done on the house (and I still had no savings!)
Debt into Savings
Those large unexpected windfalls allowed me to pay down my existing credit card debt very quickly. You might think that was lucky, but if we hadn't truly committed to paying it off we probably would have spent that $10k on pimping LaLa's '78 pickup or some other dumb thing. We had slowed the more radical spending in the beginning of the year but had not changed our monthly spending drastically.
But when my net takehome was cut by $800 a month starting in July we had even less to spend each month because we were now...wait for it....SAVING! I was putting at least $500 a month into my 2005 Roth IRA to try to meet the maximum by the 4/2006 deadline. And we were trying to start an emergency fund of 3 months expenses in a liquid account. So we really did have to try to cut spending so we could continue to pay off our credit card balance each month AND continue to make our savings goals.
Even though my story probably looks like I had it easy because I was able to pay it all off in a very short time, I think the principles are the same:
- Stop Digging a Cash Hole -- do whatever you need to do to stop taking on more debt. Don't use your cards, stop buying stuff you can't afford...whatever! You can't hit a moving target and you'll need to know the total of what you need to pay down.
- Make a Plan -- use the debt snowball, RDRP, baby steps...whatever works for you, just make a plan and start doing it.
- Use Windfalls to Pay Faster -- tax refunds, found money, sign-up bonuses, part-time income...use any unexpected inflows to pay off the debt even faster. You don't even miss it.
- When the Debt is Gone -- save, save, save and have a fine time doing it too.
At least that's what I think. And of course I'm no expert :)
Thursday, March 02, 2006
February Networth Update
Things have been nuts all week. We went to VT for Mardi Gras (ha!), we had family visiting early in the week, drinks with friends yesterday, and I've been in a training class all week 9-5 (the nerve! LOL). I've barely had time to survey the finances but I think I've eked out a fairly accurate networth update for February.
I've updated the Networth-O-Meter and I'm happy to say that so far we are still on target for our year end goal. Networth increase was technically 14.8% but I wanted to turn that text white so I rounded to 15% for the sake of readability (it's only $100 difference anyway...)
I love having a reassuring picture of a line trending upwards whenever I'm feeling overwhelmed. Here's the cute little graph provided by NetworthIQ:
I've updated the Networth-O-Meter and I'm happy to say that so far we are still on target for our year end goal. Networth increase was technically 14.8% but I wanted to turn that text white so I rounded to 15% for the sake of readability (it's only $100 difference anyway...)
I love having a reassuring picture of a line trending upwards whenever I'm feeling overwhelmed. Here's the cute little graph provided by NetworthIQ:
Earned $100 on Monday Night
...and I didn't even have to stand on a street corner! Ok that was tasteless, but I earned $100 on Monday for joining a focus group - my first - for two hours. I am quite fond of the company that was using the focus group and apparently I am also very opinionated ;)
One of the ironies is that the company is in financial services and there were a lot of women in the group. All the women seemed bright and well educated and yet were very ambivalent about money and personal finance. They admitted to not knowing a lot, not being that interested and some even expressed guilt for those feelings. Interestingly they did all seem to be *more* interested by the end of the session, but I do wonder if that will last.
It really seemed that the women in the room just didn't know where to start. Articles on stocks and funds and PEG ratios OH MY! just didn't light the fire - which I totally understand. Some days it seems like Financial Services are from Mars and women are from Venus or something. I think more and more women are starting to realize they need a basic understanding of personal finance and yet don't always know where to start. Yet, financial services seem to have a history of catering to the already wealthy. I am interested to see how financial services companies craft products and marketing towards a burgeoning female market. And even more importantly I am eager to see women claim their financial power and dive in.
I don't have any answers, I just think that for the most part women have a different "relationship" to money. I have been reading about this in books such as Secrets of Six-Figure Women and Money, A Memoir and then it was right there in the room on Monday night.
Ladies, start your engines.
One of the ironies is that the company is in financial services and there were a lot of women in the group. All the women seemed bright and well educated and yet were very ambivalent about money and personal finance. They admitted to not knowing a lot, not being that interested and some even expressed guilt for those feelings. Interestingly they did all seem to be *more* interested by the end of the session, but I do wonder if that will last.
It really seemed that the women in the room just didn't know where to start. Articles on stocks and funds and PEG ratios OH MY! just didn't light the fire - which I totally understand. Some days it seems like Financial Services are from Mars and women are from Venus or something. I think more and more women are starting to realize they need a basic understanding of personal finance and yet don't always know where to start. Yet, financial services seem to have a history of catering to the already wealthy. I am interested to see how financial services companies craft products and marketing towards a burgeoning female market. And even more importantly I am eager to see women claim their financial power and dive in.
I don't have any answers, I just think that for the most part women have a different "relationship" to money. I have been reading about this in books such as Secrets of Six-Figure Women and Money, A Memoir and then it was right there in the room on Monday night.
Ladies, start your engines.
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