<$Wednesday, July 23, 2008$>
Excuses. I'm full of 'em.
| Our finances--and our emotions--have been all over the place lately, with more lows than highs, and I just haven't had the heart (or the energy) to blog about it. Sorry. But here's a quick recap. Two weeks ago: my car died. Ees kaput. Deader than Elvis. The only way to "repair" it would be to replace the engine, which would cost more than the car's Blue Book value on a good day. Husband doesn't want to pay cash for a cheap beater to replace it, and we can't take out a car loan until this house buying business is over with. So for now I'm having to make due with borrowing my mom's van, and renting an economy car on days when she can't loan it to me. Meanwhile, we got Husband's truck running, but after sitting around undriven for three years (yes, really), it needs some work before it's really driveable. And before we can get the work done, we have to get it legal. So it's going to be another week or two before I can start driving it to work. Oh, the fun we're having with the car situation. And then, last week: we failed to get the house we wanted. The seller was willing to negotiate as far as contributing to down payment and closing costs, but not on the price, and even with those concessions he was asking more than the house was worth, so we walked away. The transportation sitch has kept us from being able to have another look at our second choice or check out other houses, but we'll finally get to do that this Friday. Other things happened, too, all at once, the way these things usually go. Lightning knocked out our satellite receivers and screwed up our electrical wiring; thankfully, as renters we didn't have to cover the costs to repair any of that, but it was still hella discouraging. I also finally received a bill for my ambulance ride last November, to the tune of $2,200. According to my insurance, I'm only responsible for about $700, which is a lot better than two grand, but still, that's a great big bill right there. We laughed at the absurdity of it all until we cried, and then we cried until it felt so absurd that we had to laugh. But we hung in there, and prayed, and believed that it would all work out for the best, and everything would be okay. And then, over the weekend, our prayers were answered: we got a letter from an old creditor saying that they owed me a substantial amount of money, some bit of unclaimed property from years and years ago that's been sitting there earning interest all this time. This, of course, seems a little too good to be true, so I'm not going to put any eggs in that basket until I actually see the money in my checking account. But if it is indeed a reliable basket, its holding enough money to do exactly one of the following: A) Buy a car B) Repair Husband's prosthesis and make it wearable again or... C) Completely pay off our credit cards. Oh, man. What a choice. We really, really need a car, and Husband would really, really like to walk again (and I'd really, really like him to, also). But after much deliberation, we both decided that the best thing we could do for our future was option C--getting completely rid of our nasty, evil consumer debt and freeing ourselves from indentured servitude to the credit card companies. Once that's done, we'll be in a better position to be able to afford the other things. Even if we end up having to borrow for them, paying off the card should improve our credit enough that we'd get much better rates that we would otherwise. So, things are finally looking up again. In fact, with the prospect of being debt free looming just ahead, things are looking higher than they've ever looked before, and that's great, because I really need to be on a high right now. Labels: credit cards, debt reduction, house-hunt, personal |
<$Monday, July 7, 2008$>
Speaking of extra income streams...
| Over the weekend, Get Rich Slowly posted The Non-Conformist's Guide to Making Money, a guest post by Chris Guillebeau of The Art of Nonconformity. I found it an interesting--and encouraging--read. Apart from inspiring me to get back on the pro-blogging wagon, it also made me want to hurry up and promote my Etsy shop. It's going to be a while yet before I'm ready to leave the 9 to 5 Cube World, but when I do, I'm confident that I'll find plenty of ways to help keep us in the black. Labels: extra income, link roundup |
I signed up for Social Spark!
 It's no secret that I sometimes use this blog to pull in some extra income, mainly via paid posts. The idea of accepting compensation to blog about something is a bit controversial for some; mainly, I think, for those who confuse personal blogging with professional journalism. But being that this is a personal blog, and a blog about personal finance (among other, related things), which includes finding extra streams of income, I think paid blogging fits right in. I only do it part time, because I only have a limited amount of time to devote to it, and also because I can get a little burned out on blogging as a whole if I do too much of it at someone else's pace. But the money is good. As an established, if not wildly (or even just kinda) popular, blogger, I pull in an average of $30/hour. Considering I only devote about an hour a week to it, for me that's also an extra $30/week. That may look like chump change, but you'd be amazed at how much progress I've made paying down my credit cards already just by applying these little weekly paid blogging "debt snowflakes" to my balance. Of course, those who devote more time to it make significantly more. I started out doing it through PayPerPost, where last year I made over a thousand dollars--a teensy fraction of what some of the full-time Posties pulled in. So it's only natural that I signed up for SocialSpark, the newest venture from Izea, Inc., the people behind PayPerPost. SocialSpark is Izea's attempt to once again revolutionize the paid blogging market by turning it into a social network, thereby gaining even more exposure both for bloggers and the products they advertise.   What I like most about this new network is that, unlike PPP, I don't have to keep refreshing the opportunities page all day long in the hopes of grabbing a good one before it's snapped up by my competition. With SocialSpark, I just reserve a slot, and they e-mail me to let me know when they're ready for me to write my post--after which I have twelve hours to get it written and posted. And if I see an opportunity I like that doesn't have any openings, with SocialSpark I can contact the advertiser and request that they open a new slot just for me. This is my first post for SocialSpark, so it remains to be seen if it will work out as well for me as its predecessor did; but I have high hopes for it, and high expectations for how it will change the paid blogging biz.  Labels: disclosure, extra income, PPP |
Life transitions are crazy-making.
| I'm pretty psyched about our debt consolidation, and I can't wait to see how much money it will actually save. It's not reflected on any of my online account pages yet (not that I've been obsessive about refreshing them or anything), but if I stick to the snowball method and keep paying as much to that card as I'm paying to my debts each month now, I should notice some fairly rapid progress in paying it off. This also comes just as my student loan forbearance ends and I have to start making those payments again, so that works out pretty well. I would consider adding my loan into the mix, too, but I think that when my husband graduates I'll be able to consolidate both our loans together. Anyway. I'm rambling because there's just so much going on and so much to think about right now. It's a little overwhelming, and no way can I organize my thoughts on it all. We made an offer on a house. It's the prettier of the two houses we were considering. We came in pretty low, so we expect to be countered, if not rejected outright. However, this house has some potential structural problems, and we're still trying to get the disclosure from the seller. If he hasn't addressed them, and doesn't plan to, then the house will turn into a money pit, and we'll have to walk away. Our second-choice house is already looking more and more attractive, though, especially considering it's priced $20,000 under value to start with. I need to sit down and draw up a to do list, because there's a lot to put on it. This week is going to be one of the busiest I've had in a long time. Besides meetings with loan officers and realtors and insurance agents, we have to attend a home buying class and a counseling session to be eligible for city First Time Homebuyer funds. I want to be excited, but mostly, I'm just exhausted. Time to go look at home insurance quotes. Whee. Labels: debt consolidation, debt reduction, house-hunt |
<$Thursday, July 3, 2008$>
Tidying up
| I did some financial housecleaning today. It's been way too long since I've done that, but the timing was just right to receive some much needed debt consolidation. Just in time, too, what with our impending mortgage and utilities payments. I had a great offer from one of my creditors to transfer my balances, for 4.9% interest until the balances are paid off. This came just as the card we use primarily for gasoline (but also used to pay for our honeymoon) jumped from 0% to 14.99%. That's really quite a jump. It was time to finally take all of the advice I've seen to consolidate debt. Now I'll only have one credit card to worry about paying off, and a much lower minimum payment than what all of my payments currently add up to. Talk about debt relief. It's also perfect timing for helping with our mortgage application. I've been gathering mortgage quotes from various lenders, but I think the lender our real estate agent recommended is going to be the way to go. I turned in our application this afternoon, and I'm pretty confident we'll get the loan we need. This ball's a-rollin'! I'm so excited. Tomorrow we're viewing the house and putting in our offer. Eeeee! Everybody cross your fingers and say a prayer for us to get the house! Labels: debt consolidation, debt reduction, house-hunt |
House Hunt & Puppy Quest Update
| This week has been one of the most hectic weeks I've experienced in a while. Apart from work being way more busy than you'd expect on a week when a third of the company is on vacation, I've been spending all of my "free" time making phone calls and filling out paperwork and doing research for our potential house. That's right, we found a house! We found two houses, even! One that we love, that's listed at the very tip top of our budget, but that, with the exception of an extra bathroom, is everything we want in a house; and one that is less expensive, and is also everything we need, but that needs some work to update it and make it pretty, and is our backup in case we don't get the first house. As for the first house, we're meeting our agent there tomorrow to go through it once more and put together an offer. Hopefully, next week I'll be able to report that they've accepted our offer and we're in escrow limbo. Also next week, I'll do up a big post about everything we've learned about how to buy a house when you're a first time home buyer with a single income and very little savings, without getting yourself in deep, deep trouble. In other news, we're not eligible to adopt a puppy from the rescue shelter unless/until we get our cats vaccinated, which we were planning to do anyway before moving them into the city. The only reason we haven't done so yet, or at least haven't done so in a long time, is because they're totally indoor cats and are never exposed to other animals. Also, they're both pretty young and healthy, and our unhealthy, elderly dog was our priority. At any rate, they're both going to get bundled up and taken to the vet soon. That should certainly be interesting. Labels: house-hunt, personal, pets |