cash for clunkers?

I've been reading a lot about this Cash for Clunkers program. I even looked into it as I have an SUV and I would love to be able to do my part for the environment. But it seems to me like this program is skewed a bit. It targets the wrong people. For instance, I really want to be able to do my part for the environment but my SUV is not paid off and it is worth more than $4500. But if I wanted to do this program then that is all that I would get. And if you think about it - who has old "clunkers" that they could trade in and have $4500 be a good offer? In my experience, those people are the same people that can't really afford new car payments. In fact, I know someone that took advantage of C4C and this person cannot afford a new car payment.

Cyber Monday shopping

I don't know about you, but my email inbox was full of cyber monday offers today. Apple wanted me to get a macbook with free shipping. Kohl's wants to give me a percentage off. Sam Ash wants to give me instruments at cost. Even CVS is having a sale. And the list goes on. For a moment I forgot I was in crazy debt and actually looked at some of them. Then I got a case of the "I wants." Luckily I remembered I have debt to pay off. :( Stupid debt

Best money lessons to teach your kids

I saw an interesting post on CNN today. It is called the Best money lessons to teach your kids. And it is actually from Oprah.com apparently. There was an interesting quote in the article. One dad said "It made me proud to give them what they wanted." And that is just it. That is how parents get into financial trouble. And that is how the kids learn bad financial habits. It's so simple but so interesting.

Free money - use it or let it expire?

I have a $25 voucher for JetBlue. It expires today. In fact, it might expire in 22 minutes. I am on the West Coast so I am just not sure. I also have around $250 in an unused credit that is good till the middle of next month. 

I wanted to use the voucher and the credit to book a flight. But here is the problem - I don't know where exactly yet. So, do I make a rushed decision just to not lose the $25 today? Or wait to make the decision and miss out on the $25 voucher?

I think I am going to let the voucher expire. I just am not ready to make the decision now and if I have to change the flight it will cost $25! Sucks to lose free money though.

The low balance transfer offers keep rolling in

It is the most amazing thing. When this journey started, I had a lot of cards with high interest rates. So, I started attacking them. I focused on the highest interest rates first. A few of those cards have been paid off. Just recently I started getting some sweet balance transfer options in the mail. They wouldn't give me these before - when I really needed them! I got one for 2.9%, one for 3.9% and one for 0% till September 2009. I am so totally jumping all over these! Just wish they had come back when I really needed them.

Debt paydown is time consuming

Focusing on paying down debt is hard work. And I am talking seriously hard work here. I know a lot of people work multiple jobs to pay down debt. And I spend a lot of time at night working on making money online for my extra income. And that can be pretty time consuming. Sure it is rewarding when you see results in your debt pay down. But it also kind of sucks to see time passing you by.

The Today show this morning

For some reason, I had my TV on the Today Show this morning. I never watch that show. So I am not real sure why I had it on there. But they were talking about budgeting and when a deal is not a deal. So, I stayed on that channel to see what they said.

Wow, talk about stating the obvious!

The first point was that anything that you put on a credit card is not a deal. No, really? I mean, that seems like common sense to me. But maybe it is not for a lot of people out there. And if so, that is just sad, right?

The only other point I remember was something about not buying on eBay.

I think the real point was that a deal is not a deal if you are in debt because you can't afford it! Just saying :)

Need a reason to not dine out tonight?

Are you trying to cut back on the amount of money that you spend dining out each month? I know how hard that can be. I used to be the same way. And it actually took a while for me to get to the point that I am at now. Basically I only dine out if it can't be helped. And I define that like this:

• Meals with family/friends
• Job interview/appointment/etc. that necessitates being away from home at meal time
• Travel (if I didn't bring food)
• Any other reason that has me away from home at meal time and I am without snacks (like traffic or an errand that takes longer than expected) - but only if I can't wait to eat till I get home!

If I had not gotten to this point though, I know something that would put the kibosh on dining out. It might work for you. Just go to the Consumerist and read the recent story titled: "Whole Chicken Breast" Actually Chicken Part Composite and then throw up in your mouth a little bit and vow to never dine out again.

The end.

I stimulated the economy

I got my stimulus check in my account on Friday. And yes, I stimulated the economy.

I spent about $7 on totally unnecessary food items to make homemade cream cheese danishes.

And then, I went to Bed, Bath & Beyond and bought a $15 blanket.

I also spent $26 on coffee from Joffrey's, which I posted about a couple of days ago.

Then I sent the rest to Toyota for my car loan :)

I can't help it. The 'need to pay off debt' part of me just could not part with any more of that money!

Can I sell my debt on eBay too?

Apparently some family in PA was trying to sell their debt on eBay. Currently there are 46 minutes left and there is a bid of $1.00. (auction link) And the amount of the debt is $103,245.11.

So, if that $1.00 is what they get, will they even come out ahead? It cost them to list it on eBay. And if they get the money by PayPal then they will take a cut.

Of course, the whole thing is pretty ridiculous. This does not look to be the best debt reduction plan. Interesting choice, yes.

I have to wonder though- did they really think that someone would just come and pay everything off for them? Are they high?

Electric bill woes

Not all that long ago we moved from a rather large 2 bedroom townhouse apartment to a smaller two bedroom apartment that is not a townhouse. In the old apartment the space around the front door was amazing. When it rained, if it was blowing rain, it ended up in the living room. So I can only imagine how much less our electric bill would have been if the place had been made a bit better.

So, when we moved I was looking forward to a lower electric bill.

Ha!

It has been $99 and some change each month. And for the life of me I do not know why!

After getting about tired of that I spent the last month doing as much as possible to use as little electricty as possible. I unplug things when they are not in use. I try to use natural lighting so that I do not need to use a lamp. I try to use the heat & A/C as little as possible. I was doing some extreme electricity saving.

So, I got my new electric bill in the mail yesterday.

Want to know my savings?

Less than $9! Can you believe that?! I do not know what is going on here. And we cannot possibly use any less electricity than we already are. It is so frustrating.

Tired of paying off debt - how to stay motivated?

I have been paying off debt like crazy these past few months. And I have seen some great progress in doing that. But you know what?

I am so freaking tired of paying off debt!

I mean, seeing the thousands of dollars I have been paying towards debt is just painful. There are so many other things that could have been done with that money. Instead, I grew up financially illiterate and am having to pay the price now.

It is really too bad that time machines are just a thing of science fiction. One would really come in handy about now.

It is hard to stay motivated to pay off the debt though. And maybe it just feels that way right now because it all is all nice and warm outside. And that makes me want to travel and what not. But of course, travel is expensive and that money is better used to pay down debts. It is just hard to tell yourself that you can do all of that once the debt is paid off.

So with that comes the task of trying to find things to do for entertainment that are not costly. This weekend we went to the movies because I had some free passes. That was fun.

Except that we decided to have lunch out, which was $21. That might not seem like much money, until you read my previous post on how I got a cart full of groceries for around $12.00 total. And the sad part is that the meal was not all that great.

And with the price of gas these days, it is not even a good idea to take drives to public parks and whatnot.

Then there are moments of weakness. You spend a little. Then after the fact you feel both guilt and regret. And that sucks.

So, how do you work through the lack of motivation once you get tired of sending every dime to credit card companies, student loans and car loans?

Credit card pains

I used my paid off credit card for lunch out over the weekend. I did that because I had been reading horror stories about people using their debit cards and having a lot of crazy charges show up. And it is no secret that it is easier to get back fraudulent charges with a credit card.

So, we get home and I log onto my credit card website. I want to make a payment in the amount that I spent.

But get this. It won't let me! It said my balance was zero so I could not make the payment! How about that? Craziness.

Honest thoughts on credit monitoring service

I have a car that I plan on getting rid of in the next few months. I will more than likely be trading it in for something else. With that in mind I wanted to have a look at my credit report and what not and see what my credit score is. Since I am paying off debt pretty regularly, I also wanted to make sure that was reflected and just see how it affected the credit score.

I signed up with TrueCredit.com last month for a 3-bureau monitoring service for $15 a month. You can refresh your credit report and credit score every day if you want with this service. I have refreshed it a few times - but not every day!

I found something that is wrong on there that I am working on correcting. I am also keeping track of the credit scores. It is crazy how they jump when something gets paid off. I had a 20 point jump with two of the credit bureaus when a card with a $500 limit and a $405 balance was paid off!

TrueCredit.com is the only service I have ever used, but I like it. It is pretty easy, although it did take me a few days to discover how to refresh the credit report and score.

Credit card #3 - almost there

Well, at the end of March I paid off credit card #3. Today my new statement hit. I now have a $4.75 finance charge to pay off. And that is it! I have already scheduled that for today. So by tomorrow it should read zero balance! Hooray!

And I think I get my new statement for credit card #4 on Saturday. Then I will get to see how much that finance charge is.

More cards paid off

With the end of the month I had a little more money than I thought.

So, guess what I did with it?

I sent it to two credit cards! Now I am just waiting on statements to run to see if there will be a finance charge or if there really is a zero balance.

Ah, so exciting. Can't wait for that 'stimulus check' in May. It will go towards debt too!

No dining out

Wow, I was looking over my March spending. I noticed something interesting. No dining out the entire month of March.

So I looked back to February. One trip to a restaurant with extended family on Feb 16th. And that is it! So basically, if not for a family get together, there would have been no dining out for 2 months! AMAZING!

I was trying to save money on my water bill

I moved into a new apartment recently. The rent is cheaper than my last place, which is good cause that extra cash can go towards bills. And I have still been employing other techniques to save money. You know - unplugging things to save on phantom power charges and trying to not use much water to keep the water bill low.

Then I get a water bill a few weeks ago. It was $28.25, which was about what I expected. Then I notice how the service date is 1/1/08 - 1/31/08. Well, I did not move in until 1/26/08 so I instantly got mad that I was getting charged for an entire month. Then I read the fine print.

"Residents shall pay a percentage not to exceed 99% of the total water and sewer usage. The total amount shall be divided equally among the complex. The first billing cycle shall reflect the water usage from the first day of the move in month. Resident will not be charged for the move out month's usage."

Now, I have lived in a lot of different apartment complexes over the last 10 years, but this is the first time I have ever encountered something like this.

Basically, it reads to me that it does not matter what I do to try to lower my water bill as I have to split the water cost with every other apt. in this complex. That is hardly fair for the smaller apartments that have one or two people to have to split with the larger apartments that have a big family.

What a bummer.

Hospital bill woes

We have some hospital bills from July that we have been making payments on. The bills were for some MRIs. Insurance covered 80%. But that remaining 20% was no small amount. We arranged a payment plan with the hospital.

Imagine my surprise when a collection agency sends us a letter demanding payment in full. Apparently it does not matter that there was a payment plan. If the bill is past due then they can send it to a collection agency. It just doesn't seem right.

And there will be more MRIs this summer as a follow up. We don't have to go to that same hospital. And after this shenanigan you better believe we won't!

Fed Cuts Interest Rate by 0.75

I happen to have the TV on CNN and they just announced another rate cut.

It seems that this time the Fed has cut interest rates by 0.75 % .

And on CNN they are saying that this will not be the last rate cut that we will see.

This is the sixth cut in the past six months too!

So, now I wonder how long it will be until ING and the others lower the rate on the high yield savings accounts. And I suspect the next headline we see will be about the value of the dollar reaching an all time low against the British pound and the Euro.