Welcome to another “Tuesday Tip Jar” where I will share awesome savings and financial tips as I find them. I might not have something for you every Tuesday, but when I do, you’ll find it here!
If you’ve got a financial tip you think others would benefit from, please send it to me via my contact page at the top of the blog, or leave it in the comments below the post!
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I’m in New York this week on business travel, so apologies for shorter posts, but at least this is one that could really save your bacon!
Back in January when the poop hit the fan for us we were in a bad way, and when I say that I mean there was real concern that we were going to lose our house. It was a really big fan, and there was a lot of poop hitting all at once!
My uncle in-law happens to be a life-long financial planner, and when we went to him cap-in-hands and pleaded for him to help, one of the things we all quickly agreed on was that we need some short term cash, and we needed it now.
That’s when he suggested reaching out to our banks and asking them to move a payment to the end of our loan.Read More »
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One of the problems is that the money is so damn accessible now. I’m old enough to remember pre-internet life where if you wanted to put money into savings you had to physically drive your car to a bank and deposit it with a paper deposit slip. Usually while someone stood next to you smoking a cigarette and talking about the latest episode of Magnum PI. If you wanted to withdraw from your savings, you got back into your Trans-Am, popped in an REO Speedwagon cassette, and drove back to the same bank where you filled out a withdrawal slip and took your money out.
Starting Credit Card Debt (01.01.19): $126,310.77 Current Credit Card Debt: $109,570.87 Total Paid Off: $16,739.90 Income Going to Savings: 2%
[06.27.19 Update] – Just got an email from Marcus saying my new APY is 2.15% and not the 2.25% called out when I wrote the post below. Make sure you check their site for the latest rates before signing up.
I suck at saving money. Growing up I lived in a household where if we made $15 bucks that month, we spent $15 bucks that month. If we made $1500 bucks that month, rather than just spending the $15 that we managed to get by on the month before, we instead spent all $1500. My family didn’t really save money, and for the past 25 years, I haven’t really saved money either.
One thing I want to be clear about is that I do have some money in a 401k account. On this blog I often talk about having zero money in savings, but when I say that I’m referring to my standard savings account.
Part of the problem for me was always ease of access to my savings. I’d put $500 in savings and tell myself I was NEVER going to touch that money unless it was due to some unforeseen emergency. Two weeks later AC/DC would announce a world tour and I’d think, “Well I need to see them. They are getting pretty old, and this will probably be their last tour. This really is basically an emergency.”
Once at the show, I’d buy a t-shirt, food, pay for parking, and of course buy a pair of those light up plastic devil horns to wear. Can’t be the only one in the crowd without plastic devil horns on after all.
So I’d pull that $500 bucks right back out, and have it all spent in a matter of two weeks. The next month I’d start all over again, each time finding some kind of “emergency” to spend things on.
One of the problems is that the money is so damn accessible now. I’m old enough to remember pre-internet life where if you wanted to put money into savings you had to physically drive your car to a bank and deposit it with a paper deposit slip. Usually while someone stood next to you smoking a cigarette and talking about the latest episode of Magnum PI. If you wanted to withdraw from your savings, you got back into your Trans-Am, popped in an REO Speedwagon cassette, and drove back to the same bank where you filled out a withdrawal slip and took your money out.
In other words, it took a fair amount of work to get your money in and out of savings, and thus once it was in, it tended to stay there.Read More »
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The analogy I use is this: Let’s say you’ve gone and purchased yourself a pet gorilla… as people often do. Years of work have gotten you to a point where the gorilla will even let you put a pink dress on it and have pretend tea parties together...
Starting Credit Card Debt (01.01.19): $126,310.77 Current Credit Card Debt: $108,870.87 Total Paid Off: $17,439.90 Income Going to Savings: 2%
Being in debt has been incredibly stressful on me and my family. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about my debt, and frankly there are times when it crosses my mind several times per hour.
I’ve mentioned it in previous posts, but it’s all I can do to keep exercising and meditating daily just to keep my heart from exploding clean out of my chest at times!
The stress has lifted a bit now that we’ve regained some control and have our monthly bills covered. [Note: We started close to $4,000 upside down every month!] I’ve also got everything set up to auto-pay now, so nothing is late and no late charges are assessed and for the most part we can cover everything each month.
The problem is that it leaves us with almost nothing to put aside. On some months I can spare a couple hundred bucks to toss into savings, but until we get some things paid off later in the year with a bonus and some vesting stock, we’re in a literal paycheck-to-paycheck cycle right now.
The analogy I use is this: Let’s say you’ve gone and purchased yourself a pet gorilla… as people often do. Years of work have gotten you to a point where the gorilla will even let you put a pink dress on it and have pretend tea parties together.Read More »
If you are enjoying what you read, please help me out and share it!
I could not be more focused on digging out of my financial situation right now, and these types of stories are exactly why. I want to get to a point in my life where not only am I financially secure, but I’m actually so secure that I can share with my friends and family.
Starting Credit Card Debt (01.01.19): $126,310.77 Current Credit Card Debt: $109,045.60 Total Paid Off: $17,265.17 Income Going to Savings: 2%
We had the pleasure of being invited to a house this weekend for a 2 day get-together of several families celebrating the end of our lacrosse season. The house itself was modest to say the least, but the lakeside location was not.
We spent hours on the lake yanking kids around on innertubes, grilling hot dogs in the backyard as we watched the wake lazily lap the dock, chasing frogs, and drinking (far too much) beer as we watched the sun set over the distant pines.
As the weekend progressed and I began to ask a friend about the dude graciously let us borrow his pad for the weekend, I found out it’s not even his main home.
“He’s got several properties,” I was told, “He’s a single guy, so he doesn’t worry too much about keeping them spotless, which is why this place is in need of a coat of paint. It’s also why it’s perfect for 15 lacrosse boys to goof around in without worrying about them wrecking the place. This is really just kind of like one of his bachelor pads, so he often lets us use it to take our boat out.”
Several properties? One of his bachelor pads? Of course my next question had to be, “What does he do for a living?”Read More »
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Starting Debt (01.01.19): $126,310.77 Current Debt: $110,408.18 Total Paid Off: $15,902.59 Income Going to Savings: 1%
[Side note: I have adjusted my starting debt and current debt slightly. I made a dumb mistake in my spreadsheet. These kinds of dumb mistakes are probably part of the reason I’m in debt in the first place…]
Growing up I was told many times to buy the best of whatever you were looking for, because if it’s the most expensive [insert item here], you’ll never think to yourself, “Well my [insert item here] is nice and all, but it kills me to know that there is a better model out there.”
This was engrained in me at a young age by the people that I knew.
My Grandfather, had lots of amazing things and always lavished us with crazy presents. Great house on a nice chunk of land, lots of vehicles and equipment, the latest “as seen on TV” gadgets in his house, everything. Then he went bankrupt, or maybe it was that he got in trouble with the IRS. I can’t remember as it was so long ago, but in any case I chose to ignore that part of the story.
I operated that way for a long time, often with my wife by my side saying level-headed things like, “Do you really need that one? The one next to it looks just as good, and it’s a lot less expensive.” I chose to ignore her as well.
See a pattern here?
The simple fact of the matter is that this “buy the best” line is all a load of horse dung. Or I guess bull dung if I’m trying to remain consistent with my post title.
Really what this is all about is ego. It’s fear of having someone have a something that is better than your something. It’s having the house on the highest hill because new hills don’t just pop up randomly, so you’re pretty safe in knowing you’ll always be on the highest one. It’s purely about status, and if you believe otherwise you are kidding yourself.
And the top of the line car, or TV, or appliance you bought? It will probably last even less time than the cheaper knock-off version.
Case in point:
My wife loves her coffee. I think if I was dangling from a bridge over a pit of alligators and there was a Starbucks within walking distance, the best I could hope for is that my wife made it back just in time to throw an egg bite in my mouth as the final rope snapped. At least I stayed keto-friendly until the very end.
Why in the hell was I on that bridge in the first place? My analogies are as stupid as my past financial decisions!
So she loves coffee, and we got a well-known brand of coffee maker that you put the little cups in and it spits out your java one lightning-quick serving at a time. Given what I called out above about my spending habits and the fact that my wife holds tremendous value on her go-go juice, I bought her the most expensive one they had.
We had a couple over one day that I would refer to as “fiscally responsible,” and they inquired about the coffee maker. The next day they went out and bought the cheapest model they could find.
Smash cut to almost 2 years later. Our coffee maker had been returned on warranty twice for breaking down, replaced both times at no cost, and eventually replaced with the brand new top-of-the-line latest and greatest model of coffee maker from the company. That one died six months later.
That cheap one our friends bought? They still use it to this day. Sure it doesn’t have the fancy touch screen, and the water reservoir is a bit smaller, but it still works and the coffee still tastes just like the coffee that came out of any of the 4 coffee makers I had.
We live in a day and age where things are made to start falling apart the moment you get them home (except for their stupid cheap coffee maker.) They’re made of plastic and can be quite flimsy and the companies bank on the fact that you’re going to just go ahead and buy a new one when that thing breaks in a year or two. So buying the best doesn’t get you much at all.
One thing that buying the best does get you? All the best bills that go along with it. You want a Lamborghini? Rad! You’re going to pay a monthly Lamborghini-sized bill. Want to change the oil in your Lamborghini? Hell yes you do! But a Lamborghini isn’t getting an oil change at a Jiffy-Lube. Oh no! It needs to be taken to an authorized Lamborghini shop where they replace the oil with the tears of the less fortunate people who work at the Jiffy Lube down the street while you eat really fancy cheese. Did your Lamborghini break down? Sweet! Lamborghini parts are super expensive. Enjoy!
I’ve never driven a Lamborghini… come to think of it, I’ve never even touched a Lamborghini, but I’m pretty sure I still nailed the paragraph above.
I think that there are certain times where you want to buy the best. I go with the nice toilet paper as an example. That region of your body is something you want to take care of. That’s a good purchase.
Premium ice-cream is another one for me. I rarely eat it (keto until the alligators get me!), but when I do don’t even try to give me a scoop of that store-brand slop. I want the good stuff. I’m looking right at you, Tillamook.
You pick your battles.
What it all boils down to is that buying the best won’t always make you happy. Buying the best will get you higher bills, just as many headaches, and the reassurance that even if you buy the best, a newer model is probably already out by the time you get your [insert item here] home.
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Digging Out with Dave Johnson 