My New Self

More updates

2006-08-10T21:24:00.000-05:00

Looking at my spreadsheet that I use to calculate and track net worth, I see that since January we've had a 11.11% increase in our net worth.

We've also managed to drop our short term liabilites from just over $16,000 to $7,759. Our investments are down a bit (around $1,300), but our property has increased in value.

All-in-all I feel pretty good about our progress this year. We still need to rebuild our emergency fund, so starting tomorrow I'm having more taken out of each paycheck to go to our money market account at Edward Jones.

Latest Updates

2006-08-10T12:52:00.000-05:00

This summer has certainly been a busy one at our house. The garden did well at first, but the incredible heat this summer has beaten our best efforts. We're now planning to put out a fall garden to get some more fresh produce later.

The price of gas has really hurt as well. I drive a Saturn SL1, and generally make about 36 mpg, but have a long commute (about 50 miles one way). Luckily, the local Krogers stores (Dillon's) also owns some gas stations, and when you spend over $100 in groceries and the like you get a coupon for 10 cents off on gas.

I've been doing better on exercise and eating, and have now lost a little more weight after plateauing a bit last month.

Financially we're doing Ok. We hit a rough patch at the end July, but made it through without taking on additional debt. So that was good. Didn't get to reduce our existing debt that much though, so that was not so good.

I'll be updating the progress bars today.

One more time

2006-07-20T12:49:00.000-05:00

Ok, our debt is pretty much under control with more and more being paid off every month. But I realized that I'm falling short in one important area - those expenses that come regularly, but not monthly.

We have real estate and personal property taxes and tags for the cars annually, insurance quarterly, and some others.

So I re-did our budget. I broke out those types of expenses by frequency (quarterly, semi-annual, annual) and then determined what I needed to save each month to make them. It was an eye-opener to be sure. The problem I was having every quarter became apparent - I didn't have enough left over to make those payments.

It may seem obvious to you all, but I just didn't get it, until now.

The preliminary budget (I'll go over it with my wife tonight) looks good. It allows for enough savings to pay those periodic bills AND still add to the emergency fund. One pontential problem is for our heating expenses come winter. We use propane, and the price we'll pay come winter time is very unknowable right now.

Things will continue to be tight, but I think we'll be ok.

Doing Dad Stuff

2006-06-14T09:19:00.000-05:00

I may be late at this, but my son and I took in a baseball game (the local minor league team). We had gone to a few big league games years ago, but we both got busy with other things and hadn't really done anything together for a while.

A minor league game is really different than a major league one. For starters, the tickets are dirt cheap ($10 each for really good seats), the food is cheap ($2.75 for a stadium style hotdog), and parking was free.

The game was good too. These guys are still pros, but are usually just starting their careers in baseball (or doing rehab from their major league parent club).

One really "Dadish" thing I did was teach my son how to keep score during the game. We printed off scoresheets from a website and taped them to some thin cardboard pieces for an instant scorepad that was firm enough to write on. My grandfather had taught me how to keep score years ago, but I hadn't done it for years. It was a lot of fun for both of us. My son is already asking when we'll go again.

Been a busy month

2006-06-06T12:03:00.000-05:00

It's been a while since I posted. That wasn't by design, this has just been a hectic month. My wife and I did manage to see a movie (RV with Robin Williams), but it's been mostly work, work, work.

We have been doing a lot of gardening/landscaping, and the outside of our house looks great! We have a nice crop of veggies coming on (in fact, we've already enjoyed some radishes and onions) and are really looking forward to getting some fresh tomatoes and peppers in a month or two. While it may not have that great of impact on our food bill, it will certainly taste great.

We have a couple of big (for us) expenses coming up - tires for our Saturn and some drivetrain work on our old pickup. This month might be a little tight, but I think we will still be able to put some away in our emergency fund and investment accounts AND continue to pay down our diminished credit card debt.

April Updates

2006-05-09T20:01:00.000-05:00

We made good progress this last month, at least financially. We have passed our current year end goal for credit card debt, made our goal for our "wealth index", and saw a 4% increase in net worth.

Here's our balance sheet for the end of April, 2006

Total Assets - $224,990
Total Liabilities - $124,570

April Net Worth - $100,420

Our credit card debt, which in January stood at $16,165 is down to $7,775, just over $200 below our year end goal of $8,000. Time to reevaluate and set a new goal.

Our wealth index now stands at .50, right at our goal. Again, time for a new goal.

In the emergency funds area we took a hit. As I wrote earlier, we are taking a bit of a gamble in drawing down emergency funds to pay off high interest credit card debt. So far, so good.

In the weight department, well this hasn't been a good month. She and I are working on some healthy diet changes (not a diet, but dietary changes) to help that out some.

I'll be updating the progress bars shortly.

We Did It

2006-05-07T08:50:00.000-05:00

As the title says - we did it. What did we do? We got our Amex Optima card paid off completely. As I wrote a while back, through a series of computer and human errors, I was late on a couple of payments to American Express last year. That resulted in an interest rate of just over 20%. So by dipping into emergency funds, a small inheritance, and using balance transfers, we have now slain that beast.

It is a pretty good feeling, that's for sure. We now owe a total of about $6,000 at 0% until June '07 and $1,700 at 3.9% for "life". When the year started, we owed about $16,000 in credit card debt, so this is pretty good news.

Our utility bills are much lower in the early summer, so we'll be using the slack from our budgeted expenses to lower that debt even more.

You all have a nice Sunday.

Husbandly progress

2006-05-03T11:30:00.000-05:00

As I wrote in a very early post, I'm striving to be a better husband. One of the biggest things that drives my wife nuts is my lack of organization.

Well, I've found a lot of help on that front on the Web. One site suggested that to tackle a messy room, you should break it up into smaller sections. So instead of saying "I'll clean the office", you'd say "I'll clean a bookcase".

This is very much in line with the idea of GTD - breaking your things to do into smaller, discreet steps.

Doing that I've made good progress on reducing clutter in "my" areas of the house. I'm also making an effort to not let it get that way in the first place. Dirty dishes go to the kitchen, dirty clothes get put in the hamper, magazines get read then disposed of, and so on.

This has made my wife, and me, much happier. It's not second nature yet, but it's getting there.

A cool little book

2006-04-28T10:38:00.000-05:00

I've run across a little disposable planner called a PocketMod. I'm (trying) to use the Getting Things Done concept in my life, and have been needing a simple way to keep notes when I'm away from the computer. This seems to do the trick.

Speaking of GTD, I'm using GMail to implement GTD, and it's working pretty well so far. I'm doing a riff on a method by Bryan Murdaugh.

Check these ideas out if you get a chance.

Taking a big risk?

2006-04-24T11:22:00.000-05:00

My wife and I talked yesterday about getting our American Express Optima card completely paid off (currently around $6,000 at 20.8%). Our plan included a bit of a gamble - dig into our emergency funds.

We're thinking that it's not as bad as it sounds. We both have Roth IRAs, with about $15,000 in contributions. So if something really, really bad happened, we'd have that to fall back on. We also have the resources of my mom, who would loan us money should something awful happen as well about $20,000 in equity in our house.

So our plan is like this:

Transfer $2,700 to a low interest card. We have a card that had no balance, and got an offer of 3.9% for the life of the balance on transfers.
Pay $1,500 from emergency savings. The Roths will serve as backup for serious emergencies, and we'll still have about $1,500 for smaller emergencies.
Use the small inheritance I talked about earlier to pay the rest off. Any left over will go on the 3.9% card.
Stop adding to the Roths for a short time and put the money that would have gone there back into the emergency fund. That will allow us to put an extra $150/month back into the fund.

Afterwards our credit card debt profile will look like this:

$6,000 at 0% until June 2007
$2,700 at 3.9% until paid off

Will the gamble work? Will we end up on the street? Stay tuned.

Reducing Fuel Costs

2006-04-20T08:35:00.000-05:00

I commute about 50 miles each way to work. I know that's a long ways to many people, but in the central and western US, that's not that far. I know people that drive that far to get groceries for instance.

That said, the rise in gasoline prices has been a concern to me. As I was filling up my little economy car this morning, I saw a sign on the gas pump for fueleconomy.gov, so when I got to work I surfed on over and read up on ways to save gasoline. And remember that gasoline savings = money savings. Here are some of their suggestions

Driving More Efficiently

Drive sensibly, i.e. no aggresive driving. Potential benefit - 5-33%.
Observe the speed limit. For every 5 miles an hour over 60, the site claims that it costs you an additional $0.19 per gallon. Potential benefit 7-23%.
Remove excess weight. This is even more important for small cars like mine. Potential savings 1-2% per 100 lbs.

In my case, I already drive pretty sensibly, so I don't think I'll see much improvement there. But I usually drive 65 on the highway to work, so slowing down a bit to 60 would save 19 cents per gallon. Gas was $2.79 this morning, so that would drop the effective price to $2.60. I don't have anywhere close to 100 lbs of "stuff" in the car, but I suppose every little bit helps.

Bottom line for me - maybe $0.19 per gallon reduction

Keeping Your Car in Shape

Keep your engine tuned up. Good advise, regardless of savings. Potential benefit 4%.
Replace Air Filters regularly. Again, just a plain good idea that will increase the live on the car. Potential benefit - 10%
Keep tires at proper inflation. Your tires will last longer too. I'd also add to that to use the size of tires recommended for the car. Wider tires, while maybe looking "cool" will lower fuel economy. Potential benefit - 3%
Use the right motor oil. They mean weight rating (like 5W/30 for my car). I'd also suggest that you consider synthetic oil. You can go longer between changes (which saves time, and potentially money). I use Mobile-1 synthetic in my car. Potential savings - 1-2%.

I already do most of these things. Synthetic oil is claimed to improve fuel economy as well, but I use it mainly for the benefit of not having to have my oil changed every 3,000 miles. But these tips are a good reminder - I should probably check my air filter next time I have the oil changed. Let's say I was able to squeeze an additional 2% savings out of this area. That works out to about 5 cents per gallon, which drops my effective cost down to $2.55.

Bottom Line
Cars, except for rare or collectable cars, are not an investment. They are a cost center, and reducing costs means more money in the bank. Reducing my costs by the 24 cents estimated here would help make the pain of the pump a little less painful.

Definitely getting to be Spring

2006-04-15T18:26:00.000-05:00

Today we got a pickup load of compost from the recycle center (if you have a center, they are likely to have mulch and compost, ours gives it out free), picked up some sulfur at the garden center, and then put that all on our new vegetable garden.

The free mulch and compost is a real benefit of our local trash utility. We use the mulch in our flower beds to give it a neater appearance, and the compost in our garden to add organic matter to the soil.

The mulch really spruces up the place, and is one of those things you can do to increase the value of your home.

You do have to be careful of this free stuff though. There is some trash that makes it into the mix (like kids toys that got raked up), so be prepared to sort through it a bit as you're spreading it around.

The garden should give us some nice veggies this summer, which will help on the grocery bill, plus be healthier than the stuff from Kroger or Wal-Mart.

Tax refunds gone bad

2006-04-15T11:04:00.000-05:00

Dick Cheney, Vice President of the US and a former executive with Halliburton, is getting a $1.9 Million tax refund.

Maybe he needs to plan his withholdings a bit better .

March updates

2006-04-09T15:59:00.000-05:00

Finances:

Assets
Liabilities
Net Worth

$225,155
$128,800
$96,355

I made some progress this month, and I think that from April through September I'll make quite a bit more. Why? Lower utility bills will allow us to pay more on the credit card debt, and half of that debt was moved to a 0% interest card.

We also had good returns on our retirement investments, and saw our emergency funds increase as per our plan.

Health:
Weight remained about the same, and workouts became non-existent during March. I'll look into using the gym at work to see if I can squeeze some time in at lunch or after work.

Family:
I have been talking to my son about starting to save regularly, and we're doing more stuff together. My wife and I have done a lot more things together as well, and things seem to be going well.

Bottom Line:
March was a good month for me, and for my family. Things are looking up on the Finance and Family front, but Health could use some improvements.

The end of March also marked the end of the first full month of this blog.

The Joy of Business Travel

2006-04-04T17:17:00.000-05:00

I'm writing this from a hotel in St. Louis and couldn't be happier. Why? I get paid a per diem rate by my employer for travel. The current rate for St. Louis is $59 for meals and incidental expenses. I get a continental breakfast at the hotel, and can sure eat lunch and dinner for less than $59. I drove (I can't fly - call it a phobia if you will), and will spend far less than the mileage payment on gas (the beauty of an economy car). Heck, I even got an oil change before the trip, and the mileage paid for that as well. I'll be reimbursed the actual cost of the hotel.

So I look to make money from the trip. And that goes on the credit card, further paying down that debt. Unless something Really Bad happens this year, I will exceed my goal for credit card debt payment. And, as Martha would say, is a Good Thing.

Good Credit Card News

2006-03-31T15:51:00.000-06:00

I just was able to transfer $6,000 from the 20% Optima to a 0% Chase card. To me, this is great news. I think that I'll take the inheritance I mentioned earlier, along with the small tax refund, and put it all on the Amex. That will take care of around $3,000 worth of debt right there. Along with the $1,100 in proceeds from the Savings Bonds we sold, the Amex Optima card will be nearly paid off. The rest will be gone by the end of the summer. That will be a 20% monkey off my back.

What a great day for us, financially speaking. Tonight we're going to go out to dinner at our favorite faux Mexican place to celebrate (don't worry, it's in the budget).

Spring has sprung

2006-03-30T19:37:00.000-06:00

I think I've mentioned it before, but we live in a rural area. That means that our heat comes mainly from propane. Today we got our tank filled, and it will be the last time until late fall. That means an extra $250 or so per month to put on the credit card expenses. Yea!

We also are getting ready to plant our garden. It will be small, but should be enough for the two of us to have fresh produce from all summer and into the fall. What we don't grow we'll pick up at the farmer's market in town. I understand that in some parts of the country, you pay a premium for farmer's market produce, but here it's actually quite a bit less than a grocery store. The food is fresher, tastes much better, and we'll be helping local producers. All that and save money too, a definite win.

This year will see some maintenance on the house, which should help to reduce that big propane bill next winter. I'll do most of it myself to save money. Where I can't do the work, I'll try to do things like the demolition work (removing shingles for example).

Spring will be busy. Heck, summer will be busy as well. But it will be fun to see what improvements we can make on the house that won't cost a fortune but will pay for themselves in energy savings.

What things do you have planned for around the house this year?

Simple ways to improve your health

2006-03-30T09:42:00.000-06:00

The organization that I work for has a wellness committee that publishes recipes and tips on our intranet site. I just found a list of 55 Ways to Improve Your Health. I won't list them all right at once, but here are 10 dealing with eating better:

Avoid food portions bigger than your fist
Skip seconds
Don't skip breakfast
Grill, steam, or bake instead of frying
Snack on fruits and vegetables
Eat leaner red meat and poultry
Choose fruit for dessert
Drink water before a meal
Flavor foods with herbs, spices, and other low fat seasonings
Skip buffets

I've already done most of these things (my snacks are usually vegetables, fruits, or whole grain foods with a low fat cheese like Swiss), I eat breakfast (usually whole grain cereal and fruit), we buy lean meat (hormone free as well), and while water is good for you, I prefer iced tea (lightly sweetened, not syrup like down south).

Any frying we do is usually in healthy oil, but we don't fry things much anymore. Grilling is our favorite way to cook.

And portion control is another key - even good-for-you foods are not so good if you stuff yourself with them.

I'll post 10 simple things you can do for exercise later.

Can saving money make you rich?

2006-03-29T08:35:00.000-06:00

Miserly Bastard has written an interesting post titled Get rich by increasing revenue, not controlling spending. In it he (I'm pretty sure he's a he) lays out the argument that the way to be rich is to make more money. His Wealth Equation captures his feelings pretty well

Wealth = [After Tax Income] - [Spending] + [Appreciation on Assets]

Is he right? Research seems to show that making money is not the whole story. In The Millionaire Next Door we are introduced to many people who don't have high incomes, yet have a net worth that by most standards is pretty high (I mean, they're millionaires and all).

Let's say you make $40,000 per year gross (one of the comments in his post states that someone making $40K a year will never be rich). I'll use figures from my part of the country (the Great Plains).

A typical mortgage payment around here is about $316.00/month; taxes $1000/year; and insurance about $800/year. Say monthly utilities average $150 (including gas, electricity, water, and phone). Total housing costs are then $7,392.

Figuring 15,000 miles per year, 38 mpg (of course you have an economy car), and $2.80/gallon for gas, fuel costs are $1,105. 5 oil changes and miscellaneous repair costs might run another couple hundred, let's say $300 to be safe. Insurance would be $304/year (according to progressive). Total vehicle costs - $1,713.

Household expenses for two (using us as an example) are about $100/week, or $5,200 per year.

Total expenses for housing, transportation, and food - $14,305.
Total take home income (I'll use mine as an example)- $31,304.

Difference - $16,999 (let's say $17,000).

Say we saved 80% of that - $13,600 (that gives you $3,400 for just spending). Not too bad. If you started at age 30 you'd end up with $1.8 million at age 65 (assuming a 7% return).

Simplistic? Yes. Is that doable? That depends on the person/family. We certainly aren't doing that right now. But we could have been doing close to that if we would have had a plan and followed through on it.

If you live in a low cost area (not on either coast for instance), even making a modest income you could be wealthy. The key? Controlling spending and investing the savings.

What to do with a small windfall

2006-03-27T12:06:00.000-06:00

In the next week or so, I'll get a small (around $2,500) inheritance from my grandfather's estate. I'm torn over what to do with the money. The two ideas I'm looking at are:

Pay more on the credit card (balance - ~$12,000), OR
Increase emergency savings ( current balance - $2,500)

Paying down debt
If I put it towards the credit card, it would pay just over 20% of the balance. That's a big chunk towards retiring that debt. It would reduce the finance charges quite a bit, and at 20% interest, any little bit helps.

Emergency Savings
I have a rather large fear that something else will happen to my wife or me, and the rest of our already depleted emergency savings will be gone. If I put the inheritance in my emergency savings, it would double the account and be right at the 2.5 months of expenses. That's a much nicer cushion to have.

Other factors
We did our withholdings pretty well this past year, and are getting $500 back from the IRS. That will certainly go on the credit card (paying down about 5% of the balance). As I mentioned on Saturday, we cashed our remaining EE Series bonds and will pay $1,100 of that on the credit card. Added together, that's nearly a 15% reduction in the credit card balance.

What do you think?
I'd be interested in hearing what other people think on this. Is it better to add to emergency savings, or pay down high interest debt?

Transformation - Fitness

2006-03-27T08:05:00.000-06:00

As I said in my first post, I'm working on several transformational ideas. One of those is to be healthier. A couple of weeks ago, I covered stress, so now I'll cover exercise.

Men's Health magazine has several tips on their Transform Yourself pages, some of which are:

Keep Track - keep a journal or log of your day and you'll see that your day will probably go better on those days that you've exercised.
Short and Hard - cap your sessions at 30 minutes and work your whole body. You'll see a pretty fast increase in muscle mass. And increased muscle mass means that your body will burn fat better.
KISS - keep your workouts simple. You don't need to target heart rates or anything, just challenge your body more each session.

Be sure to check out the complete Transform Yourself Workout, complete with log. I'm going to start today!

Transformation update for the week

2006-03-25T20:09:00.000-06:00

Health Goals
Went nowhere weight wise this week. Early in the week I slipped on some ice and twisted my back a little. Much pain, little gain. I could barely take the stairs at work, and the stress led me to fall off the Mountain Dew wagon.

Financial Goals
We cashed in our remaining EE series savings bonds, and will put that on the credit card. Also applied for a new 0% interest on transfers card.

We also received our check cards from the bank. I plan to use mine only for gas for my car - I don't like to have to get a check approved every time I want to fill up. And cash doesn't last long in my pocket. So this seemed like a good way to eliminate charges for gas while still being convenient to use.

Today was bill paying day, which is both depressing and fun. I like doing the financial stuff, but will enjoy it more once our bigger debts are gone.

Husband Goals
We did quite a bit outside today, even with my sore back. Brought home 20 bags of cow manure from Wal-Mart and spread that on the flower beds and around the shrubs. Tomorrow, weather willing, I'll till the garden.

Next Saturday I'll be updating the progress measures on the left. Can't wait to run the numbers.

Is Negative Savings Bad?

2006-03-24T11:13:00.000-06:00

MSN Money has an article titled Is saving nothing a big deal? that raises some interesting points. Let's take a look at what experts interviewed in the article have to say.

That Americans have a negative savings rate is not in dispute. But Joel Naroff argues that spending wealth, like gains from an investment sale, skew the rate. He states that

The money I get from selling isn't income, it's wealth. I didn't earn it, I got it through my investments. If I spend that wealth, instead of having $10,000 in stock, I have $5,000. That means I have spent some of my wealth, not income. It's wealth I'm drawing down. It goes into spending but not income.

He argues that spending wealth is neither good nor bad - it's related to how you view the future. The biggest risk to the economy seems to be that spending wealth will not be able to be maintained (say when housing prices fall and the housing market cools) and consumer spending will fall along with it.

There seems to be some merit to that argument. If I sell a house and make a profit, taking out some of that money counts as spending, but not income (since, I believe, reported income is generally thought of as wages and salary). So if I spend wealth, my savings rate could be negative.

John Merrill, investment manager and founder of Tanglewood Capital Management in Houston looks at the question as one of how you measure your finances. If you look at your income statement, you may see a negative value at the end. But if you look at your balance sheet (your net worth). His take:

Are assets growing faster than liabilities? Then I'm worth more at the end of the year than at the beginning of the year. I'm making a net improvement. So what if I increase my leverage? I'm still better off than at the beginning of the year.

The risks here are increasing your debt to the point that making payments on it squeezes out spending for other things (like, say, your other bills). Economically, the more that goes to servicing debt, the less there is for consumer spending.

Tony Proctor, of Proctor Financial, sees another risk - leveraging houses to keep overspending. The risk here is that their lifestyles are too expensive to maintain into retirement. Housing prices may not go up forever, and sooner or later that spending will catch up with you. He also relates that many people just assume that they'll keep working into their 70s, but here too is a risk -

When you're 45 you're in the prime of your career and you're exactly the type of employee they want. By the time you're 60, you're lucky if you're not laid off. If you haven't taken a serious stance toward retirement savings, you're in trouble.

He suggests something that many, many financial bloggers suggest - saving at least 10% of your income. He doesn't count the emergency fund as savings, rather more like deferred spending.

What do you think? Is spending wealth the same as spending income? Why or why not?

Financial Education

2006-03-23T10:48:00.000-06:00

I'm a big fan of Morningstar's website. I like their portfolio tools better than MSN or Yahoo's, and I also like their columns and forums.

One of the best features is their Investing Education section. They offer free short courses on a wide range of topics, including stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and portfolio management. You earn credits in the courses which can be traded for stuff, like Morningstar books. I have two morningstar travel mugs (no longer offered on the site) that I earned by taking enough courses.

The courses range from the basics (like Funds 101: What is a mutual fund) to the more advanced (Funds 302: Building Your Mutual Fund Portfolio) to the really advanced (Funds 406: Sector-Fund Investing). After each course is a five question quiz. The courses are clear and concise, and I've learned a lot from them.

You will need to register on the site that take the courses, but basic registration (all that is required) is free.

Class in America

2006-03-23T08:28:00.000-06:00

I'm new to financial blogging (I guess that's what I'm doing), and am still looking around at a lot of different blogs. Yesterday I found The Financial Ladder and John's post on Social Class (that points to this special section on the New York Times website).

I couldn't find my exact job on the list so I used Geoscientist (which is close) and again with Computer Programmer (which is what I used to do). I scored around the 80th percentile. But more important than the silly test was the survey results on class in America.

Over half of the respondents thought that they had little or no chance to become wealthy. Over half! To me that is depressing. One of the great things about our country is (or maybe was) that everyone had a chance to become whatever they wanted, or at least had a shot at it. Whatever you may think of Bill Clinton, for example, you have to admit that his story is one of overcoming the odds and achieving success.

To be resigned to staying in a lower class must be a sad state. I came from a solidly middle class background, but 25 years ago I was an unemployed college dropout Army veteran with a new wife and a baby on the way. We could barely afford rent, so saving anything seemed hopeless.

But I found a job (having some college and Army training helped of course), and things got better. Our marriage did end some years later, but by that time we had a decent house and had started saving for retirement. All our neighbors were working hard to not just survive but to better themselves. Almost all dreamed of an even better life than they had at the time and felt it was achievable.

So what has changed? I believe it is our appetite for things, our rampant consumerism. I know 20 year olds working in food service that have big screen TVs and high end gaming rigs. They are spending money they haven't made yet, in effect mortgaging their future earnings on consumer goods that will wear out long before the debt is gone.

And it's not just young folks that do this. I have friends that are close to my age and are having to sell their house because they can no longer afford to make payments on it plus their other debts. These are not people who work in food service either, but well paid technical professionals.

As a nation, our spending is out of control, and it seems that the biggest casualty is hope for the future.

Financial Calendar - April

2006-03-22T12:10:00.000-06:00

Over on Morningstar.com, Sue Stevens has an article titled "Your 2006 Financial Calendar". The first quarter is all but over (and I've done the things on that list), which means that it's time to start on the second quarters things-to-do. The focus of the second quarter is defensive actions.

For April, that includes reviewing your insurance life and disability insurance needs.

Life Insurance

Most people need life insurance when their kids are little and they have a mortgage. If this describes you, compare the dollar amount of life insurance coverage you have to the cost of putting those tykes through college and paying off your mortgage.

Personally, I have life insurance through TIAA-CREF and am happy with the cost and coverage. So I think I'm covered there.

Disability Insurance

Bad backs, auto accidents, and a whole host of other things can happen that may prevent you from working.

Here's an uh-oh for me. I don't have disability coverage through work, so I need to call around and find some coverage. A typical policy will cover 2/3 of your salary. Since I have a lot of bills to pay, I had better make sure that I have this area covered.

Why I use Edward Jones

2006-03-22T08:49:00.000-06:00

Most financial bloggers that I read use a discount brokerage for their accounts. While I've toyed with this idea, I continue to use my local Edward Jones office for my investments (except for my 403(b)).

I do this for several reasons. First, I live in a small town (in fact it's a Micropolitan Area according to the Census Bureau) and am a big proponent of local businesses. Using local businesses helps to maintain the quality of life for our town. This includes everything from the first-rate fire and police departments to local theatre and the arts.

But, you may say, Edward Jones isn't really a local business. True and false. True in that the corporate offices are in St. Louis, and false in that the local office acts like a local business. The local branch supports local arts and is a downtown booster. In fact, from what I've seen, the local Edward Jones branch (actually there are two of them) do more to support the arts in town than the Bank of America branch does. He's a member of the Chamber of Commerce (as am I) and manages the money of the local community foundation. All that means a lot to me as a local booster.

Second, although trades cost more, I find that that is useful in keeping me from being a trader rather that an investor. I made a total of 3 stock trades last year but might have made more if the cost of the trades were very low. That might seem crazy, but it works for me.

Third, the rep works with me. I like being able to get face time with someone to "talk shop" about investments. I know that places like TD Waterhouse advertise that you can talk to someone there, but call me old-fashion, but I like to see who I'm talking to. He's also be quite willing to educate me on investing. He got me hooked on Morningstar.com among other sites and has provided me with reading suggestions for learning more. He got me excited, not to buy more stuff, but to learn about investing.

Lastly, my rep is very hands-off. He doesn't try to sell me stuff. In fact, many times after we've talked I've made no changes to my investments. We talk about goals and look at how my investments are doing, and we decide to stay the course. If he was a high-pressure sales type of guy, I doubt I'd still be with Jones.

I've still made bad investments, but made it through the tech stock bubble mostly intact due to the cautions issued by my rep.

Saving on Home Repair Bills

2006-03-21T11:56:00.000-06:00

After our old washing machine gave out, we shopped for a new one at our favorite store - local auctions. We found a fairly new Matag washer and paid only $40 for it. The auctioneer wasn't sure if it worked, but that the family had been using prior to moving.

Got it home and uh-oh, it didn't spin dry the clothes. Some checking on the Web and I found Repairclinic.com. They have a "RepairGuru" system that walks you through diagnosing your problem. Turned out to be a simple to replace part, which I could order right from the site. A few days later the part arrived and, using the information on the site, I installed the part in about a half an hour.

Total cost for a Matag washing machine - ~$60.00.

I've since used Repairclinic to diagnose a problem with our dishwasher, our refrigerator, and our dryer. The refrigerator wasn't fixable by me, but the others were, which saved a bundle on repair bills.

I highly recommend the site.

An easy, 3-step wealth score

2006-03-21T07:54:00.000-06:00

Another article on MSN Money has some measures for your personal wealth. The first is a simple 3-step calculation of a wealth ratio. The three steps are:

Add up your lifetime earnings. (You can use your Social Security benefits statement for this)
Calculate your net worth (you should be doing this anyway)
Divide your net worth by your lifetime earnings.

The ratio you get tells you what you have for your labor. For those starting out in the work world, the ratio should be between 0% and 25%. Those in mid career should have a ratio between 25% and 100%. If you're nearing retirement, the ratio should be somewhere in the 100%-200% range.

The article also has some interesting things to say about excuses that we might use to wave off a low ratio - say you don't make that much money for instance. Two economists, Steven Venti of Dartmouth and David Wise of Harvard, studied income and wealth using the same basic calculation. They found that income alone doesn't explain wealth disparities. Some low income families had managed to accumulate significant wealth, while some high income families had almost nothing to show for their earnings.

Think that your poor investments are another good excuse? Think again - they found that investment choices accounted for only 8% of the variations. In fact, according to the article, they found that

[t]hose who made it a priority to save built wealth, regardless of their income level, individual circumstances or choice of investments.

Once again, we see that savings are key to building wealth. So, save early and save often.

MSN Money Article on Wasting Money

2006-03-19T19:59:00.000-06:00

I'm slowly going through the articles on MSN Money, and came across this one on 14 money wasters. I won't go through all of them here, but have some comments on some of them.

DVDs by mail
I'm going to try Peerflix for a while and see how that goes. We don't watch that many movies, so even $15/month is more than we'd normally spend. Unlimited DVD rentals aren't that great if you only watch one or two movies a month.

Automatic Debits on Credit Cards
I don't really like this idea. I have some recurring bills for things I no longer use that still, after two years, are not cancelled completely (I just got an annual fee billed to me. Again). The problem is that you can't cancel them - the billing company must do that. And if they don't, well, too bad for you.

Organize
This comes through on several of the suggestions. Organize your library books so you don't have fines from late returns, tools and supplies, clothes that don't fit, etc. This is really good advise, and something that I'm working on as well. I didn't think about organization as a money saving technique though - that is an added incentive to clean up my act.

New Measure of "How I'm Doing"

2006-03-18T20:20:00.000-06:00

A couple of years ago I came across an article (I think it was in Smart Money) that talked about a personal "Wealth Index". You calculated it by taking the average net worth for your age and income and dividing that into your actual net worth. Average net worth is calculated by taking your age * your income / 10.

The average net worth for my age (43) and income ($47,000) would be $202,100. My Wealth Index then is .47 (94,206/202,100). I've set a modest (I hope) goal of raising that to .50 by the end of the year.

I've added that measure to my status indicators on the left.

Back to it

2006-03-18T19:56:00.000-06:00

After a nice vacation (our first in over a year), we're back at home. And that means it's time to get to work on this blog again.

We spent about $400 on our vacation, which we will pay for by cashing in a Series EE Savings Bond we have laying around. We have one other savings bond, and will use that to pay on the credit card.

Transformation Notes

Financial
I didn't follow the markets at all for a week, so it was a nice surprise to see that the week was a good on for our investments. We have a good chuck of our retirement savings in a TIAA-CREF 403(b) account from my last job. Most of that is in the Equity Index variable annuity, which takes care of the index portion of our investment plan. We also have a chunk on the Real Estate annuity. That annuity is different than most Real Estate investments in that the fund owns the properties rather than the stocks of development companies. I like it, and it has done well over the time I've owned it.

Husband
I spent quite a bit of time on our vacation with my wife's father and brother. It was fun to work on little things on our camper with them, and I think they enjoyed it as well. In the past, I've sort of spent the time just reading and laying around. I think this was much better.

Health
It's hard to eat healthy when someone else (like your mother-in-law) is doing the cooking, but with some portion control I think I managed to stay put weight-wise. I got some exercise working on the camper (lifting, climbing, bending, etc), but I'm not sure that it counts as much as a dedicated workout.

Slowing down for a while

2006-03-14T09:19:00.000-06:00

I'm at my in-laws for a week of vacation, so I won't be posting much for a few days. I'll get back to my transformation next week.

Becoming a Saver - Reprogramming Yourself

2006-03-10T14:42:00.000-06:00

I ran across an interesting article on the MSN Money site called Reprogram your mind to become a saver. I liked this bit:

Crash diets never work because dieters feel so hungry and deprived that they end up bingeing on food. Sometimes going on a diet can actually lead to a weight gain, as dieters go from eating grapefruit only to splurging on a pint of Häagen Dazs.

It's the same thing with saving. Set attainable goals and "have dessert once in a while," Munroe says.

So true. And it goes back to what others, like Kirby on Finance have been reminding us of lately. Too severe of budget and you'll end up rebelling against it. Just like we learned as kids, "slow and steady wins the race."

So keep your goals attainable and measurable. Instead of saying that you'd like to save more this year, set an dollar amount for your savings (measureable) that you can do without living like a hermit (attainable).

I'm taking that approach with several areas (the new self in My New Self) and think that I'll be able to succeed.

Summary of Week - Stress Reduction

2006-03-10T13:23:00.000-06:00

This week I tackled stress in my life. Well, tackled may be too strong of word. I addressed it anyway.

I listed my stressors and listed some steps to take to reduce their effects. So far, so good.

Some of the concrete steps that have already helped:

Developing a budget to work on the lack of emergency savings and too much credit card debt.
Cleaning up my work space
Continuing to work on portion control for meals and eating better
Limiting my late nights

These things will all take commitment to see through, but I'm sure I can do it.

Financial IQ

2006-03-09T09:05:00.000-06:00

Several financial bloggers have posted about the Scorelogix Financial IQ test. I took it and got a respectable 144, which makes me a financial star, whatever that entails. Just remember that Dogbert calls people "stars" as well. He says it's because there are a lot of them, and they aren't all that bright.

You can see how other folks did on the test:

You can take the test here.

Reverse Progress

2006-03-09T08:48:00.000-06:00

Had my weekly weigh-in yesterday morning. Gained a little weight back, but not enough to really move the progress bar on the left. I'll leave it for now and see where I'm at next week.

I'm trying to think of a way to measure some of my other goals, like being a better husband and father. I suppose those are pretty subjective areas, so I may not be able to quantify them. I guess I could come up with concrete things to do and measure that. I'll think about that some more, but any suggestions anyone has would be welcome.

Learning to Budget

2006-03-08T12:15:00.000-06:00

We've developed some bad habits over the years spending-wise. As I wrote a while back, about 7 years ago we were debt free, I had a good income, and life - in general - was good.

When I was making a much larger salary we never had to budget - I maxed out my 401(k), we had investment property that had tripled in value, and were able to do just about anything we wanted. We paid cash for a used Saab, had a new Explorer, the works.

Things are different now. The downturn in the tech industry didn't hurt us as bad as some of my friends (I never lost my job for instance), but the reduction in salaries that it brought did hurt.

So now, after racking up debts and seeing our savings shrink, we are learning to budget. I'm starting by keeping track of our expenses using Quicken. It came with my iBook, so it didn't cost extra to get, and it seems to do an Ok job. The first two months of this year were a little crazy, with a student loan coming in and some credit card debt being paid off, so it was hard to know what a normal month would look like.

This month should be different, and will give us a good picture (I hope) of a typical month. One thing that I noticed right off is that it's hard to divide up your expenses into fine grained buckets. So all the household expenses, like groceries, cleaning supplies, clothes, and pet food, get stuffed into the "household" category. That simplifies my record keeping and entry into Quicken. That leaves only a few other categories to sort expenses into, like medical, auto (gas and maintenance), utilities, and a few others.

On the income side, Quicken will allow you to enter your gross pay and set up your deductions, like tax withholdings and insurance. I didn't do that. Instead I entered my typical take-home pay. It makes the budget reporting much simpler and since we use an accountant to do our taxes (we own two little businesses on the side), tracking how much withholdings I have isn't really necessary.

Next will be the hard part - sticking to the budget. That test will come first next month.

Other Stressors - Get To Work!

2006-03-08T11:59:00.000-06:00

While my current job is great, my last one was, well, not so great. It set me behind where I should be financially, and emotionally it was awful.

Management changes made the last year or so a living hell, so I wised up and left. But some of the damage done is still causing stress. One example is that no matter how hard I work, I worry that it's just not enough. Let me explain.

At the last job I not only developed software, but we handled user support. Normally this wouldn't be a big deal, but here it turned in to a major headache. Our management even went so far as to tell the users that we, the developers, just sat around all day "doing nothing". Yikes.

So the scars are there, and in the 7 months I've been here they haven't fully healed. So almost every day I work and stress that what I'm doing isn't enough.

I suppose it's just something I have to work through. My six month review was stellar, so I really don't have anything to worry about.

But it does make me stressed.

Anti-Stress Plan

2006-03-07T09:00:00.000-06:00

Ok, I've made a list of things that are stressing me - I'm sure I'll think of more later. Now to come up with a plan to de-stressify.

Here are my stress areas from earlier along with a brief plan to tackle each one:

Credit Card Debt
I'm already working on this one. My plan is no more charges and paying $500/month on the card balance. I did take out a student loan (at 4.25%) to help defray the costs of graduate school. The part that I didn't use for tuition/books went on the cards.

No Emergency Savings
I'm working on this as well. I can save $150/month into our money market account to use as emergency funds. So far, I'm a little ahead on that, but will not back off any.

Not Enough Sleep
Until I wrote up the list, I hadn't really thought about this. I put in about 8.5 hours at work, and have a 1 hour commute each way. I'm also taking 4 hours worth of classes. To take on this area I'll start going to bed an hour earlier each night and see how I'm doing in a couple of weeks.

Overweight
I'm about 40 lbs over where I want to be, weight-wise. I am addressing this, but progress is slower. To help out, I'm going to stop drinking by beloved Mountain Dew. Cold Turkey. I just heard on NPR that eliminating sugary drinks can lead to an average of 1 pound of weight loss per month by itself. In one year, that's 12 pounds with no effort at all.

Messy
I addressed this in another post, but it still does stress me. I know that she likes a clean house, and frankly so do I when I think about it. I guess I've never been the neatest of guys, but am actively working on cleaning up my act. I took on my work area yesterday and got it all ready for action. Just straightening up my desk gave me a boost in my work, so that's a good positive reinforcement.

It looks like my initial plan was pretty close to the mark in dealing with my stressors. Perhaps I subconsciously knew what was bothering me even before I made out the list.

Take On Your Stress

2006-03-06T14:29:00.000-06:00

UPDATE: I've added some more to the "Change" list.

This week in my transformation, I'll be taking on the challenge from week 1 of the Men's Health Transform Yourself series and organizing my workspaces, both at the office and at home. I'll also be starting a new list of stressors. As per the article, I'll divide them into ACCEPT and CHANGE. Here's a first blush look at that list:

Accept

Thinning Hair
Aches And Pains Of Growing Older
Changes At Work
Long Commute

Change

Credit Card Debt
No Emergency Savings To Speak Of
Not Enough Sleep
Overweight
Messy

I'll work on this list some more and post an update sometime later.

Style for Less

2006-03-06T08:29:00.000-06:00

Unlike a lot of guys in my industry (I'm a software engineer), I like to dress well. I also don't like to spend a lot on clothes and so do a lot of shopping at thrift stores.

Just before Christmas I picked up a blue blazer and a tweed sports coat. The blazer was $6.00 and the sports coat (which was purchased later) cost me $1.10 during a pre-Christmas sale.

During that "everything a $1.10" sale at the Goodwill store, we picked up quite a few items. She got several tops and I got the sports coat and some new shirts.

"Thrifting" can be a lot of fun - for those who like to shop, it can satify that need and for those looking for a cheap way to update their wardrobe it can't be beat.

Looking Good

2006-03-05T15:02:00.000-06:00

So far my transformation plan is coming along nicely. Weight is down a bit and net worth is up a bit as well. It's good to make progress right off the bat, but I know it will be a long road.

On the relationship front things are going pretty good too. We had a good time last night taking in a movie, and spent this morning cleaning the place. It's fun to do stuff together, and we're enjoying our time together.

The rest of the day will just be a lazy-Sunday. Hope you all enjoy your end of the weekend as well.

New Sections

2006-03-03T13:59:00.000-06:00

I'm still working on the site and have made some small changes to the sidebar on the left. The first is a "Hotlist" of sites that I've written about this month. The idea is to keep those sites fresh in my mind.

The second change is a "How I'm Doing" section. I'll put charts in there for weight loss and net worth. Not sure how to measure if I'm making progress as a husband - probably don't want to post details of that.

Selling Clutter

2006-03-03T11:32:00.000-06:00

I've been an eBay-er for almost 5 years now, and have had some success with selling stuff I don't want anymore.

What I'm planning this summer is to attack clutter in the garage and see if eBay can't help me get some cash back for my, um, collection.

We like to go to auctions (real, live ones) and when you buy something at one it is usually in a box of other stuff. This leads to a rapid accumulation of things that you didn't really want, but also don't want to just throw away (after all, you did pay for them).

So those antique wrenches and other miscellaneous stuff are going online. That should help pay more on the credit card debt. It will also remove clutter from the garage, so it helps accomplish two of my goals - be neater and pay down debt.

Debt - Making Progress

2006-03-03T08:11:00.000-06:00

I was able to send off a $600 payment to American Express this month. The minimum was just over $200. Our interest rate is pretty high on our Amex due to a couple of screw-ups on my part last year - one was caused by a slight software malfunction in Quicken BillPay, the other was a misplaced statement. I'm hoping that we can get the rate dropped down this month.

On top of being able to make a payment much over the minimum, our only charges for this period (so far) are one gasoline fillup for me and some meds for our cats.

I've started filling up in the mornings at a station that we like that takes checks without getting pre-approval each time. Now if I can resist the urge to get a Mountain Dew when I go in to pay.

To save money on our pet stuff, we have started using 1-800-Petmeds for medicines for the cats. Our vet is the cheapest in town for office visits, but is still a bit higher than we can find online for medications. Buying online does seem to violate a rule we have to buy local when possible, but the savings were too great to pass up.

There's been quite a few folks blogging about the Microsoft personal finance tools. One that I found quite eye-opening was the spreadsheet that showed the effect of extra payments on loans.

Easy Grocery Savings

2006-03-02T19:40:00.000-06:00

If you have a Kroger grocery card you can "load" it up with coupons on the Kroger website. Much nicer than having to sort through coupons at the checkout.

We save several dollars each week just by using the card to get store specials so this should help even more.

Movie date

2006-03-02T16:05:00.000-06:00

We've made a date for this weekend to watch a movie together, probably one from the stack her mom gave us.

Free movie, a bag of popcorn, some fine Mountain Dew... we'll be living large.

Her favorite movie star is, get this, Jean Claude Van Damme. Me? I'm partial to Angelina Jolie. Ok, so film critics we're not, but movies should be fun. If you have to try to deconstruct the sub-text of a movie, you're doing something wrong.

Making new friends

2006-03-02T15:56:00.000-06:00

Wife and I need new friends. We've come to that realization. Or rather, we need friends, period. We used to live in the heart of a major city (Kansas City), and had friends over all the time.

We moved to a more rural area for family reasons, and left our friends behind. Since then we've made no real friends here. Part of the reason is that we work all the time - we don't really take time to socialize. Part of it is that there really aren't many folks with our interests to socialize with. I do have a chance to get involved with the local Rotary Club, which may open some doors to social activities.

We have been kicking around the idea of learning to play bridge and checking around for people to play cards with. I think she'd be happier if we did some social things.

Saving money on entertainment

2006-03-01T12:50:00.000-06:00

Do you enjoy reading books? Watching the latest DVD’s? Still spending $20 for a book? $3 to rent a movie? $20 to buy a dvd? Perhaps it’s time you checked out these two sites.

I just came across this post from A Penny Saved. As a Christmas present this year my mother-in-law gave us about 15 DVDs that she didn't want anymore and thought we might like. I really appreciated the gesture as she usually spends way too much on stuff that I don't need.

There were some keepers in the mix, but mostly they were movies that we just aren't interested in. Peerflix sounds like a great way to exchange those movies for some we might actually watch.

We have been ending up in two separate rooms in the evening, she in the bedroom watching TV and me in the study doing some reading. Maybe we'll have to make a date to meet in the living room for a movie night.

A Better Husband

2006-02-28T08:31:00.001-06:00

My wife and I have been married for 15 years now. We were both divorced when we met, and although some say that second marriages have trouble, ours is pretty strong. But there's still room for improvement in how I relate and treat my wife.

My goals for helping our relationship are pretty simple:

Help more around the house
Be a better listener
Include her in financial decisions

Help Around The House
I admit it, I'm basically a slob. I let her do the housework while I left disorder in my wake. I don't expect to change radically overnight, so I'm going to do baby steps.

I have already started to check the house before I go to bed to see if there is something I can straighten or clean up, like putting the newspaper in the recycle bin. Being a naturally messy person, this takes some work to remember to do, but I'm finding that I like having the place neat.

Listen Better
My focus tends to drift when we're talking. Some people would say that it's a guy thing, but I reject that. I will show her that I care about her and what she has to say by actually listening to her when she tells me how her day went, or how she's feeling, or that she needs help with something.

Inclusive Decisions
For the past few years, I've made all the investment decisions. I enjoy it, and she doesn't, and we've been Ok with that. But I worry that if something should happen to me she wouldn't know where we stand financially. Later this month we'll go over the financial plan I've written and I'll see if she has any suggestions.

We may be unusual, but we rarely if ever fight about money. In fact, we rarely talk about it at all. She just assumes that I've got it taken care of. I want her to know that I do (or will) but that her input is important to me.

A New Fiscal Me

2006-02-27T13:32:00.000-06:00

Once upon a time, a mere 7 years ago, we were debt free. Oh, how times change. Why did they change? Well, we had dreams of starting a little farmers market operation, complete with organic veggies and natural honey.

We mortgaged our house and plunged in. Turns out, we didn't have what it takes to do all that. But the debt remained, and only got worse as we slid into bad spending habits. The icing on the cake, so-to-speak, was last year when my wife became sick. I mean very sick. Big medical bills kind of sick. Even with insurance it nearly wiped out our savings and led to record (for us) credit card debts.

We are in a better position than some - we have an overall positive net worth of about $93,000. But we have $12,000 in credit card debt, a mortgage, a loan on our camper (our idea of recreation), student loans from graduate school, and other misc. debt. Overall our debts are about $120,000.

What I've done to fix this problem is to sit down and work out our balance sheet to see where we are, worked with my wife to establish a budget, wrote a formal financial plan for us to see where we are going, and started paying off debts a little at a time.

We are on our way to hopefully eliminate our credit card debt this year, then start on other debts. I'll post monthly updates of our progress here. Hopefully our experiences will help others in a similar situation.

A Better Dad

2006-02-27T11:49:00.000-06:00

My son is now almost 22 years old. During those years, he's accomplished a lot that I'm proud of, but I feel as though I missed much of those good things by being too busy, or too distant emotionally. My own father died when I was still a toddler, so I didn't have a lot of first hand knowledge of what it meant to be a dad. Still, better late than never they say.

My goals for being a better dad this year are:

Be more involved in his life and his interests
Spend more time doing Father and Son type stuff

Be More Involved
He, like most twenty-ish young men, is big into gaming. I have started keeping an eye on what is going on in the gaming world so that I can relate to him better. Heck, back in the day, I was big into D&D and other role playing games, so I understand some of the allure he feels.

Father and Son Time
We live near a fair sized city with several minor league sports teams, like hockey and baseball. We've missed a good share of the hockey season, but I'm going to try to take him to some baseball games this year. My grandfather taught me to score a game, so I'll see about passing that skill on to my son.

A Healthier Me

2006-02-27T11:38:00.000-06:00

When I was younger, I was very physically active. Even into my thirties, I biked regularly and went to the gym. In the last few years I've sort of let myself go though.

It started with a move to a new job in a new city. I no longer had access to a nice bike trail, and discovered that I didn't really like riding on the rural roads near my house. Then I started on a medication that resulted in weight gain - 40 lbs in just under two years. Those two factors added up to trouble.

My health goals this year are:

improve my fitness to the point that I can take part in a 5K fun-run style race by the end of the year, and
lose that 40 pounds

Fortunately, my wife has bought into those goals, and we are eating much better than we have in the past few years. I'm also finding that portion control is one of the best, most important things you can do to lose weight.

I can't afford a bike right now (there will be more on my financial transformation later), but I do have a gym membership. I struggle with finding time during the week to go (I have an hour commute each way to my newest job), but have set a goal to hit the weights twice a week and to walk more every day.

Total weight loss since January 2006 - 10 lbs.

First Post!

2006-02-27T11:18:00.000-06:00

I guess I needed to start my own blog to get the elusive "first post", so here goes.

Men's Health magazine started the year off with a 5 week "transform yourself" program. It covered health, stress, and sex, and was pretty interesting. It also started me thinking, what else could I "transform" about myself? I can up with a list of things, and will post here to keep myself honest on how I'm doing.

Here's my list, in no particular order:

Be healthier
Be a more active father
Be a more active husband
Improve our finances

In later posts, I'll detail what I intend to do about the things on my list to transform myself.