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Archive for September, 2007

Company match

September 29th, 2007 at 11:58 pm

Well good news, I am 1 year on my job now so I am getting company match to my 403B; they match 3% to my 2% contribution. Also I am receiving an additional 6% whether I contribute or not, so it's like receiving an instant 9% raise in addition to my annual pay raise of 6%. A total of additional 15% pay is not bad. Here are some new numbers(since May):


DEBT:

Student Loan: $10,596.70 down 1.65%
Credit Card: $7969.63 down 10.4%
Auto Loan: $10146.88 down 17.6%

ASSETS:

Savings $2835 up 26.6%
Roth IRA $3302.85 up 22.4%
Individual stocks $2,070.82 up 2.1%
403B $3695 up 110%


The value of that Roth has increased by 50% over the past year even though I have not contributed a penny. I'm wondering if just ignoring that in favor of my 403B is the right thing to do since it's doing so well.

Grandma was right. (He just doesn't get it)

September 16th, 2007 at 11:50 pm

When I got married almost 18 years ago, my grandmother pulled me to the side and whispered to me "Whatever you do, don't put your money with his. Keep your money separate, provide for your own future and handle your own business. I never did believe in relying on a man to take care of you."

Needless to say I was a little shocked by grandma's advice. For a newlywed with stars in her eyes, it sounded like the opposite of what someone trying to build a partnership and a new life with her One True Love should do. I decided in all of my 20-year old wisdom to ignore her. After all, she and my grandfather were only married for 50 years, she was old and what did she know? Unfortunately, she was right. Even more unfortunately by the time I figured it out a couple of years later, she had already died. *sigh*

What inspired this? Well I was discussing with my husband what our plan should be to help our daughter with college expenses in 4 short years from now. His plan? To dip into his retirement to pay for it. The convo went like this:


ME: "You're going to use your retirement? That money is supposed to take care of you in your old age. Who's supposed to take care of you if you spend it all now? Me?"

HIM: "No. I'm not really planning to retire. I'm just going to keep working."

ME: "You do realize that you're not invincible, don't you? You could get sick, and then you wouldn't be able to work. And there's always the possiblity you might die, sooner than later. You have to do right by the kids and me."

HIM: Blank stare.


At least twice a year, he mentions using his retirement money to pay for some bills or more recently to pay for our failed air conditioning and now this. All because he doesn't want to stop spending money on crap, pay off his $33,000 in credit card debt and save his money. He just doesn't get it but fortunately I do...finally. Thanks, Grandma.


What's the point?

September 14th, 2007 at 11:29 pm

A friend was teasing me about my hobby of chasing freebies and cashback. According to her, shopping through sites like Fatwallet and always paying with my credit card isn't really worth it. I disagree. I won't get rich doing this, it is a hobby after all but it's fun and more importantly, it's a way of spending my money that insures I am getting the best value for my dollar. I had applied this way of thinking 10 years ago, I wouldn't be in debt now and I'd be a lot wealthier. So for fun, I've decided to keep a running tally of money and items earned through cashback, surveys, fatwallet, trial offers, Mypoints, etc. It'll be under the About Me section. If I must say so, I don't think I've done so bad in the past 6 weeks!