June 12, 2007

Will I EVER learn from my mistakes?

How many times do I have to make the same mistake before I actually learn from it? I do not trust my brother’s financial sense in the least. After all, he acts like he’s got none. I’ve been really good about not trusting him and he knows it, therefore he has to toe the line with me that he completely ignores in his dealings with our parents. At my parents’ behest, 23 months ago, I bought a truck for the family’s use with the understanding that he would pay the monthly bill and the insurance. It was his last chance to repair our financial relationship, after his years of financial transgressions that I’d bailed him out of.

So what did I do? After 20 months of agonizing over how long he’s going to stay on good behavior and pay his monthly bill to me for the car and insurance, after worrying that I’m going to be stiffed with the car bill because I just don’t know that he’s going to maintain a stable job, I went and made the same idiotic mistake of trusting him, with money.

I knew that he and my parents could not do business together, I knew that I would be forced into the position of peacemaker and dealbroker which I don’t have time for, and I knew that I’d be taking a huge risk of losing that money. Given those odds, didn’t that sound like my answer should have been “No no NO! Bloody no!”? Shouldn’t it have? Every instinct in my mind screamed no! But I didn’t listen. Because ….

1. He came to my parents proposing that they work together. He had been working on his own business for about a year with moderate success, and he thought this would be a good way for them to make some money without doing much work.

2. PaDucky came to me asking that I put up the stake because they couldn’t get it elsewhere and this was a chance at financial independence for everyone.

I desperately wanted my family to start functioning normally again, and I thought that my brother had been doing this on his own for about a year with moderate success already, so wasn’t this a history of having learnt his lesson and all? After some long thought, and with deep misgivings, I said yes. Conditionally, of course, that no single party would make any decisions on their own – all business decisions had to be made in group meetings. And he had a friend/partner who was supposed to keep tabs on the cash flow part of the business, and be his check & balance.

What an idiot I was. What an utter absolute idiot. As predicted, within weeks of their working together, everything fell apart and I’m left as go-between, as peacemaker, and one completely frustrated-to-smithereens loan originator, and kicking myself every single day for making such an idiotic decision. I can’t even express how deeply angry I am at everyone involved, either, because I have to focus on being the peacemaker go-between to make sure that I get as much of that money back as possible as my brother is still working on it, on his own. He’s made one of 7 scheduled payments, missed one, and I’m still trying to get a straight answer about the next one.

I’d used my BT money to make the loan, which gave me a year-long loan of interest free money. I had initially intended to put that money into a high interest savings account and earn my $50 interest a month. I should have done and found another way to support my family. Instead, I have to consider what to do at the end of 12 months when and if he doesn’t pay me back in full. Right now, I have enough in my savings to pay it off completely when the time comes, but that will utterly wipe me out. All that I’ve saved, everything I’ve worked so hard for, scrimped and saved for over the last 2.5 years, gone.

I’ve been trying to make my peace with that. After all, I was the idiot who ultimately decided to go out on this limb in the first place without really truly considering the dire circumstances. I couldn’t even say that even if I have no emergency money, I would at least be debt-free. Because I’d still have that car note. I have one investment that will pay out in a couple more years, but other than that, I’d be back to zero.

This lesson is particularly painful because, well, I was an idiot. I didn’t even really seriously think: Can I pay this off entirely, by myself, if he doesn’t pay up? Every single day, I ponder how much this, losing my life savings because I made a really stupid decision, is going to suck.

And I can’t even guarantee this’ll never happen again. Not even after I collect whatever I can collect. Just because I’ve learned from this lesson doesn’t mean that they won’t need me to help them again and I need to gauge what help I can give vs. what help I should give. I have to understand that my family is collectively financially unsavvy and peculiarly waterproofed against my attempts at helping them make better long-term decisions. So I have to be even more careful not to follow their well-intentioned paths to ruin, again. I can’t keep starting over because of them.

There. My blogging head has been in the sand for a while now because of this. I actually still don’t feel much better for having “said” it aloud. I hoped that I would, but I don’t. It’s like admitting out loud that you kick puppies, or something like that. I did a stupid thing and I’m paying for it.

I definitely need alternate streams of income.

And boy, do I ever hate that it’s so much quicker and easier to get into trouble than it is to get out of it!

May 10, 2007

What if you had a year to live?

What if you were getting older, and were told you only had a year left? What would you do differently? “Live like you were dying” as Timmy McGraw says?

What a twisted opportunity that presents. You’ve got nothing to lose living life to the fullest, and enjoying your hard-earned savings, right? As all of us ponder, from time to time, what’s the point if you’re not enjoying life? We talk about how aggressively we should save simply because we just don’t know what’s going to happen next, and we don’t want to be caught short in retirement. And that’s a valid point. But what if you knew you only had a year to live? Sorta boils down the questions, doesn’t it?

Perhaps. Or you could be this guywho was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and “quit his job, sold or gave away nearly all his possessions, stopped paying his mortgage and spent his savings dining out and going on holiday.” He then finds out that his diagnosed cancer was actually “no more than a non-life threatening inflammation of the pancreas.”

Oh, the irony! Still, in time-honored tradition, he feels “really pleased that” he’s “got a second chance in life… but if you haven’t got no money after all this, which is my fault — I spent it all — they should pay something back. If he can’t get compensation, he is considering selling his house or suing the hospital that diagnosed him. The hospital has said that while it sympathizes with Brandrick, a review of his case showed no different diagnosis would have been made.”

(Wait, I thought this guy was a Brit, are they as sue-happy as we Americans are? He admits it was his fault for spending it all, but yet the hospital is still responsible for his spending spree. But if he’d really had cancer, they’d be responsible if he hadn’t had a chance to enjoy life, if he had been misdiagnosed with the inflammation of the pancreas. They really can’t win for losin’.)

I notice that it doesn’t mention that he spent anything on cancer treatments, though. I guess he was going to let nature run its course? Of course it sucks that he had to think he was dying, but goodness, did he have to spend himself silly? I can’t help but think that if he’d considered making a will to distribute something to those he was leaving behind or even a worthy charity to receive his wealth after he passed, he wouldn’t be in quite such dire straits: “Brandrick was left with little more than the black suit, white shirt and red tie that he had planned to be buried in…”

Not that he was obligated to leave anything behind, but I’m just sayin’. Charity can still pay off, even if you’re dying. Or not dying.

Moral of the story? Don’t be so quick to believe everything doctors tell you, they’re not infallible. You might end up living.

April 30, 2007

Open Mouth, Insert Foot

You may recall, good readers, that I brunched and spent time with the friends last weekend. I might have mentioned, also, that we’re all at different places in our financial lives. Purtroppo (unfortunately), I forgot that one of the girls I could always rely on to be a fellow starving-college-student budgeteer is now working a real job with real pay and … is living on her own with no dependents.

As she lamented her recent weight loss but not in the *ahem* assets, that made a $150 dress fit perfectly but for one key area, I said, “Hey, it’s a good thing you can’t fit into a dress you can’t afford anyway, right?”

Friend: “Of course I can afford it.”

*thwomp* Now where did my foot go…? Ahh… yes.

February 26, 2007

It’s the principle of the matter, United

I took a moment to check my credit card billing statement for the CitiPremierPass that I used to buy all my airfare for this trip, and lo and behold I was charged two fees for booking an award flight!

The first item shows the correct flight information and a $5 charge. The second shows dummy flight information, an incorrect departure date, and a $50 charge. Since I booked 12 days before the departure, the $50 charge would be right (exhorbitant for an award flight, but it’s according to their new rules), but I was under the impression that the charge was inclusive, security, tax, extra lunch money, extortion overhead, whatever.

The customer representative I’m on hold with claims that the $5 fee is the security fee, and the $50 charge is the correct service fee IN ADDITION TO the security fee. I’ve booked many an award ticket with plenty of lead time and there’s always been a $5 charge, but to charge a total of $55 for an award ticket is bad business IMO.

Chalk another chunk o’ change up in the “costs of emergency, last-minute travel” category.

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