July 11, 2008

Basic liquidity error

Wachovia has a 7 month CD at 4% APY and a 12 month CD for 4.25%. That’s a good percent above my highest earning savings account, so I was about to commit to the 7 month CD last night.

Then I realized:

1. It’s a minimum $5000 deposit.
2. You must have a Wachovia checking account.
3. My E-fund is 5 months’ worth of expenses. If I lock up a third of it for a maturity date of 7 months from now, I’ve got a rather large gap of time that’s not covered by cash in hand. It’s not that I couldn’t break the CD, but I would lose at least half of the interest earned. That would completely defeat the purpose of having it in there to earn more money.

It’s best that I hold off on this until the job situation is settled one way or another. But perhaps this CD will be helpful for someone else!

July 10, 2008

Down payment progress

Yay, I was able to add another $27.50 to my DP fund. Some old posts were approved and paid for recently. I really like this idea of saving for two goals from one source of income, and alternating between the two.

$100 increments are satisfying enough that I feel like I’m making progress but not so much that I feel stuck in one gear for too long.

July 9, 2008

Saving $40 a month on cable

My cable rate was up to $40/month for the past 6 months. When averaged against the other 12 months of the 18 month contract, it wasn’t a terrible price but then again, 18 months ago, I envisioned that I would be in a very different financial position.

Knowing that, I decided to cancel the cable service as soon as it was up. It’s not like I even know how to work our television anymore, anyway, so no great loss to me. On the phone with Dish Network, the CSR started asking me a couple of questions about why I was canceling and I took a minute to explain that I don’t spend that much time watching tv (er, none?) and that I wasn’t very pleased with the service quality.

He offered me a service with about ten channels for $10/month, and I was about to thank him and decline when he said, “for free for six months. Try it, and if you like it, it’ll only be ten dollars a month after that.”
Uh…. six months? Free?
Yes. Yes, six months free with some of my favorite channels (Food Network, History Channel, Discovery Channel) and he’s waiving the $5 local channels fee that I was protesting many moons ago. For life. He waived the local channel fee for life. Hum.

So, free cable for six months. Ok, why not?

Since we’re only a few days into the current billing cycle, he’ll apply it to this one, which means I can cross a $40 bill off my list of bills for the month.

And I might want to figure out how to work the durned tv.

July 8, 2008

Walgreens rebates online!

My preference for Rite-Aid rebates, despite rarely going there since I don’t live near one, was always because I could easily submit the rebates online. Now we can submit our Walgreens rebates online as well!

Thanks to Kacie:

I just tried it out, and it was pretty easy. Go to Walgreens.com, click the EasySaver catalog button and click “claim rebates.” You’ll have to register for an account, but it doesn’t take much time.

You’ll enter a unique code from your receipt to show that you’ve purchased an item that generates a rebate.



July 1, 2008

My non-windfall money, reorganizing

(ie: Supplemental income)

Ahhh, yes. My second income “make-up” check has come in, and I’ve divvied it up.

Originally this was going to be the All Responsibility Check: 20% to savings and 30% for taxes. Since I’m struggling with cash flow, I took 5% of it from the savings allotment and put it that in the expense account. I might as well. If I run short and have to dip into the emergency fund, I’ll just be really annoyed and I have a policy against dipping anyway. As Sistah Ant and I discussed once, it seems like a slippery slope to tread, dipping into the e-fund for non-emergencies.

I’ve an abundance of Citi and ED savings accounts but they’re all being used for specific purposes (Travel, Car/House Maintenance, easier access E-fund, expenses, Car Insurance), so I’ve finally returned to my old ING Direct account to hold my tax savings. That money is just going to be sitting there until next April, so I want it out of sight. Even better, ING is offering a 3% APY rate, so it’s actually doing better than ED.

I’m considering moving my entire emergency fund over to ING, actually, since it’s a fairly substantial amount. I think the Car/House Maintenance and Car Insurance funds can also be moved because those expenses won’t crop up so suddenly that I can’t wait a few days to transfer the money from ING.
Oh, and I still need a Moving fund; it’d be nice to have most of the sub-accounts in one place.

*thinking ….*

June 26, 2008

Ach, I’m one of THOSE people now

Boston Gal’s posting of this WSJ article about folks who are cutting back on their retirement savings made me feel guilty.

I know that I had a perfectly good reason for doing it, but it still stings that not only did I cut down, massively, on contributions, my account keeps dropping like a rock and doesn’t even reflect the amount of contributions I’ve been making since the beginning of the year. At this rate, I’ll never crack $25,000! [I’m not talking about overall, just between the 401(a) and 403(b).]

Ok, that’s not guilt I’m feeling, I’m just disheartened.

The important things to remember:

1. The reduction is temporary. It does not affect my match because I’m maxing out the 401(a) which is the only account that is matched.
2. Finances have to be flexible to accommodate when life happens. Obstacles are inevitable, and stubbornly stashing hefty amounts in my retirement fund while cash flow suffers does not make sense.
3. I’m simultaneously working on reducing all expenses so as to narrow the gap between expenses and income. This reinforces the temporariness of this solution. I’d like to see the gap closed in a matter of months, but it’ll take some more mathing, when I have time.

June 24, 2008

Wee bright spots

Happily, two bits of great news: I got confirmation from a friend that I can use his lodgings for my trip to San Diego this July. A couple friends will be joining me, and normally that would require a hotel room for them, costing about $130 for a motel that’s none too near our destination. This is a great convenience! I have to find something cool for him there, or think of something cool to give him. I don’t know what to give a man who can afford to live in NYC and maintain a condo in downtown San Diego, though. Any ideas?

The other thing is the truck registration was unexpectedly $12 cheaper! I went online to pay the bill today, and noticed the reduced price. It’s nearly enough to offset the increased airfare. Yay!

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