About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag
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June 11, 2009
Here’s a new one on me. I slipped on scheduling my Chase credit card payment due to a number of excuses that just don’t matter. The due date was the 9th, and it wasn’t until a day later that I realized that I couldn’t remember paying the bill! I went back and forth with myself, checking banking and bill pay records to make sure it wasn’t just a glitch in my mental matrix.
*ugh* Nope, no record of paying it.
I quickly hopped online, made the necessary transfers to my checking account, and paid the bill, all the while, kicking myself and muttering under my breath about fools being parted from their planners.
In the follow-up phone call to the company to check the potential late fee and finance charge damage, I recalled that the balance due had never showed up in Yodlee. [Full disclosure, I’d been mucking about with my Chase account online and had signed on a number of times in the last two weeks so I knew the due date, it just got lost amidst the meetings, conference calls, and job applications.] I mentioned that I didn’t recall seeing any minimum payment amount listed online, was that just a glitch?
The customer service rep said that for some accounts, they weren’t requiring a minimum payment and that meant there’d be no late fee. [That’s really odd.] He also said that there would only be finance charges for the time elapsed between the due and payment dates, but he was sure that it’d be waived because of my activity history.
Chase was roundly berated earlier this year for charging $10 monthly service fees, and had to refund millions, but I had no idea that this other practice of not charging minimums even existed. Of course, the rep said not to count on it because he didn’t know what the rules were regulating the exceptions. That just makes me think he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
Has anyone else seen this before? Heard of it?
June 9, 2009
It’s June 9th.
I still haven’t gotten feedback or follow-up from the place I really really want to hear from, and I have a couple anemic freelance options to consider.
One is a lock but it’s just a favor for a family friend, a one-off deal that I could probably complete in a solid week.
The other is something I really don’t want because it’s going to a huge mess to navigate (workload + politics — TONS of politics) but it may come down to that or unemployment. I’d rather put off the latter for a while longer if there’s a solid financial advantage to making this commitment. We’re in talks this week. A very “we’ll see” situation.
I’ve done my best to keep maintain Zen-mode since the end of last month but it’s slipping from my grasp like a wiggly water toy you play with at the Discovery Channel Store.
The delicate fabric of that calm is revealed when those closest to me ask the most innocent questions about my plans or job situation. It feels something like a vise of atmospheric pressure closing in, reminding me that I still haven’t got my life ordered properly and by the way, young lady, what do you intend to do with your life when you grow up? I’m not sure which movie character menacingly delivers that line, but I’m properly chastised/chagrined every time.
No answer, I’m afraid. But I’ll repair the bastions of calm and move along my day. Trying not to fret too much about the terrifying maw of a completely unscheduled life after a date three weeks into the future.
Strange. Writing about it is rather calming.
J. Money’s having a giveaway at Budgets are Sexy for three Amazon gift cards ($50, $30, and $20). I’d like y’all to head on over there and cast your votes for me.
Really.
I need a win here, people.
š
June 4, 2009
Every time I get set in my financial plan, I turn my mind one-quarter turn to the right and find myself seeing it in a slightly, or wholly, different way. That change of focus is, in many cases, a good thing.
So … I thought I had too much cash? No, not really, it was more like I finally realized that my previous worrying was excessive. Not unjustified, just rather obsessive. I am a slightly obsessive personality. Normally, I vent, develop a game plan, set the course and go! This time, I tinkered with the game plan, started off and kept second, third, and fiftieth guessing myself. For months. No wonder I was going slightly mad.
No small part of that is that there’s enough uncertainty in the job market, aside from the rather certain rejections I’ve had, to keep me guessing about how confident I should be.
More, reading articles about folks who planned well, saved, and still couldn’t find a job after months and even years of pounding the pavement catalyzed panic mode. I could literally taste my every fear coming to life: of following my family’s footsteps into unemployment and drudgery, of being the last bastion of support, and spiraling into financial and health failures … just like they did.
That’s one reason I haven’t even mentioned the layoff date to my family. I have no answers for them, other than unemployment +savings, and I can’t even mention the savings because my lousy brother will take that as an excuse to coast even more. The irony, of course, is that I’m hiding a major life event from my family that I support and still live with, yet I still haven’t forgiven my dad for lying to me about his job losses and indebtedness.
After spinning my mental wheels for a while, that steam wears out and leads to more productive thinking like, I can probably take a little of that stash and start investing now. I know that I haven’t maxed out either of my retirement vehicles yet, but with a dwindling income stream, I’d prefer not to lock up any more cash in the 403(b)/401(a)/Roth.
I’ve been wanting to buy some dividend stocks for years. Not on a grand scale. But what am I waiting for? Someone to take my hand and lead me through it? That’s not how I operate and that’s definitely not how I learn. I can read all I want about the schools of thought behind investing, but what I want is basic: to create income and protect assets. I’m looking for dividends and lower prices for companies that are basic and sound.
The temptation is to do it up big: throw five grand in the pot and create a diversified portfolio right from the get-go. But that dips far too heavily into the emergency pot for something that is essentially a business venture, non-essential, and a bit of an analgesic for the financial fear that swamps my common sense every so often.
So! The plan: open up an account with TradeKing using a referral from Sun at The Sun’s Financial Diary, deposit $1000, and buy some stocks. And hold them. No day trader am I.
Simple. Quick, except for setting up the ACH transfer capability which has always seemed rather primitive to me. Easy.
It’s all about finding the comfortable zone between being ultra-safe and taking some risks. I’m not going to get anywhere by stashing all my money in retirement accounts and CDs, nor will I throw caution to the wind. It’s just time to get in the game. More importantly, it’s time to work on things I can do.
June 3, 2009
Remember how happy I was when I finally rolled over my Rollover IRA?
The pure joy may perhaps be less than obvious, but it was there, I promise. About three weeks after that happy occasion, I received Another Statement from my former brokerage. Wha?
Two cents. A dividend of two cents paid out into the account that was safely and finally closed, keeping it open. Then Chase, in their ongoing brand conversion, opened up a brokerage account for me funded by those two cents. I could just imagine trying to do something with that two cents and being charged another annual service fee. AUGH.
Grumpiness and inertia kept me from doing a darn thing about it until I received a Welcome to Our Brokerage Services! letter yesterday, complete with account number and phone number.
A few minutes later, a friendly fellow with Chase Brokerage services ran a solution by me: write off the two cents and close the account. Yes!! Thank you. They can have that two cents if it means one less account for me to deal with.
June 2, 2009
Blissfully Domestic is giving away one lovely Vivianne Tam HP Mini from Intel.
I hadn’t admitted it here yet, but I’ve been ogling Minis wherever I see them, and have firmly slapped my own wrist a number of times for wanting to pet them … and then own one! Especially since my new laptop from December would be decidedly jealous if I actually went out and purchased a travel sized. But winning one in a contest would be A-ok!
The contest ends at 11:59 PM on Monday, June 8, 2009. One winner will be chosen via Random.org. Please read the official contest rules here.
- I’m getting better at this cooking thing. Dinner creation: sole, quinoa cooked in a rice-like fashion, and lemon butter haricot verts! [Right, green beans. But the schmancy packaging said haricot verts.]
- And I made a luscious lobster macaroni and cheese, which I forgot to capture on digi-film because we dug in so quickly. It might even be better than my last favorite mac’n’cheese incarnation. I can think of a few changes I’d make to it, though.
- We saw UP this weekend. It was so good. Very cute, moving, a little sad (yes, I teared up), but very good.
- New shoes, 35% off, filed under budget-cheat because they were a gift. They won’t be the multi-purpose walking/casual shoes I was really looking for, but that’s ok because these 993s hug my heels and support them like a good friend. And yes, 35% off is hardly my style when the shoes still ring up to $95, so I can only take my solace in knowing that we clocked in the world’s shortest shoe shopping expedition. Walked in, looked at the wall for a minute, pointed at the ones I wanted. Not counting the time it took Dorky Sales Guy to find the shoes, the selection and decision process took 7 minutes, tops.
- New 1/2 sleeve button down shirt for work, on sale and another 20% off because the shirt was missing a button. Silly people: the shirt comes with an extra button! But of course no big-box retailer is going to pay their employees to sew on a button to save $5. So I will! Thank you.
- And my PF blogger win? We sprung for the 3-D tickets because it was an earlier showing. We used premium movie passes worth $10.50 each, and paid the 3-D surcharge ($5) with a gift card. Total: $26.50. I’m not sure what kind of math they were using for that, though, because 21+5=$26. Except we got to the theatre a little late and the place was packed to the rafters; the only empty seats were in the front row. We’re too old for that nonsense, so we went to Customer Service to exchange the tickets for a later, non 3-D showing. I offered the CS rep our gift card to replenish with $5, and waited. And waited. And waited some more. I could see he was having trouble, at one point fumbling with his own wallet, and I started to grin evilly.
I had no intention of causing trouble for the poor guy, I was just trying to save him the use of a new gift card! But, evidently, as the sweat beads formed on his forehead, I realized he didn’t know how or simply couldn’t add the $5 to the card. He returned with two tickets in hand for the later showing, a free movie voucher card, and said “it’ll be just a minute.” My friend was happy, willing to walk away with the free movie voucher which was worth another $9.50. I, however, stood firm. If nothing else, I insisted, he had to return with the gift card – we still have $5 on that thing and that’s cash value! I don’t care if the value of the voucher was almost equal to the $10 in GC that he owed, I expected that gift card with $5 back. Friend thought I was pushing it, I simply smiled and shooed him off.
Five minutes later, the discombobulated fellow returned, flush with apology, another free movie pass, and the original gift card. I graciously told him not to worry about it, confirmed that the gift card still had the remaining $5 on it, and walked away with two free movie tickets, worth $10 each, in exchange for the “loss” of a $5 value on the gift card.
I could probably have suggested that he simply load up a new card, but that would have been pushing it. He needed to towel off as it was. š
