Weekend Roundup: January 27, 2012

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It’s been a couple of weeks so I thought I’d share some of the favorite blog posts I’ve read recently as well as some of the carnivals I’ve participated in.

Hope you have a great weekend!

Thanks for reading! Please subscribe to my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, or check out my Facebook page. This original Money Beagle post Copyright 2012 Money Beagle is authorized to appear only on www.moneybeagle.com. Thank you for reading and remember: It’s a great day to be alive!

I Should Have Known We Would Get Less Snow

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We moved into our house in 2007. Since then, the Metro Detroit area has had above average snowfalls every single season up until this winter.  Having had to shovel / snow blow the driveway over the past four years, I can definitely attest to the above average snowfalls.

This year, though, we’ve had virtually none, with one real snowfall to speak of just last weekend.  Before that, I hadn’t had to shovel the driveway once, let alone use the snowblower.

Thinking about it, I probably should have known that this would happen, since I put a significant upgrade into our driveway this past year.

Ever since we’ve moved in, shoveling has proven to be a nuisance, because of uneven slabs in the driveway.  Over time, some of the slabs sunk or shifted, and it always happened that the higher edges were the path that I would be shoveling.

Inevitably, I’d be shoveling and the shovel would smack into the lip of the next slab.  This would result in the shovel jarring to a sudden stop, giving me a near hernia (I’ve already had two operations in my lifetime) and multiple curse words.

For the overall health of the driveway, I finally decided to get things fixed over the past summer.  I had the sunken slabs lifted by a professional company that drilled small holes into the offending slabs and lifted them by injecting a concrete slurry underneath.  I also had all of the joint cracks as well as a couple of cracks that have developed over the years professionally filled so that water does not get under the driveway.

Except for the sinking, the driveway is in pretty good shape.  There were just the couple of cracks, only a couple of chips here and there, and very little pockmarking across the surface.  A couple of the representatives for companies that gave us bids figured that we could easily get another 10-15 years of life by taking the steps that I outlined above.

So I did so.  And, after the slabs were raised and everything was done, the first thing I did was grab my snow shovel (never mind that temperatures were in the 60′s) and run it across the path of where I typically shovel.  Imagine my delight when the shovel didn’t hit any lips due to uneven slabs.

All the work cost roughly $1,000.  Some would argue that it’s a small price to pay for no snow.

I figure all it did was delay the inevitable, as I predict we’ll get our normal amount of snow, just crammed into a couple months.  If I’m right, I might be cussing about snow, but at least it won’t be due to the snow shovel getting knocked loose!

Thanks for reading! Please subscribe to my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, or check out my Facebook page. This original Money Beagle post Copyright 2012 Money Beagle is authorized to appear only on www.moneybeagle.com. Thank you for reading and remember: It’s a great day to be alive!

The Financials of Freelance

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Being a freelancer means you are your own boss. You can set your own schedule and work at your own pace. Even the amount of work that you take on is up to you. However, when it comes to setting up your finances around your new job, things aren’t as simple. Whether you are considering business loans or you want to use your savings to get started, you need to know just how money works for freelancers.

What is Your Cost of Living?

Business loans can make the transition to freelance work easier but you still need some idea of what it costs to live. Add up all of your monthly bills. This includes your mortgage, your car payment and even your utilities. These are things that you probably can’t live without.

Once you have a roof over your head and electricity, you still need money for food, clothing and gas. Entertainment expenses should also be included, but remember that this is a category of spending that may have to go if you aren’t making enough money.

Remember that medical insurance isn’t usually offered in freelance positions. Because you are an independent contractor, you are not a full time employee for any company. This means no medical benefits, no retirement fund and no special savings plans. These expenses and investments will need to come straight out of your pocket.

The total of all of these things added together is the amount of money that you will need to come up with each month to make sure that you are taken care of. Business loans make this transition easier as they make up for the lack of income as you get things started. At some point, you will need to be able to support yourself and make enough money to begin to pay the loan back.

How Do You Handle the Ups and Downs of Income?

Consistent income isn’t always a possibility in freelance work. You can end up having a sizable income one month and not being able to pay the bills the next. While your goal is to find work that is consistent, with steady pay, this isn’t always a possibility. You have to plan for the good and bad months.

When extra money comes in, move it straight to the savings account. You will be tempted to spend it and celebrate your success. Celebrate in moderation. The next month, things could take a turn for the worst. For the first few years, your savings account could end up being a lifesaver.

As slow months approach, you have the savings account to fall back on. You always need to have a safety net when it comes to freelance work. A solid savings account could be the difference between staying in business for yourself or going back into the traditional workforce. Even if you weren’t planning on looking into business loans, that type of back up money can be helpful in the beginning.

This post has been provided by Money Supermarket.

Thanks for reading! Please subscribe to my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, or check out my Facebook page. This original Money Beagle post Copyright 2012 Money Beagle is authorized to appear only on www.moneybeagle.com. Thank you for reading and remember: It’s a great day to be alive!

Looking For A Good Reward Credit Card For Gas Purchases

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At the end of last year, I reported that we were the proud owner of a new camper which will become our main source of vacation time starting this upcoming summer.

A few days ago, I started having a mild panic attack when I looked at the gas price situation and some of the surrounding news.  In Michigan, gas prices have gone up around 30 cents over the past couple of weeks.  It seems every year the gas price rise starts earlier and earlier in the year, and the projections get a bit higher for the summer projections.

This year, people are already talking about $5 gas.  Thinking about the cost associated with towing a camper, it seems that any ‘savings’ we are getting on paying for cheap campground accommodations would be negated by higher gas prices.  The vehicle we tow with gets about 20MPG regularly, and I’m assuming that will drop significantly given that we’ll be towing another several thousand pounds.

I finally calmed down when I realized a few things:

  • We usually do a good amount of driving anyways, so while there will be additional costs due to the reduced mileage and potential higher gas prices, the difference won’t be as bad as I’m probably thinking.
  • I can take this as an opportunity.

This second aspect actually calmed me down and got me a bit excited.

See, right now, we pay for gas and many other regular costs on our Citi Dividends Master Card.  This is a cash back rewards card that offers 1% cash back on all purchases, and 5% cash back on rotating categories that change every three months.  Since there is no annual cost for the card and we pay our balance in full, this is just ‘extra’ cash, which we’ve used to buy new TVs and other ‘luxury’ items that, in essence, become ‘free’.

So, back to the opportunity.

What this gives me is an opportunity to see if there is a better card that I can use for rewards on gas purchases.  Because, I know there are rewards cards all over the place, but because I’ve been satisfied until now with the simple 1%, I haven’t done much digging.

But, since I know I’ll be spending more on gas than ever before, it’s definitely time to start looking.

Here are the things I’ll be looking for:

  • Cash back rewards.  I want to keep it simple.  No ‘points’ or anything else or having to ‘spend’ the rewards with a certain group of retailers.  Show me the money.
  • Rewards for gas greater than 1%.  Unless I can find this, there’s really no value in changing cards or adding another card.
  • Not tied to one particular station.  Our camping journeys will likely take us all around the state and maybe even to other parts of the country.  I don’t want a card tied to one particular station since I have no assurance of knowing what station we’ll be fueling up at on any given trip.
  • No annual fee. I’ve never paid for the privilege of using a credit card, and I’d prefer not to begin doing so now.

So, savvy readers, do you know of any credit cards that fit the bill?  Anything else I should be looking for? 

Thanks for reading! Please subscribe to my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, or check out my Facebook page. This original Money Beagle post Copyright 2012 Money Beagle is authorized to appear only on www.moneybeagle.com. Thank you for reading and remember: It’s a great day to be alive!

Making One Good Decision Is The Key To Everything

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Monday through Friday, my alarm goes off at 5:04AM.  I have two options:

  1. Get up, go downstairs and exercise.
  2. Flip the switch, resetting the alarm for 5:39AM.

That’s a gap of thirty five minutes.  It’s thirty five minutes of extra sleep or it’s a thirty minute workout.

My goal is to work out three times a week minimum.  More would be nice but anything less than three and it’s not a good week.

I don’t do anything too intense. I have a recumbent exercise bike in the basement, so I’ll head downstairs to use that.  Sometimes I’ll lift some of the dumbbells that we have down there.  During spring and summer months, I’ve been known to walk around the neighborhood and enjoy the sunrise.

But, it all starts with that first decision.

Measuring My Progress by kretyen, on Flickr

I’ve found that the decision on whether to wake up or sleep in goes much further than that.  It can lead to an overall impact much greater than that of just the workout.

In an average workout, I burn, for the sake of argument, 150 calories.

That means that the difference between a day when I get up versus a day when I don’t is 150 calories.

Not too shabby, right?

Except it often goes further.

On a day when I work out, I know that I’ve already started things on the right foot.  So, when it comes time to pass the candy jar later in the afternoon, I’m more likely to pass on a day when I’ve worked out versus on a day when I haven’t.  That can be 100 calories of no-candy eating.

When I get home from work, I’m normally hungry and I’ll usually have a snack at the same time that Little Boy Beagle wakes up from his nap as a way to tide me over until dinner.  One of my favorite things to snack on is graham crackers.  I’ve found that on days when I work out, I might grab a sheet, break it in half, and eat just that.  On days when I don’t, I’ll eat an entire sheet or maybe even more.  That can be another 100 calories!

Add those three things up and we’re talking a difference of 350 net calories in a single day, but the ‘indirect’ benefits have already become more of a factor than the direct benefits derived from the actual workout.

The same can hold true with financial decisions.  If you’re on a strict budget, and you go out on a whim and spend $10 that wasn’t accounted for, that might look innocent enough especially when you figure that $10 isn’t going to really break the budget that much.

Only that $10 purchase can open the door.  After all, if you can afford $10 without an impact, what’s going to stop you with the next thing you want that’s $20? After that, it could be $40.  Keep going and you’ll suddenly be wondering how you spent $500 over budget at the end of the month.

All because you made the $10 decision that started the whole thing.

I truly believe that making one good decision is the key to making a lot of other decisions that will help things go your way.

Don’t worry about every decision being the right one.  Just focus on the first one you make being the right one, and you’ll have a much easier time of it and you’ll find that many other decisions will simply fall into place.

And, for the record, today I got up at 5:09!

Thanks for reading! Please subscribe to my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, or check out my Facebook page. This original Money Beagle post Copyright 2012 Money Beagle is authorized to appear only on www.moneybeagle.com. Thank you for reading and remember: It’s a great day to be alive!

Drum Roll Please…What Was The Paycheck Like?

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Last week I wrote about how I was curious what the first paycheck of the year would look like in light of the fact that things changed, primarily on the health care cost (unfortunately, there was no salary increase involved *sigh*).

To recap, we changed the plan option and also reduced our FSA contribution level, both as a result of the fact that we are not planning on having a baby, which was why costs were higher in 2011, and hopefully not having any other unplanned major medical expenses.  I wanted to see what the net effect would be on the paycheck and the results are in.

It basically resulted in around a 2% net increase in pay.

Which is sort of what I was expecting.

Not very exciting.

Unfortunately, what we’re spending it on is as equally un-exciting.  We’re really not spending it.

I haven’t bumped up my retirement contribution level in over three years, since we haven’t had any raises in that long.  This doubly hurts because the company used to match, but cut that out at the same time they froze salaries.  Especially in light of Sam’s recent article on where people should be in terms of retirement savings (note: we’re not close to Sam’s numbers), I wanted to increase our contribution.

So I did.  From ten to eleven percent.  This eats up about 70% of the ‘extra’ money.

The rest I want to use as a backup savings to our FSA card, in the event we go over for any reason, that we have money to back this up if we run out of dollars before the end of the year.

So, while I was excited to see what the paycheck would be, in the end it turned out pretty much on spot what I had expected, and the results are kind of a yawner, unless you are excited by extra savings and retirement contributions.

Which I guess I am and hopefully a few readers are too :)

What changes have you seen in your first paychecks of the year?

Thanks for reading! Please subscribe to my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, or check out my Facebook page. This original Money Beagle post Copyright 2012 Money Beagle is authorized to appear only on www.moneybeagle.com. Thank you for reading and remember: It’s a great day to be alive!