Finance Gets Personal

Things have been soooooo slow at work lately. There are days when I don’t have ANYTHING to do except entertain myself at my desk.

The Internet is my main source of entertainment, and unfortunately, CNN, MSN, TMZ and my favorite blogs don’t always update every five minutes (horrors!).

That leaves me way too much time for shopping online.

I’ve found a lot of great bargains from deal sites like dealnews.com and slickdeals.net, but with my upcoming anniversary and outstanding speeding ticket, I seriously need to lay off the bargain shopping. I try to do other things like plan my weekly grocery trips, create a family calendar, schedule veternarian appointments, etc., but I am running out of ideas of things to do while I’m at work with nothing to work on.

At least you can look forward to more frequent blog posts!

A month ago, I bought tickets to a concert that I was fairly sure was going to sell out. My pre-sale code allowed me to order four tickets, so I did - even though I only needed two.

A few weeks later, the concert sold out, and I sold my extra tickets on StubHub for a profit of $50 after commission, which essentially cut the price of our two tickets in half.

Then, I purchased tickets to a big football game that I also thought was going to sell out, and sure enough…it did. I purchased five tickets instead of the three we needed, and am hoping the sale of the extra tickets will help pay for ours.

Scalping is legal in my area, so I know I am within the law, but is it ethical?

My opinion is that if I put in the work to obtain the tickets, and someone else is willing to pay more than face value for them, isn’t that just the way a free market works? It’s not like I’m hacking into Ticketmaster to buy a thousand Hannah Montana tickets or something.

What do you think? Am I out of line here?

Photo Credit: Hawking Extra Ticket by P.J.S., used under Creative Commons licensing.

To the athlete who won it, a gold medal is priceless. But what about to you and me?

How much is all that gold worth?

As it turns out, less than you might think.

According to CNBC, the gold medal is actually made of silver with about six grams of gold plating. For the Beijing Olympics, the medal also incorporates a ring of jade, which signifies honor and virtue in Chinese culture.

As of today, the gold is worth $158.50 and the silver is worth $60, for a total value of approximately $218.50 (plus the value of the jade).

But…I’m sure Michael Phelps and Nastia Liukin could still make a killing selling them on eBay.

Kidding!

I think my whole life needs an organizational overhaul.

Besides the fact that my house is a disaster (other than the rooms visible to last night’s dinner guests), I am running around with a constant to-do list, with hardly enough time to eat dinner.

Here’s what I have to look forward to tonight:

• Call my stepson right before I leave work (since I left my cell phone at home) and tell him to find something to eat for dinner, brush his teeth, get dressed for football practice and get his school supplies and football equipment by the door and ready to go when I get home
• Get home around 6:15 or 6:30, change out of my work clothes and finish filling out all the school enrollment forms we need to bring to Meet the Teacher Night
• Go to Meet the Teacher Night, which ends at 7:00, and turn in forms/drop off school supplies
• Drive across town and drop stepson off at football practice, which starts at 7:00
• Go find something to eat for myself at a nearby fast food place and get gas, even though I’m supposed to be sitting there watching practice the whole time
• Go back to football practice and sit there until 9:00 or whenever the coach decides they’re done (often after 9:00)
• Drive back home and put stepson to bed, get eBay order ready to ship, get Amazon.com order ready to ship, get the coupons for tomorrow’s grocery runs, get the check to take to the bank tomorrow, get the Walgreens receipt to figure out if I messed up my rebate so I can buy/return something tomorrow night as necessary
• Watch the gymnastics portion of the Olympics and go to bed

EVERY DAY is like this, and I’m starting to go crazy!

My husband is working 12-hour days and weekends for some important project, and I’ve been left to pick up the pieces. My sister asked us a month ago to go to the state fair with her for her birthday on Saturday, and now my husband has to work and says my stepson can’t miss football practice on Saturday. I am FUMING!

I’m about to institute a family calendar for the refrigerator since none of us ever have any idea what’s going on.

What do you do when you’re this busy/stressed? Is it just a function of having two people who both work full-time? Working so late and far away from home? Argh!

Illustration Credit: Ripping Hair Out by Dan4th, used under Creative Commons licensing.

Well, July has come and gone (over a week ago - whoops!), and my net worth has taken another hit. This was mostly due to spending the money we’d been saving to have our house painted. But it was something that needed to be done, I guess.

Net Worth as of July 1: $68,815
Net Worth as of August 1 (well, August 7 if you want to be picky): $66,904

Here are this month’s highlights:

• I started selling some items on eBay, like this dress that was rejected from the consignment store. The dress sold for about $15 plus shipping, but I also sold some perfume I won in a contest, a new baseball hat I got for free with a coupon, some diabetes testing kits I got for free with coupons, baseball stadium giveaways and other things I didn’t have to pay for. So far, I’ve made about $60.
• We purchased a new mattress, and I *mostly* resisted the temptation to redecorate my entire bedroom. I managed to stop after the new bed frame, mattress protector and pillow protectors, and haven’t even bought new pillows yet! (although I am very tempted by Linen’s ‘N Things’ going out of business sale!)
• We took a week-long staycation instead of our usual summer vacation, and found it to be fun and relaxing (well, some days were relaxing). We did things like go to the zoo, visit amusement parks, check out museum exhibits, go to plays, etc. Hopefully next year we’ll be able to go to a beach!
• I bought a lot of clothes on clearance for next summer, and am also stockpiling things like gifts, groceries and household items when they go on sale. It will be wonderful to be “ahead” on things and save money in the process!
• My FICO score reached a high of 842, which I find a little CRAZY! We’ll see how long it stays that way now that I don’t have any credit card debt and only use my credit card for things like concert tickets.
• We had our house painted for a cost of $2,992, and had some wood replaced on our deck and another coat of stain put on for about $300. We had been saving up for this for a few months, and it’s nice to have it taken care of.
• Things started getting a little tight toward the end of the month (maybe due to all this spending?), and I reluctantly skipped one of our extra debt payments in order to get us back on track.
• I ended the month with a bang, in the form of a $150 speeding ticket, which will cost about $300 after I have it reduced to a non-moving violation. How come every time I get pulled over, it’s in a town where I don’t know a handful of cops or dispatchers?

Here’s hoping for a prosperous August!

Photo Credit: Lazy Dogs by karolajnat, used under Creative Commons licensing.

Before:


After:


At $1,130 for the bed and frame (minus the $75 delivery fee that will be refunded), it’s not the cheapest purchase ever, but definitely worthwhile in my opinion!

I’m *technically* not supposed to be on the Internet this week, since we’re on our “staycation.”

I should be back with a new post on Sunday or Monday!

I currently use AT&T U-verse for my high speed Internet and television service.

Last week, I received a referral offer from the company and would like to offer this deal to anyone who is shopping around for services or already planning on switching to U-verse:

If you sign up for AT&T U-verse TV and high speed Internet service, I’ll get a $100 Visa Gift Card, Starbucks Card or Amazon.com Gift Card. To thank you, I’ll send you a $50 gift card to Target, Starbucks, Barnes and Noble, or a national store of your choice (that I have easy access to).

If you add wireless service, I get another $25, and you’ll get another $12.50. If you add voice service (home telephone, I presume), I get another $50, and you’ll get another $25.

This deal is not just for new customers. You can also be rewarded if you add additional services. Here is the full rewards schedule (you will earn half of each amount listed):

Referrals Who Are Current AT&T Customers:
High-Speed Internet $25
Wireless $25
Advanced TV $25
High-Speed Internet U-verse Enabled $50
U-verse TV $50
U-verse Voice $50
PLUS get an additional $25 for NEW AT&T customers!

If you decide to sign up for service with AT&T U-verse, just email me your name, address and which gift card you’d like, and I will email you back with my referral code. Then, enter the referral code when you sign up at att.com/uverserewards. Once I receive my gift card, I’ll mail yours.

Sound like a deal?

p.s. I’m not sure about the exact pricing, but I have the fastest Internet option, TV and DVR for $89/month. There is no contract. If you’d like more details, you can probably find them at att.com/uverse.

From my Panda Express fortune cookie:

“You need to work on your exercise routine”

Hmm…I guess the Panda knows its customers.

Last month, I expected that my net worth would take a hit in May due to home repairs, but I’m happy to report that it went up anyway!

Net worth as of May 1: $67,943
Net worth as of June 1: $70,247

Here are this month’s highlights:

• We spent about $105 on Mother’s Day presents, including baseball tickets for me (yea!)
• My mom’s birthday ended up costing us a bundle, even though not all of the costs were incurred in May. She wanted to go to a play that cost us $100 for our two tickets, we went out to dinner ($30), bought her a present ($30) and paid for parking ($7).
• We got a bid for painting our house and it was only $2,600, so we decided that we’ll hire someone else to do it instead of painting it ourselves. Since then, I’ve gotten another bid for $2,100, and am trying to get some more bids, but painters apparently don’t like returning phone calls. We’ll probably have the house painted late summer/early fall, and will be taking a vacation in our own city (staycation!) instead of going out of town.
• We received our $1,500 economic stimulus payment and $213 state tax refund, which went toward replacing our heat pump ($3,467) and hot water heater ($674).
• I started snowflaking toward my credit card about halfway through the month, and paid an extra $171 through snowflaking techniques such as selling things on Craigslist, spending less on gifts, matching spending on indulgences, etc. I also created a website for graphic design to get some additional income from a snowflaking business.
• I began playing “The Drugstore Game” and it’s been pretty successful. Before too long, I’m going to have a year’s supply of razors, shampoo and toilet paper!
• My husband got a bonus of $885 and about $200 extra in his paycheck (due to having three paychecks in May - they don’t take insurance out of the third one or something), which went toward the credit card.
• I’ve been putting more effort into getting to work on time, and I’m getting closer to “on time,” though I’m still not quite there.
• I have been trying to lose weight, and lost five pounds last month, but I’ve been slacking off lately. I’ve only managed to maintain my weight loss from last month, but I think I’ll be able to get back on track if I start tracking my calories online again.

  Welcome to June, the fifth month of Finance Gets Personal!