All posts by 1MansMoney

I am a guy pushing 40 that is married to a beautiful woman in her 30's. If I can only have as much luck with our finances.
Deals and Bargains

Beat The HEAT

The heat lately has been oppressive. Since our condo is so close to the ocean, it does not have central air conditioning. During this recent heat wave, my wife and I have found it difficult to sleep at night. To make matters worse, our condo is only open on one side, so there is no opportunity for cross ventilation. The best we can do it put a fan in front of an open window.

We’ve lived in our condo for ~2 years and have finally decided to throw in the towel and purchase a Soleus Air 9000 BTU Evaporative Portable Air Conditioner. A few of our neighbors have similar units and they do a great job cooling our little condos for ~$50/month. My wife found this unit online for $295.20, it regularly sells for $369.00. Since it’s portable, we can take it with us when we move to another place at a later date.

It would be great to be able to put this money into our investments, but it sure is going to be nice to be comfortable at the push of a button.

Income Statement

August 2007 Income Statement

As I mentioned in my July 2007 Income Statement post, I didn’t expected that we would be able to match the relatively low expense levels of July in August. Well, August, with all of its ups and downs, ended up being a great month in terms of our expenses (click spreadsheet below). We only went over budget ~$300, $716.53 of which was for a new mattress. That puts our August expenses $264.69 lower than our July expenses!

In terms of income, August was a mixed bag. I received an extra paycheck this month, but my wife’s 1st paycheck was only for one week. We were able to earn an extra $104.53 thru credit card cash back rewards and $100.00 thru selling our old mattress. And finally, with our increased savings account balance, we earned $12.14 in interest income, our largest amount yet.

September should be a great month incomewise. My wife is expecting a commission check on a job that she referred to her dad’s company (~$700), a final commission check from her old job ($600-$1,000), a final check from the job that laid her off (~$1920), and her first paycheck from her new job(~$1,075). Hopefully, we can continue keeping our expenses down.

Net Worth

August 2007 Net Worth Update (+$2,205.39)

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August has been a volatile month in more ways than one. Nonetheless, our net worth increased $2,205.39 over last month, to $17,267.23 (click on spreadsheet below). We are currently at 78.49% of our 2007 net worth goal. Thank God, we’re still ahead of schedule to meet our goal.

What worked this month?
I received an extra (3rd) check this month that provided us with an additional $1,880.70. We were able to increase our savings by $831.02, which is amazing because we had a couple of large expenses come due in August, such as a $716.53 mattress bill and $300 seat sponsorship for our church. Surprisingly, we did not have a $1,000 business expense that we are expecting post to our credit card; this will likely post in September. In other good news, we were also able to contribute another $500 to my wife’s Roth IRA and we continue to make progress on our liabilities, decreasing them by ~$1,000 each month.

What did not work this month?
Obviously, this was a roller coaster month for the stock market. After subtracting out our contributions, our retirement investments were either flat or lagged behind last month’s balances. Another shake-up this month was that the company my wife just started with 1 month ago laid off 75% of their employees, including her. The great news is that she already has a replacement job.

What’s coming next month?
Now that August’s books are closed, we’re looking ahead toward September. All indications are that it should be a good month too. My wife is expecting a commission check on a job that she referred to her dad’s company (~$700), a final commission check from her old job ($600-$1,000), a final check from the job that laid her off (~$1920), and her first paycheck from her new job(~$1,075). I’m also hoping to receive my company profit sharing (~$550) in September.

Career

It’s Good To Know We Were Prepared

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Great news! My wife has accepted the job offer that she was considering. We are very blessed in that she was offered the job within 2 days of being laid off from her last company. After meeting with them again this morning to learn more about the company and the job, she decided it was a good fit. She starts with them on Tuesday of next week.

Her first 2 months with the company are training, but there may still be an opportunity for her to earn some commission during this time because she inherits all existing accounts in her protected territory. Any accounts that are due to renew service, she receives a commission for.

I am very proud of her. You hear horror stories of people being out of work for months on end. Within a week, she interviewed with numerous companies and received quite a few call backs for second interviews.

Since she received a new job so quick, and her old company agreed to pay her until 9/5, we will not experience any paycheck lapse. Therefore, our emergency fund will remain untouched and we’re moving forward. I’ve got to say, it’s good to know we were prepared for the worst in case things worked out differently.

This concludes this test of the Emergency Broadcast System.

Budget, Career

The Beat Goes On

Thus far, we have done a pretty good job of reducing our expenses while my wife is searching for a new job. To further help our cash flow, we have decided to postpone a $165 deep cleaning that my dentist wanted to schedule this month. Also, if my $1000 business expense posts before my wife has a new job, we will likely pay the minimum to preserve cash.

My wife has had many interviews with various companies and is seriously considering an offer from one. She has arranged a 2nd meeting to learn more about the company and the position before making her decision. The position is in a field that she is not experienced in, but the company has a training program to get her up to speed and she would receive existing accounts in a protected territory. They would like her to start Tuesday of next week, which is great timing for us.

The offer is a $35,000 base, 20% commission, milage reimbursement, laptop, cell phone, and 100% medical insurance paid for. Unfortunately, they do not offer a 401(k), but they are considering adding it down the road. I am only contributing $2,000/year to my 401(k) currently, so we have plenty of room to increase our contributions.

Stay tuned.

Budget

Delicious Savings

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With my wife in-between jobs, we are working on stretching our dollars. One area we can have an immediate affect in is our grocery/dinning budget. We allocate $400/month to groceries and $130/month to dinning out.

Plain and simple, we waste too much food. My wife buys nice groceries so that we can enjoy delicious healthy meals together (she’s an awesome cook), but sometimes these ingredients go bad before we get around to eating them. I’m especially guilty of letting my workouts and surfing get in the way of a nice meal together. When I’m in a hurry, I’ll pick something up on the road, compounding the problem (wasting food at home + spending unnecessary money).

So, we’re consciously looking to see what food is about to expire, and eating it first.

Here’s and example: My wife bought ingredients to make Tex-Mex meatballs for a work potluck. Since her company laid everyone off, these ingredients have been sitting in our refrigerator. We also have a $50 Roy’s gift card that we’ve been wanting to use. Well, we spent Saturday at the beach and when we got home, Roy’s was sounding pretty good. However, we knew the Tex-Mex ingredients were close to expiration, so we did the right thing and stayed home for dinner. The meal was awesome and we have leftovers for today.

I know this sounds kind of a basic, but think about how much food you throw out each month. Stale bread, expired yogurt, moldy fruit, etc.

It all adds up.

Budget, Career

Cash Flow

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My wife’s 2nd to last paycheck arrived last night via direct deposit. We were expecting it to be somewhere between $1,000 and $1,100. It ended up being $1280.88! That extra cash is a God sent at a time when cash is critical.

One element of our finances that we have never included in our balance sheet is our checking account balance. This number fluctuates each month, depending on our expenses, and is not worth tracking in our balance sheet. With my wife currently searching for a new job, this number is important given that we’re much more focused on managing our cash flow.

We typically keep a few hundred dollars above and beyond our normal monthly expenses in our checking account. This “extra” money is usually somewhere between $300 and $600. Whenever this “extra” money gets higher than $600, it is moved into our online savings account.

Thankfully, it looks like we will have somewhere between $500 and $600 “extra” in our checking account at the end of August. This will help greatly as we manage our cash flow during my wife’s job search. In fact, our cash situation is looking so strong that, with reducing expenses and receiving unemployment benefits, we should be able to get well into October before having to resort to tap into our saving accounts.

That is a very good feeling.

Career

Wife Laid Off

There have been rumblings at my wife’s company that trouble was on the way. Well, yesterday, trouble arrived.

My wife’s company laid off 75% of their employees, agreeing to pay them until September 5. The remaining skeleton crew will likely finish the final business before the company closes their doors.

My wife receives her standard paycheck via direct deposit tonight at midnight. We’re not holding our breath on the final check they promised her on September 5. Unfortunately, it’s hard to get blood out of a turnip. Thankfully, this happened at a time when our savings is higher than it’s been in months ($3,326.97). In addition, my wife is expecting a final commission check from her old job (~$1,000) and a commission check on a job that she referred to her dad’s company (~$700).

It’s disappointing because my wife enjoyed her work, got along well with her co-workers and bosses, and had an opportunity to earn great money. She also quit her old job only a month ago and is forced back into the job search. Other employees that were hired by her company just a month or two ago moved here from out-of-state to start their careers. Now, after spending the money moving out here and signing apartment leases, they are left without a job. What shocked me the most was to hear is that they hired another group of employees just last week. These people probably left decent jobs, just like my wife, only to be unemployed a week later.

There’s no time to cry over spilled milk. My wife has hit the ground running. In less than 24 hours of receiving the news, she has already updated her resume, had one face-to-face interview, had a phone interview, and spoken with a recruiter. Tomorrow, she has a phone interview (set-up by a retired VP of the company that she knows), plans to do some marketing for her father’s company, will investigate her unemployment benefits, and will continue her online job search.

We have put together an action plan to limit our expenses and increase our cash flow while my wife is between jobs:

Thanks to my wife’s extra commission checks, and our plan to reduce expenses, we probably won’t have to dip until savings for at least one month. After which time, our savings should last a couple of months. Worst case scenario, if we blow thru our savings, we can consider placing charges onto our credit cards or pull contributions from our Roth IRAs. I don’t see it getting to that point as I’m confident that we will pull thru this hiccup without any long term damage.