Rae Uses the E-Fund Cause Tires

Quick post to try and get me back into the swing of things... gotta go to work, though.

You already know from my previous posts that our income has risen somewhat. Not significantly, just a few hundred dollars a month. So I've been putting the excess into our emergency fund. It grew from $1200 up to $1700! I was so proud.

Aaaaand it is back down to $1200 again. Because Corey got a nail in his tire at a point where it was not patch-able, and one of my tires basically wore out completely, so I needed two new ones. But hey... that's what an emergency fund is for, right?

/sigh

On the plus side, we have:

• Received $180 cash back from getting the bonus on Chase Freedom Unlimited.
• Qualified for Chase Sapphire, paid off the old card, and started working on the bonus there. It's a higher minimum spend - $4000 over 3 months - but I can actually pay my rent with a credit card. Not something I would normally do since it tacks on a surcharge, but worth it in context. Hitting that minimum will net us approx. $600 in travel play money, and I want to fly my bff in to visit early next year.
• Claimed some unclaimed property in Florida - I had an electric bill deposit that was never sent to me, so I got $89 by filling out some forms and being patient.
• We renewed WoW for the new expansion. The initial renewal and pair of expansion packs cost a bit, but as to the monthly fee - you can pay your monthly bill with in-game gold. Already saved $30 so far by playing enough, which is a terrible hourly rate if you think about it, but considering that I don't feel like it's "work" I am fine with it.

So things are going okay. We are working this month to severely deflate our eating out, and get it back down to the budgeted amount. I also finally bought new bras and jeans since the old ones were 100% worn out beyond my skill to fix. I got the cheap stuff, too, cause I'd rather spend my money on other things. Like food.

Oh yeah, and I'm 33 now. Yay for birthdays or whatever. /grumbles at the unassailable passage of time

Also, I'm late for work, haha. Bye!

Rae Has an Upswing

So I'm sure that reading this blog has been a little depressing of late. Posts admitting that I'm not doing well, etc. But this month has been going... weirdly well. I'm kind of baffled. And the fact that it seems to be a good result of my efforts, rather than raw luck, makes it even more baffling.

Something I did.... paid off?

Okay, so I had 2 medical bills left over from my ER visit when I had the miscarriage. It was just the last bits that finally finished the billing process - you know how long those things can take. They totaled to about $200 that I hadn't budgeted for. I did have enough in my checking account to pay them off of course, and initially I kind of borrowed it from my unallocated funds that should have gone toward next month's budget. To be honest, I was very fortunate that my work insurance covered the more than $4k it would have been otherwise. But wait, there's more!

I saved $138 on my phone bill budget by switching from Sprint to Google Fi as I mentioned a few posts ago. No joke - by using wifi and being data-conscious while away from wifi, we ended up spending just about $25/phone after taxes and fees. So our phone bill was $50 for the month instead of $188 or even the $80 or so we expected.

I also got my deposit back on my natural gas by being in my apartment for a year - an unexpected windfall which negates my $25 monthly bill for almost 3 months.

Just those two things almost cover the medical bills.

Then I got my first bi-monthly paycheck on the 15th. My raise went through, and it looks like my take-home pay is going to be $160/month more than previously. So the unexpected expenses are now completely covered and then some.

And then, something I did not mention on my previous post - Corey got the job! It's full time but it is a small business, so he does not get benefits - but he is still overwhelmingly happy there. He also put in some training hours at the new job while offboarding at the old job, so his paychecks are going to be increasing either way.

Phew. Looks like we finally get to start saving something again. Now I just need to lose some weight and work on getting my credit card bonus money without overspending on the credit card. I may also look into selling platelets since it's for a good cause and doesn't take a lot of effort, and I'm also trying to get our annual gift-giving, like Christmas and birthday presents, organized so that we can buy things on sale and set up crafted items to give instead of spending a lot of money or making last-minute purchases.

It's a lot, but... hey. If it works, it works.

Rae Gets a CC

So in general, I have not been a big fan of credit cards. I ended up doing your typical college sign-up and over-charge and pay a lot of interest. We no longer carry a balance on the one card I've had for 12 years, so I've been happy with just using it for things that you can only use credit cards for.

Recently, I wanted to verify that my single credit card's balance is 0 recently (I've had times where I thought it was 0 but I really owed a couple of cents that kept gaining 29% interest and accruing late fees) and out of curiosity clicked on the free credit report. My credit was lower than I expected. And one of the main reasons was that I don't have enough credit, even if the revolving credit I do have is unused and I have a history of years of on-time payments.


With that thought in mind, and wanting to build my credit a bit if I can, I went looking for answers. According to Reddit, if you have a higher credit limit, even if it's unused, that can contribute toward a higher score. So having another credit card might be good. Okay, cool. I also poked around Mr. Money Mustache... and found the concept of credit card churning.

Now, I was skeptical about whether this would be good for my life. Still am. We also don't travel a lot, though that's more because of the financial blocks than anything else. But I found a credit card that gives a $150 cashback bonus if you spend $500 in the first 3 months, along with general cashback that would be more than the $0.10 per purchase that my debit card gives. My other credit card gives nada for rewards.

I applied and I was approved immediately. I also checked, and Corey could apply as well. So... really, why not?

I still don't like the concept of churning, though. I feel like it might be safer to take it one card and one step at a time, mostly because of our spending habits and a fear of reprisal for "manufactured spending." But if we pick the best reward, get the card, earn the reward, and do it again in 3-5 months or so to keep it from hurting our credit too badly... well, it could be kinda neat. And if a cashback card saves us more money on the purchases we would have made anyway, that's an extra hundred or so per year in our pockets. Maybe we'll even get one of those airline cards and go on more trips or something. It could be good for us.

Oh, I also bought a drying rack, also per MMM's suggestion. More on that later.

Rae Finds the Weight vs Money Link

One of the things I've been wondering about for a while is whether losing weight will actually, realistically save money. I know that in an overall sense, being overweight causes healthcare issues that not being overweight would prevent. My back pain is a big part of that, and I'm a little nervous about the looming concept of diabetes, though I've never been tested. It's always been kind of abstract, though.

But here it is. I finally found something concrete. The whole article is worth a look, but here's what it boils down to:

The overall, tangible, annual costs of being obese are $4,879 for an obese woman and $2,646 for an obese man. The overall annual costs of being overweight are $524 and $432 for women and men, respectively. For both genders, the incremental costs of obesity are much higher than the incremental costs of being overweight. 

Adding the value of lost life to these annual costs produces even more dramatic results. Average annualized costs, including value of lost life, are $8,365 for obese women and $6,518 for obese men. 

That is a lot of money. A lot of money. Basically, by going from obese down to normal weight over the next year, I'll get a $4879/year raise. That's 50 bucks paid annually per pound I lose. A dollar per 70 calories burned.

Investing $4879/year with compound interest at a 7% rate would be 500k by the time I hit age 65 (thanks, online calculators). That's a retirement level amount. Seriously. Holy crap.

Kind of a nice way to look at things, and it might be the motivation I need to get back to my goal.

Rae Takes a Breath

I feel kinda bad that I've been neglecting this blog for over a week. This time, though, the main issue is that there hasn't been that much to write, really. Work is work (aka stressful and tiring but doable), and I'm finally moving officially into my new position pay-wise starting this coming week. There's still room to grow there, but I know I'm well-suited to the work. I'll be making less than the average local Account Manager salary, but the fact of the matter is that if I become a really kick-ass Account Manager, I'll be able to get enough experience under my belt to become competitive in the field. And in the meantime, I have really decent benefits and vacation days. Plus this is a 3-day weekend, which is nice.

And hey, check out that crazy new background. I finished one of my $4 coloring book pages. It's not super professional, but I think it looks kinda cool.

There is some other good news on the horizon, in that husband has a decent job prospect. Nothing crazy, but it's full-time at a local independent toy store, which means he can get more pay + potential benefits + he might actually enjoy his job/life a bit more. He also doesn't have to wear a uniform, which he enjoys. And we are pretty confident about his chances, because he found out they were hiring on Thursday afternoon, immediately went to fill out an application, was told to call back Monday when the hiring manager was there, but then got a call Thursday night to interview on Friday afternoon (gotta love next-day interview offers). And though their hiring manager is still out, he interviewed with the owners, and loved them as well as the interview process - he told me about it and them, at length, with a grin on his face. Apparently, the interviewers are like an older, business-owner version of us. They invited him to call or come in on Monday to check back with them.

So, fingers crossed, he'll get a job upgrade in June, and I should be getting my first higher paycheck either June 15th or 30th - I should be getting $100 extra per paycheck before tax, so it'll definitely be something. And then we can finally beef up our savings account!

I did ask Reddit one thing recently, specifically about my car loan. Look for the post with AntiPixie, asking if I should work on my emergency savings or pay off my loan faster. The one reply I got advised me to put money into emergency savings first, since my interest rate is so low. While I want to be out of debt faster, I do agree with them. And once I can get to the point that we're able to save over $100/month, I'd like to transfer anything over $1000 into an online high-yield savings account. Specifically, I'd like to look into a dream account for the interest bonuses - it's got good reviews, so I'm really hoping it's something we can do soon.

Then once we are done with the emergency fund, transfer that to a regular high-yield savings account or a small CD ladder (whichever gives more interest), finish paying off our one debt, and then finally open a new dream account to start saving for a house downpayment. I still love the idea of paying "extra rent" every month towards a pretend mortgage so that we can be budgeted for a real one when the time comes.

I was also thinking about doing that transcription side gig, but Corey doesn't think it's such a good idea, with my day job being the way it is lately. I was so exhausted from the stress of this past week that I ended up sleeping most of Saturday. I need to focus more on where I'm putting my time, so that I can have more of it and waste less. For the past week or more, I've been basically working and then getting home and watching Korean dramas. While they're great, it's kind of a waste, and I do not have time to waste right now. I haven't been dieting at all (bread!!), so I need to press the re-set button on my dragon, and focus my time on getting healthy. If I do that, and make it into a habit, I'll actually be fit and energetic enough to do a side gig.

Oh, btw, sorry about never updating re:the sourdough starter. I kinda... gave up on it. Making from-scratch sourdough takes more patience and time than I have. On the other hand, working with commercial yeast has been a dream. I've made two batches so far, and I love love eating fresh-baked from scratch bread - and I actually just really like kneading dough! I gave a loaf to a coworker for her birthday. Here's a comparison of the sourdough attempt to the commercial yeast loaf:

You can see that the sourdough yeast did work - there's 2 whole bubbles! But it didn't work well. On the other hand, the commercial yeast packet bread was amazing, and my second attempt (not pictured) was even better and made more bread with an equal amount of yeast. And let me tell you, making french toast out of homemade bread = heaven. Another reason I haven't been feeding the dragon... gotta fix that. But kneading bread IS a workout, I can tell you that much!

Anyway, long story short, I'm doing better mentally, and now I have to do better physically. With my raise that's finally about here, plus Corey's potential new job, we can worry less about money and we might even start making a bit of progress soon. I'm looking forward to a nice healthy coloring page update to share with you wonderful people.

Rae Admits She's Not Doing Well

So the purpose of social media, it seems, is braggadocio - boasting about one thing or another. This is why I've taken myself away from Facebook apart from a small update post once per month. People brag about different things, of course. Most brag about success or relationships or how clever they are. I've been guilty of this myself, back before my Facebook diet, because it's just such an easy advertising platform. If you have friends, you have people who are at least mildly interested in you, which means that your words will be heard. Another form of bragging is, of course, the opposite - bragging about the cruelties of life and how awful things are. This is often displayed as very public mourning, another reason I've withdrawn from that shallow digital world. Advertising your pain just so that people will hit a Sad button on Facebook seems to me to be very unhealthy. Telling people that someone passed away, to inform them of a major event in your life? I understand that. Posting once a week about how much that event still effects you? Wouldn't it be more effective to actually talk to a person?

At the same time, it's so easy to do. You feel sad, hop on Facebook, and write a 2-sentence post about how much you miss your mother or how sucky life is when a coworker stabs you in the back, because you might get the instant gratification of knowing that someone saw what you said via a comment or a like. Having someone know and understand your pain can be soothing, but when it comes to social media, it is a temporary balm because you know in the back of your mind that by the time you see their response, they've already moved on and are probably watching a video of someone's kid petting a cat.

Now, I realize the blatant hypocrisy of this post. Yes, even this blog falls under that umbrella, both for boasting about successes and mourning my own losses. But here's the difference - I could post a sentence on Facebook, and it would be viewed for 1 second by the 200-some-odd people who would then keep scrolling for something more interesting, while I sit back and hope for someone to pay more than 1 second of attention to my joy or pain. Or I could post a full discussion of my pain and how I'm trying to overcome it by journaling, which is well known for its therapeutic properties. And instead of worrying about those 200-some-odd people seeing this and paying me a few seconds of attention, I'm posting this on a platform where I've had maybe one view per post. This is for me. If someone else reads it and can identify and feels less alone, then it's for them.

So... therapy-wise, it might be working. I'm just not doing as well as I'd hoped by now. Sometimes I'll be at work and read a message about something and just... deflate. I recently used some background check software that I have to get to know for work, to look myself up. Mom's name came up, and I clicked on it, and it noted that she would have been 65 today. Stupid idea on my part, to put myself in that position, but it happened. And later that day, a friend talked about hanging out with her friend's child, and it just deflated me even more.

It just feels like... not only am I not over this recent pain, but I'm not doing well enough to move forward. My diet's at a dead end, even moreso because I'm on my period. I've managed to save only $100 since I started this blog, and I've been lax enough with my spending that we're a little over budget for the month. Eating out too often, indulging in comfort food when I'm feeling sad, and then the fact that I'm not making progress keeps me feeling down. Vicious cycle. I know there'll be an upswing again at some point if I keep at it, though.

So here we go. I forgive myself. I forgive myself for spending too much of my minimal income. I forgive myself for overeating and losing track of my calorie counting. I forgive myself for being human, and for using any means necessary to stop being sad when sad things happen. And because I forgive myself, I can remake myself. I'm going to get up, take a shower, and spend time with a friend. I'm going to focus on healthy, positive things, and I'm going to be gentle with myself. I'm not going to be harsh or cast blame or say I'm a bad person.

Because I'm the only mother I have, and the only child I have. If I can love myself the way I would have loved my baby, if I can trust myself the way I trusted my late mother, then I'll be okay. And I'll do better. And I'll move on.

Rae's Sourdough Starter Update

So this has nothing to do with money (unless you count breadmaking as a healthy/frugal activity). Mostly, I just thought this was neat... my sourdough starter is apparently badass. Maybe because I'm using flour that was sitting alone in a baggie for a while, I don't know. But I've already got some growth and some bubbles this morning after its feeding last night:

I mean seriously, it looks like the pictures from way later on in this post about how to make the starter. I'll have to move it to a bigger container tonight. I might be able to even make bread with it before the coming weekend. Kinda awesome. :)

Rae Makes the Switch

Hey guys,

It's been a while, huh? I just wanted to ensure everyone that I am still alive and still remember this blog. I'm even still making some progress on my goals, though the weight loss has trickled out a little bit since Thursday. But it's only Sunday, and I have time to get back on track. Tomorrow I'll track Thursday through today as like 2400 calories as a guess-timate since I am still tracking my weight and it hasn't skyrocketed up.

I... got through Mother's Day okay. It's been rough since I lost my mother at 16, and I expected that it would be even more rough now that I lost my second pregnancy, but it was okay. Still. People who are single get to whine on Valentine's day. People who lost both their mother and their pregnancies should get to whine too, right? I'm just glad I "quit" Facebook so that I don't have to look at the 20 babies currently being shown off.

So hm. Happy updates. Well, the biggest one (weirdly enough) is that we switched phone services last weekend. Due to my compulsive morning financial blog habit, I've learned a thing or two about super-cheap wireless services, mostly from Mr. Money Mustache and his Republic Wireless reviews. But when I was doing my Republic Wireless research, I discovered Google Fi (apparently there was a review of Google Fi on his blog, but I wasn't aware of that until today). Corey and I researched the services, the phones, the little extras like making your phone a wireless hotspot, and decided that Google Fi was the competitor we wanted to go with, so we chose to embrace our new Google overlords and make the switch. Here's the fun part:

Current plan with Sprint: $188/month after taxes for both of us, unlimited data
Current plan with Google Fi: $89/month after taxes for both of us, 2gb data/month each*
Cost to purchase 2 new phones compatible with the plan, after tax: $422
Months to break even: 4.5
Monthly savings after that: $99/month +$1 for every 0.1 GB of data unused
*I checked my data usage with Sprint before we started, and the most I've used is 1-2 gb.

So in less than 5 months, we'll get an ROI of over $99/month, especially if we aren't spendy with data usage and stick to wifi as much as possible. Plus, Corey's phone was on its way out anyway - his power plug had stopped functioning, since we've only ever had 1 smartphone. So we get an upgrade. Plus instead of texting from my phone, since the plan uses Hangouts with SMS as a texting function, I can send and receive texts from my computer instead of checking my phone at work.

Okay, enough squealing about my cheap upgrade though. Let's see, what else... I had a quasi-fight with a coworker last Friday, which wasn't fun and had me very upset to the point of tears. But it led me to find out that that coworker had been against my promotion, and put a bug in my ear about both increasing my work performance and panicking about not having a good emergency fund. So as soon as I could, I threw another $100 into the emergency fund, plus I've been on my toes and shared some ideas management liked, and I feel a touch safer now.

I also made a grocery list that is semi-based on this Reddit post in which a super-cheap and reasonably healthy meal plan is described. I've tweaked it for our own use, of course, but I love love this post. I'm wondering if I can start price-tracking all of the necessities I put on our own grocery list across the 3 stores where we buy things, so that I can buy lots when prices are extra low per unit.

I even started a batch of sourdough starter. I'll let you know how that comes out. So far so good, and I'll be "feeding" it tonight.

Hm, what else. I did slip up here and there. Made a few impulse purchases (most recently $6 on a coloring book and some candy) and ate out a little, which isn't great. Still, I think we're doing better than the average, and we even have more in our eating out fund than usual, which is amazing.

I guess that's it. Next, I'll work on coloring in my bubbles and posting the updates to the side bar. Hopefully I can get a little more done soon. Until next time!

Rae's Next Idea Theft

So, you may or may not know that I like to "advertise" to myself by reading articles in the morning oriented toward my goals. I'll check my favorite finance blogs (Get Rich Slowly (less so lately since they started advertising credit cards on a blog that encourages 0 debt budgets), Mr. Money Mustache, the Non-Consumer Advocate) and reddit's /r/personalfinance to kind of get into a mind set of non-spending early in the morning. It doesn't always work, but it's better than watching a McDonald's commercial and then immediately wanting McDonald's breakfast.

Or even typing that sentence. Ergh. Now I want an egg white delight damnit. Focus, Rae. Remember, you've got good healthy paid-for 50-cent pineapple yogurt in the fridge at work and skipping a $2 sandwich today will save you $1.50, which will be $12 in 30-odd years if you put it into your IRA instead! Is that sandwich worth $12 and a spoiled yogurt? I don't think so.

Oh hey, Roth my mutual fund purchase went through. And I got it cheaper than last month's purchase even with the market up. Neat!

Ahem.

One of the ideas I read the other day, I think on reddit? I'm totally stealing it. The suggestion was that if you want a certain price house, you should calculate exactly how much it will cost you per month - in mortgage + interest + pmi (if any, which since we don't have a downpayment there would be) + taxes + insurance + estimated maintenance. I would even add HOA fees to that, since locally, almost every place you purchase is going to have an HOA. And once you have that number, you budget for it, even though you're not purchasing the house yet. Then, when you pay your rent every month, put the rest of that amount into a savings account.

I love that idea. Not only is it a realistic way of looking at whether I can actually afford a house, but it will definitely help me save for a mortgage downpayment. And if we need to pull from that money to pay bills or get groceries, well, we have to wait longer and make more money if we want a house, and that's that.

So, my goal is to get a $200,000, single-family house with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. I want to estimate high with my numbers so that I can be pleasantly surprised. So, with an interest rate of... let's go crazy in case it's a while from now, 5%, 0 downpayment, 2% for taxes, $2000/year for insurance, HOA fees of $100/month, PMI of $163/month. So using some online calculators, I get:

Mortgage Principal + Interest: $1074
PMI: $163
Taxes: $330
Insurance: $167
Estimated Maintenance: $167
HOA: $100
Total: $2004/month

So yeah. I am aiming very high of course, but that's about the total cost. It'll be a lot less if we save up for a 20% downpayment of 40k, because that'll bring the mortgage + interest way down, and nix the PMI entirely. But that would be an awful lot of saving, and I want to be putting my current rent cost into equity sooner than later.

So... time to start pretending my rent is $2004/month, and see where that goes. Hoo boy.

Rae Colors a Smattering of Bubbles

Progress, y'all.

I gotta say, I'm enjoying this whole coloring thing. I spent a whole $7 on the "good" set of Crayola colored pencils and went to town. Now I've got a veritable army of goal images on the right sidebar. The weight loss one I'm just having fun with - I did the whole background in blue to represent the first 1000 calories lost via dieting - those were hard. The rest are getting progressively easier, though. Hopefully I'll be finished with that dragon in no time and on to the next. There are multiple dragons on that site, and I'm planning on setting up a few of my favorites. Not sure if I want to go with a Chromatic set or a Metallic set. Heh.

Anyway, here they are, so that eventually I can compare the bubbles I've colored in at this point in my life to the ones on the side bar later on.

The colors, Duke. The Colors.

And now, to go plan death for my Friday D&D group. Muahahaha.

Rae Does the Books

This post could be considered a blatant plug, but be assured that I am in no way affiliated with Goodbudget or any associated businesses.

But dear god, I love Goodbudget. Check out this report:

So that's my year to date spending for 2016, for the first third of the year. It includes pretty much everything except savings, since I have the paid version of Goodbudget and my savings counts as another account I transfer funds into, rather than something that comes out of checking. I've also put about $620 into our retirement fund and $100 to our emergency fund in that same timeframe. Not sure how that would change things, but it's a sliver for sure. :\

As an explanation, "Bills" encompasses rent, utilities (gas, water, and electric), phone bill, cable internet, my husband's health insurance, and our car insurance. "Household" encompasses groceries, gas, and some miscellaneous spending. "Debt" is just our car loan and nothing else. "Leisure" is eating out, Netflix, our Twitch subscription to Geek & Sundry, any games we buy. "Standard" is a little wonky - it should say "spent from savings" or something, I don't know what I was thinking when I came up with that name. But it's just what I spent out of our tax return windfall at the beginning of the year and all it includes is my medical bills and a haircut. 

Still, this honestly makes me feel kind of good that only a little over 8% of our spending has been on leisure, even though I get a little sting of guilt every time I eat out. I would love to do the 50/30/20 needs/savings/wants split everyone seems to recommend, but right now our income just doesn't allow for it. What I really need to do is cut down on our needs, like reducing the per-month cost of my phone bill and maybe cable, because that Bills envelope is a monster chunk of our outgoing funds and has been ever since we moved into this nice apartment. If we can cut down on our monthly necessities, we'll have way more wiggle room, you know?

I can try, anyway. I'll let you know how it goes.

sdrawkcaB seoG eaR

So today I asked myself something I had not. Which was probably a mistake. Not to do it, I mean. Sorry, not super eloquent today. It's been a weird few days. Battling some depression. Trying to work it out.

Anyway!

I was watching some of these home improvement shows on Netflix, like Love It or List It. Then I got sick of that and instead looked at some new construction websites, then some homes on Trulia and whatnot, and just got more and more kind of sad about the whole mess and how impossible it seems, not to get a house, but to get a nice house. Something pretty, and done, and livable. Something that feels like forever.

But then I look at the homes that are in our price range, and I look at my current apartment. Which is pretty, and done, and livable. Not super big, but also not super expensive. And while it doesn't feel like forever (since it's never going to be mine permanently), it's a great place to be for now. And it just made me wonder... what is it that I want out of the whole home buying experience?

Part of it is standard consumerism. It's jealousy, and wanting something that other people have, and wanting something that I can show off as a standard of class and well-being. Something that proves to other people that I'm doing okay. And honestly, I think that's going to be the case for a lot of people.

Part of it is also a way to play the long game, of course. Owning a home is a very concrete step toward financial independence and a comfortable retirement in the distant future. Because if we can get a 30-year mortgage now, we can own our home outright by the time we retire, if not before then. But as far as the house itself, apart from an investment, why do I want it? What do I want? So then came the actual question:

What is a realistic vision of my "perfect" life? Because maybe I should work backwards from there.

So, okay. Not to toot my own horn, but it is a good question, and one I haven't thought about in a while. It used to be one thing, and to be honest, it probably hasn't changed much. But who knows? So... here we go.

Wake up early, get my workout out of the way, shower, get dressed and beautiful. Make coffee and breakfast and eat with the family, plus do the bills and budgeting. Then get cracking on childcare (for the time that they need it) and writing, afternoon errands just after a nice lunch, back to writing, clean up before dinner, make dinner, eat dinner, clean up, hang out with hubs/the fam and do game night, long-distance family skype night, date night, plus homework or whatever, and then super comfy snuggly sleeps. And also, two adventures a month! Concerts, library trips, museums, festivals, comedy shows, etc. And a mimimum of two hosted weekend dinners/brunches for my writing group, my family, etc., per month as well.

So! What do I need to have a shot at that clearly idealized life?

• 3 bedrooms for hubs&I and our two (currently nonexistent) kids
• Room for the treadmill
• A home office
• A clean kitchen to cook in
• A dining table for eating breakfast together (and to host D&D...)
• Standard cleaning & storage stuff like laundry and dishwasher, because I'd rather do less cleaning and more family time
• 2 bathrooms, non-negotiable
• Enough money to live on

That's... is that it? Maybe that's it. So yeah, for a house, that's what I need. But here's the thing - a lot of what I described is what I could be doing now. I could get up early and work out, which I was doing temporarily before the miscarriage. I already have coffee and pay bills/check finances in the morning, which is an oddly calming ritual, and I should probably make breakfast and eat with the husband. Corey and I already have a kind of date night on Thursdays when we watch Critical Role, we have a weekly D&D night on Fridays, and I generally try and call my Dad and Gramma on Monday evenings.

But yeah, I could be doing better. I could be writing more, going on more adventures (especially the free ones), etc. So... yeah. It's time to live the life I want. To work for it. Even if I get it wrong along the way. More than a pretty house, more than a million dollars or a fabulous car, that's what I want. That little package of perfect.

Rae's Random Thought

You know what would be kind of cool?

Well... there are game streaming channels like Twitch, right? And real estate, well, people are almost obsessed with it. As proven by HGTV. And myself+people I know.

Wouldn't it be cool to set up kind of streaming real estate website with live-stream open house tours including current pricing information? Even if it's just like you get a GoPro and take house tours, then edit out anyone's faces. Heck, a real estate agent could make a killing by advertising houses that way if it got big enough.

Just a thought. :)

Rae Talks to a Lending Agent

Okay, so things are going okay. Mentally, I'm still a little out of it, I'll admit. Work is going well, but I'm still stressing myself out thinking about all this stuff. Last night I couldn't sleep from thinking about just how impossible everything feels right now, even after the progress I have made. I ended up freaking out and crying (the hormones probably didn't help) and got up with husband to watch Bob's Burgers and eat juice pops we got at Costco. It was nice to just regress a little bit.

And you know, I'm okay with being weak like that here and there. It'll probably happen again. I'm human, and intensely fallible. I'm no fantasy blogger with only good habits sharing her wealth of knowledge with the world. I'm just some schmuck with an internet connection.

But things really are going okay. I've got a 3-day streak of practicing my harp (and doing my back stretches right afterwards because short arms = back pain when you're reaching forward for a half hour plus), and I'm working on my callouses. Here's the main plotline for this post, though: today, I actually went to go see that lending agent I was planning on talking to.

It was an interesting conversation. The most interesting piece, I think, is that he ran the numbers and based on our combined income, husband and I could afford a monthly payment of $1313 if you include principal, interest, taxes, etc., which would allow us about a $150k house. That surprised me, tbh. Like it isn't all that bad, and there are actually more options than I realized.

1. We could take our time and save up more money. Which we should probably do anyway. I really need to settle down on the house goal and prioritize setting up a better emergency fund and getting it into a high-interest online savings account.
2. We could apply for down payment assistance from the city. The only issues are that we would just need to stay in the house 5+ years, and to be honest we'd probably still need more income to get the size of house that we want (3 bed/2 bath, single family home with separation from neighbors is $200k+ around here). And higher income probably = less chance to qualify for that grant. Unless we had a larger family and the same income levels. Hm.
3. We could move way out to BFE and go for a 100% USDA loan. We're still at low-moderate income levels for this metro area (I think we just now hit the "moderate" level with my raise) and there are some eligible areas in some parts of north Austin that we were considering anyway.

The guy also let me know that if we want to move out of this unit in April, we would want to apply for pre-qualification in November/December, which gives us plenty of time to decide if that's the right time for us. And that we would then want to start house-hunting in January 2017 at the latest. He actually suggested that I check with our apartment complex to see if we could get out of our lease early, which was... weird. I dunno. He needs to hit his numbers I guess.

And then there's all the stuff we need. 1 year's worth of W2s, 60 days of bank statements, 30 days of paystubs, and any recent tax returns. Easy enough to collect once we're ready for all that. I'm okay about organizing that kind of thing, for the most part.

That covers all my notes from the meeting. I think it went well enough, and helped me get some ideas to mull over instead of this big conceptual mass of money that I'll never get. There are options. I just need to roll them around in my head, talk to husband, figure some things out. We'll get it done.

Rae on the Great 2016 Roller Coaster

I haven't posted in a few days - sorry not sorry to be honest. Today I wasn't feeling great so I've been napping a lot. Yesterday (Saturday) I hung out with one of my writing buddies again and we got a little progress made and she brought me tea and taught me how to pan-fry cheap fish, which was *awesome.* Friday I had my Dungeons & Dragons group over, and ran my first game session!

And then Thursday and Wednesday, well, I was just generally distracted by the fact that I got a promotion.

I'm not joking. On Wednesday morning, I read this article about optimism. On the drive to work, it was raining and the classical station was playing Sorcerer's Apprentice by Dukas, which made me giggle. And then I went to work and got a promotion.

Starting in June, I'm getting raise, new KPIs, and potential commission and bonus structure if I do well. Starting immediately, I've moved out of my cubicle and into a shared office with a window. I'm still a little in shock, even though apparently this was a done deal for a good long while. Multiple people knew it was set in stone before I did, ha!

WINDOW!!!!!

Now, for some background, my manager left in February of this year, just after management began to change up our organizational structure. I've basically been doing a lesser version of her role since she was here, excluding running meetings. I was the primary consultant one or two because I'm especially savvy with one of our products, but I didn't think it was any big deal until she told me afterwards. Before she left to move out of state, she told me that I absolutely had to apply for her job. That I was ready. I was, admittedly, interested in the pay raise, and I had finally realized a few months before that it wouldn't be insanely hard or stressful as I'd first anticipated when I was just working as an admin under her. So she helped me write a bang-up cover letter, and I brought that along with a resume I'd had updated over to management, and the department head (and my now-manager) responded with, "Oh! Oh, you're interested in that job. Good for you! Challenge yourself!"

It was a bizarre reaction to say the least. But then things changed, because the department head became my direct manager, and my work actually had the chance to be seen by upper management instead of just the one person who left. And then I made a small sale on my own - granted, it was low-hanging fruit. I just said, "Hey, since we just finished this project for you, do you want another one?" and the client went, "Yeah, let's do that." Easy, and fairly small, but still required the ask.

So... hard work results in progress sometimes. Who knew? It just comes at such a good time in my life. I'm going to go chat with a Wells Fargo mortgage officer on Tuesday, not necessarily to apply for a pre-approval, but to tell him my situation and to be frank in the fact that I am probably going to apply with them once we are ready to buy a house, but I want to get my ducks in a row first. I doubt that any lender is going to be upset if their potential clients are doing their homework first!

So yeah. Roller coaster two months. It's making it a little easier to start looking at those silver linings.

Anyway. I practiced harp today until my fingers hurt (woo!), but I just don't feel physically up to much, so it's time for more Netflix. Things downstairs are back to normal working order now that a full month has passed, which means cramps. And the way I see this, it's good, it's healthy. I'm not getting super emotional, which is kind of amazing. I feel normal again. I feel more like me. Now to keep up this progress.

Rae has Random Ideas for Income

I've been chatting with one of my besties this evening, S. S is pregnant (like, about to pop) and is going on maternity leave soon. Unfortunately, she's in super-pricey California, and maternity leave, while necessary, is going to be a huge hit on her little family's expenses. So we got to chatting about different income ideas.

There are already a ton of blog posts out there about how to make extra money. A metric butt ton. This post isn't anything like those. "Start a blog!" "Mow someone's lawn!" Nope. This is more personal. This blog isn't to make money. If it gains a following and people think I should add a donate button because I helped them? Fantastic. If it doesn't? No big deal. It helps me, and that's the main point.

Nope. These are income ideas that have nothing to do with the standard person poking at the internet in their PJs. These are for me, for my bestie, and maybe for the other random creatives out in the world.

1. Be a harpist

I may have already mentioned this in the previous post, but I am a harpist. I know how to harp. I can bump my thumbs, lift my elbows, and I can kinda-sorta sight read. But I'm really rusty. This is going to take a lot of practice, some nice calluses, and I'm going to miss my longer nails. But if I work up a gig book again, I could totally do some weddings and get a reasonable hourly rate.

2. English language transcription

I'm still kinda-sorta interested in this, but I don't think I have the time to commit to an IC contract right now. I would love to have a second job, and it actually does sound very interesting and like something I could do, but after talking it over with some people, this is my bottom choice for a side gig.

3. Knit up all the yarn and sell sell sell

I have 2 bins of crafting supplies. I need the room and the money. This one's a no-brainer. Though I don't think I'd ever do an Etsy store tbh. If nothing else I should at least make a ton of badass Christmas presents. Something other than scarves preferably.

4. Podcast script writer

This could be fun and potentially profitable. It also could be a total wash, but I don't care. I'm loving the couple of scripts I wrote with another friend this past weekend. We've finally got An Idea that works and flows pretty well. I wrote a full 10-min comedy script, and if we put 3 of those together with some ads, well, there you go.

5. Life manager

This is a wacky idea I had in the shower, and one I'll probably never follow through with. You know how there are life coaches? Well you can ignore a trainer or a coach, especially if you already find yourself ignoring your family. But you can't ignore a manager if you want to get paid and don't want to get fired. I was thinking this could be a fake boss with kind of a goal setting and time management role in someone's life, and while you do pay them for their services, they also pay you a salary if you do what you're supposed to and accomplish your goals. Lots of issues could come up, like if it's long-distance the person could always lie, but it's a neat thought.

6. Goal setting Photoshop artist

This is one I came up with when talking to S. There are folks out there who are using Photoshop to fat shame women by making pictures of them looking skinny - usually no-ribs skinny. But what if you were trying to lose weight and you wanted to see that After picture? Especially if it was one that actually looked like you would look like skinny, in a realistic way? I'd be interested, myself.

7. Lower bill arguer

This is another wacky one - and would just be something you'd really do for friends and family. But see, I really hate calling places. I know I could get a lower rate on my phone or internet bill if I was good at arguing, but I'm not. But if someone could call on my behalf and save me a little money on my monthly bills, heck yeah I'd pay them.

That's just a few, but it's stuff I haven't seen on all of the financial and frugality sites that I check.

Also, quick whine: I got on Facebook to check for updates on my friend J's baby, and there were literally four baby posts in a row. Four. And that doesn't count my friend J's baby, or S's soon-to-be-completed. So there are six people in my social circles (more, because I rage-quit Facebook after that, again) who are pregnant. I complained to my coworker about it and he was like, "Yeah, it's like a party that you didn't get invited to, huh?" And I'm like no, it's like a party that I was invited to, but the guy that sent the invitation changed his mind and uninvited me and f**k that guy.

Sigh. I just... need to lose weight. Top priority. Today was a wash as far as that goes, cause free Cheesecake Factory. But I did do my stretches for a third day in a row, got healthy work groceries, and logged my food. I need to lose all the weight. House or no house, that part doesn't matter as much as making my body birth fit.

Now where are my damn colored pencils?

Rae Talks Stress and Goal Coloring

So it's been an interesting day and a half. The introduction post has been posted, the first day is done. And I realized something rather interesting: I am already burning myself out on the magnitude of the task at hand.

See, originally, I was going to post my wins and my losses. A win was applying to a second job or remembering to use a coupon. A loss was eating out or neglecting to balance my bank account. But I tend to overdo things early on, and I was just getting overwhelmed. Even something like looking up a mortgage-savings website got me stressed out. So I'm going to spend this evening's blog focusing on baby steps and the fun I could have with this process. That's right. Fun.

For instance, over the weekend, I got together with a friend of mine and we talked about a podcast we'd like to put together. We've been talking about it for a while, but we had a legitimate breakthrough. I wrote an entire script for an 8-10 minute parody skit, and the words just flowed.

Then today, I was talking to a friend and former manager about the skit and how awesome it was, and then how stressed I was about the concept of needing a second job. And she gave me some very good advice - that when it comes to a second job, I should do what makes me happy. I didn't have a response. I mean, I wanted to do something creative, of course, but everything I've read has said that you need to make sacrifices to save money.

But... why not both? I'm a harpist and a writer. Why not spend time that I would be working on admittedly boring work like a part-time data entry or store clerk position, and instead work on creative ventures that could very well make money? The reason I rejected those at first is that they're unstable in a way that my job isn't. But if I looked at them as a job, and put the same amount of time and energy into them, they would be so much more rewarding on a spiritual scale, and I'd be able to save more willpower to doing well at my main job which would pay higher than a part time job anyway.

So I'm going to try it for a while and see how it works, and report on it to you. Fingers crossed, right?

Now I know this is a financial blog, but I'd like to also to post a few notes related to losing weight. Why? Because at some point in the future (playing the long game here), I am going to want a better full-time job with better pay. And in order to do that, I need to take care of my physical issues like back pain and extra weight, both of which I have the tools to manage on my own terms. The fact that there is prejudice in hiring toward overweight people, especially women, sucks. But it's the truth, and it's not going to change just because I wish it would. So I'd like to lose some weight so that I'm a thinner candidate at my next important interview and more likely to be hired. Plus lower back pain sucks. And better health = lower medical costs in the long term!

And, to comment on the elephant in the room, yes. I am terrified that my weight is why I've lost two pregnancies. I do consider myself lucky, in that my losses were early in - both before 7 weeks - and they occurred naturally and completed without medical intervention. But I'm not going to try again until I consider myself more in shape. So without further ado, here are the primary goals I want to work on:

1. Do a great job at work.
2. When I'm home, make sure my home is cared for (meal prep, cleaning, organizing, and balancing the e-checkbook).
3. Once I have cared for my home, get my daily exercise in.
4. Once I am too tired to exercise any longer, practice harp - specifically, put a gig book together again.
5. Once my fingers hurt too much or I am too frustrated from practicing, write.

And that should honestly take care of the majority of my time. So the sacrifice is going to be focusing on those five things at the expense of stuff like playing video games and reading as much.

Now I still love knocking out goals and seeing the progress toward them. My three main goals are to lose weight (0 lost of 65 lbs in total), to pay off our car loan ($1,500 paid/$14,400 principal) and to save up as much money as humanly possible outside of my IRA ($1100/$50,000 goal)

I went to http://www.free-mandalas.net/ and printed out a few adult coloring pages. I'm not worrying too much about how many coloring spots are in it. If I run out, I'll get a new one. :D

  

Dragon for weight loss (rarr!), stained glass for the car debt, and heart for savings. One bubble per $100 saved/paid off or 1000 calories burned.

And just like that, I'm excited instead of stressed. BAM. Take that, human psychology!

Rae Introduces Herself

I must have tried to start a blog a thousand times by now. Blogs about my goals, about weight loss, about creativity, and about writing. Even one about my journey into pregnancy, though that was never published and ended with my second miscarriage.

In fact, that event is the reason I’m starting this blog. It happened a month ago at this point, and I’m doing better… but I’m not 100% me. I took my time with it, as one does. Played a lot of video games, read some really good stories, and got myself back into the swing of things at work. The truth is, though, I am never more myself than when I am working towards a goal. Obsessively. Especially if it’s a huge goal, with very little hope of accomplishing much in the short term, one I would need to focus on every single day and can work on in my spare time order to achieve it.

So that’s the purpose of this blog. It isn’t to brag about my financial success or to give advice (though there may be some of both due to the nature of the beast). It’s to help myself hone in and focus on who I am when I’m and at my best and working toward something better.

What I really want financially is a mortgage to replace my rent. I am 32 years old and plan to work until I'm 65 barring the unforseen, so a 30-year mortgage would give me at least a few working years free of house payments. Currently, I have a very nice, if pricey, apartment. $1024/month after pet rent, plus it's being jacked up this year as par for the course. Expensive, right?

This was an upgrade that husband and I chose to make after I got a raise at work, because our previous apartment was a shithole. We lived there for two years - it was right on the highway so you heard sirens every night, there was no washer/dryer in the unit, the machines at the laundry facility worked only if you were lucky (or if someone didn’t open the dryer you’d paid for and stopped it), we saw domestic violence from our living room window, our door was kicked in by an overzealous security guard, and a murdered woman's body was dumped at the homeless tent camp just outside of the gate. So yes, we have a fairly expensive apartment right now. I have no regrets. But I would prefer to put that monthly payment toward equity than an apartment, even if it is lovely and safe and has a washer/dryer in unit.

The problem is that with our rent so high, we’re having difficulty saving anything up. Now that’s not to say that we’re living from paycheck to paycheck. In fact, we’re doing okay. The problem is that things are stable, instead of on the upswing.

So to be completely honest about everything, I’m going to share my financial situation with you. It’s all in approximates, obviously, and I’m not not going to say where my accounts are. That’d be ridiculous. But it’s a way for me to hold myself accountable and keep things realistic. And hey, if I end up with a reader who starts in my financial situation and has goals similar to mine, so much the better.

Debt: $13,000
We purchased a second car in December 2015 on a 48-month lease at 2.99% APR financed through our credit union. The car was $10500 but we chose to get a few warranties for safety's sake. We managed a $1k downpayment at the time and have made 4 monthly payments and 1 extra payment. I'm not as nervous about this because it's our only debt - no credit card bills or student loans.

Retirement: $4000
Putting 2% of each paycheck to my Roth 401(k) + $100/month toward my Roth IRA. It isn't much, but it's also not something I'm willing to sacrifice for anything else. I look at it as a bill. I'd love to max out my contributions every year, but I think that might have to come after we get the rest settled.

Savings: $1100
This is the part I'm a little embarrassed about. It's better than it could be, but this includes our total savings, so emergency fund, Christmas gift fund, everything all in one. It might dip a bit as soon as I get the rest of my medical bills from last month in the mail. Also doesn't help that I ate out a lot last month after everything happened.

Budget: $3200/month
Contrariwise, this is the part where I feel we've made the most progress. See, we've finally managed to get to the point where we're not spending the money we made on the last paycheck - instead, we spend from the money we made last month. All the money we're making this month is going to be allocated to our budget at the end of the month. We use our goodbudget.com account, but we aren't always great at sticking to the plan, so things do get a little disjointed sometimes. More or less, though, that $3200 is our 0-sum budget, using up all of our income from the previous month but not over-using it, and our retirement fund is a part of it.

So there you go. Obviously, in a perfect world, this would be a lot different. My goals are admittedly pretty lofty:
$0 Debt
$5500/year to Roth IRA (instead of approx. $2000/year)
$10000 in Emergency Savings
$20000 for House Downpayment (+closing costs, inspection fees, etc)
$25000/year Superfrugal Budget
Also I'd like to lose 65 lbs and have 2 kids.

I'm serious about all of this. These goals are, admittedly, crazy, but I'm not getting anywhere with them right now. So that's the purpose of this blog. Rae Wants a House. And without working harder on those goals than I am right now, Rae ain't gonna get what she wants. Time to get to work.