Roommate Luck

It's hard to believe it's already almost the end of the month!

Normally I'd write a post a day on the 31st, 1st and 2nd, but it occurred to me today that I'm going to have to do some prep writing this month. Why?

I'm going out of town to meet The Boy's mom on Friday.

*cue panic*

I've never actually been "taken to meet mom" before. I've always either known them before, or met in a very casual setting.

I'm meeting her at her birthday party.

Awesome.

So, yeah, I'm going to have to get my posts written early because Friday is going to be spent hyperventilating into a paper bag.

Possibly Thursday night as well.

Anyway, on to money stuff. I actually have a roommate now! Actually, I've had one since the middle of February. I lived with him for my first couple college years, so I know we can live together. He had been unhappy with his existing living arrangement (living with parents, unemployed), but was hesitant to take the first steps forward to actually change it. He was worried about money, obviously, because he didn't have an income to make the jump with. The area he was living in isn't exactly known for being an employment hot spot either.

So, I told him to move to Edmonton, crash at my place, search for work here, and we'd work something out rent wise when he found a job. I haven't asked for anything since he'd moved in, but this month he pitched in on utilities. Yay! I think he felt bad when he saw that my electrical bill spiked after he moved in (he has lots of electronics).

Apparently I overestimated the job market here though, this weekend he FINALLY got a call back on a resume he took in over a month ago. That took far longer than I expected.

Anyways, he has an interview on Thursday. Wish him luck!

Banging My Head On A Table

I made what is quite possibly the most bone headed move I've made in QUITE a while.

I was late on a credit card payment.

Actually, scrap that, I was early on a credit card payment.

I made a payment thinking it would be going towards my March bill, but I didn't pay attention to the date on my billing cycle. The payment actually got posted onto my February bill, leaving my second March payment short of what I actually owed.

I'm kicking myself so hard right now, you have no idea. I've never done this before. Short of racking up my credit card balance, this is the stupidest thing I've ever done with it.

The only reason I noticed anything was wrong was the fact that my minimum payment jumped. It had been below $100 a month for a little while now, and my balance had been steadily decreasing, so when it jumped to $120 I looked at it with my head tilted to the side thinking wtf?

Then I saw the little note at the bottom:

Your account is one payment past due, which may result in account suspension. Please contact the account management centre at 1 888 XXX-XXXX to make payment arrangements.

You want to see my eyes bug out? That did it. I checked my bank records. I checked the credit card's payment history. Sure enough, it was all there, just not where I thought it would be.

I am absolutely livid with myself. This was nothing short of bone headed.

Let this be a lesson for everyone in knowing your payment due dates. Learn from me so you don't have to learn for yourself.

*head desk*

I'm Dreaming

Because the last couple days have been a little stressful, I really wanted to do something light and fluffy. Something fun and semi-useless. I say semi-useless instead of useless, because this exercise can give you real insight into where your priorities actually lie. Sometimes that's just as useful as money. So, inspired by Money Rabbit's What I Would Do With $100,000, and Krystal at Give Me Back My Five Bucks' What I Would Do If I Won $1,000,000: 4 Years Later, here is what I would do if I had $100,000:
Credit Card - $4,300 ($95,700 left)

So long sucker. Like a bad ex-boyfriend, I won't miss you when you're gone.

LOC - $11,000 ($84,700 left)

This is like the annoying kid brother to the aforementioned bad ex-boyfriend. Less directly spiteful, but I'll be happy to not have to deal with it again either.

Car - $9000 ($75,700 left)

I still plan to sell my silvery little lemon, but in the mean time I'd rather not have the monthly payments or inflated insurance on it either. Hello extra $450 a month...

Mortgage - $48,000 ($27,700 left)

My mortgage, while it is fixed, has multiple pre-payment options including one allowing me to put up to 20% of the total mortgage down on the balance every year. That chunk right there takes my mortgage out of the oh please don't let the rates get too high category into the *breathe* category. Ah the things you learn when you're young and dumb.

New Homebuyer's Repayment - $15,000 ($12,700 left)

Because when I put money into RRSPs, I want my tax money back dammit.

Emergency Fund - $5,300 ($7,400 left)

I'd plunk the money for my goal of $4000 in there, along with a little extra just for good measure. That puts my combined cash savings and investments between $9,000 and $10,000. I'd feel pretty good about that for the time being, as that gives me several months living expenses should I need it. Or a new furnace in January. You never know.

Renovations - $5,000 ($2,400 left)

I need to finish the flooring on my staircase, and the tile in the kitchen. After that, I should have enough money left to put up the other half of the fence in my back yard.

Pantry Restock - $400 ($2,000 left)

Assorted dried/canned odds and ends, as well as 1/2 a lamb from a farming friend of mine up north. Some containers to hold dried goods in an orderly fashion would be nice too.

Grandfather's Birthday Present - $250 ($1,750 left)

Because he deserves it. I don't know yet what the exact gift would be, but I can assure you it likely includes a large Tim Horton's gift card.

Grandmother's Birthday - $750 ($1,000 left)

It's my grandmother's 80th birthday this year, and the family is all getting together in BC to celebrate. That means flights and accommodation, along with a gift for my grandmother.

Wardrobe Restock - $995 ($5)

Right now the thing I'm most in need of are a pair of gum boots (rain boots, wellies, whatever you call them). The snow is melting around my place, and the water on the sidewalks gets quite deep in some places. Other than that, some good quality work clothes to kick a couple items off my list would be great.

Starbucks Chai Latte - $5 (I'm Out!)

Because, you know, I want one.

;)


*Missed a couple several others - Oops*
Paying Myself
Finance Say What
Debt Free Kid
Fabulously Frugirl
Little Miss Money Bags
Figuring Money Out
Hi That's My Bike

Wallet Worries

One of my friends has been having an absolutely brutal time over the last couple weeks. Every time something starts looking up, she gets side swiped by something else. The poor girl just can’t catch a break right now. The most recent thing to happen? Her wallet was stolen and the thieves racked up her credit cards before she realized it was missing.

What would you do if your wallet was stolen?

Hint: Your first response should not be to go out and buy a new wallet.

It occurred to me after she mentioned it this morning that I wasn't actually sure what to do if my wallet did get stolen. I knew I had to call the banks and the credit bureaus, but that's about it. So, I did a little digging.

I wish I could dig out of debt as fast as I can dig stuff up on google.

There was a decent stack of things to filter through on there. Everyone seems to have their own order of importance for what you should do first. One site that I did find particularly interesting though was a link from Service Canada, detailing the order of events they recommend you follow. Have you ever gone into a government building to apply for something, and after half an hour of waiting in line find out you don't have the necessary ID to actually do it? Kind of a piss off, and that's what I'd expect I'd be dealing with if my wallet was stolen. Service Canada breaks down the order you should reapply for your ID, so you don't get hung up on the "You need ID to get ID" issue. Kinda handy.

They don't really go into great detail on the financial items though. They mention at the very beginning that you should contact your banking institutions and credit card companies, along with contacting the police, but that's pretty much all they say. Nowhere do they mention that you should also contact the credit bureaus. There are 3 bureaus in the US, but in Canada we only have two: Equifax and Transunion. Why the 3rd company pulled out, I don't know.

The ugly part about having your wallet stolen is that whoever is holding your wallet is basically holding your identity. They not only have (some) access to your money and credit, they also probably have enough information to open new accounts in your name. Think about some of the more common security questions: What is your date of birth? (Drivers License, Health Care Card) What is your postal code? (Driver's License) What are the first/middle/last 3 digits of your social insurance number? (SIN Card). Immediately after calling my banks to have all of the cards frozen and reissued, I'd be calling the credit bureaus. You can have them put a fraud alert flag on your account so that they know to watch for suspect activity, and prevent new accounts from being opened. If the thieves do manage to open up accounts in your name, it will be much easier to argue the charges aren't yours because you've taken a proactive approach and they're aware of the situation.

Personally, I'd work in this order:

1. Call Banks - Have accounts frozen.
2. Call Credit Card Companies - Have cards frozen and reissued with a new numbers.
3. Call Credit Bureaus - Have Fraud Alert placed on account.
4. Contact Police - Go to the station and fill out a report.
5. Go to Bank - Get debit card reissued with a different card number and change your PIN.
6. Go to Government Building - Start the ID replacement process, it'll take a while.
7. Contact Utilities - Or anything else you have automatically billed to your credit card. They'll need to know what's up so that your bills don't bounce. See about getting an extension on paying the bills if you need to and let them know you'll update them with the new number as soon as you get it.
8. Check Credit Report - Wait a while and then contact the Credit Bureaus again to make sure nothing has been opened in your name.

You may do it in a different order, but that's how I'd do it personally. Fingers crossed I never have to deal with this as an adult (my wallet was stolen as a teen).

One things I've seen recommended a lot is keeping copies of your ID at home. I'm not sure whether or not this is actually useful in this case, seeing as last I checked most places won't accept a photocopy of your ID in place of actually having it. Has anyone else had to deal with this before? Do you know if the government will accept photo copies of ID? My gut feeling is no.

Has anyone had to do this before? If you had to do it again, what would you do differently?

Mmmmm Payday

I'm happy that since starting my cash only year I've been much less concerned about when payday actually occurs. While some of my envelopes tend to run out rather quickly (I'm looking at you Food and Entertainment), its soothing to know that I have cash sitting in the other envelopes for when I need something. It also feels like the 2 weeks between paydays go by much faster now. Rather than sitting impatiently waiting for the money to come in again (MUST SPEND MONEY! RAWR!!!), I'm a little more content. Scratch that, a lot more content.

That doesn't mean the internal shopping beast doesn't occasionally try to manifest itself, it's just that I'm getting a little better at beating it into submission.

Along with the lower spending comes higher debt payments :) I love dumping a decent size chunk of change onto the totals. I feel like I'm sticking it to the credit card companies every time I do it (not nice, no, but if it's keeping me going...). I've also gotten better at writing my spending down in my day planner! So far I'm up to date with my February mini goal. I'm not blogging the result of that weekly, though I plan to do it all in a more visual form at the end of the month. I know you like the visuals FB ;)

I'm also a little excited about this payday, because I have a new way to track my money now :) One of my friends read that I have problems writing things down, so we met for coffee and she showed me how she tracks hers. She also gave me one of her little note pads, which was/is SO appreciated (Thanks M!), and I plan to start using it today as soon as I take my cash out for the next 2 weeks :)

On a side note, apparently Tim Horton's is trying to rebrand some of their products again. Their danishes and croissants are now European Style danishes, and European Style croissants. Really? Last I checked they haven't changed at all. Yay marketing?

Anyway, that's it for today. I hope you're all doing great ;)

The Cost of a Guilty Pleasure

I know that taking a bath uses more water than taking a shower. I know this for a fact. Put the plug in while you're having a shower and note the water level when you're done, almost guaranteed the tub isn't even half full. From a green standpoint it's abhorrent that I prefer baths to showers, I know. However when I come inside after walking home from the bus stop in -35, a 5 minute lukewarm shower just doesn't get rid of the chill. It really doesn't. Enter long hot bath. I've been wondering for a little while what my baths are costing me though, seeing as during the middle of winter they happen much more frequently.

Excuse me while I geek out for a bit, I've been wanting to do this calculation for a while.

If you're looking for an easy metric unit reference sheet, I'd recommend using this: http://xkcd.com/526/ Geeky, somewhat tongue in cheek, and not necessarily 100% accurate. Perfect.

The temperature of cold tap water here is close to 10 degrees celsius. I wouldn't be surprised if it's colder than that right now, but I'm going to use this as my starting point. I like my baths somewhere around 43 degrees to start, which means the water has to be heated 33 degrees.

My tub, very crudely measured to bath water level, is approximately 40cm x 60cm x 135cm. I'm not going to take my body volume out of there, we'll just assume that I'm going to warm up the water at some point. This gives us a volume of approximately 0.32m3.

It takes 4.184 Joules of energy to warm up 1 gram of water by 1 degree celsius. 1 gram of water is approximately 1cm3. So, in order to warm up my bath water, I'm going to require: 

(0.32m3) x (1,000,000cm3/1m3) x (33C) x (4.184J) = 44,183,040J or 44.18 MJ

So now I know how much energy this is going to take. Kinda. This is assuming everything goes absolutely perfectly, and that every last bit of energy is converted into heat and goes directly into the water. As nice as that would be, it doesn't happen this way. My hot water tank is heated by natural gas, which isn't overly efficient. Lets assume my tank is 65% efficient.

44MJ / 0.65 = 67.69MJ

That's probably a little closer to what is actually being used to heat the water. My gas bill charges by the Gigajoule of energy. Not that they know the exact amount of energy I'm getting, they've just applied an average conversion factor to the volume of gas provided. Anyway, from my last set of utility bills:

$3.97/GJ for the gas itself
$0.53/GJ for the gas delivery
$0.23/GJ for the GST on the gas
$4.73/GJ for heat

$1.59/m3 for the water itself
$1.18/m3 to drain the water
$2.77/m3 for water

Apparently GST is charged on gas and electricity, but not water? Oh well. I'm only taking the variable charges on this, because I have to pay the fixed charges regardless of whether or not I take a bath. I'm also not taking the electricity for the bathroom fan into account, because I don't really feel like looking for the motor rating. That would mean actually finding the label! lol.

So my guilty pleasure is currently costing me:

(0.06769GJ x $4.73/GJ) + (0.32m3 x $2.77/m3) = $1.21

That's better than I was expecting. Cheaper than Starbucks, that's for sure. However, I can see how this would add up over time. Having a hot bath every day of the month rather than a quick shower? That's almost $40!

It's enough to make me think "I'll just have a shower tonight". Tomorrow, maybe not so much ;)

Interest Introspection

I was looking at my debt balances the other day, and thinking about how much I pay on them in interest every month. My credit card balance currently costs me about $55 a month in interest charges, while my line of credit costs me about $85 a month in interest charges. For a little while there I was thinking "maybe I should pay down the line of credit first, it's costing me more in interest." For a couple days now that's what I'd been thinking I'd do *shakes head*, but I sat down and gave it some thought in terms of investments this morning. The money I put towards paying off the credit card is like investing money and getting a 12.9% return, while putting money towards the line of credit is like getting an 8.52% return. Sure, I'll feel better watching the total interest I'm paying decrease every month, but it will decrease at a much slower rate than if I keep paying off my credit card first, and I'll end up paying more interest overall. If I had applied my slightly confused money sense to all of my debts I would have had myself paying off my mortgage before I paid off my credit card. Doesn't exactly make sense, does it?

Some days I wonder how I got myself into this mess. Then I have moments like these. Then I remember.

*facepalm*

A(n) (Un)necessary Bill Payment

Paying bills soothes my nerves.

I’m actually not joking. Yesterday I was sitting at my desk at work, internally freaking out about my finances. What did I do? I logged onto the bank website and moved the money out of my savings account and onto a debt. It didn’t pay the debt off, and my savings account is now empty, but it served the purpose of calming my nerves. That’s it.

There seem to be a couple different schools of thought when it comes to personal finance. Some say to pay off debt first, save later. Others say to do them both at the same time. Both have their merits. Previously I was saving while I was paying off debt, but now I’m not entirely sure how I want to approach this. Aside from my mortgage, I have 3 debts. I almost feel sometimes like it would be easier to have lots of small debts rather than having 3 big ones. At least that way you have the occasional satisfaction of paying something off in full and forgetting about it. It will be quite a while before I can do something like that, save for selling my car and paying off the loan with the proceeds.

I wish I knew a better way of dealing with my stress.

The Backtrack

So, while I was looking at the balance on my credit card earlier, I realized I didn't know what I was actually paying for anymore. Was I still paying for my laptop? My car maintenance? Last Christmas? I really didn't know. So I looked it up. Or rather, I tried. Apparently my credit card only allows you to look back at the last 3 months worth of statements. As I switched to e-bills a while back, I don't know if I'll be able to actually look up the specifics... Based on my estimate I'm in the middle of paying off the iPhone I bought in February while I was volunteering at the Olympics in Whistler. Yeah... buying an $800 phone to replace my beer soaked Blackberry while I wasn't receiving an actual pay check was perhaps not my best step financially, but here we are. Either way, when I was forking over the plastic at the counter I didn't expect that 8 months later I'd still be paying the damn thing off. It's definitely making me think twice about buying anything now.

The belt I was going to get this weekend... sold out. Gone off the website. And the sweater alternate is out of my budget. *Sigh* No treat this go around.

Payday

I love the feeling of money in my account. It's right up there with paying down my beast of a debt that I've accumulated. Today I got both :) Shortly after checking to see that my paycheck had been deposited, I put almost $500 onto my debts, and $250 towards my upcoming utility bills. I never pay my utility bills when they come in, they're always paid in advance. By the time I get the actual bill, it almost always says they owe me money. I don't mind that. It means that if I have a legitimate emergency I can forego paying my bills for a month and nobody gets pissed at me for it.

I am being a little bad however... I'm drinking Starbucks as I write this. Or, as my dad calls it: Fivebucks. He's not far off, my Grande Chai latte set me back almost $4.50. At least today they gave me a survey slip. That means the next one is on them :D I love that.