Archives for July 2005

(More) About Me

Posted on July 19, 2005 // 7 Comments

I was cleaning out my Inbox and ran across somebody who was wondering if my money was from my parents or other gift/inheritance. So I wanted to expand upon my initial About Me post and share some more about my financial past.

Let’s start with college. My parents did help me through undergrad, but I still took about $8,000 of students loans for each of my four years. So, $32,000 in total. I worked part-time every single year in college, working everything from restaurant host to tutor to parking lot attendant. This mostly went towards food and spending money. I also worked full-time every single summer. I’d say each summer I’d earn about $3,000 net, and $1k (edit: towards loans) from during the rest of the year.
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Filed Under: General //

Massive Loan Adjustments Up Ahead?

Posted on July 18, 2005 // 4 Comments

It seems like every tenth house we see in our neighborhood is going up for sale these days, with the “Sale Pending” sign up within a week afterwards. But in reading this month’s issue of Kiplinger’s Personal Finance, I read an opinion that closely reflects my own future predictions (not that I’m Miss Cleo or anything). Economist Mark Zandi describes a scenario that mortgage rates will rise by 1 to 1.5 points of the next year, and that home prices will flatten but not fall. However, due to the large amount of interest-only and adjustable-rate mortgages out there, and “…in 2006 and early 2007, we’ll be in the middle of a massive loan adjustment.” Thus, there will be a high number of foreclosures and delinquencies, with bargains to be found.
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Filed Under: Real Estate //

Presidential Bank Raises Checking and Savings Rates to 3.5% and 3.75% APY

Posted on July 17, 2005 // 7 Comments

As I mentioned in my latest Net Worth update, my savings and free money borrowed at 0% interest are earning 3.75% APY now, thanks to a recent uptick in the Presidential Bank Premier Savings Account (mentioned previously). In addition, the money in my checking account there (Presidential Bank Checking Review) is now earning 3.5% APY. This is good news for people like me who are saving up for a downpayment in the future and not trying to get a low low mortgage rate right now. At 3.75%, my current cash holdings of $58,000 would earn $2,175 a year. Not bad, hopefully inflation will stay at bay as well.

Filed Under: Banking //

Budget Analysis and New Budget Limits

Posted on July 16, 2005 // 1 Comment

Ok, so we’ve been carefully tracking and categorizing our spending transactions in Microsoft Money 2005 for the last 3 months, and I’ve collated the information into this chart:
budget.gif
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Filed Under: Budgeting //

Buy vs. Rent? Screw it, we’re Renting.

Posted on July 16, 2005 // 2 Comments

I’m not doing the buy vs. rent analysis because my wife and I simply aren’t going to buy a house and try to sell it again in two years. We already know the analysis mainly hinges on expected real estate appreciation, and we ain’t psychic, so we are just going to take what comes for now. No word on if we have to move yet.

Filed Under: Real Estate //

3 Simple eBay Selling Tips

Posted on July 14, 2005 // 8 Comments

Ok, a day late per my weekly to-do list, not too bad. Now, I know there are a billion eBay tips out there, but here are the ones I always tell my friends when they ask me about eBay. (In a previous life, I was a eBay Powerseller.)

1) Don’t dawdle. Just list it. – The most common mistake I see people make is put off listing their items for sale, whether locally or on eBay. I’m guilty of this myself. Unless you are listing antiques, your stuff is losing value by the second, especially electronics like laptops and other gadgetry. I’m selling an old laptop this week that I haven’t used in over a year, and it’s probably lost over $300+ in value already. Set yourself a deadline, and just list it, even if you don’t get the perfect listing time, description, or picture.
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Filed Under: eBay //

Brainstorming More Things to Sell on eBay.

Posted on July 13, 2005 // 5 Comments

The more I gather the things I want to sell on eBay, the more things pop up. I made this list to help me brainstorm items, and have been adding to it continuously. I’d be open to more! =)

Old Clothes, Handbags, Shoes
VHS Tapes, DVDs
Music CDs, Tapes
Electronics including cameras, printers, printer ink cartridges, cell phones, laptops, disk drives, zip disks, cables, (I’ve got a ton of these)
Antiques? (I’ve got none of these)
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Filed Under: eBay //

My eBay Selling Template (in Microsoft Excel)

Posted on July 12, 2005 // 34 Comments

I’m still in the midst of listing everything I need to sell on eBay… man it’s a lot of stuff I’ve been hoarding. I’ve decided to share my eBay selling template – it’s nothing spectacular, just something I whipped up in Microsoft Excel to help organize and automate selling a large number of items. Hopefully others can find it useful. You can download it here – MyMoneyBlog_EbayTemplate.xls. Here’s a screenshot (click to enlarge) and some instructions:


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Filed Under: eBay //

Debtor Beware: Two-cycle Billing Credit Card Trick

Posted on July 11, 2005 // 3 Comments

I thought I was pretty knowledgeable about credit cards and all, but in doing my due diligence for my Discover 0% For Life credit card offer, I learned something new to look out for – two-cycle billing. (Coincidentally, I wake up to the a comment mentioning it). I guess I never heard of this becuase I never carry a balance that isn’t at 0% APR. Also, most credit card companies don’t use it. Two biggies that do are BankOne (now Chase) and Discover. What is two-cycle billing?
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Filed Under: Credit Cards //

July 2005 Financial Status / Net Worth Update

Posted on July 10, 2005 // 6 Comments


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Filed Under: Goals //

Use Capital One 360? Save 16% off your Sprint PCS bill every month!

Posted on July 9, 2005 // 9 Comments

I just got this in my Capital One 360 BrightSpots monthly e-mail newsletter:
“Sprint is offering a 16% discount on select PCS Services to all Capital One 360 Customers. Go to ingdirect.com/sprint to learn more. And if you’re already a Sprint customer, just dial #ING on your Sprint phone to reach a helpful Capital One 360 Associate from the hours of 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. We’re happy to work with Sprint and to offer you one more way to help you Save Your Money?.”

Nice! My brother uses Sprint PCS, I gotta send this to him. For example, if you pay $40 per month now, it’ll just be $33.60! That’ll save you $6.40 a month, or $76.80 a year. Wow, it pays to read those newsletters sometimes!

If you don’t have an Capital One 360 account, see this previous post for more information. You can also get $25 for signing up.

Filed Under: Deals & Offers //

Unemployed Week-long To Do List

Posted on July 9, 2005 // 1 Comment

Ok, now that I am unemployed, to help me focus here are the money-related things I want to do this week, with due dates.

Tomorrow – Post Monthly Financial Status
Monday – List everything I need to put on eBay to sell
Tuesday – Post my eBay tips, do eBay research
Wednesday – Do a quick rent vs. buy home analysis for market area
Thursday – Collect spending data from last 3 months in MS Money
Friday – Analyze data to help refine monthly budget
Saturday – Take pictures of items, make descriptions, list items

Filed Under: General //
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