Women in Red Savers 2016

[chiver78]

checking in a little unexpectedly here. I was able to add a little more to my EF just now. today, my paycheck (budgeted for) and bonus (earmarked for a project) hit my checking account. also, my federal tax refund (I bought a house last year) hit savings, as well as the $22 from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. I was able to add $1000 to my EF over the amount I was replacing from having to borrow from it earlier this week to float a loan. woot!

so, in addition to keeping up with the calendar challenge, I am proud to say that my EF is just over $2000.

[forwardwego]

woo hoo chiver78 way to go chiver gal!

[forwardwego]

UPDATE 3/11/2016 $2580 (goal $18000)

FUND 2016	Present	Goal	% Met	$$ Needed
Homestead EF	1400	2000	70	600
Vehicle XF	500	1500	33	1000
Medical XF	60	1500	4	1440
Travel	20	1000	2	980
SL payoff	150	5000	3	4850
DD wedding	50	5000	1	4950
Rusty J Boxer	100	600	16	500
Weekly Challenge*	300	1400	21	1100
Totals	2580	18000	14	15420

 


*Weekly challenge/53 Friday summary

 
1   2   3  4   5   6  7   8  9  10

11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40

41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

51 52 22

14+10+22+24+20+4+50+16+40+52+48=300


Another IBU     (itty bitty update) 
 
The medical expense fund is lower than I would like, but we have been cash flowing our co-pays. As long as we do that and the balance climbs I'm happy. 

[chiver78]

forwardwego - thank you! I still have my shell game going on, but I have an empty shell now. that's been missing for awhile, and I'm going to maximize my payoff power this year. I still need to check in with the Racers, but I have some dust that needs to settle first.

I have a couple questions for you though....

1 - cash flow your co-pays? do you not have an FSA account, or do you count the FSA funds in that ledger? if you have the option for an FSA and can at least ballpark your annual medical spending, it's a great idea.

2 - are you picking and choosing which "weeks" to play on the weekly challenge? I've seen a couple other posters crossing off random numbers up to 52, but I haven't had a chance to ask yet. that's interesting. I might have crossed off a few weeks this week with a lottery winning (see the "why should my YM card be revoked" thread for that rant. the winnings were the saving grace) but I'm just chugging along the calendar weeks. tomorrow is $11 or $12, I think.

[forwardwego]

chiver78 Good for you on having an "empty shell". I hope soon you'll have several empty shells. I know you are feeling motivated. You CAN do it! 

I have a confession. I missed the deadline to participate in the FSA 
I have done FSA for @ 10 years or more.. I've saved a bunch of $$ that way. But since I missed the deadline, I figured instead I'd have a fund for med expenses. 

Yes, I play the weekly challenge out of order. When I have a fairly liquid week I aim for one of the big numbers. Tougher weeks I pick off a smaller number. Also I like to take things to the even $10 when I can. Last week I was up to $252, so this week I added an amount ending in 8 ($48). If I remember right you like to round to the $25?   It keeps things interesting, challenging, and works well for me. seriousthistime dubbed it the maximum tackle method. I aim for as high of a number as I can manage each week. 
 

[Ombud]

2nd post. Added the front yard as I'm a little short of his bid:

♤ 2016 Roth: 2250 of 6500
♡ Solo vacation : 0 of 2000
◇ Front yard: 1000 of 2600

OMBUD $3250 (1/1/16 $0, Goal $11,100)

[seriousthistime]

Update

	Goal	Added	3/11/16	% Saved	Roses
Travel	$1,500	$60	$421	28.1%
Moving fund	$1,500	$0	$75	5.0%
Pet care	$3,120	$120	$600	19.2%
Weekly savings	$2,028	$78	$390	19.2%
Total	$8,148	$258	$1,486	18.2%

Seriousthistime, $1,486, 3/11/2016 (Goal $8,148)


Just plodding along.  No insights or wisdom to share.  I'm too focused on my to-do list around the house. 

[sealy]

Ok this is what's going on with my money. I will put $1000 in my far away account for my EF. The rest I'm not sure about but I've used ~ $65 on a rented bush wacker. I gave my cousin $120 for helping me, my other cousin $100 for a table set, and my brother $80 for his electric bill. And that's what I mean about slowly fading away.  It's ok though because it's for my family. 

[Jaguar]

Well I've started the process to stop the bleed of spending money on things that are pure luxury as opposed to a real need. It takes 7 days to shut down an Ebay account and I just started the process.

One more albatross off of my shoulders.

[sealy]

When I update should I repost the post I updated?  (Does that make sense?)

[snapdragon]

Car/House $ 500.78 / $1500

Savings $ 1339.56/ $4000

Travel $ 3083.38 / $4500

New Totals $ 4923.72 / $10,000





Snapdragon 3/14/15 --- $4923.72 / $10,000



I just wanted to get something put in. Next month everything should be shaken out.

[shanendoah]

Our savings is going to take a hit this month.
I hope to do taxes next weekend. I expect we'll owe a few thousand (from the sale of the rental property).
Also, we noticed a couple of weeks ago that our water heater was starting to get rust on the bottom. We have had a water heater fail and flood the basement before, and since this one is in a finished part of the house, we'd rather no flooding. But we would like to change from an electric water heater to a tankless gas water heater. We had the guy out to give an estimate today - about $4k. We should qualify for a rebate of about $950 from our energy company, so that will help, but I am still expecting an initial hit of $7k or so, with the rebate then filtering that back in.
Luckily, we have about $20,500 in savings because I planned for the tax and gas conversion costs when we sold the second house this summer.

[forwardwego]

sealy basically yes, seriousthistime has an excellent step by step on how to do this. I'll see if I can find it.

Hola snapdragon Good to see you!


shanendoah Nice work saving ahead for the taxes, and tankless water heater, prevention beats a flooded house.

[forwardwego]

Jan 3, 2016 13:22:10 GMT -5 seriousthistime said:

you can always quote your message and it will go into a "create post" box.  At the bottom, click on the BBCode button, and it will switch over to a code-based reply.  Delete the code at the very beginning and the very end.  (You will know what that code is because it is everything before your first text in the quoted post above.)  Then click back on the Visual button next to BBCode.  Your original post will appear without any reference to it being quoted.  Then edit as you need to, click "Create Post" and the new (updated) post will appear as if you had created the new one from scratch.

Hope this helps.

[sealy]

I usually just edit then copy and paste my tagline in a new message.

[Ombud]

Bimonthly update -- 5 weeks to go on the 2nd job, then I'll learn what's up. So trying to knock it out:

♤ 2016 Roth: 3300 of 6500
♡ Solo vacation : 0 of 2000
◇ Front yard: 1500 of $2600 May job

OMBUD $4800 (1/1/16 $0, Goal $11,100)

[Rocky Mtn Saver]

Rocky Mtn Saver: 03/17/2016 $300 (goal $1000 EF, start 01/01/2016)

Just a small update today. I'm still juggling numbers for the current year, but I'm trying to at least maintain consistency about my retirement contributions and savings amounts after a big work change.

[Ombud]

Mar 17, 2016 13:58:46 GMT -5 Rocky Mtn Saver said:

Rocky Mtn Saver: 03/17/2016 $300 (goal $1000 EF, start 01/01/2016)

Just a small update today. I'm still juggling numbers for the current year, but I'm trying to at least maintain consistency about my retirement contributions and savings amounts after a big work change.

What change? Do tell! Are you still in South America?

[forwardwego]

UPDATE 3/18/2016 $2610 (goal $15400)

2016 FUND	Present	Goal	% Met	$$$ Needed
Homestead EF	1400	2000	70	600
Vehicle XF	500	1500	33	1000
Medical XF	60	1500	4	1440
Travel	20	1000	2	980
SL Payoff	150	5000	3	4850
DD Wedding Pt 1	50	2000	2	1950
Rusty J Boxer Pt 1	100	1000	10	900
Weekly Challenge*	330	1400	23	1070
TOTALS	2610	15400	17	12790

*Weekly challenge/53 Friday summary

1	2	3	X	5	6	7	8	9	X
11	12	13	X	15	X	17	18	19	X
21	22	23	X	25	26	27	28	29	X
31	32	33	34	35	36	37	38	39	X
41	42	43	44	45	46	47	X	49	X
51	X	22

14+10+22+24+20+4+50+16+40+52+48+30=330

Only able to add $30 to savings this week, so it seemed like a good opportunity to fine tune my 2016 goals. I've reduced the DD Wedding Goal from $5K to $2K. I believe DD's serious BF will someday be her husband but I probably have time to bump up that goal in 2017. Since I am designating a fund for our beloved boxer boy Rusty instead of buying pet insurance, I have bumped up that goal from $600 to $1000. My thought is to bump up that goal by an additional $1K every year. He is 7 years old now so I'll hopefully have @ $5K in his fund by the time he is into his "golden years".

[forwardwego]

Wow Savers this year is zooming. Only 13 more days in March. And soon one quarter of the year will be DONE! I believe as a group and individually we are really rolling!!! I think now is a good time for each of us to earn an "atta girl" or "atta boy".

So the "challenge" question is: What are you really good at that is contributing to your ability to save??

For me the answer is "I almost always eat my leftovers." Whether it's cooked at home or bought at a restaurant, I save and eat the leftovers. 

[sealy]

i pick up found money on the ground and yell "I'm a money magnet!"

I can't wait to see what others say.

[forwardwego]

sealy That sounds fun   

[sealy]

Mar 20, 2016 19:19:45 GMT -5 forwardwego said:

sealy That sounds fun   

I learned it from a coworker. she says that every time ahe finds money so I start doing it. I even tell her when and how must I find then we say "whooo hooo" and occassionally high 5 each other.

[sealy]

I'm thinking I'm going to take $500 out and put it on my CC so I can go under $5,000.

[chiver78]

I know this isn't the format typically used in WIR, but I can't post this in EE. they'd talk me into it over there.

dear WIR,

please talk me out of trying to figure out a way to make this work... my long term goals include buying vacation property to rent out, since I live in a vacation spot (Cape Cod). I am currently still digging myself out of debt and am about to sign on for a new fence to contain my pups in the yard (~$10k) so I shouldn't really be seriously looking at properties yet. I do have a search saved on Zillow, so that I can see what the market for this sort of property is like and what trends, etc.

today's search results popped up a serious contender - link
it is exactly the area of town that I intend to focus on, as the properties are all formerly seasonal cottages, small and inexpensive. this one looks to be in outstanding shape and priced very well. to purchase a 2nd home, I would need 10% down in order to secure financing. as you can see from the asking price, that would be about $8k.

please talk me out of this.....
thank you

[teachermom]

You need to decide if the opportunity costs are worth it. Make a list of pros and cons. I would say that while in debt, not a great time to invest. What happens if something goes wrong? How are you going to cover it? What kind of savings/EF do you have?

Teachermom

[seriousthistime]

chiver, it was my understanding that to purchase a second home/rental property you would need a minimum of 20% down and so many months of reserves in savings to cover the mortgage, taxes, and HO fees.  They usually don't allow you to use the anticipated rental income to qualify for the mortgage unless you can show a few years of solid rental history (like with a refi).  Do you have a lender lined up that has less stringent requirements? 

I would also talk you out of it.  It's great to be have goals, but unless you are on super-solid financial ground right now, one domino could topple the whole shebang.  

[chiver78]

thanks, ladies. I actually had pretty much talked myself out of it before I spoke with the listing agent, and then I got answers I didn't really like for some of the questions I had for him. so, I'm all set with this for awhile. if it's still available when I'm in a better position to bid, I'll bid appropriately for it - which is not the asking price.

back to paying stuff down and financing the fence. thanks for being my sounding board, as always

[bankergurl]

I got a little bit behind posting here.....

It's been super busy here continuing to work on getting through all of my clothes and helping out at my parents rentals.  They have now officially made MO and I the property managers and they paid us for half of March and all of April so that was a good boost to savings.  I sold $25 worth of old shorts this last week so that is good.

We leave for vaca in less then 3 weeks so trying to get the house cleaned up (which is hard with me having piles of clothes all over...) as I hate to go to or come back from vaca with a messy house.  Luckily we leave on a Monday and I have nothing planned the weekend before so I will have that weekend to get everything that is left done at that time.

Current Deposits = $13,146.00

+$25.00 My Payday to Our Savings

+$25.00 My Payday to Mom Loan Savings

+$375.00 March/April Property Manager Pay
+$35.00 Escrow Refund
+$12.25 FB Sales
+$2.75 Even Out Amount

+$10.00 Beer Rebate
+$35.00 FB Sales
+$12.00 52 Week Challenge Week #12
Total Deposits for 2016 = $13,678.00


Banker Gurl : 3/23/16 $13,678.00 (1/1/16 $0, WIRS1) Goal - Contribute $12,000

[gracendignity]

I have received my 2nd paycheck for March, so it's time to update my list.

NAME:                YEARLY GOAL:                MONTHLY GOAL:                % MET:

Emergency Fund     $1200                            $100                                      25%

Gift Giving              $1200                              $100                                    25%

Travel                     $600                                 $50                                    25%

My divorce was final on March 17.  Now comes the transferring of funds, selling some property, etc.  I'm not sure exactly how much I will end up with but it is a scary-small amount.  The first transfers are to take place within 30 days of the final decree date.  The property sales won't be for awhile so money will be trickling in for awhile longer.  Emotionally it's been a pretty hard week, and I've just kind of put one foot in front of the other and puttered along, but I'm starting think ahead again and planning how I'm going to grow this decidedly small amount of money into a retirement fund.  I've enjoyed my pity party long enough and it's time to get out my big girl undies and conquer my little corner of the world.

I received my grant money last week, too, so next month I'll start my course in legal scoping/transcription.  On my sewing machine is my first miniature quilt for the little shop my daughters and I are (slowly) starting up.  Who knows where life will find me next year?  The possibilities are endless!

Grace