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Hi, I'm 22 Eargesplitten. I have sadbrains, autism, and an arguably unhealthy sentimental attachment to inanimate objects. When my last thread left off I was in an abusive relationship that was so bad that it was impacting my work performance, leading me to a nervous breakdown and FMLA leave on short term disability. To summarize the past few years: Last half of 2018: Everything is terrible and holy gently caress one of my roommates is a violent alcoholic First half of 2019: Everything is terrible and two people I thought were my friends sucked me dry financially and bailed and holy gently caress one of my roommates is a sexual predator Second half of 2019: Everything is a tiny bit less terrible but I'm living in a crack house and holy poo poo how do I keep ending up with unstable alcoholic roommates? Jan-Feb 2020: Hey I'm making good money and I'm still living in a crack house but at least I can save up and move out soon. March-July 2020: I got a pay cut and the world is on fire and I'm in a crack house August 2020 - February 2021: I'm no longer in a crack house but now I'm spending all my money on rent March 2021 - 3 days ago: My expenses are way lower and my divorce is finalized and life is actually pretty good let's live it up! Present: I need to start being responsible again now that I have nobody to blame but myself. Assets: 2 cheap cars (the reason this thread may go down in flames) 1 cheap camper (my home) $1,800 in a HSA Liabilities: Discover Card: $8500 @ 20% APR Personal loan: $9050 @ 20% APR American Express in collections: $8700 @ 0% APR, in collections since June 2019 Stafford Loans: $41,000 at varying APRs, in forbearance from early in the pandemic My broken brain Income: ~$3400 per month, I get paid bimonthly rather than every 2 weeks so it can vary by a couple hundred per month. Budget:  A few things to note with the budget: 1) Per the terms of my divorce I'm still paying my ex's phone bill and car insurance for another 4 months while she tries to get on her feet, but on the bright side no alimony since I took all the debt and she got the valuable car. 2) The car maintenance category is high because I'm expecting to have to replace either the engine or the water pump and timing belt on my Subaru Impreza fairly soon, I'm going to take it to a local shop to determine how the engine itself is looking to determine whether I replace just the timing belt and water pump or see about replacing the whole thing, maybe with a lower mileage JDM unit, per initial research that's possible. Once that's done I'll be lowering it down. 3) I live in a very remote area, anything consumable is more expensive than it would be in a bigger city. Food, gas, anything like that. Gas will also fluctuate month to month depending on how much I leave town, I use less than one gallon per week if I don't leave town, an entire tank if I go visit family on the front range, but that's rare. More common is having to drive ~60 miles to and from a nearby town for something I can't get in town and don't want to wait to have delivered. 4) I'm hoping to finish cleaning out the storage unit in September, although that may require paying a little bit for dump fees, I'm not sure where to categorize that in the budget. 5) I'm thinking about cancelling Netflix. I know that seems like a very small expense but I don't remember the last time I used it so there's no point in keeping it now that I'm looking at everything I pay for. When I do watch something it's almost always sweaty men in their underwear grabbing each other on Fite.tv. I'll also be cancelling the Pluralsight subscription once I land a new job, although that will be pennies compared to the raise that I would get at any new job I accept. 6) I'm hoping to tighten this budget down a bit further as I go along, my logic is that since I haven't been keeping a budget since 2018 going as strict as I want immediately would be like going on a crash diet. In the Newbies thread I said I expected $500 per month excess, but I found out today that I got a COL increase, and I was also being conservative expecting to have forgotten something in my budget, we'll see. Water is included with rent and heat is electric, which means it will be going up later in the year but I'm in the process of winterizing the camper which will help a lot. My current plan is to get my checking account to the point where I'm living off of last month's paychecks rather than paycheck to paycheck, as that makes things much simpler since I just have to stick to the budget rather than stick to the budget while also keeping track of what I have until the next paycheck. After that I'll figure out whether to build up a bigger buffer or attack the Discover Card or split between the two, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Aug 24, 2021 04:57
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So, I’m legit curious, what does live in a camper mean ? Also, my input so far is it’s pretty much three simple things for the immediate future : 1. Make sure Income is net positive monthly 2. Set base emergency fund of 1,000-2,000 3. Pay off those credit cards , as quickly as possible.
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Aug 24, 2021 05:14
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I live in a 30-foot long fifth wheel in a trailer park. Partially because housing up here is incredibly hard to come by, partially because it's super cheap, partially because I'm interested in tiny houses and figured that spending four figures to find out whether I can stand living in a small space is better than spending the better part of $100,000 in case I hated it. I work remotely doing IT so I moved up into the mountains when I got the chance and it has done wonders for my mental health. When you can look out the window and see a 14,000' peak across a forest and the air smells like juniper, pine, and sage, it really does something for you.
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Aug 24, 2021 05:18
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Is there any possible way to do a balance transfer off those cards, onto one with an introductory 0% rate or something? I’ve never had to do this, but if it was possible, that would be big. Regarding the car, I recommend trying to YouTube the repairs you need to do. A water pump is pretty straight forward if I remember right. If you can get your hand on a set of socket wrenches, you might be able to do it yourself for a fraction of the cost. Be wary of asking mechanics what they think the car “needs”, because they will sell you on stuff you can’t afford. Your budget states you put 800$ per month towards your emergency fund. Once the fund is at about 2k or so, dedicate that money to paying down your debts. You should not be going to restaurants. Ever. Or buying alcohol. Or clothes, unless absolutely necessary.
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Aug 24, 2021 05:49
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sell you're shitcar Okay! with that out of the way, $766 a month toward emergency fund is good but also you're sitting on $17.5k in cc debt, yikes (this is okay, and you're going to get through it). Your living expenses are very low so "six months" of efund isn't as high as it would be for other people, which is great. I've lived in a van for a month at a time before and man, i'm an indoor computer touching troll through and through but there's definitely something about waking up in nature that loving rules. So, a couple things: Interest on $8050 at 20% apr is $1610 a year (holy poo poo, right?). You're barely barely covering the interest with the $170/mo and you're not going to make any progress on the Discover for a long time. Building an efund is critical especially if there's the slightest bit of uncertainty about your employment, but it might be worth seeing where you can tighten the belt elsewhere to start chipping away at the cc debt too. $180 is kind of high for a storage unit, any way you can knock that down? Maybe sell some of the things in it and downsize? Are your ex's phone/insurance included in the totals you have there? Is $80 insurance on three cars and a camper? quote:More common is having to drive ~60 miles to and from a nearby town for something I can't get in town and don't want to wait to have delivered. I'm gonna be honest, you're probably not going to go from negative savings to more than $750 your first month--it's just not a switch that flips like that. Log every transaction, don't give up if you go over in a category, be honest with yourself, and don't quit. If you need encouragement or reassurance or anything 
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Aug 24, 2021 06:17
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I almost never go to restaurants up here, maybe a pizza once a month because that's the only place up here that is not garbage. I just want to have a little wiggle room there for special occasions. Alcohol, well, I am not dependent but I do drink to cope with work stress which I know isn't healthy and I'm trying to cut back, but I'm trying to ease myself in on all of this rather than going from 0 to 100 overnight. $30 is less than 3 6-packs, a 6-pack is like $12-13 after tax up here. I'm cutting out hard liquor / mixed drinks completely because at this elevation it hits me harder than I intend it to basically every time and then I do dumb poo poo with my debit card. Clothing, I am probably going to buy a couple sets of long underwear because I've only got one and a spare pair of long underwear pants. I was living in long underwear and wool socks or slippers until April when I moved up here. I've got good snow boots, a good parka, a couple nice sweaters that I impulse-bought as part of my last big splurge before I realized I needed to take control of my spending, snow pants, a carhartt-knockoff pair of coveralls, and lots of wool socks, so I think all I really need at this point for the winter is more sets of long underwear. I'm just putting available money in every category so that if I do end up spending money in one of those categories I don't just go "Oh gently caress it, budget is blown, why bother." I might do the belt and pump myself, I might not, it's kind of tight doing it in the engine bay on a Subaru and it's an interference engine which means if I mess it up I have just blown up the engine. I've got a friend up here with a garage and a lot of tools, and I have a decent amount myself, I've worked on my own cars on and off since I was 18 and got my first car. I actually haven't asked said friend if he has ever done a timing belt and water pump, if he has that would make the decision much easier. In that case it would just be probably $300-400 and a weekend's work, but it has been a while since I looked up the price of the kit on Rockauto. There's a good local shop that I'll take it to for the inspection and make it clear that I'm just looking for diagnostic work so I know what work to do myself. Spokes posted:sell you're shitcar Thankfully(ish) American Express has already offered to settle for $3700, per Motronic's advice I'm going to handle the stuff out of collections and let them offer lower and lower settlement amounts until I can afford it. quote:$180 is kind of high for a storage unit, any way you can knock that down? Maybe sell some of the things in it and downsize? My goal is to get rid of it in September, coincidentally my ex needs a computer desk (which I have in there) and I offered to let her have the recliner that her grandmother left to me when she passed because I have no room for it whatsoever. After that it's just a few more things, I can probably rent a Home Depot truck and take the rest to the dump. quote:Are your ex's phone/insurance included in the totals you have there? Is $80 insurance on three cars and a camper? The $80 is insurance on three cars but not the camper, I got a quote for the camper insurance last night and it was like $450 per 6 months with the highest possible deductible on loss of the camper, so I need to figure out what to do there. I didn't realize there was such a thing as fulltimer insurance before last night. The coverage is just liability and uninsured motorist, my cars are worth so little that the cost of collision/comprehensive would be more than I would get out of it within a couple years, if it's even possible to get that coverage on a rebuilt title car like my Impreza. The $55 is for both phones, although I want to find a different carrier, Verizon are a bunch of bald-faced liars and Visible's coverage is worse than Cricket's was. I get more like 25-30MPG but point taken. It's usually once a month at most that I make that trip. Almost everything I can get locally assuming that whatever store carries it isn't out of stock. Ask me about having to buy bath towels off of Amazon rather than just walking into the Dollar General. I've got a 3d printer that I can make most plastic stuff with at least, that's handy when deliveries can get delayed by weather so easily in the winter. One thing I forgot to mention is that I'm currently working on quitting vaping, after struggling with that for over a year. At this point I'm at .5mg/ml, which if you don't know anything about vaping (and you shouldn't, it's bad for you) is 1/6 of the lowest concentration most stores carry. I've got another bottle that's .25mg/ml, after which I'll either quit or go to 0mg/ml if the oral fixation is too bad. Please don't say that I should just quit, nicotine is the loving worst addiction I've ever had, worse than withdrawals from (low doses of) prescribed benzos or amphetamines, worse than alcohol, I could drop those instantly with at most headaches and irritability. When I tried quitting nicotine cold turkey after six hours I almost bit the head off of the poor woman at the Lowe's customer service desk over a minor inconvenience. Thank you all for the supportive posts, I was worried after most of the discussion in the newbie thread being about how I should sell my car (which I agree I shouldn't have bought but at this point I couldn't get something better for the money I would get selling it) that I wouldn't get feedback on basically anything else.
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Aug 24, 2021 06:49
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items that should be zero for at least 6 months: fite netflix pluralsight restaurants (or at least cut that in half) clothing (unless dire need) alcohol (for health if nothing else) do you have amazon prime and is that not listed? what in the world is $150 in “spending money”per month?
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Aug 24, 2021 13:11
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A few thoughts besides sell the loving SVX. You're not quite drowning in debt but you're really loving close. Good news is that you are obviously aware wrt the posts and thread, the bad news is I don't think you realize HOW close you are to being completely hosed. Cost to service your high interest debt only is about 10% of your monthly income, and that means making almost zero progress towards actually paying it off. At current payoff rate, it will take over 6 years. By the way, those student loans aren't going to stay in forbearance forever, meaning that the sense of urgency around the CC and loan debt needs to be extremely high. You're on a thin margin WITH forbearance. When that goes away you will be underwater each month. I don't think you have a good handle on your outflows, so I don't think your budget is realistic. I highly doubt that you are actually spending ~$900/mo on the stuff you have in your every day expenses category. What is this actual number today? By the way this includes dumb poo poo like a 100 dollar text book on gun manufacture, cashmere sweaters, and fountain pens. Make sure you base this budget on actuals. A few thoughts: You are on the right track with ideas (building efund, getting a month ahead, etc) but to do any of that requires a lot of behavior change and self-accountability. As others have stated and is your priority, ditch the storage unit ASAP. Sell everything in it or take it to the dump. Keep the things that have sentimental value that you have room for. Commit to making this happen in September. I know you are driving two relative shitboxes but $400 for car mx a month seems kind of insane. Make sure you get the water pump done on the impreza and then shift this to efund. You need to 100% commit to spending ZERO DOLLARS ON THE SVX. The only way you should spend any money on the SVX is if you have to spend a couple bucks to prep it for sale. Canceling Netflix is good, no reason not to if you aren't using it. Ok now on to thoughts you hate that are sell the loving SVX because look, you may not like it but it's an idea that you need to consider. Like most insane car people (hello) you have fallen in the trap of thinking that two $2500 shitboxes provides more utility than one $2500 shitbox that you put $2500 worth of work in to. If you had spent the SVX money on the Impreza you would not need another car and you wouldn't need a $400 maintenance line item. You're rationalizing the poo poo out of it in the other thread claiming that the SVX is going to be better than the Impreza in the snow. Dude, what the gently caress? The Impreza is a great snow car. That is the POINT of an Impreza. Selling the SVX for $2500 gets you a new water pump, good snows, and pads and rotors for the Impreza and frees up $400 a month in free cash right now, which is massive. You're handy so you can do at minimum pads and rotors yourself without issue, which is great. Just putting that money towards your high interest debt shifts the payoff to two years and change. You should loving sell the SVX. It will allow you to get out of debt YEARS earlier and gives you a buffer against the nasty student loan monster that is lurking. I am an insane car person and I know selling a car, especially one you love, is a very difficult decision. I have a second car that I love, which is absolutely not a good financial decision and yet I keep anyway. The difference is that when I was much less financially stable, I did not have this second car. If I somehow had $20,000 of 20% interest debt and $40,000 in student loan debt coming up right now, I would sell that car for 80 cents on the dollar to get out from under a piece of that. Paging AI/BFC crossover legend Cornholio to the thread for carchat.
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Aug 24, 2021 13:23
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22 Eargesplitten posted:The $55 is for both phones, although I want to find a different carrier, Verizon are a bunch of bald-faced liars and Visible's coverage is worse than Cricket's was. I mean, we aren’t all bald faced liars all the time. With phone stuff (what I do daily), honestly if you’re paying $55 total for 2 phones, you aren’t gonna find cheaper than that, and if you’re in a remote area it’s quite possible you have limited options. Overall, I would just say this seems like a small issue compared to your other bills, so I would prioritize that.
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Aug 24, 2021 13:57
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pmchem posted:items that should be zero for at least 6 months: I will cancel Netflix, but Pluralsight is... basically think of Lynda/Linkedin Learning but better and focused on IT. That's a professional development expense and is essential for me getting the type of job I'm angling for right now. I could have gotten an annual subscription for less per month but I specifically chose the monthly one because it would give me an incentive to get my courses done and get a new job fast because I agree with what you're probably thinking, $48 per month is a lot. As my manager put it, people change when the pain of changing is less than the pain of staying the same. I think I will cut restaurants down to $50 like you said, that would still be enough for me to hypothetically have a nice meal down on the Front Range where there are actually restaurants worth a drat. Some of the weirdness in my budget may be that I'm not used to budgeting for one person, so the numbers I'm throwing out as "this used to be reasonable" sometimes don't account for there being only one of me. I do have Amazon Prime but I couldn't find how much it is costing me per month at first and then forgot to look when I had more time, I need to dig that up and add that in. The $150 in spending money is excessive and is another one of those relics of my old budgeting where my ex was going to spend money on random stuff whether it was in the budget or not so I had a line item for discretionary expenses. I can definitely cut that down but just as an example for what one of those purchases is going to be, I had a problem with my 3d printer that led to the print surface being damaged beyond repair, so I'm going to buy a new print surface. I predict someone is going to tell me I shouldn't be spending money on 3d printing but I should clarify up front that I'm using it for practical items rather than Warhammer figurines or something. As an example, I'm putting up foam board skirting for the camper in order to keep cold air from blowing under the camper and stripping all the heat out in the winter. The way I had been affixing it with duct tape and tent stakes wasn't working, so I'm printing feet that will hold the skirting and then be nailed down with extremely long nails into the ground. That would probably cost $40-50 if I could even find something suitable at a hardware store, total cost for me including nails is going to be about $5 including the box of nails. If it can be made of plastic, I can get it cheaper by printing it, albeit at the expense of time to print and effort to model it. But I enjoy modeling, so I get to indulge my creative urges and have a hobby that saves me money, which seems like a thing BFC should love. And I already have slightly less than 3kg of filament, which will last a long time. KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:I don't think you have a good handle on your outflows, so I don't think your budget is realistic. I highly doubt that you are actually spending ~$900/mo on the stuff you have in your every day expenses category. What is this actual number today? By the way this includes dumb poo poo like a 100 dollar text book on gun manufacture, cashmere sweaters, and fountain pens. Make sure you base this budget on actuals. I can try to sort out from my statement what I spent on what but it's going to be difficult in some cases because the expenses are old enough that I might have a hard time telling what they were for. Off the top of my head I went on vacation to Atlanta to visit my 91-year-old grandmother in June which cost probably somewhere around $1k, spent $3,250 out of that $3500 on the SVX since March, had a $600 cardiologist visit for my cat in July, $200-300 in vaccinations for the dog and the cat in May, bought a lot of tools, bought a gun and upgrade parts in June and July (shooting now has a $0 budget, as does video games), had to pay lot rent for my ex until poo poo happened and now she's living with her parents rent-free, and spent a lot on gas driving down to the front range for several family birthdays, I have no plans to go down there again for a couple months. The $400 isn't something I plan to have long-term, it's more of a "I know I need a big job soon, so I'm building that up over a few months." Then it should drop down to a more reasonable amount, although I will have to figure out what that is. And sincerely, thank you for giving advice beyond "Sell the SVX," I know that's probably going to be a point of contention in this thread but as long as I can get advice on other relevant decisions, I don't mind that. When I had the last thread was the first time in my adult life I managed to make progress on the hole I dug for myself when I got my first job and immediately started overspending and running up a credit card bill. I'll work on adjusting the budget and cancelling various poo poo today.
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Aug 24, 2021 17:34
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Amazon Prime is $12.99 per month (plus taxes) or $119 per year (plus taxes) (so about $10.60/mo). I agree with the other posters that the next thing is getting an accounting of what you are actually spending. There are probably other forgotten expenses, especially annual things that you're not remembering. When you make that list of actual expenditures make a new column, don't delete the budgeted column. You want to be able to compare what you thought you were spending to what you are actually spending.
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Aug 24, 2021 18:08
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What are your prospects on earning some extra income in your area? Tightening the budget is a great first step, getting rid of the big line items like the storage unit and stuff is great, but I've found when you get the point of worrying about 15 dollars for Netflix, or 20 bucks for vape juice, and you start giving up certain things you enjoy, it gets harder to stick with the budget mentally. I rather put time and energy into earning additional income rather than cutting a few inexpensive personal luxuries like the 5 bucks you spend on fite. If you can figure out something, anything that can produce an extra 150 to 200 dollars a week, that's 600 to 800 a month more you can put towards your debt obligations. I don't know what's available to you in your area, but I bet you could figure out a way to make another 150-200 bucks a week on the weekends or after work. Yeah, working 2 jobs sucks, but it will greatly accelerate getting out of this. It could be anything. I stocked shelves at walmart for a few months over the holidays for extra income when I was younger. There are remote IT support jobs, flipping things from garage sales on ebay or FB marketplace, get creative. I'm also concerned about the 0 dollar budget for medical and dental. Do not neglect your teeth or your health. You should be getting your teeth cleaned and checked twice a year, and at minimum an annual checkup from a doctor. Taking care of yourself is the #1 priority.
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Aug 24, 2021 18:10
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The storage unit is the most obvious low-hanging fruit. If you absolutely refuse to sell a car, (which you very much should do), can you winter the car that's about to need a bunch of maintenance, and just use the other one? You could cancel the insurance and put that money along with the maintenance money into paying down debt; every $400 you spend now on debt is $480 you won't have to spend a year from now. Also, is there any reason you couldn't just pay down the debt, then put any maintenance items on the credit card if you need it? Sticking that money into a savings account just means you're paying 20% interest when you don't need to. Ham Equity fucked around with this message at 18:21 on Aug 24, 2021 |
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Aug 24, 2021 18:18
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The other thing I'd say is that for the arguments you are anticipating you have justifications at the ready. You should probably reorganize your budget to reflect those things so that your priorities are visible. I made an attempt. Fixed Needs - Rent - Phone - Internet - Electricity - Car Insurance - Storage Unit (this is a non-negotiable until you get rid of it) Variable Needs - Groceries - Fuel - Household Goods - Pets (??? I don't know how much of this is pet food/vets and how much is toys & cute hats) - Car Maintenance Professional Costs - VPN (??? I assume this is for work?) - Pluralsight - Alcohol (this isn't great but it's what you said was the reason it's not $0) Nice to Have - Spending Money - Restaurants - Clothing - Fite - Netflix - Amazon Prime Emergency Fund - General Emergencies - Medical/Dental (You have this at 0 which means you are relying on, what, to cover it? Debt - Student Loans - Discover - Personal Loan - AMEX
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Aug 24, 2021 18:27
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How much are the guns and shooting supplies you currently own worth? Don't start out with a justification. It's a simple question. Same question on fountain pens and anything else you've been collecting or impulse buying if they have any intrinsic value.
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Aug 24, 2021 18:31
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22 Eargesplitten posted:$150 + $1000 + $3500 +$600 + $300 + $??? gun and parts + $??? video games + $400 That's $5950 + an unknown spend on guns and games that is only sorta-kinda on the budget.
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Aug 24, 2021 18:39
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Campers, RVs and many mobile homes suck rear end at keeping in heat. If you live in an area with snow your electric bill is probably going to go from like $50 now to like $200 in the winter. I would also think about getting a part time weekend job. You have already cut back a lot of recreational spending anyway so what else are you going to do?
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Aug 24, 2021 18:49
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skipdogg posted:What are your prospects on earning some extra income in your area? Extra income opportunities aren't great given my work schedule, I work 4 days a week for 10 hours 2PM to midnight. There's no gig economy stuff here. I am working on finding a new job, though, which would pay at least $15k extra per year for me to take it and quite possibly as much as another $45k per year, more likely 25k-ish, but that's still almost half again what I'm making now so that's huge. That's why the Pluralsight subscription is on there, I'm building up my skills so I can slide into a DevOps role hopefully. I've been paying my medical expenses out of my HSA, and I am getting IIRC something like $100 per paycheck added to it, so it covers all my expenses there. Thanatosian posted:The storage unit is the most obvious low-hanging fruit. If you absolutely refuse to sell a car, (which you very much should do), can you winter the car that's about to need a bunch of maintenance, and just use the other one? You could cancel the insurance and put that money along with the maintenance money into paying down debt; every $400 you spend now on debt is $480 you won't have to spend a year from now. I probably could winter one of the cars, yeah, I just need to figure out what's involved in preparing a car to not be driven for months through an incredibly cold season aside from unplugging the battery. Oh yeah, that's another thing I'm likely to need up here, according to my friend up here the weather destroys flooded lead-acid batteries so I'll be getting a sealed AGM battery, probably an Optima red-top or something. Related to maintenance, I just looked up the price of the water pump and timing belt kit on Rockauto and it's like $170 for one of the premium Gates ones, I'm going to ask in AI for recommendations. I've also got the FSM around here somewhere so I can look at that. The reason I can't put maintenance items on the credit card is that I'm going to be freezing the credit card, I can't be trusted with a credit card and I need to cut off my access to it util the time (if it comes) when I have enough self-control not to run it up again. Motronic posted:How much are the guns and shooting supplies you currently own worth? Prices have been kind of crazy due to the pandemic and Biden so this is just a ballpark because I haven't really been doing much since pre-pandemic. I'd estimate about $2500 once I fix the gun I got (I think the reason it was so cheap was the guy that built it hosed something up but I know what). That excludes the one my granddaddy left me which is probably only worth $50 or so anyway because it's not in working order and has unobtanium parts because it was a cheap import in the '80s that stopped being made by the time I was born. That's spread over 5 guns. I could try selling some of them, although it would definitely take a while. Imagine Craigslist car / car part buyers and now imagine half of them want you to sell it to them illegally without a background check. I already sold the ones that could be easily sold in 2020 when I was selling stuff to make rent at the crack house. The fountain pens are worth like $10, one was a gift that is a super cheap Chinese novelty pen and the other one I bought that is a super cheap Chinese non-novelty pen. The ink is probably worth another $10 or so. doingitwrong posted:That's $5950 + an unknown spend on guns and games that is only sorta-kinda on the budget. I'm not quite sure what you're saying, I'm not going on any other vacations anytime in the foreseeable future, I'm done spending money on the SVX for quite a while, the scan at the cardiologist was a one-time thing and I'm budgeting for more vet visits in the pets category, the pets are up on their vaccines for a couple more years, guns and video games are off the menu until I get in a better situation, and I'm not sure what the $150 and $400 are. Spending money and maintenance? CongoJack posted:Campers, RVs and many mobile homes suck rear end at keeping in heat. If you live in an area with snow your electric bill is probably going to go from like $50 now to like $200 in the winter. That's very true that campers suck at holding in heat. That's why I'm working on winterizing it, I'll be blocking off windows that I don't care about as well as the skylights, putting insulating film over the ones I do want, I'm putting up insulation foam skirting that will keep the bottom of the camper sheltered from the cold, and I'm varying what portions of the camper get heated at what time of day based on where I am in it. That said my electric bill will definitely be going up in the winter, no arguing that. As for what I do on the weekends, I'll still have plenty to keep me occupied, and I'm skeptical that I could find a job in this tiny town that only needs help on my days off. 22 Eargesplitten fucked around with this message at 18:56 on Aug 24, 2021 |
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Aug 24, 2021 18:51
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People are being a little hard on your past spending because what usually happens with people with a pattern of "one off" spending on things is that those one off things just somehow keep coming up all the time. I'm sure if we asked you a couple months before you bought the SVX that you weren't really planning to buy one, and before you bought the most recent gun, and before you bought the guns textbook, etc etc I think you should try to sell any guns you don't A) have an emotional attachment to (eg grampa gun) or B) require to defend your person and home. Is gunbroker still a thing? Otherwise I am sure you can sell them to a local gun shop.
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Aug 24, 2021 20:38
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You have 3 days a week to find some sort of extra income. There's got to be something you can find to do part time on the side. I know you're looking for a new gig with more pay, but I'm telling you its way easier to earn your way out of a financial hole.
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Aug 24, 2021 21:09
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Gunbroker requires you to subscribe for listings on top of taking their cut I'm pretty sure now, and now that I think about it so does Armslist. I'm not sure where you go if you don't want to pay to see ads about limited edition Trump 2024 coins. TFR does have classifieds, I could see about selling some stuff there, I'd just need to figure out the best way to ship a firearm since I've never been on that side of the transaction. There is no local gun shop, I'd have to drive an hour and a half or so and I'd be looking at maybe $1,000-1,200 selling them to a store because it's pretty much like trading in a car, you're lucky if they give you half of what they are going to sell it for. Consignment is a bit better but then you have to wait, and I had one of these things on consignment through about six months of panic-buying with no luck, I'm not sure if that store just pushes people towards stuff in their stock or what because it was one of the cheapest things in the case. The two most valuable ones are customized but like with cars, the mods you put on might not be the ones the person buying it wants on there so you don't raise the sale value by the price of the stuff you put on there. I do have one customized one that I would be open to selling because I just don't shoot it well enough compared to the other stuff I have to be worth it, but it's the kind of thing where cost to replace would be roughly $1400, the amount I could sell it for in any reasonable amount of time would be $600, so I'm having a hard time with that idea. Still might be the right move to put it up for sale at a price I'd be okay selling it at, worst case it doesn't sell best case I can knock a big chunk off my debt. FWIW I was planning on buying a car a month or two before I actually did buy it, I wasn't planning on specifically buying an SVX but I knew I wanted a second car and I did start looking for SVXes on top of other AWD/4WD vehicles. And I have wanted that book for a year+, the impulse part was buying it when I did rather than planning ahead and setting aside money to buy it the next time I found it in stock. That's true about the most recent gun though, definitely. I finally got my tax return after waiting 4 months and did something stupid with it. I do find that forcing myself to look at numbers rather than brushing everything aside and not thinking about it makes it a lot easier for me to hold myself to task, though, which is why I feel so optimistic. skipdogg posted:You have 3 days a week to find some sort of extra income. There's got to be something you can find to do part time on the side. I know you're looking for a new gig with more pay, but I'm telling you its way easier to earn your way out of a financial hole. I hear what you're saying and I don't disagree but I already basically collapse for the entire first day of my weekend, I feel like forcing myself into extra work would be detrimental to my mental and physical health, as the weekend is also when I get the most exercise and I'm trying to lose like 30 pounds. Not to mention that nobody around here appears to have heard of the delta variant so I'm the only person wearing a mask. That's also less time and energy to job hunt, which is by far more exhausting than actually working a job in my experience. 22 Eargesplitten fucked around with this message at 21:31 on Aug 24, 2021 |
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Aug 24, 2021 21:19
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You don't need a weekend to lose 30 pounds long term. That's like 30mins-1hour 3 times a week of exercise + some extra belt tightening wrt food. Also you might not like doing extra work, but you're in a lot of debt buddy, that is probably already a huge mental burden. It'll be a lot easier to pull yourself out of a gutter if you have extra real physical cash coming in and could even reduce your stress levels. I feel you're trying to rationalize your way out of doing a lot of the things you don't want to do, instead of rationalizing yourself into the things you need to do.
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Aug 24, 2021 21:51
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22 Eargesplitten posted:Gunbroker requires you to subscribe for listings on top of taking their cut I'm pretty sure now, and now that I think about it so does Armslist. I'm not sure where you go if you don't want to pay to see ads about limited edition Trump 2024 coins. TFR does have classifieds, I could see about selling some stuff there, I'd just need to figure out the best way to ship a firearm since I've never been on that side of the transaction. I'm going to ignore the frankly staggering amount of rationalization in this post and just point out that having $600 in hand by getting rid of a gun you don't shoot RIGHT loving NOW is a lot more important to you than $1,400 in the future. If you really want a whatever gun it is in the future after you pay off your debt, that $1,400 will feel like nothing.
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Aug 24, 2021 22:04
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You don't get to want a $100 useless book about gun manufacturing, you are $17.5K in debt at 20% PLUS student loans. If you had set aside money for it and bought it it STILL would be a bad idea.
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Aug 24, 2021 22:06
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Just to focus in on one thing, what is the $120/month in pets? How many pets? That seems really high and I buy very expensive dog food and go to an excellent (but expensive) vet and I doubt it averages out to more than $500/yr. See if you can do a 0% APR balance transfer ASAP. $300/mo. on groceries also seems like a lot. The good news with your student loans is that once the moratorium ends in January 1 if you switch to an income based repayment plan, with your current income, your monthly payment will probably be $0. It's AGI minus 150% of the poverty level for your household. The key thing here is though you need to proactively file for IBR! You can do that right now. Also sell the loving guns. Upgrade fucked around with this message at 23:06 on Aug 24, 2021 |
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Aug 24, 2021 23:01
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:I'm going to ignore the frankly staggering amount of rationalization in this post and just point out that having $600 in hand by getting rid of a gun you don't shoot RIGHT loving NOW is a lot more important to you than $1,400 in the future. If you really want a whatever gun it is in the future after you pay off your debt, that $1,400 will feel like nothing. I've started putting out feelers in the TFR Discord where there are many people with more money than me already. Getting that money RIGHT loving NOW isn't necessarily possible though, it depends on finding someone willing to buy it. qhat posted:You don't need a weekend to lose 30 pounds long term. That's like 30mins-1hour 3 times a week of exercise + some extra belt tightening wrt food. I have done a lot of OT at my job previously, including working a couple 6 day weeks, I was mentally falling apart by the end of it. My mental health is very fragile, which might sound like an excuse but consider that I've been in treatment for depression since I was 8 years old and anxiety since I was 22, I'm 30 now. In my last thread I started doing OrderUp because it was something I could do when I felt up to it but like I said, there's no gig economy up here. I am probably going to get a part time job that I'm not going to detail because it would make me way too easy to doxx but it would be very part time, probably like $150 a month rather than a week, although it depends on how often I'm needed because I would be substituting for someone else who does it full time when hes' unavailable. Upgrade posted:Just to focus in on one thing, what is the $120/month in pets? How many pets? That seems really high and I buy very expensive dog food and go to an excellent (but expensive) vet and I doubt it averages out to more than $500/yr. I had it at $75/mo for the dog and the cat but then the cat went to the vet and I found out that her heart murmur is still there, she's on medication for it but I don't know if she's going to need emergency care or euthanasia or when, so I'm building up a fund so that whatever she needs she can be healthy as long as possible and then comfortable when she goes. My credit is somewhere around 550, another credit card isn't happening. $300/mo on groceries is more than I would like, and I want to keep it way below that but food is significantly more expensive than the national average up here, something like 125-130% the average because of how remote the place is. Selection can also be limited due to how infrequently groceries come in, and a lot of things don't have store brand available. I'm pescetarian but fish is too drat expensive so I just eat vegetarian but also sometimes tuna basically. Lots of burritos and quesadillas and potatoes. I'm trying to eat less garbage food which means more fruit and vegetables as snacks, in order to actually do that I'm not being as much of a cheapskate as I used to be with what fruit I used to get. I used to get <$1/lb apples from Sprouts, now I'm getting $3/lb honey crisps because the cheapest they have is $2/lb red delicious. Ideally I'd like to keep it under $150 but I don't know if that is practical at this point. I'm trying to find more ways to use my instant pot to help cut down on costs as well. You're right, I should file for IBR. E: Forgot to mention that from what I'm finding online it seems like I might be able to do the upcoming maintenance for $150-200, which would be about 10% of what I expected to have to pay. Then if I assumed something like $100 a month to build up funds for any future repairs needed, that would give me an extra $300 per month, getting me above $1k per month if I don't gently caress up. 22 Eargesplitten fucked around with this message at 23:39 on Aug 24, 2021 |
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Aug 24, 2021 23:35
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22 Eargesplitten posted:I've started putting out feelers in the TFR Discord where there are many people with more money than me already. Getting that money RIGHT loving NOW isn't necessarily possible though, it depends on finding someone willing to buy it. well you never would have gotten any loving money for it if you didn't try, which was your original plan, so: Good Job
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Aug 24, 2021 23:45
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With an instant pot you can eat hella cheap since it makes cooking dried pulses like lentils, chickpeas and beans from scratch a breeze without needing to soak them overnight. This thread looks like a promising one in GWS for what you can do with one. My main use for mine is making ethiopian lentils (misr wot), dal, chana masala and hummus from scratch, all which are vegetarian and drat amazing.
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Aug 25, 2021 00:07
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You can literally buy lentils and poo poo with spices in bulk and make really delicious meals with just a little heat. Idk man you don't really sound open to the suggestions people are giving you. You're spending all this money on things you don't actually need and you seem to want people to give you the magic solution that doesn't exist. You don't want to work 6 days a week, and you're saving up an emergency fund for the cat that's looking like it's on the way out anyway? Really? Okay whatever fine, then sell absolutely everything you don't need (the car, the guns, do not look for the best price, sell them this week and pay off the CC debt). Cancel any payments or subscriptions you don't need. Live like the dalai-lama until your CC debt is gone. I'm not exaggerating whatsoever. Your expenses are extremely high for someone with your debt-load and low-income, you need to resolve this extremely quickly before it gets worse and you can no longer solve it without insolvency.
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Aug 25, 2021 00:17
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qhat posted:solve it without insolvency. 2/3 of their debt can't be discharged by bankruptcy.
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Aug 25, 2021 00:27
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Motronic posted:2/3 of their debt can't be discharged by bankruptcy. The 1/3rd that would be discharged costs more to service than the other 2/3rds in its entirety. At any rate, the goal isn't bankruptcy, it should be getting rid of the CC debt ASAP and make any and all sacrifices possible so that happens.
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Aug 25, 2021 00:36
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I kind of feel like between selling at least some of the guns and having 700-1,000 to put into the eFund and then towards debt per month that's a good start, is it not? I do need to use my instant pot more, I'd kind of like a rice cooker so that I could make rice and beans/lentils at the same time while I'm at work because whenever I try to cook rice in a pot while I'm at work I burn the poo poo out of it, I'm a terrible cook. But I know I can't justify that at this point. Lately I've been making a bean and cheese burrito with canned refried beans that still comes out to about $1/ea, I guess if I made a big pot of beans I could have pinto beans for stuff like that for cheaper than the refried beans and just keep them in the fridge. Ideally I'd like to get it under $150, I've just been significantly over that fairly often. I'm gradually finding cheap recipes though, most of my recipes before involved meat so I'm still learning how to cook vegetarian. I want to reiterate that my plan is to tighten down the belt further as I go on. I'm looking at this as a financial diet. Crash diets usually fail. I want to start by just cutting out the frivolous spending that I have been doing and cancel subscriptions that I don't need, then as I go I'll try to cut down on stuff like food, I'll be getting rid of that storage unit this month (which may end up meaning that I'll be over-budget on gas this month, we'll see), I can hopefully cut the maintenance budget down to $100 or so, I need to figure out what a normal maintenance budget is since the last time I did budgeting I was at a point in my car's life when it needed pretty much nothing but oil changes. That alone would put me around $1,100 to e-fund/debt per month, that feels significant to start out, right? Am I off-base there? I should say I'm also studying 8+ hours per week plus job hunting, so I'm not exactly just laying around all weekend. The IT job market is very hot right now and with a bit more studying and some practice interviewing I should be able to land a job making 50%-100% more money. Those are my three priorities right now, cut frivolous spending, stick to a budget, find a new job. I feel like that's a good start, isn't it? I'm not trying to take baby steps or take it easy on myself, I just feel like if I set the bar too high I'm going to mess up and feel like a failure and go back to how I have been. There's a psychology aspect to this as well as a numbers aspect, does anyone disagree there? Does anyone have a recommendation for where to buy spices in bulk online? Nowhere in town does that, I know Sprouts does but the nearest Sprouts is probably in Denver, or at least that's my best guess. I guess I could also get like10 pounds of pinto beans while I'm at it and a big bag of rice if I can get free shipping. Otherwise it might be best to just buy that stuff locally. Making a big pot of rice would let me make my "depressed rice ball," also known as tuna and mayo and seasonings on a bed of rice, maybe with some seaweed depending on whether I can find it here for a not ridiculous price. E: Oh yeah, I've been updating my budget based on feedback from the thread, I'll take a screenshot later this evening once I'm happier with it.
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Aug 25, 2021 00:46
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You work from home, right? I know you said you have a "cheap" place to park your camper, but you also keep saying that cost of living is high around you, there's no place to shop, etc. What's keeping you from looking for someplace cheaper?
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Aug 25, 2021 00:55
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22 Eargesplitten posted:Does anyone have a recommendation for where to buy spices in bulk online? Penzeys and Savory Spice are my go-to
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Aug 25, 2021 01:03
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22 Eargesplitten posted:I want to reiterate that my plan is to tighten down the belt further as I go on. I'm looking at this as a financial diet. Crash diets usually fail. I want to start by just cutting out the frivolous spending that I have been doing and cancel subscriptions that I don't need, then as I go I'll try to cut down on stuff like food, I'll be getting rid of that storage unit this month (which may end up meaning that I'll be over-budget on gas this month, we'll see), I can hopefully cut the maintenance budget down to $100 or so, I need to figure out what a normal maintenance budget is since the last time I did budgeting I was at a point in my car's life when it needed pretty much nothing but oil changes. That alone would put me around $1,100 to e-fund/debt per month, that feels significant to start out, right? Am I off-base there? I should say I'm also studying 8+ hours per week plus job hunting, so I'm not exactly just laying around all weekend. The IT job market is very hot right now and with a bit more studying and some practice interviewing I should be able to land a job making 50%-100% more money. Those are my three priorities right now, cut frivolous spending, stick to a budget, find a new job. I feel like that's a good start, isn't it? Unfortunately time is not on your side, there are any number of things that could happen that could definitively push you into bankruptcy at any point; you have already mentioned some of those things in this thread already, your cat for example. You shouldn't be looking at this like a 300lb person trying to get to 200lb over the next two years by progressively making small changes here and there. You should be looking at this like a 600lb person who is a year or two away from a heart attack. You ever seen that show where they put them on 1200 calorie diets and they lose like 100lb in a month? You need to lose that 'weight' quick before it gets too big and takes over your life.
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Aug 25, 2021 01:04
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It's simultaneously high and low COL. The rent is very low compared to most of the state, durable goods aren't any more expensive than anywhere else, I spend far less on restaurants than I used to (I used to spend $700+ per month) because there is one good restaurant in the city and there's no delivery for anything so if I don't have the energy to go get something, I only have what's in the house. I'm not tempted to go do anything that costs money because there's nothing to do except be outdoors, and the small town experience is way better for my mental health. I never realized how much being in even a small city put me on edge from the background hum of people. I'm happier and less anxious here than I have been in the past decade, even when I had a job paying $10,000 more per year and way less debt. It's also important to point out that my essential expenses are roughly 30-40% what they were before March, so despite my current situation it is way better than any other I have found even after separating from my ex. There are two other critical factors. One, there is good internet available, that's not true for many small rural areas, and if I don't have reliable fast internet, I can't do my job. Second, I have a friend here, the last time I moved somewhere that I didn't know anybody I ended up meeting a good four or five people that took advantage of me in one way or another because I'm a terrible judge of character. I need to be somewhere that I know people, and when it comes to the combination of small town, good internet, and knowing somebody, this is the only place I can think of aside from one town nearby that isn't really any cheaper and might be more expensive from what I saw looking for housing. luminalflux posted:Penzeys and Savory Spice are my go-to Thanks, I'll look into it. I have a pretty thoroughly stocked spice cabinet right now but when I start to run low that sounds good. qhat posted:You ever seen that show where they put them on 1200 calorie diets and they lose like 100lb in a month? You need to lose that 'weight' quick before it gets too big and takes over your life. Have you seen what happens after that show? They gain almost all of their weight back. Here, I've redone the budget with a few categories removed and cut down, I should be able to stay under $200 for groceries. And if it gets close, hey, I've been in a position before where my food for a day was a loaf of day-old bread, at least it shouldn't be that bad. I've cut alcohol down to one six-pack per month, which is pretty loving major compared to 7-10 drinks per week like I have been at. Removed the VPN and Fite.tv, I'll just play more video games when I'm too tired to be productive. I've cut car maintenance to $200, I should be able to get the maintenance on the Impreza done within that budget if I DIY, I'll try to do my own rudimentary inspection first so if something is completely hosed I might be able to avoid the cost of having a mechanic tell me that. That puts me at $1,200 in the e-fund the first month, then I get rid of the storage unit in September, puts me at $1,380 per month. If I can sell that gun next month that will get me to a month's income in the bank on the 1st of the month, thoughts on whether I should build it up more after that or put money towards the credit card or split it in half? At that point I would have almost 2 months of essentials in the bank even assuming no food stamps or unemployment. Putting it all towards the credit card would pay it off in 6 months if I'm doing the math right, probably a bit less since I'll still be putting that 170 towards it as well even after the interest drops. Then another 5-6 months to pay off the personal loan, assuming I'm still doing this same job at the same pay since I'm currently paying ~100 towards the principle per month, it will be around $8200 by the time I get to it.  I forgot to mention up to this point, I still haven't gotten my $1400 stimmy, so if I somehow manage to get it (they said they sent it ages ago) I'll put that towards either the e-fund or the credit card. Does that budget seem better?
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Aug 25, 2021 01:34
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22 Eargesplitten posted:Have you seen what happens after that show? They gain almost all of their weight back. Not all of them. But they also definitely never succeeded with small changes in their diet either, that's why they're on the show. I sincerely hope you are able to pull it together and your plan works without any hiccups, because you're making a lot of assumptions about the future and you're legitimately one hospital visit or one redundancy away from being instantly insolvent.
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Aug 25, 2021 01:49
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Can you find better paying employment? Move somewhere for a better paying job?
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Aug 25, 2021 01:59
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I've seen more success in YLLS from people taking drastic but sustainable action, then when they get to their goal they loosen up a bit but keep the same general habits and through that process they have kept their weight off as long as I followed their logs. I feel like my plan of 1/3 this month and 40% of my income going towards an e-fund and debt reduction by October fits the description of drastic but sustainable, do you disagree?Upgrade posted:Can you find better paying employment? Move somewhere for a better paying job? Currently working on that, basically this job cut my pay from 70k per year to 53.5k per year in March 2020 and the COVID job market was so bad I couldn't manage to get a better job by the end of the year. It's supposed to have heated up quite a bit so I'm studying relevant technology and applying to a bunch of jobs. I'm not taking anything less than 70k, and I should be able to get 80k-100k with my experience.
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Aug 25, 2021 02:00
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22 Eargesplitten posted:I've seen more success in YLLS from people taking drastic but sustainable action, then when they get to their goal they loosen up a bit but keep the same general habits and through that process they have kept their weight off as long as I followed their logs. I feel like my plan of 1/3 this month and 40% of my income going towards an e-fund and debt reduction by October fits the description of drastic but sustainable, do you disagree? This seems like a reasonable goal but the reason you're getting pushback is because people are skeptical about your ability to do this, both because: a. you're extremely resistant to doing simple, common sense things right now that could raise several thousand dollars and go a significant way towards helping you reach your goals quicker (sell one of your lovely cars, sell guns) and b. there's a lot of weird back and forth/justification over some of the projected budget figures which seem high or to not make a lot of sense at first glance, which would lead a reasonable reader to believe that you're going to go down the path of Blue Story and confess you spent an extra $2,500 on parts for your shitcar. quote:Currently working on that, basically this job cut my pay from 70k per year to 53.5k per year in March 2020 and the COVID job market was so bad I couldn't manage to get a better job by the end of the year. It's supposed to have heated up quite a bit so I'm studying relevant technology and applying to a bunch of jobs. I'm not taking anything less than 70k, and I should be able to get 80k-100k with my experience. This is a good goal. Also a lot of the costs you've talked about seem to be associated with where you live (no access to cheap groceries, expensive to drive anywhere because everything is far away). Moving isn't ever easy, but it might be something to consider.
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Aug 25, 2021 02:03
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