Posts Tagged ‘Number Crunching’

Updated Numbers for May

If you’ll take a look over at the sidebar, you’ll see I updated my debts for May. Overall not a bad month, although there was a $400 splurge on a new iPod touch when I got the new job at the end of April. I know, I know, I shouldn’t have done that, but I got a good deal and I just couldn’t resist. This will be my only splurge this year, promise.

Overall my Debt Snowball worked quite well for May. I paid the minimums on all of them except for the credit card at the top of the list, and I was able to put an extra $78.83 towards it, so I’m pleased. I also just felt like it was a more productive month financially simply because I had a bit of a buffer in my chequing account. Of course I wasn’t spending the money there, but just seeing it in my account was nice. In fact, that buffer was already spoken for in my budget, but wasn’t going to be spent until the end of the month, so it sat there in my account until this weekend. Sometimes it’s just nice to see the extra numbers when I logged into my account, you know?

I’ve also started writing a note to myself with each pay day, so that I know what the money is going towards. A friend of mine does that with her pay stub, writing the bills she’ll be paying with it on the papers, however I absolutely despise pay stubs because nobody ever does anything with them anymore. I find them to be such a waste of paper it’s ridiculous. So I clip a note to the calendar that just above my computer, and I find it more useful. At any rate it doesn’t really matter, does it? As long as I’m aware of what things I’m paying with each paycheque, that’s the main thing.

Why My Emergency Fund Is A Little Smaller Than Before

I spent part of this evening working on the blog here, tweaking the stylesheet to be a little more to my liking, updating the sidebar, and so on. You might see that I’ve updated both my total debt load as well as my emergency fund.

Holy robbery Batman, your emergency fund’s looking a little low! Wasn’t it almost at 50% a while ago?

Why yes my observant readers, my emergency fund was almost at 50% of my intended total as of last week. Unfortunately I had to dip into it because I am now unemployed. Several weeks ago I blogged about my intention to go freelance, as I felt that was a better situation for me personally. My initial intention was to do it on the side until I had created enough of an income to do it full time. But my full time job was causing me a lot of stress, so much so that I actually have lost about 20 pounds because of it. Definitely not a good thing for me. I was dreading going into the office, mostly because the political situation at the office was just horrendous. I have worked for a large number of companies over my career, and I can say that this place was, without a doubt, the worst place for office politics! It was completely unbearable. So I did what we all dream of doing.

I told them (to) “take this job and shove it!” (Metaphorically speaking of course.)

Whoa Jb, how can you possibly have done that in this economy? Are you mad?

Well dear readers, I can tell you I did not take this decision lightly, nor did I do it capriciously. I had already been looking for a new job for the last several months, but things just came to a head. My doctor advised me to leave this job immediately, because after all the tests she ran, it was most definitely the stress that was causing me physical aggravation. I took stock of my financial reserves, talked it over with friends and family, and decided to take the plunge. It’s been almost two weeks now, and I can tell you that I am feeling much, much better, both physically and mentally.

So this is why my emergency fund is looking a little smaller than before. I had to take some money out of it to pay my rent and car payment. It’s a good thing I have this emergency fund, because it will allow me the opportunity to really take a good run at getting my freelancing career started. So far I’ve been able to update my freelancing website and blog, read up on things I’ve been meaning to read up on, and also continue to make some great contacts. I made my first $5 on the weekend by writing up a guest post on a freelance writing blog, which I’m excited about. I’m actually excited about the whole prospect of working as a freelancing technical writer. It’s something I’ve been wanting to do for several years now, in fact quite a few of my friends are getting sick of hearing me talk about it. So now I’m doing it.

Sure, it’s a little scary to be doing it in this economic climate, but like I blogged previously, technical writers are always in demand, so I anticipate being able to survive. It might take me a while, it might take a little more legwork than I’m used to, but I’m up for it. Most of all, I’m prepared for it. I’ve got my emergency fund and my income tax refund that will sustain me for about 3 months or so. I could possibly stretch it out if I go and get a part-time job, but that’s only in the plan near the end of Month 2. I’m going to give it a good shot at starting out as a freelancer and then decide what to do. I have faith and determination to give it a shot. Wish me luck!

Monthly Number Crunching: June 2008

Many of you may have noticed that I’ve not done any Monthly Number Crunching posts, and there’s a reason: I’m embarrassed to say how much my debt has increased! It was only increasing by small amounts over the last 6 months or so ($1000 each time), but in the last couple, it’s gone up by big chunks. And yet again, I have no idea why. I have not purchased any big ticket items (as much as I want a new tv and a new computer), and have not gone on any clothes shopping sprees. I am going to take some time this holiday (it’s Canada Day on Tuesday) and start figuring some things out. I think I’ll do the classic “track my spending for a month” routine and see where the money is going. I am a little suprised and dismayed to see this number increase, and had thought I was doing well. (In two months I will have paid off one of my balance transfer credit cards, and I was quite pleased with that.) How annoying, how frustrating, and how embarrassing! Apparently I am going to have to do some serious belt tightening and make a more concerted effort to sell off any and all unused/useless things in my house.

Stay tuned for some serious money crunching and belt tightening measures. *sigh*

Number Crunching April 2008

Whoa, all that work and living of life has sure made me late on my monthly number crunching! Without further ado, here are the even-more-red-than-normal numbers for April:

Total Debt: $27,845.78

Debt Paid off This Month: Not applicable since I went back over my original debt amount, again…

Total savings this month: $200 (not including interest)

Emergency Fund total: $ 2,211 (approximately, and not including interest)

RRSP Savings: $400 this month, up to $800 for the year now.

You’ll note that, yet again, I’ve increased my debt rather than decreasing it, but remember the new car? Yeah, that’s where things went “wrong”.  However, I am actually managing to pay off a more significant portion of my debt because of the balance transfer deals I’ve got right now. The one on the new MasterCard is the most significant one as it’s at 0% until January 2009. So each payment I make there goes towards the principal. Also, I have been making a concerted effort to pay off Visa #1 as the transfer deal I have on that one expires in July. I want to make sure to pay off as much as I possibly can before I have to transfer it back to my line of credit.

One thing I will be exploring this month is speaking to my MasterCard issuer about transferring some of my other debt over to it. Because they gave me a crazy limit, and the balance I transferred over wasn’t anywhere near that limit, I thought I’d see if they’d give me a less-than-5% deal on any other balances I transfer over. That would mean that a good 1/3 would be at 0%, a good 1/3 would be at approximately 3%, and the rest at approximately 8%. So it’s definitely something worth exploring.

How are you all doing with your debt repayment? Are you doing better than me? Heck, everyone else must be doing better than me right now.