Archive for October, 2013
Sweet Little Mortgage Chip
October 26th, 2013 at 02:58 amThis evening, I have an email that Swagbucks has deposited $5.00 into my Dwolla account. I logged in, requested a transfer to my bank account, and was advised the transfer will take 2-3 business days.
Since October is waning, I logged in to WF and transferred $5.08 to my mortgage. (Dwolla gave me eight whole cents during the verification process. So generous!)
Swagbucks just got a whole lot more fun for me. Currently, I have enough to redeem for another $5 Dwolla gift card. That will make a fine little mortgage chip in a week or so.
Tomorrow morning my mom and I are driving north to Redding to visit my niece. She lives in Tacoma, WA but is in Redding for a week or so. We will spend the night and drive home Sunday. Should be a fun weekend.
Courtesy of Monkey Mama...
October 25th, 2013 at 04:37 pm...I will have a lower home insurance bill. Yay!
I received my renewal a week or so ago. As always, the new premium crept up a bit from last time. The bill is $912.
This morning, after reading Monkey Mama's latest blog post, I pulled out my renewal, went to State Farm's website, and submitted a request for a rate quote. I can get the exact same coverage for $695, saving me $217.00
Since I have an impound account for property taxes and homeowner's insurance, I will not see any monthly savings now. But, when my account is analyzed and adjusted next year, I will enjoy some combination of lower monthly payments and/or a refund.
Mail Order Rx
October 23rd, 2013 at 12:33 amToday, my health insurance provider gave me a call to see if I would like to sign up to receive my prescriptions in the mail.
OK, this was low-hanging fruit. I should have done this YEARS ago. And I think I meant to, but just never did get around to making those phone calls.
I take 4 prescriptions. I make a trip to the pharmacy once per month to pick them up. My co-pay is $10 each, or $40 per month.
With the mail order service, I will receive 90 day supplies for $30 every three months. Yes, that's right, $30. One Rx is completely free of charge if I order it 90 days at a time. They even pay shipping.
Obviously, this must be saving my health insurance money too, or they wouldn't be calling me to ask if I want to switch.
In mortgage chip news, I received a $3 payment from Hausernet for April, which I have turned into a mortgage chip.
Miscellany
October 21st, 2013 at 07:18 pmI received my check for $41.53 from Inbox Dollars, and it has been applied to my mortgage principal.
October bills are all paid, except for the bug man who has not shown up yet. I left $562 in checking, and swept the rest to CurveBall. The sweep amounted to $102.86, so that is helpful.
Heard About Dwolla?
October 19th, 2013 at 07:12 pmI've been doing Swagbucks for a few months now. (CreditCardFree's tutorial from last May is very helpful). So far, I have purchased 1 $5 Amazon gift card for 450 Swagbucks. What I would really like though, is to redeem for cash.
Today I noticed there is a gift card for a vendor called Dwolla. Dwolla seems to be very similar to Paypal. Dwolla does charge a $.25 fee for transactions over $10.
Currently, $5 Dwolla gift cards are on sale for 400 Swagbucks. I bought one. It will take a few days for Dwolla to verify my bank account info, and a few days for my gift card to be available.
Hopefully, one day soon I will have $5 cash in my checking account, courtesy of Swagbucks and Dwolla. It will make a lovely mortgage chip.
Last night, I met a girlfriend I hadn't seen in about 6 months for drinks, dinner, and giggles. I offered to pay. I spent $30 including a generous tip. (The place we like to go has awesome margaritas for $2. Also, the best chips and salsa I have ever had). We had a great time.
Today I am planning to drive up to Davis to see BF. I will spend the night and come home tomorrow afternoon.
Gross Wages 2013
October 16th, 2013 at 07:03 pmLooking at my YTD on my paystub from yesterday, and looking ahead on the calendar, I see I am on track to gross $51,102.25 this year. This includes my seasonal OT and tax season bonus. It does not include my Christmas bonus, child support, or my PT job income.
If I want to continue socking away 15% of my gross pay towards retirement, I need to save $7,665.34. By the time the year ends, I will have contributed $2,550 into my Simple IRA and $3,000 into my Roth. I will receive $1,533.07 in matching funds from my employer. That leaves an additional $582.27 still to be coughed up, we can just call it $600.
(I made a 1k contribution to my traditional IRA in February, but that was for 2012).
I believe I can easily contribute $600 from my Christmas bonus, and I believe I will. I will also need to pay for gifts for my kiddos, and hope to make a mortgage chip and stash a bit into savings. We will just have to wait and see how good I have been this year. Perhaps I was more naughty than nice and can only look forward to coal.
PineCone Payment
October 16th, 2013 at 05:43 pmThis morning I received $3 from PineCone, which I have made into a mortgage chip.
That's it. Life is pretty exciting around here, isn't it?
PayDay
October 16th, 2013 at 01:15 amToday was payday, so it was time for a wallet sweep. I had $8 to apply to my mortgage, bringing the balance down to only $176,247.01. (Yup, that was tongue-in-cheek).
Automatic savings transfers happen tomorrow, so I just went ahead and updated my sidebar totals. It is nice to have a little something in CurveBall again. If I finish October bill paying with more than $500 in checking, I will sweep any excess into CurveBall too. It needs all the help it can get.
Cashed Out Inbox Dollars
October 11th, 2013 at 04:12 amIt took about a year this time, I think.
But I have $41.53 on the way, which will make a nice mortgage chip.
September 2013 Budget Report
October 5th, 2013 at 05:58 pm
I overspent $1617 for the month. My security cameras were $1590, so I am not displeased with my spending for the month. I also paid $330 to have all of the embroidering done on J's letterman jacket. If not for that, I would have come in under budget. But, it is always something, right?
Just after the 1st, my daughter paid $300 towards household expenses, which is what we have agreed. Yesterday, I received a check in the mail for $200 from my part-time job. With this recent infusion of $500, I was able to pay Visa for my security cameras without dipping into Vacation Fund. CurveBall is impoverished once again. But, everything is paid in full.
Oh, and utilities are so low because last month I ended up paying my water, sewer, garbage bill twice. So this month, I only owed $3.89.