Bloom Where You Are Planted

Cash is down.
Debt is down.
Investments are up.
Zestimate is up.



And look at this...for the first time since my divorce, if I liquidated everything I could theoretically pay off my mortgage, and have a whole $101.39 left.

Theoretical, because of course there would be severe tax consequences to completely liquidating my retirement accounts.

I continue to think Zillow has my home value too low. Trulia says 137k, which may or may not be true, but nonetheless does make me .

I received my money from Second Spin. After reimbursing WF Visa for my actual shipping costs, I had $38.85 to send off to E Fund.

The item I asked BF to list on eBay is up to $102.50. The auction closes Wednesday. The proceeds are earmarked for E Fund.

I received my state income tax refund of $1,039. I made a 1k 2012 traditional IRA contribution and sent $39 off to CurveBall.

On Feb 1st, I "paid" my car insurance premium (6 months) with WF Visa. The cost was $534.09. I will need to transfer that money from CurveBall, but will wait until later in the month.

In late March I am going to see a play in SF with a particular group of friends. We all worked together about a decade ago. We have seen about a half dozen really good plays together, and about the same number of really good concerts. When we are able to get together, it is always super fun. So my play ticket is $60, and then there will be bart, dinner, etc. I am watching my discretionary spending this month and next, in order to afford this hoorah.

I am happy to report thus far this month, all of my spending is within acceptable parameters.

Months like this one show me, I still have so far to go. Way too much spending in "everything else". Of course, $600 was my HVAC repair. But even excluding that, it was too much. Where did it go? Mostly eating out (for convenience), which was totally unneccessary as we have plenty of groceries at home. J did get some new clothes (2 jeans, 4 tshirts), his first this entire school year. He got a new speedo for swim team. I bought him some things at Party City for spirit week. Face paint and green hair spray to be the joker. A red bandana with attached fake dredlocks for pirate day. (I figured that one will be great in the future for International Talk Like A Pirate Day, Halloween, and the occasional FSM event. Not so much for me, but for J or even BF.) I blame no one but myself.

I don't regret the J expenses at all, but because of those expenses, there shouldn't have been ANY meals out. To me, that is the point of having a discretionary category like "everything else".

Well, nothing to do but begin anew in February.

I have received my electric bill for February, and after I pay it I will have a credit balance of $504.51. February is the month they recalculate my "balanced bill pay" amount, and March is the first month I pay the new amount. I am expecting my monthly bill to drop at least $50. I will be able to trim a bit from my budget for utilities. I intend to add that amount to my automatic CurveBall transfer.

I am still waiting to receive payment from Second Spin. Looking forward to adding that to E Fund.

My wallet sweep last payday netted me $1 for E Fund. Just $1. I guess really, anything at all is a bonus because it is the unspent portion of my cash allowance. Nonetheless, I like to do a little better than that!

Tomorrow I will work a full day and bank some more OT hours. I'm looking forward to the work tomorrow, too. A client with 3 LLCs and some personally owned rental properties. I don't do her tax returns, but I get to do her accounting for the year. For some reason, I always look forward to doing her books. If I finish with her stuff before I have put in 8 hours, I have plenty of other work to choose from.

Cash is up.
Debt is down.
Investments are up.
Home Zestimate is up.



This is the highest my net worth has been in quite a few years. It's very encouraging. I'm no spring chicken, so I need it to climb quite a bit during the next two decades.

I just tried to update my sidebar with 1/31 numbers. Instead of updating, I lost all of my settings. Notice I now have no blog name, bio, etc.

Don't know what is going on.

It's too late for me, but save yourselves!

UPDATE: Nate fixed me. Thanks, Nate!

But it won't post Feb 1. This little goodie was on my Visa statement:

Congratulations| You have earned a $25.00 rebate which
will be automatically applied to your home mortgage loan
within 4-8 weeks.
Thank you for using your Wells Fargo Home Rebate Card�.

I do so like free money.

And I have never received an alert, but i was able to transfer into Vacation Fund this morning. So, hopefully no more hiccups.

I went through my CD collection at work and chose 2 to sell on Second Spin. I went through my small DVD collection and chose 1 to sell on Second Spin. Those 3 items came to $17.50!

Also, I had a copy of "Rosetta Stone" for Spanish. I have asked BF to list it for me on EBay. At one time he had a side business, buying pallets of merchandise at auctions and selling the individual items on EBay. He has thousands of sales and a high satisfaction rating, whereas I have none at all.

I am irritated at TIAA-Cref. My automatic transfer to Vacation Fund did not happen. There was no message or indication as to why. I can look at my "transfers" list and see the next one is scheduled to happen in February. So, I scheduled a one-time immediate transfer. It didn't happen. I couldn't tell why. So, I sent a secure message on their site. They replied I needed to call. I called this past Monday. It seems the problem is my Vacation Fund account is inactive. They will make it active within 24 hours and send me an "alert". As of this morning, still no alert. I tried to transfer from CurveBall to Vacation (an immediate transfer since both are with TIAA-Cref) and I received an error message. Humph.

Thinking I may just switch back to Ally, although their rate is slightly lower. I logged on to Ally. All 3 of my accounts have 0.00 balances, but all show "active" under the "status" header.(On TIAA-Cref's site, I couldn't find "status" information anyplace.) So, I scheduled three $1.00 transfers from WF checking. If they happen, and if TIAA-Cref still won't let me transfer money into Vacation Fund, I think I will just wash my hands of them. I could call again, but it annoys me that I even have to deal with this. I just want to transfer some money into my account, why should it be hard?

TIAA-Cref was paying 1.25% in December, but are down to .99% now. Ally is currently paying .95%.

Well, I worked 4.75 OT hours yesterday. It would have been a longer work day, but I got a phone call from a neighbor that my dogs were out and about. I left to collect them.

When I got home, I discovered that a board from my gate was off and neatly propped against the fence to the right of where it had been nailed in place. I wonder how my dogs were able to accomplish that? Either they have some amazing carpentry skills for creatures with no opposable thumbs, or a person did that particular deed. Hmmm. I wonder who would do such a thing? And yes, this gate is right next to the gate of the delightful dog-poisoning neighbor.

By the time I had nailed the board back into place, I didn't feel like going back to work. Even so, it was a productive work day. No ringing phone to answer, no clients dropping in, no e-mails requesting this or that, just one payroll return after another.

I have my income taxes mostly prepared. I estimated a few small items, and will correct those entries with actual numbers before I submit. I am getting a state refund of $1,039 (every dollar which was withheld) and I owe $372 federal. I am claiming a 1k contribution to my traditional IRA, and will use my state refund to make it. I will have the federal taxes electronically debited on 4/15.

BF is excited about the recovering real estate prices in his area. A vacant lot across the street from him sold recently. The lot backs on to the golf course whereas his backs on to an empty field. We looked it up on Zillow to see the selling price. 650k. This bodes well for his sale in the spring. He is hoping to get 850k. Zillow says it is worth a bit over 1m but BF doesn't think so.

This afternoon I am off to our local independent movie theater. They are showing Gone With The Wind. I have never seen it on the big screen, so I am looking forward to this treat.

My mom has always wanted to visit Alaska. Recently, she brought this up (again!) and so I made suggestions (again!) as to who she might ask to be her travel companion. She said she wants me to go with her. I replied that I can only save for one trip at a time. She said if I will go, she will pay for both of us.

She wants a trip which includes both a cruise and a train ride. I said that if I visit Alaska again, I want to see Denali.

We got online to price some trips. It seems we can book a 12 day trip in June leaving from Seattle which includes all of our desired features. It will cost right at 5k total. I explained that tips and excursions are extra.

I have a niece (my mom's granddaughter) who lives in Seattle, so that would be a nice opportunity to see her as well.

My mom has a history of wanting something, but when it comes right down to paying for that something, she will change her mind. She has always been frugal and just has a hard time paying for anything which is not a necessity. My mom is not wealthy, but she is comfortable. She has reached her 80th birthday. I would like to see her spend and enjoy her money. I hope she does take a trip to Alaska, whether she takes me along or not.

So, we will see. I think I will give her a month or so to contemplate parting with 5k, then ask her if she still wants to book a trip. If she does, then heck yes I will go. You betcha.

BF was here over the weekend. The change in him is very noticeable. He is out of his "funk", and is more his old self, the fellow I was so attracted to in the beginning. He is getting a lot accomplished with his mom's estate, and was full of plans and details (of things already accomplished) to report. He left Sunday afternoon, as he had to be at work early today. (We live approximately 88 miles apart.)

I don't think I've mentioned before how we met. We were both on Nutri-System. Nutri-System has a website with message boards for support. There is an area specifically for singles in their 40s. People discuss challenges and strategies with their NS diet, and of course chat about their personal lives a little bit. (Kind of like here, only the focus is on diet and exercise rather than finances.) Well, I started frequenting that message board and BF did too. I first noticed BF because he made a remark which struck me as funny. After a few months, BF sent me a private message and asked if I would like to have lunch with him sometime. I thought that might be fun, so I accepted. We met for lunch one day (at a Fresh Choice, very NS friendly) and immediately hit it off. There was a lot of chemistry,and we just "clicked", right from "hello". That was about 3.5 years ago now.

I had kind of lost sight of that man, while he was in his "funk". It's pretty exciting to see him again!

In other news, I transferred $600 from CurveBall to cover my HVAC repair.

Yesterday was payday, and I saw that my take home pay for an 88 hr pay period has gone from $1534 to $1499.

Now that I have so many things set up for automatic transfer, there wasn't much to do besides record the transactions which will happen shortly.

I finished the pay period with $4 left from my allowance. I had a few more splurges (lunch out with a friend, and Starbucks), but that is what my allowance is for. I only sent $2 off to EFund, and gave the other $2 to J for bus fare. I always fund that out of my allowance too, just because it is convenient.

Tomorrow J has his physical so that he can be on the swim team again this year. I will be using his Health Savings Account debit Visa for the first time. It is ex-h's HSA, so I don't use it for any of my medical expenses.

I am off to work, have a great day everyone.

I was swamped, swamped, swamped at work today, but I still found time to miss Saving Advice!

I went to Best Buy on my way home tonight and cancelled my extended warranty. There was no hassle at all whatsoever. J knows that there is no warranty. I feel good about the decision.

BF got a job this week! It is part-time and just minimum wage while he is training. He is processing mortgage loans. BF hasn't had any job whatsoever in about 6 years. In the past, he has done a number of things. Most recently he worked for an HMO in their IT department. He did that for about a decade. I'm glad for him that he is making progress towards getting "unfrozen". (I just don't know what else to call it.)

J is making dinner for the two of us tonight. Grilled cheese sandwiches. Yum!

Well, my son's ipad quit working. I bought it in December 2011, and I did purchase a 2 year extended warranty.

I located my receipt and took it back to the store (Best Buy). They determined it was not fixable and exchanged it for a new one. Then I had to make a snap decision I was not expecting, did I want to buy another warranty? I opted to buy another 2 year warranty. Upon refection, I am thinking I made a mistake.

The price of the 16gb ipad was $499 when I originally bought it, but is down to $399 now. The 2 year warranty was $158.01. Well, that is almost 40% of the cost of just buying a new one! What do you think? Should I contact Best Buy and see if I can decline the extended warranty and have them reverse the charge?

In other news, I decided I didn't have enough of my portfolio allocated to total stock market, and so moved 5% from total international stock market. And that's it, I am done "tweaking" my mix. I have a pattern. I stay hands off for a year or more, then play with different tools (such as Future Advisor) and decide I need to make some changes. Then I am unhappy with the changes and gradually move back towards what I already had! It's dumb. Lesson learned.

I've seen people talk about selling things on Second Spin. I do have a large CD collection. Most of them, I won't part with. However, I was sure I had a few at least I wouldn't miss. Nonetheless, I've never been motivated to try selling them.

Be A Wealthy Warrior's post tonight inspired me to see what I have and don't want that they would buy. I went through my collection and surprised myself. I had about 40 cds I don't really care to listen to! I sold 26 of them tonight. With the extra 20% code my total came to $29.88. And I will have a bit less clutter to boot.

Thanks, Be A Wealthy Warrior!

I like to periodically re-read various personal finance books. Over this weekend, I just finished re-reading Dave Ramsey's "Total Money Makeover".

While I have no objections to his get out of debt advice, I find his investing advice scary. In my opinion, people who follow his investing advice are setting themselves up for failure, big time. If you read the forums, you may have already read my objections to some of his investing advice, as I have been vocal about it a time or two already. After re-reading this weekend, I find his investing advice scarier than ever.

A few weeks ago, I shared my Excel calculations on the possible size of my nest egg at retirement age, assuming different scenarios. Here are my projections using Dave Ramsey math:

My traditional and Simple IRA balances as of 12/31/12 total $141,313.40. If I were to re-allocate that money based on Dave Ramsey's advice and assume I can count on 12% returns from now until age 65, my nest egg will reach $1,217,098.64 without my adding another single penny.

Currently, I am aiming for 600k in those accounts so that I can draw down 24k per year (standard safe withdrawal rate of 4%). But, Dave Ramsey says 8% is a safe withdrawal rate. So if I follow his advice, I only need 300k to safely draw down 24k per year.

Well holy cow, I am already looking at a nest egg of 4 times that amount without adding another penny between now and age 65. I will be able to count on my nest egg being 1.2 million, and I will be able to count on safely drawing 96k annually from my 1.2 million nest egg. I only make 49k per year now, so to me that is a fortune! Conclusion: I am golden. I have no need to continue adding to my traditional or Simple IRAs. I should immediately begin doing something else with the money I have been directing towards my traditional and Simple IRAs.

What about my Roth? I need to re-allocate that to 100% stocks too. The $15,295.50 I had on 12/31/12 will grow to $131,736.50 by the time I reach age 65 without adding another penny. My goal is 150k, so this is a little bit short. However, the whole reason I am saving in my Roth is to have a fund to pay for large irregular expenses such as a new roof or a new (to me) vehicle. But if my income is 96k per year, I don't foresee having any trouble paying these expenses out of current income. I will have twice the income I have now and no longer be saving for retirement or paying Fica taxes, so surely I can come up with 10k to buy a nice used car. I won't even need to dip into my 131k Roth. In fact, I don't see why I need money in a Roth at all.

Conclusion: I have already salted away far more than I need. I am done saving for retirement.

So I stop saving now and arrive at age 65 with...substantially less than Dave Ramsey promised me. Then what? Well, adjust to a much lower standard of living than I had expected. It's too late to do anything else.

It is a good thing for me that I recognize the huge flaws in Dave Ramsey's investment math. I hope that those following his advice are able to recognize the flaws too, but I fear that many are not.

It is not to scale, but here is the floor plan of my house. The wall I would like to take out is between the kitchen and bedroom #4. I suspect it may be a load bearing wall. However, it is also vaulted in the center (between living room and kitchen) and tapers down. I think I could remove most of the wall and leave the top part as is and be ok.

I think that the builder would have had to file the blueprints with the city. So looking into that is going to be on my "to do" list this year. If a general contractor looked at the blueprints, s/he should be able to tell me if what I want to do is possible or not.

The circuit panel is all that was needed. The repairman was scheduled to come yesterday between 3 and 5 pm. I was expecting him to call so that I could come home from work, discuss anything which needed discussing, and pay. He never called. I came home to a toasty 68 degree house. After turning the thermostat down to 64, I asked J if the repairman had said anything to him. He said nope, and the guy had already been gone for awhile. So, I guess I will call the office Monday and use my Visa over the phone.

Mortgage payment #6 is scheduled today, but will hit my checking account Monday I suppose. Another $258.60 to principal.

I have been thinking about my house, and what changes I would like to make if I stay here for the rest of my life. There are some positives to this, as I am just a few blocks from a bus stop (I was thinking about the possibility my mom might need to move in with me at some point, and that if she could no longer drive herself, she would like the independence of taking the bus under her own steam), a few blocks from a grocery store, and it is all on one level. I have a small kitchen in the back of the house. On the other side of one wall is a small bedroom. I have 4 bedrooms and would not miss one. I wonder how much it would cost to open up that wall and incorporate that small bedroom into my kitchen. This isn't something I would do immediately, but something I might do down the road. I would then have a lot of windows, a lot of counter space, and a lot of storage. I think it would be a nice improvement.

The plumber's bill arrived. It is $40, which I feel is very reasonable. I paid it via bill pay. (I am really enjoying not writing checks.)

The heat & air place called today. My circuit panel is in, so they will be installing it tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully, that will do the trick. I asked if they take Visa and they do, so I am going to get some reward points out of this at least.

I stopped by the library tonight. As I walked in, I thought about how much I enjoy our downtown library, and how I have taken my kids to story time and other programs, how we used to meet up with friends, how my daughter displayed several of her collections, how my kids loved to see their huge aquarium fish. Then the thought occurred to me that if I were retired, it would be a fun weekly outing for me to bike to the library, browse, and take home my choices.

I guess I must be preoccupied with planning my retirement, since these little thoughts flash in my mind from time to time.

I have been thinking a lot lately about what it will be like for me if I have to retire with a mortgage. I would prefer to retire without one, but the truth is that simply may not happen. One option I do keep in the back of my mind is a mortgage recast. Freddie Mac (owns my mortgage) allows a recast at any time. There is a $250 fee to do so. So if I have chipped away at the balance, and especially if I can afford to apply a largish lump sum, I could at least reduce my monthly mortgage payment.

I didn't mention it before, but my central heat stopped working over the long weekend. It's been a bit chilly around here.

So this afteroon a repair guy came to take a look. He said my circuit panel is burnt out and needs to be replaced. He cannot say with certainty that is the only problem, as he cannot do much testing without the panel. So they are ordering the part and will call me to arrange a time for the work to be done. The estimate is $600.

Oh CurveBall, what would I do without you?

In other exciting news, I had $1200 odd dollars in cash in my traditional IRA due to dividends. So, I calculated where the money needed to go. It turned out I was under-weight in bonds and tips, so I bought 6 more shares of each.

I have recently added a page to my sidebar with my exact portfolio holdings. I will try to keep it current.

Today I spent the afternoon at my mom's house, visiting and playing cards.

I brought up the Mexico trip my brother had proposed. I just told mom that I spent more in Hawaii than planned and that I just paid off my credit card in December I said I simply won't have enough saved by June to afford a trip to Mexico. Mom was OK with it, and we agreed we will plan to go in June 2014. So, I am relieved and happy about that.

We also talked about possibly going to Lake Tahoe for a week or so this summer instead. My cousin L (went to Hawaii and China with her) owns a rustic little house in the old part of Lake Tahoe. (Well, her husband and son do. It is a family vacation home from her husband's family.) I have enjoyed several long weekends in that house, and my cousin L will let us rent it for $25 a day. However, 2 winters ago a pipe burst, the downstairs flooded, and extensive repair work needed to be done. I am not certain, but I think it is not finished and so we could not rent it. However, we could check around. I am sure we could find something reasonable. That would be a nice and affordable vacation.

I get three weeks of paid vacation per year. It is use it or lose it. This past year I used 7 vacation days and just lost the other 8. I realy, really want to stop doing that.

So here is a little thing I like to do at the end of the year. I take my retirement savings and project what they will be when I am 65 and 67. (My SS full-retirement age is 67. If it is possible, I will retire at 65.) I assume different average rates of return and see what I will have if I keep saving at my current rate, and if I stop saving.

Here are the results for my tax-deferred accounts:




And here are the results for my Roth:



What these tell me is that if I continue at my current savings rate and enjoy 7% returns, I will hit my targets of 600k tax-deferred and 150k Roth. If I don't earn 7%, or if I don't keep saving at my current rate, I will fall short.

My current savings rate is 2.4k into my Simple plus 1.4k of company match, and 3k into my Roth.

Cash is up.
Debt is down.
Investments are up.
Home Zestimate is up.

I've made 5 payments to my new mortgage already. This table shows how the payments broke down in 2012.




Not terribly exciting. Just think, only 355 more payments to go.

* The payroll tax holiday is over.
* My credit card debt is gone.
* My grocery budget is not high enough.
* I need a line item for Emergency Fund.
* I need a line item for Vacation Fund.

All of this adds up to budget adjustments. Here is my new monthly budget:

I worked on updating my budget spreadsheet this morning, tallying all transactions and entering them into their respective categories. Spending is OK, I am over on "Groceries" and "Everything Else" because of holiday gifts and edible treats, but of course my bonus was extra income and paid for the lion's share of the extra spending. I will wait for the month to be over to post my budget report.

My checking account balance is ending the month lower than usual, and I realize why that is. I have started using my WF Visa for most things, and transferring money to pay in full within a day or two. So, instead of paying November's charges in December, I have paid the bulk of December's charges in December. I like it! My Chase Freedom bill next month will be $47.30. My AmEx bill next month will be $152.39. There won't be a WF Visa bill, the balance is $0.

The AmEx bill represents 2 tanks of gas and groceries at my "on occasion" grocery store (not my regular grocery store). So, it is looking as though I will not be applying for the Preferred Card ($75 annual fee, 6% cash back on groceries, 3% cash back on gas). Not being able to use it at my regular grocery store is a deal killer.

From Jan 1 - Mar 31, gasoline is one of the bonus categories for Chase Freedom. So, I won't be using AmEx much at all for 3 months.

It looks as though I will have enough reward points on WF Visa by mid January (when the statement closes) to redeem for a $25 credit to my mortgage. I know from past experience they will hold it until Feb 1 then apply it. So, it looks like my first mortgage chip on my new mortgage is about 6 weeks away.

Today is payday, so it is time for another wallet sweep. At lunch, I did my banking and deposited $27 from last payday's allowance, which I have already sent off to E Fund.

Little by little, my cash accounts are getting a bit fatter.

Well, Christmas was so nice this year. I had both of my children sleeping at my house on Christmas Eve, something which hasn't happened in years. We went to see Les Miserables in the afternoon. They did a wonderful job.

Then it was back to work for 3 days, which as always this time of year is hectic. Just one more work day and then another 4 day weekend. Yay!

In addition to the generous bonus from my boss and the cash "tip" from a client, a client who owns a food distribution company gave me a nice box of meat. Steakhouse quality steaks and tri-tip. Mmmmm, we've really been enjoying them.

I received an e-mail yesterday from our local independent theater offering me free tickets to a documentary about global warming entitled "Chasing Ice". It looks interesting and the price is certainly right. J and I are going to see it tomorrow night.

I received an e-mail today from HauserNet (decoy mail company). They are switching from mailed paper checks to PayPal. They are also changing their payment policy. Instead of paying out once per quarter with a $10 minimum, they will be paying out once per month with no minimum. So, that is a nice change.

I think this is the 4th year in a row that a certain client has sent me a Xmas card with a nice hand-written note and a crisp $100 bill. It is so nice of him.

Off to E Fund with the $100. It is nice to see those numbers getting a little larger.

With my Roth contribution this month, it puts me at 3k contributed for the year. 3k per year is my goal. I wouldn't mind exceeding it, but I am glad to have hit it. I think between now and April 15th, I will contribute 1k to my traditional for 2012 and save a bit on my tax bill.

I received my 1600 thread count sheets from No More Rack too. They are soft but thin. I am not entirely certain they were worth $31. I haven't slept on them yet.