No-Kill Finance

(approximately 0.8% of the library)

First, a brief note:  sorry for the hiatus.  Not much free time as Istruggle to stay caught up with school and work.  But enough about that!

As returning readers may know (do I still have returning readers?), I recently tried to sell a lot of crap via the internet.  eBay proved difficult on account of my schedule generally conflicting with the hours of the post office, so I turned to facebook.  After I listed all of the books I hoped to sell, a friend told me she’d take whatever five that I most strongly recommended.  This should prove difficult…

See, I own a lot of books.  Too many books.  I took a tally a few years ago, and at that point (I’ve since acquired many more), I owned something like 1300 books, and had only read about 20% of them.  I of course intend to read them all, but as I go through a maximum of two books a month (or, lately, more like zero), that’s not a realistic goal.  Hence, I tried selling some of them.  But the ones I want to sell are not the ones I’ve read (hence, difficult to offer recommendations).  Nor are they the ones that I much want to read.  And this made me wonder, why would I expect money for them if I don’t think of them as being worth keeping?

The books I’ve decided to keep (and it should be noted that I was only trying to sell 100 or so) can be classified into two broad categories:  books I’ve read, and books I want to read but haven’t.  The books I haven’t yet read are the ones that I think of as being worth something, monetarily.  They are goods that I have purchased and not yet enjoyed.  So, I own them, but still hold material desire for them.  The books I have read, though (that is, the books I could reasonably recommend to my interested friend), are beyond monetary value.  If I wanted to part ways with a book I’ve read and enjoyed enough to keep in the first place, I would never, ever ask for money in exchange.  It would be handed over to – no, bestowed upon – a friend as a cherished gift.  There are few things I take as seriously as a good book.

So why, then, do I sell the crap that I don’t care about?  Or, rather, why do I expect anyone to want to buy it?  I mean, yes, there are some award-winning books in there, and books that I would probably have loved if I’d ever gotten around to them, but if my aim is to make money, shouldn’t I try to sell the things that are subjectively worth the most to me?  Would anyone buy my repeatedly read, beat-up 1980’s mass market copy of Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle for what I think it’s worth?  (If so, please contact me privately, and I’ll give you the address to which you can mail the $500 check.)

I still intend to sell a lot more stuff.  I’m working my way up from the crap I don’t care about to the crap I shouldn’t care about but do.  But where do I draw the line?  How do you (if indeed there are any of you out there) ascribe value to personal belongings?

A few days ago, there was a discussion about money at work in which one of my coworkers uttered the claim, “I just can’t save money.”

I didn’t go into full budget-geek mode at work, but I have no qualms doing so here.  So, to that claim, that misguided idea that any person is incapable of saving money, I offer a simple retort:  Nuh-uh.

I can prove it.  I’ll even phrase it like a self-help guru (imagine me speaking in a Dr. Phil voice):

In one easy step, I can teach you how to save money.  I guarantee that this simple, solitary action will start you on your way to saving potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars.  Do you want to know what it is?  The secret to practically limitless savings?  Well, I’ll tell you:

Just save your money.

I know, it’s anticlimactic.  But it’s so terribly easy that the word “can’t” simply doesn’t apply.

There are plans you can follow, books you can read, and seminars you can take on how to save, how to spend more effectively, and how to be thrifty.  You can get a second job, sell everything you own, or win the lottery.  Or you can follow my one-step plan:  just save your money.

Okay, enough of the self-help guru.  And enough of the smart-ass one-step plan.  But saving is important.  You need money in an easily accessible account for when (not if) emergencies come.  And, if I were to play the part of a self-help guru and propose a plan to a new saver, it could indeed be broken down into very few simple steps:

Step One:  Save your money. (No, I’m not joking this time.)

On your next payday, take some tiny amount of money (it could be $50, it could be $5) and put it into a savings account.  If you don’t have one, there are many online banks that offer higher interest rates than your neighborhood bank is likely to, and many of them have no account minimums (so you could indeed start an account with just $5).  I use ING Direct, and have nothing but good things to say about them.  In fact, if you opened an account with them, you could cite me as a reference and we’d both get some free money out of it.  But I won’t turn this into a ploy to make money for myself…the point is, this is how you prove to yourself that you can save.  You just do it.  Put the money away and don’t allow yourself to touch it (having it in an online bank makes this easier, since it takes a bit more effort to get to and won’t be used for an impulse buy or anything).  It will be out of your hands and, even if the $5 was a significant percentage of your monthly income, you’ll be forced to find a way to do without it.  You’ll get by, and you’ll have saved in the process.

Step Two:  Watch your spending.

Do this however you think you’ll be most likely to follow through:  each time you spend money, record it somewhere (text it to yourself or write it in a notebook or record it in some fancy-schmancy budgeting app on your high-falutin’ smart phone).  Keep track of what you spend in a given period:  in a given day, week, pay period, or month.

Step Three:  Adjust your spending.

At the end of whatever period you settled on (in my opinion, the end of the month makes the most sense because so many common expenses are only charged once a month), look at where your money went, and ask yourself if it all needed to go there.  How much did you spend on coffee to-go when you could’ve brewed some at home?  How many times did you eat out because you didn’t feel like packing yourself a sandwich before heading to work in the morning?  Which of your expenses are based on your needs, and which are based on your wants?  What of the things you spent money on would you have been better served by saving it?

Step Four:  Adjust your saving.

Now that you’ve seen where you can trim the fat, determine how much more you can afford to save from your next paycheck.  Set goals for yourself.  See if you can save even more than you budget for.  I make $1100 a month and save over $250 of it:  it’s not nearly as tough as I thought it would be.

Then it’s just a matter of repeating the same cycle:  save, track your spending, and save some more.  Perhaps it’s a grotesquely simplified version of a financial plan, but it’s a start.  And the simple act of doing step one alone is proof:  anyone can save money.

A quick post to start the day:

I was reviewing my accounts this morning, and something was off:  I owed $1.50 on the credit account that I’m so proud to have finally maintained at $0.00 for a whole month.  How could this be?  Did an ineptly risk-averse identity thief steal my credit card number and only charge $1.50 to it, just to play it safe?

It turns out that Chase charges a minimum interest fee every month, even if you don’t carry a balance.  At my interest rates, I could carry about a $150.00 balance, and pay the exact same interest rate I pay for carrying $0.00.  This strikes me as somewhat ridiculous.  Granted, I don’t understand the intricacies of the banking world, but I do understand the phrase “no-fee credit card,” and I also am pretty familiar with the phrase “false advertisement.”  Am I really supposed to pay interest on money that I haven’t even borrowed?

Chase has been a pretty disappointing bank for a while now.  The random fees attached to the (here’s that false advertising claim again) “free checking” and “free savings” accounts have probably cost me a few hundred dollars in the several years since my BankOne membership was bought out and turned into a Chase membership (mind you, this happened without the CEO even asking my permission!).

Plus, although most of my savings is done with my ING Direct accounts now (ING rave review still forthcoming in a future blog), I still have a small Chase Savings account that I use as short-term savings to set money aside for rent.  So, although I’m constantly contributing and then withdrawing from the account, the $300 I have to keep in it to avoid a $4.00 monthly fee gains only 0.01% interest annually.  Stacked against inflation, I’m probably losing $10 a year by saving with Chase!

I’d imagine I’d do better with a local credit union…the chief convenience of Chase has been the plethora of ATM locations all around Chicago.  But, frankly, I rarely use ATMs any more.  Chase and I have just grown apart.  And I think it would be better for both of us (or maybe just better for me and not at all noticeable to Chase) if I just moved on.

Where do you bank, readers?  (I do have readers, right?)  Are you big corporate bank people?  Small local bank people?  Credit union people?  Cash-under-mattress people?  What do you like/dislike about your banks?  (Please refrain from complaining about your uncomfortable mattresses.)

Yesterday, I got a phone call from my friend Danielle regarding my blog.  (She neglected to take me up on the free beer offered in the last post.  Big relief, since I can’t afford it.)  Since I neglected to save the message she left, I’ll paraphrase:

Justin.  I’ve been reading your blog.  How the @%&# do you save that much money when you make so little?  My fixed expenses are too high to save at all, and I make more than you.  What does your budget look like?

Well, Danielle, if I may respond in a public forum (though I didn’t ask before posting this), my main trick is that I just don’t spend much money at all outside of my fixed expenses.

I budget a monthly income of $1100, though I usually make a little more than that.  My fixed expenses are:

• $450 Rent
• $70 Transportation (approximate:  bus and train)
• $80 Utilities (approximate:  gas, electric, internet)

I’m fortunate enough not to have to pay for my cell phone, as it’s a recurring Christmas gift from my mother.  I also don’t currently have any monthly credit card payments apart from the not-quite-weekly $20 charges from the Chicago Transit Authority, which I pay as they appear on my statement (see “$70 Transportation”).  I don’t have any student loans (yet), because I was able to make it through my undergraduate schooling debt-free as a result of the responsible financial planning of my parents and grandparents.  (Side note:  this is one of the main things that makes me want to be financially responsible:  I want to provide for my children and grandchildren as well as my parents and grandparents did for me.)

But anyway, after those fixed expenses, I’m left with $500 a month to spend on food, pets, clothes, household expenses, and (if I’m very, very lucky) a bit left over for entertainment.  It’s a sparse existence, but I make it work.

For my non-fixed expenses, I eat a lot of cheap meals (made at home from cheap groceries…I price compare like crazy:  if something is 26 cents an ounce at Trader Joe’s and 27 cents an ounce at Jewel, I buy it at Trader Joe’s).  I keep and am sure to consume leftovers rather than letting them go bad in my refrigerator like I used to, and I scarf down any freebies offered to the staff at work (one of the perks of working for an animal organization:  lots of people want to thank us for our efforts by feeding us…even if it is mostly junk food).

I dine out very rarely, and try to do so cheaply whenever I do.  Again, I save leftovers and try to stretch them over a few meals.  (A trick:  I offer to brave the cold weather and pick up food for co-workers in exchange for getting to keep their change.  If I get six people to order Thai food along with me and they all round up to the nearest dollar – as a delivery tip – I end up getting an order of pad thai that lasts me two or three meals for just a couple of bucks.)

For entertainment, I rely on my “cheapest-plan-possible” Netflix subscription (complete with online viewing) and Hulu, plus the plethora of CDs, DVDs, books and magazines that I purchased and never fully enjoyed back in my days of unrepentant spending.  Mostly, though, I don’t leave myself time for entertainment.  Between school, work, and mindless internet browsing (I mean…constructive blogging), I don’t find much time to yearn for concerts or movies.

Household expenses are easy because we buy most household goods at thrift stores.  We clean with cheap cleaner (or sometimes just diluted white vinegar).  I re-wear shirts and pants until they’re simply too dirty to pass as clean in good company.  I buy clothes at thrift stores, too, and rarely at that since my job doesn’t really require any sort of dress code.  (All of my stained, too-small, white t-shirts are my “work shirts”…which I wear six days a week to match my work schedule.)

Mostly, I just cut back on the things that used to be my weaknesses: if I want a drink, I have $3 Trader Joe’s wine rather than $25 Jameson whiskey; if I want to see a movie, I stay in and see what’s new on Netflix rather than buying a ticket to see a new release; if I want a sandwich, I make one rather than running to the Quizno’s across the street; if I want to buy a book or CD or DVD or video game, I just…well, I just don’t.  And the best thing about it is that my extreme thrift hasn’t really detracted from my quality of life whatsoever.  I’m just as happy being cheap as I was being reckless.  And this way, I have $250 bucks or so every month to squirrel away for a rainy day, which just makes me more secure, therefore happier.

Returning visitors may recall that, in opposition to the unrealistic idea of holding myself to a New Years Resolution, I instead made several New Months Resolutions toward the beginning of January.  The time has come for a quick review:

Out With the Old

1.  Save 20% of my income to an ING Direct emergency fund. I’m happy to report that I overshot this one…by a very long shot, actually.  If you include all of the belated Christmas money I received (thank you, loved ones), I saved just over 53% of the money that came into my life!  And even if you don’t count the unexpected income from gifts, I still managed 30%.  I’ve been annoyed with how slowly my savings are growing, but I see in writing this blog that I’m performing so much better than I had budgeted myself to perform.

2.  Post at least 50% of my “crap” to Ebay or Amazon Marketplace. I found in starting this process that eBay and I do not get along.  And while Amazon Marketplace is lovely for buyers (it’s the source of hundreds of the books I’m now itching to get rid of), it doesn’t offer the best deal for sellers.  So, I found an alternative:  I wrote a facebook note with a list of all the DVDs and CDs I’m selling (at least 50% of my “crap”) and tagged all of my [geographically] closest friends.  So far I’ve sold about $130 worth of music and movies, and the requests are still coming in!

3.  Add at least 3 entries to this blog each week. For the first 60% of my blogging career thus far (that is, for two of the last three weeks), I was doing too good a job at this; I was obsessing over writing.  While this isn’t typically a bad thing for a creative writing graduate who has relapsed into writer’s block for the last five years, it is a bad thing for a returning student who should be devoting at least some of his brain power to chemistry.  So, after writing 4 or 5 a week for two (and a half?) weeks, I took a week off for studying.  More on that in #4.  But, strict numbers show that I made 11 entries in 3 weeks and 3 days, for a total of…3.08 entries a week.  Success again!

4.  Set aside seven hours a week (average one a day) for studying and homework. At my best, I have devoted five hours a week to studying.  This week.  But that’s following almost three weeks of not opening a single damned page of my chemistry book.  Even as I write, I realize I should be studying instead.  But I can’t abandon this, my primary source of self-accountability, totally.  I found that, in taking a week off of blogging in order to focus on my school work, I was far less capable of resisting the urge to be unproductive than I am when I’m writing here…perhaps I should just give up on school and do this full time.  (Just kidding; stay in school, kids.)

5.  Keep up with my chore list. This has been both a moderate failure and a moderate success.  In issuing myself a “procrastination challenge” last week, (though I failed colossally at focusing more on my school work) I was able to not spend so much time playing various computer games and reading random items of interest online, and therefore a lot of my important and occasionally neglected chores (animal care, general cleanliness, remembering to eat three meals a day) have become part of my daily routine.  But, in becoming part of the daily routine, I have forgotten to check them off of my chore list, thus I have forgotten to look at my chore list, thus some of the less crucial – but still important – chores (e.g. “Brush cat hair off of furniture”) have been overlooked for a whole month now.  I’ll have to modify that in this glorious New Month:

In With the New

1.  Save 25% of my income to an ING Direct emergency fund. In spite of the fact that I surpassed 50% last month, that may be a bit high to set as a given expectation.  But 20% isn’t cutting it!  I’m working full time during school, which I wasn’t planning on doing when I set down the 20% goal.  The result of this is that I’m making a lot more money than I planned on, and I have a lot less free time in which to spend it!  25% should be easy to meet and surpass (perhaps I can hit the $1000 mark in the emergency fund!), but by refraining from putting down a 45% goal, I’m not setting myself up for inherent disappointment.  After all, Christmas checks only come once a year…

2.  Add at least 3 entries to this blog EVERY week. Next month I won’t skew the numbers by taking an average…I’m new to blogging (perhaps you could tell that by my 2000-word entries), but I understand it well enough to know that taking a week off can hurt, in terms of readership.  Things have been going well here at No-Kill Finance (better than I expected they would after only 4 weeks!), and I should keep up the momentum.  Even if that means having to work harder to keep up with my next goal…

3.  Set aside seven hours a week (average one a day) for studying and homework. Yes, I still want (and need) to make this work.  This is a personal finance blog, and what’s more important to my financial future than my ability to pursue the career I want?  I need to get an A in this class, and frankly, I didn’t find it too difficult to be first in the class last semester.  So, now that I’m working 7 extra hours a week and trying to maintain a blog in my free time, I’m struggling.  But that doesn’t mean I need to drop one of those distractions so it can be easy.  It shouldn’t be easy.  It should be a challenge, and I should rise to accept it.

4.  Settle school finances before it’s too late! All this talk about school reminds me of a key point:  I haven’t paid for it yet!  I need to look into private loans (since, as a “non-degree-seeking graduate student,” I don’t qualify for federal loans) and sign up ASAP, because I’m sure the university doesn’t take kindly to delinquent payments.

5.  Find some time (somewhere) to see friends. One of the sadder aspects of being so busy is that I, a somewhat aloof fellow to begin with, haven’t seen some of my closest friends for months (over a year in one case).  This is absurd.  Some of these people live less than a mile from my apartment.  For all the rough patches that my friends have seen me through, no excuse (particularly not, “I hardly have any free time, and I’d like to devote what free time I do have to online gaming”) is good enough to neglect them for so long.  So, to any friends reading this, feel free to call me up and get on my ass about scheduling a rendez-vous some time in February.  (Mention this article and get a free beer at a neighborhood bar!  Why am I cutting prices like this?  Because I’m craaaazy!)

6.  Keep up with chore list. For real this time. All day, every day.  Starting now.  Bye!

Today’s post will serve two purposes:  to make a point, and to apologize ahead of time in case I don’t show up around these internets til the weekend…

See, in spite of my resolution to devote seven hours a week to school, I’ve been putting in…well, roughly zero.  I was sick pretty much all through last week, and didn’t attend a single class, discussion, or lab.  Upon my reappearance in class this morning, I found out I was two chapters behind the class.  Two chapters’ worth of complicated chemical energy transfers, enthalpy, entropy, and a bunch of other concepts that I only vaguely understand (not to mention words I can’t pronounce).  There’s homework due tomorrow night, and a quiz next week.  Obviously, I need to play catch-up.

This doesn’t intimidate me.  It should, I know, but I am sadly so very experienced with procrastination that it just occurs naturally to me at this point.  I am intimately familiar with the stress of the last-minute hustle, the crunch time, and the pre-test cram…so much that it sometimes doesn’t occur to me that these are not appropriate ways to manage tasks.  But expecting stress can’t possibly be as healthy as avoiding it.

I’ve found that the best way to overcome procrastination is just to, well, do things.  Get them over with.  It feels immensely rewarding and it’s usually not nearly as difficult as you build it up to be.  (Says the guy writing a blog instead of studying.)

BUT.  It takes a lot of motivation – and, in my case, a very good mood – to muster up that sort of proactive thinking.  It’s hard-wired in my behavior to procrastinate, and I so rarely try to change anything about my hard-wired behavior.  But that’s what this whole personal finance thing has been about, so why not give procrastination a shot, too?

For the rest of the week, I’ll try the procrastination challenge:  no, “I’ll do the dishes after this episode of Seinfeld,” no, “One more level before I start homework.”

Instead, just, “Damn it, Justin, get off your ass and do it now!”

It’s true, I’m not particularly stressed about how far I’ve fallen behind in school.  But I should be.  And I can catch up with a little effort, and a whole lot of, “Do it now.”

A few days ago, Katie had a day off while I had to work. She’s been spending most of her days off setting up the new apartment, so she was excited to have plans with a friend for a change.  When that friend suggested brunch, Katie said her initial reaction was to immediately regret not being able to afford a meal out.  But, of course, she can afford it…I’m the one who can’t.  So after she realized that I wasn’t coming along, she gladly accepted the invitation.

This lead me to wonder…at what point does my budgeting become a burden on, rather than a benefit to, my personal life?

Choosing Battles

I mentioned in a previous post that Katie and I recently had a minor disagreement over the cost of dining out.  After the disagreement had been resolved (i.e. we made sandwiches and ate them angrily), she pointed out that we probably could have compromised by splitting a meal from the restaurant and eating something small (like, say, sandwiches) beforehand.  It was a good point.

I need to be careful of falling into a damagingly severe mindset of scrimping and saving at every turn.  It could not only have a negative effect on my ability to enjoy life (because, like anyone, I need to treat myself to a nice thing or two every once in a while, budget be damned), but also on my ability to function in a relationship with someone who doesn’t have the same need for extreme thrift as I do.

And, besides my relationship, what about my own peace of mind?  My own well-being?

Thrift vs. Deprivation

Last week, I wrote about saving money by walking to work rather than taking the bus.  I feel like I made a pretty reasonable argument.  This week, though, I had a pretty serious cold along with a sinus infection (and, I suspect based on details I won’t share here, a touch of pneumonia?), and still insisted on walking to work one day.  Stupid.

Sometimes, spending $2 just makes more sense than saving it.  I was lucky in that particular circumstance, in the sense that I seem to be recovering at a decent rate and won’t need to go see a doctor as a result of my trek through the great [frozen] outdoors while ill.  Sometimes, whether to save time (that could otherwise be spent earning more money…or sleeping) or simply to save whatever small amount of sanity I might still be clinging to, spending a few bucks here and there on amenities is an okay thing.

Are you guys budget Nazis, too?  Where do you make allowances in your budgets for spoiling yourselves?

I got my yearly review at work today.

It was…not stellar.

At the same time, though, it was one of the best reviews I’ve gotten in my working life.  And one of the main reasons is that I agreed with the constructive criticism given to me rather than taking it as harsh judgment and becoming defensive.

The main complaints:

• My attendance is not that great, because there have been several occasions of my not looking closely at the posted schedule.  Yes:  I’m a disorganized kind of guy.  This is something I’m working very, very hard to improve.  Hopefully by this time next year, nothing along these lines will have happened since today.
• My attitude has not been as positive in regards to work.  This seems (in my supervisors’ opinions) to have gotten worse since I started school.  That makes good sense to me; my stress level has gone through the roof in the last seven months, and I’ve stopped being able to enjoy work as much.  If you’ll recall, this was one of the reasons I started this blog:  in the hopes that writing about motivation and determination as they related to work and wages would help me feel positive about the other aspects (i.e. ethical, emotional) of my job that I enjoy.
• My initiative is good, but I have trouble with follow-through because I’m easily side-tracked.  My mind is all over the place.  Again, they observe that this has gotten worse since school started, and I’m not surprised by that.  I’ve always been somewhat easily distractable, and…(ooh, what’s that shiny thing on the other side of the room?)
• …
• …
• Sorry, I’m back.  Anyway, moving on:  I was faulted on “good judgement” for similar reasons; specifically, my time management needs work.  This is another aspect of myself that seems to be improving as my interest in all matters grown-up increases:  along with my budgeting and saving, my time management has improved tremendously in the last month.  So, yes, it’s an issue, but I’ve already started working on it.

And then it was mostly very flattering compliments to finish off the review…making the criticisms much easier to handle.  Or at least easier to absorb.

The interesting thing that occurred to me (halfway through the review, when I wandered off mentally to think about writing this blog entry…just kidding) is that this review of my employment is a very accurate review of my life, too.  All of the above points are issues in my personal, social, and financial lives, as well as in my work life.  Disorganization, distractability, and poor foresight?  These are the reasons I ever developed financial problems to begin with.

So, I did something as in keeping with my newfound enthusiasm for accountability as I could think of:  I asked for periodic reminders from my supervisors if I was failing to improve any of the criticisms.  If I start slipping into pessimism or (god forbid) ditziness, I want to be reminded that I promised I’d work on fixing these issues.

If I’m going to devote so much writing time to asserting accountability upon myself, why not extend that into my work life, too?

Over the weekend, Katie and I went to a monthly game night with half a dozen friends.  This was our third month of actually doing it monthly (after several months of faltering), a trend I hope continues.  In attending – and, last month, hosting – game nights, I’ve learned a few lessons about frugality.

1.  Accept Ridicule With A Smile

When I told a friend at work about our evening’s plans on Saturday, he poked some fun at me.  He said, “You hipsters and your trendy get-togethers.  What’ll it be next month, Bingo?  What ever happened to going out and getting drunk?”  Granted, he was being friendly in his teasing, but it was worth a response.

I told him, “No bars; I’m trying to spend less than I earn for a change.”

“Well,” he said, “you’re working at the wrong job for that.”  A fine point…in fact, the whole point of this blog.  See my first post for the talking points of the rebuttal I could have offered.  Instead, though, I smiled along with him.

“Tell me about it.  But I may as well try, right?”

While his teasing was of a friendly nature, not all the teasing I’ve encountered has been.  People get uncomfortable and annoyed when you tell them you can’t join them for social events due to lack of money.  If a friend who makes $60,000 a year (or, worse, lives off of a high-limit credit card) wants to go out for an expensive meal or to a $30 concert, it’s very difficult to tell them no without some emotional repercussion, be it guilt, shame, or frustration on your part, and sometimes irritation on the part of the friend.

It’s important, though, not to let the emotional impact of having to say “no” weigh you down.  One single lapse in steadfastness born of guilt and peer pressure could end up costing you a $20 trip to a bar or a $30 meal.  When you’ve budgeted (as I have) $30 per paycheck for dining out, that’s nothing to take lightly.

So, learn to say “no” now, so that some day you’ll have enough money that you won’t have to say it any more.  And if you take any flak for it, fight back with a smile and acceptance.  ”Yes,” you should say, “I know I seem cheap.  But it’s better than being broke.”

2.  Accountability, While Sometimes Painful, Pays Off

The weekend prior to game night, we were invited over to a friend’s house for dinner.  I was excited for the get-together, but was dismayed to learn that we weren’t exactly being hosted for dinner, we were supposed to pick up carry-out from the [somewhat overpriced, though very good] Thai restaurant in our building and bring it over.

Now, one of my biggest complaints about our new apartment is that there’s a Thai restaurant directly below us, and our back porch constantly smells like great food that I can’t afford.  Thai is my very favorite cuisine, and I desperately wanted to give in, drop $12 on a meal, and ignore by budget for just one delicious night.  But I objected.  I asked if we couldn’t instead maybe just eat in and join them later for drinks…an idea that was not well-received by Katie.

Of course I don’t have anything bad to say about her…especially not here where she might read it (heehee), but although Katie is the inspiration for my newfound concern with money, she’s still having as much trouble adjusting as I am.  She dated the “careless me” for a whole year, and became accustomed to $12 Thai meals (which she could actually afford, where I’d always put my half on my credit card).  She understood my dilemma, but she’s just not used to not being able to do the things she wants to do.  We ended up eating at home in heavy silence and taking a cheap bottle of wine over later in the night…a nice evening, but tinged with the tension of the “discussion” we’d had earlier.

Cut to Saturday afternoon a week later, and the entire episode is long-forgotten on account of the fact that I’m giddy with excitement for the night of socializing ahead.  It served as a good reminder for both of us that, though I may be forced to deprive myself (and, unfortunately, deprive her by proxy) from time to time, it doesn’t hinder our ability to have a good time…it just hinders our ability to have an expensive good time.

3.  Fun Can Be Inexpensive Without Being Cheap

There’s really nothing more finance-friendly than a game night.  You tackle three cornerstones of good personal finance in one fell swoop:

• Frugality – at $4 each for 6 hours of entertainment, what else could you call it?
• Friendship – spending time with others who appreciate cheap fun as much as you do is excellent reinforcement for your frugal efforts.
• Fun – and what makes for better reward for your efforts than a night of socializing, giggling, and playing games?

Admittedly, when we hosted, Katie and I spent a fair amount of money (maybe $30, after the frozen pizzas, beer, chips and dip).  But we are one of six “households” that attends, so we only have to host every sixth month.  Average our $30 month with the $8-$10 we spend every other time (this weekend we provided a bottle of cheap Trader Joe’s wine, cookies, and ice cream bars…each under $3), and that’s less than $14 – $7 for each of us – per game night.  And, even if no one in our social circle owned any board games (which practically makes me laugh out loud on account of how very many each of us owns), they’re pretty cheap considering the return on investment you get out of years of use.  (This month, we played Quelf, an incredibly fun if slightly frustrating game…more fun and less frustrating with each glass of wine consumed.)  Not to mention the used Monopolys and Scrabbles and Pictionarys one so often sees at thrift and antique stores.

So that’s “frugality.”  In terms of “fun” and “friendship”, it all comes down to operant conditioning.  Unlike the first two lessons in gritting your teeth, accepting the difficult challenges, and sticking to your miserly budget, this third lesson is a direct reward for your efforts.  The principles of operant conditioning tell us that, the more our good behavior is rewarded, the more likely we are to instinctively behave that way in the future.  I know I’m already excited for next month’s game night.  Perhaps this time, the ridicule and tensions that may precede it will be a bit easier to bear, now that I have the positive reward in sight.

Inspired by a fellow blogger’s admirable sense of self-accountability, I thought I, too, could stand to do a mid-month check-up on those New Month’s Resolutions I made.  (Granted, I made them a bit late…just a little over a week ago, but it’s the middle of the month already; I need to make sure I’m getting things done!)

1.  Save 20% of my income to an ING Direct emergency fund. Success!  And then some.  Probably more like 25% thus far in the month.  I’m afraid my overzealous saving has put me into a bit of debt, though.  It’s the “interest-free” kind of debt, but that makes it all the worse, as it’s money borrowed from a loved one.  So perhaps after the next New Month’s Day (read:  February 1st), I’ll make debt repayment a bit more of a priority than emergency savings (as I’ve already almost scraped together enough to cover a month’s expenses!).

2.  Post at least 50% of my “crap” to Ebay or Amazon Marketplace. Haven’t even begun this one yet.  Perhaps I’ll get a bit of that done today…check out my ebay seller’s page if you care to check on my progress (or buy my crap…please, buy my crap).

3.  Add at least 3 entries to this blog each week. So far, I’ve pulled this off, though it’s hardly an impressive feat after only two weeks of blogging.  The real resolution is to keep this up week after week, month after month, year after year.  Check back in 2012 to see how I’m doing with it…

4.  Set aside seven hours a week (average one a day) for studying and homework. Well, I should’ve known myself better than to think I’d follow through on this.  I did maybe 3 hours last week, and I skipped a class.  Ugh.  Okay, I RE-resolve to set aside seven hours a week.  And I’ll actually make an effort this time.

5.  Keep up with my chore list. Not fully applicable, since our apartment has been buried underneath half-unpacked boxes since the move.  But I did finally print the new chore list out last night…and I’ve kept up with it ever since.

In other news, both Katie and I are coming down with colds, mine more severe than hers (as usual).  I’ll try not to let that become an excuse for not keeping up with my already-faltering goals.  For now, though:  vitamin C overload!