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He got the job! It's contingent on the drug test, but he should pass that. $11/hour with vacation and sick time. Plus he can get benefits. We will probably stick with mine, but we can compare. He's going to be working nights too, 6:30-4:30, Sunday to Wednesday with overtime Thursday. He won't start for 3 weeks at least though. Otherwise things are going ok. I had an unexpected dinner out on Sunday, I had the kids out and we were helping at an event that ran late. We did go cheap, but had to spend $24 because I couldn't make them wait until 10 pm when we got home.
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Oct 3, 2013 04:26
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LoveMeDead posted:He got the job! It's contingent on the drug test, but he should pass that. 
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Oct 3, 2013 14:39
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He will pass that.
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Oct 3, 2013 14:48
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He likes his job so far, but has only been there a week. Mandatory overtime through Christmas, so that's extra money. One of my co workers is having surgery, so I have overtime every week for 3 months. Our October budget was ok. Went a little over in some places, unset in others. Went way over in clothes when we discovered that the of our winter coats were ruined somehow in the move. We haven't replaced mine yet. Got one of them at a resale shop and the other at Target. November budget looks good. We should be putting over a thousand dollars in savings after putting only a couple hundred the past few months. December brings two birthdays and Christmas with another birthday in early January. We are going to talk to the bankruptcy lawyer next Friday. We haven't heard anything from the mortgage company since the foreclosure, is that normal? e. His benefits are better than mine, and cheaper so we are switching and saving $150 a month on premiums, plus $28 on all of my regular prescriptions. We were passing $87 every month for the months of one of my prescriptions, it's only $60 with his insurance. LoveMeDead fucked around with this message at 10:36 on Oct 30, 2013 |
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Oct 30, 2013 10:33
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LoveMeDead posted:He likes his job so far, but has only been there a week. Mandatory overtime through Christmas, so that's extra money. One of my co workers is having surgery, so I have overtime every week for 3 months. You should look into Costco generics if it's an option for you  they are often cheaper than the copays and you don't need a costco membership to use the pharmacy
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Oct 30, 2013 23:07
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Trilineatus posted:You should look into Costco generics if it's an option for you Unfortunately, three aren't available in generic. I wish I could use generics, but I've tried all sorts of meds before finding these.
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Oct 31, 2013 06:26
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What's the total debt which the bankruptcy will wipe out and how much debt will you still have left? Have you talked to people about Christmas/birthday expectations (I understand this one well, most of our family is doing it tough this year due to people having been out of work for part of the year and they're feeling guilty about not being able to spend as much as usual)? You haven't actually posted a budget for a while. Now might be a good time to post a new one which includes your husband's income from his new job. Check whether any of your medications are on the needymeds list. It's not just for low income earners. http://www.needymeds.org/drug_list.taf
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Oct 31, 2013 08:35
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Lolie posted:What's the total debt which the bankruptcy will wipe out and how much debt will you still have left? I don't know about the debt yet, we'll go over that when we meet with the lawyer. We always do cheap/homemade gifts for family. Pictures usually. We are making a calendar this year for grandparents. The kids understand, their grandparents spoil them enough. That med site is great, I can only save on one of my meds with it, but it will help. Keeping it bookmarked. November budget: Income: $4400 (does not include any overtime he will probably work) Rent: $650 Renters insurance: $19 Electricity $200 (will probably be less now that the air conditioning is off, but we aren't sure) Water $86 Internet $33 Car payment $272 Car insurance $177 Gas $300 Medications $120 Doctor $40 Health Club $55 (I can't exercise outside and I need to) Groceries $800 Personal supplies $50 Household $50 Education $150 Hulu/Netflix $19 Misc $50 Student loan $46 All of the rest is going into savings. At least $1100. We currently have $1700 in savings.
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Oct 31, 2013 22:42
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Does the $1700 in savings include the amount set aside for getting the bankruptcy in motion or is that going to wipe out your savings? What debts do you have which aren't going to be covered in the bankruptcy - you should know the amounts of these. I'm a bit concerned that while your income has increased, a lot of your expenses remain high and you still don't have a lot of room for "poo poo happens" events and may continue finding yourself having "one off" expenses every month. You haven't included a line for clothes in your November budget and (as you've discovered), people are going to need clothing replaced during the year.
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Nov 1, 2013 21:56
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Lolie posted:Does the $1700 in savings include the amount set aside for getting the bankruptcy in motion or is that going to wipe out your savings? The $1700 is our entire savings right now. The bankruptcy is $1000, so we will be left with $700. The lawyer it's going to pull up or credit reports and go over everything with us. Right now I honestly have no idea what won't be included besides the car. There is a $50 clothes budget, I just missed it when I was typing things out. We can't seem to get our groceries any lower than about $175/week. We don't get prepared foods or snacks except generic pretzels. We both bring leftovers to work for lunch. No soda, no bottled water. As far as electricity, we turn things off when we aren't using them and have the heat set at 68 and the air conditioning was set at 73. We are going to put plastic on the windows to help with the heat. What else do you think is too high?
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Nov 2, 2013 11:57
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LoveMeDead posted:The $1700 is our entire savings right now. The bankruptcy is $1000, so we will be left with $700. The lawyer it's going to pull up or credit reports and go over everything with us. Right now I honestly have no idea what won't be included besides the car. Your fuel cost is pretty high and it might be helpful to think about ways to carpool or alternatives to your commute. Other than that, I think you owe yourself a bit of positive reflection. Sure it's hard to get the grocery budget down, but look at that misc category! If you stick to it, that means that you've successfully tracked and categorized (and maybe anticipated) a huge portion of your expenses compared to when you started. This is a great achievement for improving the financial health of your family. 
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Nov 2, 2013 16:18
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tuyop posted:Your fuel cost is pretty high and it might be helpful to think about ways to carpool or alternatives to your commute. We live in a rural area, so no public transportation. I only work with one nurse that lives anywhere near me, and we only work together about once a week. Plus, with staffing issues, she occasionally gets sent home early. We bought a smaller car, but husband got a job. This month's fuel cost is a guess, really. It's the first month he is really working. We've spent less than $300/month every month before now. I wish we could get rid of our Mountaineer, but we have 3 adult size kids and I don't know what else we could do. There is no fuel efficient car that comfortable seats 5 adults and we can afford. I feel like we are doing much better overall. We still look at our account and budget and make excuses to spend. Last month we went out to dinner for our anniversary. It wasn't on the budget, and we really shouldn't have done it. We didn't go anywhere fancy at least, but that's $65 we didn't need to spend. We should have just planned a special dinner into our menu at home and gone for a walk or watched a movie at home. Or budgeted in a dinner out at the beginning of the month. We've consistently overspent by about $200 over the past three months, and that's not ok. I know that we won't always be exactly on budget, but that's a big difference. On a good note, we only spent $155 on groceries yesterday. We saved over $100 by shopping sales and using coupons. The checkout girl laughed when we high fived each other. Edit: The 17 year old got a job! He's working at Little Caesar's. His friend works there too, so they are going to ride together. I'm excited for him. LoveMeDead fucked around with this message at 03:57 on Nov 4, 2013 |
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Nov 2, 2013 23:42
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LoveMeDead posted:Edit: The 17 year old got a job! He's working at Little Caesar's. His friend works there too, so they are going to ride together. I'm excited for him. That is excellent news! Have you spoken to him about what's expected with his paychecks? I'm sure he'll use some as pocket money, but maybe you could hold on to the rest of it for him so he can save for his own car.
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Nov 8, 2013 06:01
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fork bomb posted:That is excellent news! Have you spoken to him about what's expected with his paychecks? I'm sure he'll use some as pocket money, but maybe you could hold on to the rest of it for him so he can save for his own car. Yea I think this is a great idea, if you're not adverse look at something like Dave Ramsey's kid's financial peace stuff. It's like spend/save/give portions of your money. Him getting in the habbit now can pay off bigtime down the road.
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Nov 8, 2013 16:11
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He's working at Little Caesars. That money is being directly converted into weed.
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Nov 8, 2013 16:26
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Harry posted:He's working at Little Caesars. That money is being directly converted into weed. Hey now, there were frequently as many as 1-3 members of the staff that didn't smoke weed when I worked at Papa John's!
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Nov 8, 2013 19:58
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It's to be expected that the 17 year old will not be making the big bucks from this job. However, it should be expected that he be (more) fiscally responsible for his needs and wants, especially given how open the OP has been with the family about their finances. It would be great if he took the initiative to save upon himself, but the smart thing to do is clearly communicate this to him before he gets his first paycheck. It's really easy to blow through a couple hundred bucks when you have a debit card and aren't paying close attention to your spending.
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Nov 8, 2013 20:41
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Harry posted:He's working at Little Caesars. That money is being directly converted into weed.
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Nov 8, 2013 22:13
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100 HOGS AGREE posted:If he's lucky many of his tips will be in weed, thus cutting out an annoying step in the weed acquisition process. They don't have delivery, and I'm pretty sure he knows where to get weed. He's also going to graduate with honors, so if he occasionally wants to smoke weed I'm not going to care too much. We've had the talk about how if he gets convicted of a drug crime he can no longer get federal financial aid, but he's 17 so I don't know if that really sunk in. We've talked about what he's going to do with his money. 60% is going in to savings for college and the rest is spending money. We have started donating time at a food bank because we don't have a lot of money to donate, so I'll suggest he donate money but not expect it.
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Nov 8, 2013 23:34
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LoveMeDead posted:We've talked about what he's going to do with his money. 60% is going in to savings for college and the rest is spending money. We have started donating time at a food bank because we don't have a lot of money to donate, so I'll suggest he donate money but not expect it.
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Nov 9, 2013 05:31
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He's 17 and working a part-time job (making probably minimum wage or close to minimum wage) and it's November. I assume if he starts college it's going to be either next May (6 months from now) or a year and a half from now if he's a Junior. I would be pretty surprised if 60% of that pay adds up to any significant sum of money. Also no offense to the OP but if your son ends up giving you, say, $3,000 for you to put in your Roth account and then college time rolls around, are you really going to be able to cough up that $3,000 to give back to him? You said for the last 3 months you've overspent by $200. So your financial life is still "out of control" as you say. How are you personally going to take care of that money for him without spending it? It would be pretty tempting if suddenly your son was giving you $300 a month (or whatever) and you and your family are still living in the red. He'd probably be better sticking it in an envelope, it's not like that small amount of money will generate any significant interest in ~ a year and a half. I've never heard of FAFSA reducing your aid package due to money in a savings account. I had about $6,000 in a savings account that was in my name and I got loans that covered 100% of my tuition and I never had to pay any money out-of-pocket for tuition. The 6K I saved is what I used to pay for my housing. Is this really a thing that happens? I'm actually curious about this because it just seems like a terrible idea. Savings for college isn't *just* tuition. There's books, housing, food, etc. So any amount a potential student has in savings HAS to go towards their loan up-front or FAFSA will give them that much less money? You're saying that FAFSA forces you to go to college with literally zero dollars in savings? That doesn't make sense and is not what happened in my experience. Granted that was ~8 years ago so maybe things have changed. razz fucked around with this message at 18:39 on Nov 9, 2013 |
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Nov 9, 2013 18:29
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I was under the impression there was a savings allowance but anything over it might decrease your funding. I don't think his savings would be over the allowance amount though. Personally, saving for college seems like a huge goal for a 17 year old that probably isn't really going to sink in as much as something smaller and more tangible that he can budget for and get used to that idea of delayed gratification. I think a good combo would be something like saving for a senior trip with friends after graduating while simultaneously budgeting for a new computer for college and where if he doesn't budget, he goes without. And it means he has to think ahead a little as to what his bigger, long term needs or wants are and prioritize.
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Nov 9, 2013 19:45
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I agree. "saving for college" with the intent of using that money for tuition is unrealistic. Even if he would have started saving when he was, say, 14. There's no way he could save enough money for full tuition at a 4-year university. A more realistic goal might be saving for a deposit and 3 months' rent on an apartment, or saving $1000 for textbooks. Either way he is going to have to take out loans for his tuition. What you can help shield him from is having to take out additional loans to cover other expenses like housing, food, etc. Most of my friends who have insane levels of college debt didn't get it from tuition. They got it from using loans to pay for their housing and whatnot as well, because they didn't have a job when they were in college. If your son keeps a part-time job throughout college, he can get out of college only owing for tuition which, depending on where he goes, could end up being pretty reasonable in terms of debt. I know that's how it worked out for me. I took out loans that only covered my tuition. My pre-college savings and my college part-time jobs allowed me to pay for my own housing, food, bills, and spending money without taking out additional loans. So I got out of college with what I consider to be a reasonable amount of debt (quite a bit lower from the statistics you see about average amount of college debt). razz fucked around with this message at 23:51 on Nov 9, 2013 |
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Nov 9, 2013 20:06
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He isn't saving toward tuition, he's saving towards books, dorm accessories and spending money. He's almost definitely going to MTSU, so tuition should be completely covered by grants and scholarships without taking out any loans. We are hoping so, at least. If he joins marching band, they get a stipend every semester and he is also talking about doing work-study. I don't know about loans having anything to do with money in your bank account. I'll look in to it, because it might affect loans for my grad school. I don't want to have to take the money in our saving's account and put it in an investment account that we can't touch. That would be the time that something happens and we need it.
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Nov 10, 2013 00:31
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I used my part-time job savings (about a quarter of two years of work at 13k/year) as living expenses during my first year away from home when I was unemployed. It didn't really sink in because I went full credit soon after and financed poo poo like vacations but the savings let me preserve my independence which was very important to me. I think your 60% savings plan is a good idea but I have no idea what the financial aid consequences will be.
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Nov 10, 2013 00:46
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LoveMeDead posted:I don't know about loans having anything to do with money in your bank account. I'll look in to it, because it might affect loans for my grad school. I don't want to have to take the money in our saving's account and put it in an investment account that we can't touch. That would be the time that something happens and we need it. When your son applies for the FAFSA they're going to ask for a list of all his assets and your assets. The amount/type of financial aid he's eligible for will be calculated based on them. Retirement accounts don't count as assets in a FAFSA application. If he already applied for the FAFSA this doesn't matter, but if not he could put his earnings (up to $5500) into a Roth IRA. You can withdraw your contributions to a Roth penalty-free at any time (just not when you're applying for the FAFSA); it's any interest the contributed money earns that you can't withdraw without a penalty.
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Nov 13, 2013 08:12
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LoveMeDead posted:They don't have delivery, and I'm pretty sure he knows where to get weed. He's also going to graduate with honors, so if he occasionally wants to smoke weed I'm not going to care too much. Nnnnnghg is this the son that wants to get into the military? The military is looking for any reason at all to cut members and I can say with almost complete certainty that if your son gets busted for pot he isn't getting into the military. So you should care. Actually your son should care. Why do you have to run his life for him, serious question. When I was his age I was in almost the exact same living situation, rural no public transport. I would find a ride to the closest city 1st thing in the morning Saturday and Sunday and spend the day walking from store to store trying to find a job. When I found a job I used 100% of my money to buy a car. My mother didn't give a poo poo about either of those things and she certainly didn't baby me like what is happening here. At some point your son needs to take charge of his own life and you need to stop making excuses for him.
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Nov 13, 2013 20:32
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Queen Elizatits posted:Nnnnnghg is this the son that wants to get into the military? The military is looking for any reason at all to cut members and I can say with almost complete certainty that if your son gets busted for pot he isn't getting into the military. So you should care. Actually your son should care. Why do you have to run his life for him, serious question. When I was his age I was in almost the exact same living situation, rural no public transport. I would find a ride to the closest city 1st thing in the morning Saturday and Sunday and spend the day walking from store to store trying to find a job. When I found a job I used 100% of my money to buy a car. My mother didn't give a poo poo about either of those things and she certainly didn't baby me like what is happening here. I'm trying not to baby him, but what exactly am I supposed to do? He's almost 18. We've gone over what pot can do to a developing body and brain. We've gone over the legal consequences of getting caught with pot. We've gone over not driving while under the influence of anything and the potential consequences of that. I don't know that he smokes pot. I know he has at least once over a year ago. He says he doesn't, and maybe he doesn't. He also sometimes tells me that there is no food in his room and I find a half empty bag of chips. If I ever caught him smoking or with weed, there would be consequences. But I can't follow him around everywhere, and I don't want to. We've pushed him to get a job, and he has one. He's indifferent about it right now, but will like the paychecks.
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Nov 13, 2013 22:47
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November budget looked pretty good. Income was $478 over and expenses were $123 over. Most of the overage of expenses was from husband getting a new phone unexpectedly. His old one crapped out, and since we do not have a house phone it is a necessity. Grocery budget was $8.08 over. Gas was $2 over, so those both looked pretty good. Household was $25 over, I'm not sure why it was so much. We put $1300 in savings, so we are up to ~$3000 in savings. We didn't meet with the lawyer because I was sick, and at this point we are putting it off until January. There weren't any days this month that we were free together that we could go. December budget looks good so far, but it's really early. We should have $6000 in income this month. We budgeted $600 for the holidays, which includes the daughter's birthday in early January and the son's birthday this week. We budgeted putting $2200 in savings. Nothing else unusual for this month. No gift exchanges with friends except Dirty Santa's, and we have plenty of stuff around here to regift. Son's job is not going well. They only have him working 5-6 hours a week, so with gas it's barely worth it. He's netting about $25/week. Not sure what he's going to do. Husband is doing great at Amazon, he loves it. I've cut back on my overtime because I can and I was getting burnt out.
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Dec 6, 2013 01:07
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It sounds like you guys are getting a handle on things - keep going! Even if you can't find a date this month, could you two get a date set with a lawyer for January so that things are scheduled? That way you know it won't be put off.
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Dec 6, 2013 01:44
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So how have things been going?
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Dec 28, 2013 17:23
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Gophermaster posted:So how have things been going? Good. We only went$38 over for December's budget. Only $5 over for gifts. We put $2400 in savings. Technically we went $238 over budget, because we put $200 extra in savings. I'm officially in grad school starting February. We will be putting less in savings this month because I have to pay about $1000 in fees and supplies. At least we can do it and still pay the bills. I'm going to apply for a couple grants and a bunch of scholarships, but will probably still need to add to my loan debt. Edit: Ugh, fell asleep while writing this earlier. Had just gotten home from work. We have an appointment with the lawyer in two weeks. She is gathering our credit information for us. The house debt is $105k, and there is about $5k in misc medical stuff from a few years ago. There really isn't anything else. She said we can keep the car by just not claiming it in the bankruptcy. I'll still have my student loans. Husband's job is going well. He really likes it, so that's good. I have to buy an Ipad for school. I'm thinking it will be better to pay the extra $50 or so to get a new one because I'm going to be using it for 3 years and don't' want to have to replace it. It's already looking like I'll have to replace my laptop in the next year. It's 3 years old, so it's about to expire. LOL. I'm going to be filling out my FAFSA January 1, along with one for our son. He's decided on MTSU, and wants to transfer in 2 years to a better school. He should get enough grants and scholarships to almost pay his tuition and fees. Minimal loans for him for the first two years at least. My schooling is $39k just for tuition. I'll have a doctorate in 3.5 years though. We've set a tentative goal of June for buying another car. The Altima is still running fine, but I hate driving it for some reason. I know this isn't a good reason to get another car, but it would be good to have a reliable car with good gas mileage. We should have over $10k saved by then so we don't have to get a loan. Our car insurance went down by about $25/month when our son turned 18. I think it's about to go back up when our daughter gets her license in February. We'll see. It's also going to go up when we have two cars with full coverage on it. I'll figure that out closer to when we buy a car. LoveMeDead fucked around with this message at 01:04 on Dec 30, 2013 |
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Dec 29, 2013 15:12
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Why do you have to buy an iPad? Is it a requirement or something?
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Dec 30, 2013 07:40
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pomme posted:Why do you have to buy an iPad? Is it a requirement or something? It is. For clinical we have to have an iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad. The screen on an ipod is too small for me. I'm going to get an iPad mini I think. Cheaper and easier to carry around. If I had a choice, I would not be getting an iPad.
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Dec 30, 2013 08:37
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You don't have to replace your laptop because it's 3 years old. If you've been treating it adequately and don't need to play Skyrim or do complex meteorological modelling on it, a 2010 laptop ought to last you another 7 years. Is that that you're sick of it and just want a new one? Protips for extending the life of your laptop (in order from "do first" to "do last"): - Get a damp cloth and scrub down the exterior. Do the screen too, then use a soft, lint-free cloth to dry the screen off. Use an old toothbrush to clean gunk out of ports, etc. - Get a can of compressed air and blow all the dust, Cheeto crumbs and eyelashes out of the keyboard. Blow out the air vents while you're at it. Turn it upside down and give it a good shake, then blow the keyboard again. - Flatten and then reinstall Windows and your apps. This time around, don't install crap you don't need. You probably only "need" MS Office, some kind of browser, and VLC. - Max out its RAM if it isn't already. - (Optional) If you're having battery problems, get the battery reconditioned, or just get a new one. Presto, another few years of life from your laptop.
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Dec 30, 2013 12:47
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I keep it clean and wipe it down regularly. I don't know what you mean by flatten. I know very little about computers. Basically it's starting to have errors more frequently and is running more slowly at times. I try to keep the drive defragged and not have too many things on start up. I won't replace it unless I have to. I do need a new power cord because the one I have has split in a few places. I put electrical tape on them, but it keeps coming off.
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Dec 30, 2013 13:30
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If your power cord is ok except for the plastic coating coming off, get some heat shrink tubing from the hardware store and use that instead of tape. You can find all sorts of tutorials on YouTube but it's pretty easy.
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Dec 30, 2013 14:44
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quote:Husband's job is going well. He really likes it, so that's good. quote:I'm going to be filling out my FAFSA January 1, along with one for our son. He's decided on MTSU, and wants to transfer in 2 years to a better school. He should get enough grants and scholarships to almost pay his tuition and fees. quote:We've set a tentative goal of June for buying another car. The Altima is still running fine, but I hate driving it for some reason. I know this isn't a good reason to get another car, but it would be good to have a reliable car with good gas mileage. We should have over $10k saved by then so we don't have to get a loan.
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Dec 30, 2013 19:39
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LoveMeDead posted:I keep it clean and wipe it down regularly. I don't know what you mean by flatten. I know very little about computers. It's an old forums joke, he just means erase everything on your laptop and reinstall Windows. It is likely to help with the random errors and slowness. Make sure you back up your important stuff though, like any pictures or word docs or whatever.
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Dec 30, 2013 20:12
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Sorry to be trite but you do realize that, if you keep spending all your money, you won't ever have any money, right? You aren't ever going to run out of things to want, a new car being "good to have" seems clearly insufficient to me.
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Dec 30, 2013 20:16
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