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If you can live without a car, then great, GWM to not have a car. The vast majority of Americans need a car. A car by it's very nature is somewhat BWM, but if you are smart, you can minimize the BWM-ness of owning one. A cheaper used car that you don't have to pour repair costs into is essentially Neutral With Money. All that being said, the stories where people are very BWM with their cars are still hilarious, like buying $80k pick up trucks, and should continue to be shared so long as we don't have to do the whole "Well owning a car at all is dumb" dance every time.
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Jun 1, 2016 14:30
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next lets get jastiger in here to talk about Des Moines
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Jun 1, 2016 14:48
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Does anyone have any experience or advice with loaning their parents money? I come from an extremely poor family and my mom claims to be struggling right now with a recent move and job switch. She texted me yesterday asking for $2000. I've been saving up diligently for a while to move into some more comfortable digs and really dont want to have to loan her the money, especially right now since this is the best season inventory wise for me to make my move. I thought about giving her some just as a gift with no expectations on being paid back. But I'd really like to help her learn basic budgeting. I know shes horrible with her money and I'm sure if I worked with her and she was willing she could be saving a lot more. I just dont want to insult or belittle her by teaching her basic personal finance.
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Jun 1, 2016 14:52
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BaseballPCHiker posted:Does anyone have any experience or advice with loaning their parents money? I come from an extremely poor family and my mom claims to be struggling right now with a recent move and job switch. She texted me yesterday asking for $2000. I've been saving up diligently for a while to move into some more comfortable digs and really dont want to have to loan her the money, especially right now since this is the best season inventory wise for me to make my move. This seems awfully sincere for the BWM thread. Ask to sit down and help her with her finances? Probably couldn't hurt to make sure she isn't being scammed out of money on 9% car loans and stuff. Either gift her money or don't, but I wouldn't loan my parents money.
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Jun 1, 2016 14:56
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I've loaned my mom money, but she always tells me the date when she will pay me back and she has hit that date every time, also it has never been as high as $2,000.
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Jun 1, 2016 14:59
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If you're going to give money to a family member, it's best to just quietly assume that it's a gift and you'll never see a dime of it back. Certainly don't put it that way to the person receiving the money, or really anyone else, just know it yourself going in. Situations like WampaLord's are the exception rather than the rule.
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Jun 1, 2016 15:05
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I had to buy my own car, but that meant waiting until I was almost 20. Taking the bus grocery shopping might have built character, but it loving sucked to the point that, even 20 years later I'd rather not have the extra character. Plus there's all the recovered opportunity costs of not having to drive a teenager everywhere they want to go. I won't have to look down at the Friday night cocktail I just made and realize I have to be sober for at least another 3 hours to pick up the kid. So yeah, BWM. But worth it.
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Jun 1, 2016 15:11
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BaseballPCHiker posted:Does anyone have any experience or advice with loaning their parents money? I come from an extremely poor family and my mom claims to be struggling right now with a recent move and job switch. She texted me yesterday asking for $2000. I've been saving up diligently for a while to move into some more comfortable digs and really dont want to have to loan her the money, especially right now since this is the best season inventory wise for me to make my move. you can't give away your houseboat cash just like that man
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Jun 1, 2016 15:11
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:you can't give away your houseboat cash just like that man Right??? Here I go making GBS threads all over baseballPChiker's dreams again: there is no chance in hell your mother will bother to learn to budget if she hasn't done it by now. Give her money or don't, but understand that it's not going to be the last time she asks for money unless you manage to set and enforce firm boundaries (this is never going to happen) with her. The way some people manage this is to say 'yeah, I can do it this one time, but if you don't pay me back, it's never going to happen again' and then they stick to that.
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Jun 1, 2016 15:29
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Krispy Kareem posted:I had to buy my own car, but that meant waiting until I was almost 20. Taking the bus grocery shopping might have built character, but it loving sucked to the point that, even 20 years later I'd rather not have the extra character. I bought a ten year old lovely little pickup truck for $1500 I made my first year or so working at a pizza place. Not sure if it was GWM or not, it broke down all the time and at one point the heater was basically spraying some kind of chemical on the inside of the windshield.
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Jun 1, 2016 15:33
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Oh poo poo, I totally missed it was Houseboat Guy. Yeah, you aren't seeing that money back. I expect to get half whatever I loaned back. So when I get none of the money back it only feels like I lost half. On the plus side she just moved and changed jobs. That can be rough on a budget, but it's not something that happens every month. So while giving her 2k sucks, she won't need another 2k next month. Unless she moved to a houseboat.
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Jun 1, 2016 15:34
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Maybe put her to work running your business from your houseboat.
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Jun 1, 2016 15:40
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NancyPants posted:there is no chance in hell your mother will bother to learn to budget if she hasn't done it by now. This is my parents. Still paying $300 a month for Comcast and buying cigarettes despite one being unemployed and the other working 15 to 20 hours a week at a convenience store. I'll have to supplement their retirement, which I'll dutifully do, but trying to motivate them to change is a lost cause. At least they got a free house. 
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Jun 1, 2016 15:56
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Nitrox posted:In all fairness that comment could be interpreted as suggestion to find a job closer to where you live. There is one company in my field that's not QUITE walking distance, but is possibly bikeable and would be about 1/10th the length of drive. I interviewed there once. Thought it went well despite having my strangest interview experience ever (the HR rep stopped me in the middle of answering my second question and had me kill a spider climbing up the wall for her), but didn't get the job. Probably for the best, seeing as their managers make what I make in a specialist role. My other walkable options are Costco, a credit union, and a lot of minimum wage retail. No thanks.
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Jun 1, 2016 16:02
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Moneyball posted:This is my parents. Still paying $300 a month for Comcast and buying cigarettes despite one being unemployed and the other working 15 to 20 hours a week at a convenience store. I'll have to supplement their retirement, which I'll dutifully do, but trying to motivate them to change is a lost cause. At least they got a free house. They pay for DirecTV for NFL sunday ticket and some other sports package, and comcast with all of the movie channels. Two newish cars they are still making payments on and are renting a 3 bedroom house with full basement for the two of them. They pay $1400 a month for this place in Iowa of all places. This is on top of them eating out way to often and spending a ton to host bbq's for friends and family on the weekends. I called my sister to see if she got hit up for money and she said no, and that our parents were just talking about some expensive wine they bought and some stupid baby car that was $300 for my niece. gently caress that, as I type it all out I'm just mad at my Mom now. They also recently blew through their $50K retirement fund when my step dad lost his job. Of course when that happened they didnt cut back on anything and still lived like they had two incomes coming in. I think I'll just give her $500 and tell her that its a gift I dont expect to be paid back but that its all I will give her.
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Jun 1, 2016 16:19
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BaseballPCHiker posted:They pay for DirecTV for NFL sunday ticket and some other sports package, and comcast with all of the movie channels. Two newish cars they are still making payments on and are renting a 3 bedroom house with full basement for the two of them. They pay $1400 a month for this place in Iowa of all places. This is on top of them eating out way to often and spending a ton to host bbq's for friends and family on the weekends. I called my sister to see if she got hit up for money and she said no, and that our parents were just talking about some expensive wine they bought and some stupid baby car that was $300 for my niece. Or buy a houseboat. Sounds like a better investment.
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Jun 1, 2016 16:24
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BaseballPCHiker posted:I think I'll just give her $500 and tell her that its a gift I dont expect to be paid back but that its all I will give her. Why would you give her anything?
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Jun 1, 2016 16:42
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Sorry man, your family is a sinking ship.
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Jun 1, 2016 16:45
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If someone is asking for money that means they are living a lifestyle beyond their means so unless they have as a result cut back to fix that imbalance then you shouldn't loan them money since the fundamental cause of being short money remains and now you're just enabling a lifestyle that they cannot afford. You can guarantee that they will be short again next month and come back hat in hand once again and will never make good on repayment. If someone needed a loan to pay off debt and they were cash flow positive aside from the debt servicing I would make the loan but otherwise not.
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Jun 1, 2016 16:46
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Krispy Kareem posted:Taking the bus grocery shopping might have built character, but it loving sucked to the point that, even 20 years later I'd rather not have the extra character. The gently caress? Is this an American thing? What the hell can be so bad about your buses?
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Jun 1, 2016 16:53
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Company vehicle with personal use : GWM Having another vehicle anyways (in case i lose my job) : BWM?
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Jun 1, 2016 16:54
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cowofwar posted:If someone is asking for money that means they are living a lifestyle beyond their means so unless they have as a result cut back to fix that imbalance then you shouldn't loan them money since the fundamental cause of being short money remains and now you're just enabling a lifestyle that they cannot afford. You can guarantee that they will be short again next month and come back hat in hand once again and will never make good on repayment. This is why I don't keep any emergency savings, because I know that sudden one-time expenses are a myth. As long as I'm cash flow positive in a normal month, I'm guaranteed to never need help!
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Jun 1, 2016 16:58
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Per posted:The gently caress? Is this an American thing? What the hell can be so bad about your buses? Our public transportation is in atrocious condition. But the main thing is probably the fact that it's FAR and the routes are poo poo. Something that takes 10min to drive to will easily take 30min+ on the bus. That means you probably only do the trip once a week, which is a lot of groceries to carry. The stops are far apart and prob means you have to walk half a mile with all those groceries just to get there (where I live now, more like 1-2 miles), and then the bus only comes every hour/45minutes, and I feel like more often than not the bus I was aiming for would come 5 minutes early and the next bus would come 10 minutes late. So you're just burning time. My husband and I did this while we lived in downtown Seattle and refused to shop at WF's. Seattle's considered to have some of the best public transportation in the US so we actually didn't have a lot of the above problems and even then it was... not fun. I wouldn't say I would never do it again, but with kids... idk.
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Jun 1, 2016 17:05
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Rurutia posted:we lived in downtown Seattle and refused to shop at WF's. BWM and GWM in the same sentence.
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Jun 1, 2016 17:32
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Per posted:The gently caress? Is this an American thing? What the hell can be so bad about your buses? Public transit quality totally depends on the city. Buses are pretty good where I live but the grocery shopping issue is because in the US (outside of the city) we typically do all of our shopping once a week. That means I might be carrying home a bag of potatoes, a bag of onions, a watermelon, a chicken, a bag of carrots, apples, sweet potatoes, and frozen vegetables and fish and poo poo that I'm trying to keep cold until I get home. And that's without buying diapers or paper towels or toilet paper.
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Jun 1, 2016 17:42
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Per posted:The gently caress? Is this an American thing? What the hell can be so bad about your buses? Actual public transit exists only in Real Cities in America, places like Chicago, New York, and now Denver. For example, I live in a fairly populous region, about 2 million people across the Triangle. I can't find a number on the area, but Wake county has 1 million people in 857 square miles. I currently live 17 miles door-to-door from work that is in the heart of RTP. It takes me 22 minutes to get to work if the freeway doesn't have any accidents. I live right next to a few bus stops. If I want to make it into the office by 9am, I have to hop on a bus at 7:04am to arrive at 8:44. This includes 2 bus changes and about half a mile in between each change. It'll also cost me $3.50 for the fare. So a combined 1.5 miles of walking (no biggie), riding on 3 buses total, for $3.50 and 100 minutes of total travel time. We had some transportation experts come in last year and said that traffic wasn't bad enough to warrant a light rail system because why would you ever want to invest in the future? Denver's system is thriving because they decided to actually invest in the loving thing. This is have state of public transit in America. E: I just punched in the place I'm moving to in 6 weeks to see what it's going to be. It's 7 miles away on surface roads, 8 on the freeway; both take about 15 minutes. The bus picks up around the corner and it's only one bus, but 36 minutes of travel time, 15 of which are on foot (once again, no biggie), but the fare is $2.25. I picked up a scooter last year for goofing off around town, and I'm planning on leveraging that a bunch since it returns at least 60+ mpg cruising at 40mph since I can take surface roads to work. E2: just looked at the website and it looks like I could get a card that's 20% off... And it dumps off literally right in front of my office... Time to run some numbers... Thanks BWM thread! Phone fucked around with this message at 18:12 on Jun 1, 2016 |
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Jun 1, 2016 17:45
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The buses were alright when I would go grocery shopping. It's just hauling a week's worth of food that sucked. And I was 19 so I didn't know big canvas bags existed yet. I still will do the Aldi challenge where I go in without bags or a cart and see how much stuff I can carry out in one trip. But that's going from the store to the parking lot and not half a mile of walking between bus stops. Phone posted:We had some transportation experts come in last year and said that traffic wasn't bad enough to warrant a light rail system because why would you ever want to invest in the future? Denver's system is thriving because they decided to actually invest in the loving thing. This is have state of public transit in America. Our city's major league baseball team is relocating to a new spot right off the interstate in a county with no rail system. At the same time we have billions being spent on a new elevated expressway and toll road system that goes right by the ballpark. There will never be a better to add a rail system. The money's there, the land is available, and there's public demand for light rail at least to the ballpark. Instead we get a new toll system where cost increases or decreases based on demand. Honestly I'm stoked because there are times I would definitely pay an extra $8 to drive in the rich people's lane. But I would have preferred a rail line. Krispy Wafer fucked around with this message at 18:05 on Jun 1, 2016 |
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Jun 1, 2016 17:54
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Also I live near a big city with a pretty recent and generally good metro but it keeps catching on fire and it's murdered some people so now they have to fix it and it won't really exist for a lot of people for months at a time. So yeah actually US public transit is generally not great. But there's a LOT more space to connect. I was able to almost never use my car when I lived right outside the city and worked in it but now that I live and work in the suburbs public transportation to my office is a terrible option. Like, I would go an hour in the other direction and take at least two different buses and possibly also the metro for a stop bad.
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Jun 1, 2016 17:54
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As anyone from Boston will tell you, it's quicker to walk than to take the Green line after a certain stop. I'm all for public transportation if available, though.
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Jun 1, 2016 18:05
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Space Gopher posted:This is why I don't keep any emergency savings, because I know that sudden one-time expenses are a myth. As long as I'm cash flow positive in a normal month, I'm guaranteed to never need help! My credit cards have $10k limits, why would I need an emergency fund??? BWM federal gov edition: If you are in the military and deployed, your travel expenses go on a card that you are responsible for and which reports to credit bureaus just like any personal credit card. Reimbursement for that bill takes as long as it takes, so if you are like our family, you consistently float government travel expenses out of your own pocket. And even though you're responsible for those expenses should they get paid late, you're not supposed to use your own personal credit card and reap whatever seashells the credit card company is using as rewards because ~*~reasons~*~. I object to it on principle in our case, but this is a fantastic way to create actual hardship for lots of families. Oh and when we get moved to BFE, they won't even ship vehicles. Not only do I not want to pay to ship any vehicle, I especially do not want to have a road trip to some poo poo hole, nor pay for food, lodging, and fuel on the way there. I have a feeling claiming it on our taxes is not going to result in a wash on the expenses and I'll never get that time (likely traveling through the South) back.
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Jun 1, 2016 18:13
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NancyPants posted:My credit cards have $10k limits, why would I need an emergency fund??? It's even worse: the GOVCC doesn't count for any positive marks on your report, but it can count for derogatory (late/non-payment) stuff.  At least per diem isn't mandated to be spent on it. (the ~*~reasons~*~ are your standard mil-industrial bureaucracy/lobbyist dealmaking) e: find the month where I spent 27 days 'deployed' on temporary duty 
overdesigned fucked around with this message at 18:25 on Jun 1, 2016 |
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Jun 1, 2016 18:21
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overdesigned posted:It's even worse: the GOVCC doesn't count for any positive marks on your report, but it can count for derogatory (late/non-payment) stuff. Yeah I neglected to mention that. In short: GTC is bullshit.
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Jun 1, 2016 18:38
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Moneyball posted:BWM and GWM in the same sentence. Haha, it made sense for us. We lived walking distance away from work, and we went out a lot. Most of our friends lived in downtown Seattle as well so that was nice. We lived right by a zipcar lot so we didn't pay for a car/parking and when we wanted to go to the mountains or something, it was still really convenient. We basically walked everywhere because central Seattle has amazing walkability. I miss it a lot.
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Jun 1, 2016 18:40
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On the opposite side of that, I know someone who had to travel for the government about 80 nights a year to two different cities, and the Marriott property .gov rates were always the cheapest in town. He joined their rewards program and got elite super platinum signature whatever status, and accumulated enough points every year to spend a week or two at one of the nice Marriott properties with his family on vacation. So that was pretty cool (as cool as spending 8-9 workweeks a year traveling for work can be)
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Jun 1, 2016 18:51
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The GTC is easy as poo poo to manage. You only have to put hotels and airfare on it. All food can be paid for with your normal cc. Most corporate credit cards work nearly the same way. They tried for a while to make GTCs work like debit cards, where you got all your per diem and expenses up front, but then they realized that the average military person would just spend all their money on hookers and forget to have money for the hotels, and ended it. Vahakyla posted:I have a motorcycle, a V8 convertible Mustang, and a Kia Rio. All paid off. Yeah, the Kia is the car I need. The rest are things I want. But I bought them with cash and I loving love them. It's not okay to buy poo poo you like if you can't afford it. I also have never seen someone have fun in gridlock traffic. Are you just sitting in neutral revving your engine? TLG James fucked around with this message at 19:20 on Jun 1, 2016 |
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Jun 1, 2016 19:12
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I work from 2100 to 0300. I get to ride my mustang for 15 minute commute through empty freeways.
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Jun 1, 2016 19:43
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TLG James posted:The GTC is easy as poo poo to manage. You only have to put hotels and airfare on it. All food can be paid for with your normal cc. It's not hard to manage, I just think it's a little bullshit to be fronting $3k every couple of months on hotels and airfare when we can't mill points off it.
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Jun 1, 2016 19:43
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NancyPants posted:It's not hard to manage, I just think it's a little bullshit to be fronting $3k every couple of months on hotels and airfare when we can't mill points off it. Pretty much every corporate card is the same way  You can still get airline miles/hotel points from it though. I think it's more hosed up that on some hotels, if you put in you're military or government rate, it actually jacks up the rate to exactly what the per diem is.
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Jun 1, 2016 20:23
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Vahakyla posted:I have a motorcycle, a V8 convertible Mustang, and a Kia Rio. All paid off. Yeah, the Kia is the car I need. The rest are things I want. But I bought them with cash and I loving love them.
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Jun 1, 2016 21:58
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I don't know. Not much of a brag post. I just looked on craigslist and found a 1996 Mustang convertible for $1000 and some poo poo motorcycle for $2000. Whoop de doo. I think the 2016 goals thread is the accepted bragpost location.
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Jun 1, 2016 22:53
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