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This is very simple. You make $100,000 a year and don't pay rent. Literally all of your debt could disappear in roughly one or two years without that much deprivation. Or you could sell the stupidly expensive truck, and make it disappear in probably 1/2 to 3/4 of a year. There's no need for a bunch of shuffling, confusion, and complicated financial analysis here. It's just a question of whether you will exert the discipline to do this. SlyFrog fucked around with this message at 15:18 on Jun 17, 2019 |
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Jun 17, 2019 15:14
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 08:57 |
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Knyteguy posted:Thank you, I agree. Living off of one income changed our spending habits. Lifestyle creep is the biggest thing we need to watch out for, so we just need to follow the budget. It's simplistic, but this is one of those "high interest rate first" scenarios in my opinion. The RV is only $20,000. With no rent, you should be able to live off of $2,000-3,000 a month, and have $3-4,000 in free cash left at the end of every month (I'm doing a rough tax rate of 20%, leaving you with $80,000 a year after taxes - the numbers might be a tiny bit off, but they're close enough for this purpose). That means you should be able to pay off the RV easily in around six months. Hell, even if you spent a little more each month, you should be able to pay it off super easily inside of a year. I mean, you have the free cash flow to easily, without any stress, throw at least a couple thousand dollars extra at the loan each month for that thing. As you noted, you live in the thing, so paying that off is also keeping you rent free for a while. If you're done towing around the RV, you can sell the truck and get something non-ridiculous to drive. There are vehicles that do not cost $50,000 that can tow RVs, I believe. In any event, at least by getting rid of the RV loan, you're down to loans that don't have utterly ridiculous interest rates. I actually wouldn't advise refinancing the RV loan, just because you should be able to pay it off much faster than it would be worth refinancing for. I assume refinance origination charges and the like would be more than the value of just paying the thing off in six months. After you get rid of the RV loan, your finances are simply a matter of being reasonably high income people who bought way too much vehicle. Not the brightest thing in the world, but certainly not a position where you can't save for retirement, etc. At that point, I think you are left with reasonable options to keep the vehicle and save aggressively on everything else, downsize the vehicle for something more intelligent, etc. But again, the solution to the entire scenario really involves you not pointlessly spending to your income level, but instead using the massive monthly savings you are able to generate to actually pay things off early. I am always a big fan of wiping out your existing debt before saving for retirement. You're not going to get a risk free 5.6% return in this current market. That's what your truck is costing you. But the problem is, too many people hear this advice and don't save for retirement, but then also just spend the money. You actually have to aggressively pay down the debt. SlyFrog fucked around with this message at 16:19 on Jun 17, 2019 |
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Jun 17, 2019 16:15
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:it costs him nothing to actually get an answer to this question Sure. It does not hurt to check to see what the refinancing would cost. But I've often found that people who do not do things like that often don't really appreciate the costs, and the bankers certainly don't go out of their way to spell out all of the origination fees and other refi fees that they then roll into the loan. So if he does it, he needs to be hyperaware of the actual cost of doing the refi, not just the new interest rate he's getting.
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Jun 17, 2019 17:17
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I have no idea why someone who could pay off both the RV and truck loan in a year with reasonably frugal living would declare bankruptcy. Bankruptcy isn't going to help his decision making. It's just going to badly gently caress up his credit, ability to get a new apartment (say, for example, if they ever need to move for a job), a home, etc. for basically the next decade of his life. Declaring bankruptcy when you could actually pay off your debts entirely in the next year would not be the right call, in my opinion. Fixing their poo poo is the right call. And if they can't do that, what's the point of bankruptcy? It's not going to stop this from happening again. Bankruptcy for him is like the asocial goon who graduates high school and says, "Fresh start, college is going to be different!," and then fires up Minecraft for eight hours the day he moves into the dorms.
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Jul 3, 2019 15:06
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Knyteguy posted:Let me ask you guys this for some perspective. What would a successful month look like to you? What would a successful thread look like to you this time around? Don't ask me. A successful thread a year from now to me would have been you having stayed in your RV, paid it and your truck off, then selling the RV and then getting that apartment and having a positive net worth from the RV sale (even if it was a relatively small amount from the sale). But now you've jacked up your monthly spend in an unalterable way, will end up spending a bunch of money to furnish an apartment to a liveable degree, and have probably pushed back your ability to get to zero net worth by at least a couple of years, if not more. One thing I've noticed from the Zaurg thread - Goons seem to love taking people with financial difficulty and telling them to move, even when the place they are living in now (even if for a short period) is essentially their greatest financial asset. Zaurg's move was absolutely stupid, and it wasn't just because of Zaurg. It was bad advice. I'm not convinced you giving up living rent free for a year (even if it is a difficult situation) is the smartest thing you could have done. I also have no idea why some Goons were obsessing over you being in technical violation of some zoning ordinance for living there - no one was going to ever do anything about it, and even if they did, it would have been "You have to move within 60 days" or something similar. But it's done now. SlyFrog fucked around with this message at 15:50 on Jul 3, 2019 |
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Jul 3, 2019 15:47
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Your pros/cons list is greatly altered by the amount of time you need to do this, if you don't continue to spend like a dipshit and pay stuff off. Remember, you can pay this poo poo off in a year or under, if you're not paying rent. So I have added some comments to your pros/cons list:Knyteguy posted:Pros/Cons:
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Jul 3, 2019 17:02
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I want to be clear - you should not live in the RV for the long term. Not paying rent for this apartment for a year or less literally allows you to get out from under this RV. Like the rent for one year pays off the RV. To me, it is your actual way out in a year. Paying the rent literally moves you in the opposite direction. You are taking money from paying off the RV and getting out from under it in a year and handing it to a landlord (on top of the additional amounts you'll pay for furniture, move costs, utilities, etc.). The RV is not a long term plan. It is a short term plan so that you can actually get a long term plan, instead of being stuck in lovely apartment hell with an added monthly burden, with reduced mobility if you actually find a higher paying job somewhere else. It would also be different to me if you hadn't already been there for a while. It's not a new shock at this point. To be blunt, your family is used to it. One more year or less is really not all that material. To the extent there is damage, it has already been done. I also think the thread is over-exagerating the Grapes of Wrath like squalor and poverty you are in while living in the RV. It's not fun, but nothing you have written sounds insurmountable or horrific. If the worst thing your child has to face in life is going inside the nearby house to use the bathroom, he'll be okay. But in the end, while I don't think the apartment is the right choice, I agree that it could be done - the bigger issue is are you going to save even more of the income you have left after paying $20,000 a year in rent that you are not paying not to get out of your hole?
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Jul 4, 2019 22:08
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Inept posted:People aren't worried about the RV so much as Knyteguy's hosed up family dynamic. His alcoholic mom called the cops on them a year ago, and it sounds like that's just one of many things that have happened. That can really mess a kid up if they're in a dysfunctional or stressful environment in childhood. Research is showing that it leads to all sorts of issues well into adulthood. I can understand that, but I think we need to know a lot more about the environment before we can say either way based on that.
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Jul 4, 2019 22:27
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Yes. Fees are one of the killers of retirement savings that a lot of people don't see. They pay fees to their brokers, fees for the funds they broker puts them in, transaction fees, etc. All amounting to a major drain on their retirement savings. Because when you're talking about average annual returns of 6-7%, losing 1-2% of that (and the compounded value of that) just kills you. And the best part is, those fees go toward nothing of real value. Good brokers will just put you in the same broad range of equities and bonds (asset class allocation appropriate for your age) that you could get for zero or near zero fees at Fidelity or Vanguard. I prefer Vanguard over Fidelity, but for an admittedly silly reason. I believe Fidelity does now have a number of no fee basic funds, but only because they were forced into that to compete with Vanguard, which was basically the original "We're not going to gently caress you over with fees" brokerage. So I'm oddly loyal to Vanguard, given that the cost of Vanguard funds is usually a fraction of a fraction of a percent.
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Jul 20, 2019 15:47
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Just wanted to pop in to cry about my five piece (bass, three toms, snare) canary yellow Yamaha set with five Paiste cymbals and all stands, chair, and double bass pedal that has been sitting in boxes in my parent's unregulated (no air or heat) garage (in a state that has temperatures ranging from 100 in summer to -0s in winter) for 25+ years. The set cost around $3k new back in the early 90s (I got them very, very lightly used for much less). It has genuinely reached the point now where I just don't want to open them, out of sadness for what I will find. Carry on.
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Jul 26, 2019 22:21
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Motronic posted:Ugh. Nothing of value was lost. Honestly, I would have prefered Zildjian, but when you're buying a drum set that the guy at the music store confirmed he sold two weeks ago for $3,000 for $1,000 because the dude wants to start some business and needs the money, you take the cymbals that come with it. Of course, the reality is, I couldn't tell the difference in sound between Paiste and Zildjian if I tried - I think 15 year old me just thought the name was cooler and much like children do, decided to pick a side and think that Zildjian was much more badass.
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Jul 27, 2019 03:22
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Yes, I'm a big believer in not paying children for routine housework and the like. They need to learn that doing it routinely is just a necessary and normal part of life, and not a big deal - you just do it every day and move on. You don't get paid for doing your dishes as a grown-up. Teaching children that they should be rewarded for doing staple caretaking acts for their own lives is, in my opinion, a bad idea.
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Aug 17, 2019 00:43
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Followed Goon advice, left free (if substandard) living situation to get an apartment, sold mobile home, life poo poo blew up, now stuck in lease with crippling monthly rental cash burn, sucking dick for $20s behind the K-Mart to make rent payments.
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Nov 2, 2019 03:57
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Rarely are things improvements to the original, but you have decidedly accomplished that. Kudos sir.
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Nov 2, 2019 23:23
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On the other hand, let's not go nuts on the "OMG you will burn it all down," talk. As I get older, I wish more and more that I had developed some home improvement/mechanical skills earlier in my life. I'm trying now, but it's harder to learn when you're older. I have found that any kind of home contracting work is basically a giant ripoff. It's one of the last areas of the wild west, where a huge chunk of people will try to size you up to see if they can gouge you as much as possible without any shame, and the work is very often frankly just lovely and poor quality regardless of what you pay. The number of contracting quotes I have received for the exact same project that have been literally multiples of each other are ridiculous. I know someone is trying to rip me off when they're quoting 3x as much as the next guy for a basic project (think of something like a water softener replacement). Or, frankly, when someone tries to tell me that a new water heater for an ordinary suburban house is gonna be $8,000. Lawn equipment, things like that, they break. And you'll be much further ahead if you can do some basic things and troubleshooting like replacing spark plugs, replacing power outlets, regrouting, etc. SlyFrog fucked around with this message at 16:19 on Jun 16, 2020 |
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Jun 16, 2020 16:10
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 08:57 |
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I know of a person who died a few years ago. He bought so much stuff - cameras, cooking equipment, camping equipment, vinyl records, computer equipment, garage tools, bicycles, kayaks, etc. Just a poo poo ton of expensive stuff. I was talking to the person who knew him and said, "Wow, he had so many different things for so many hobbies and projects. He must have been into a lot of different things." The person responded, and told me that one of the guy's other friends perfectly encapsulated the dead guy's issue, when the friend said, "He was passionate about being passionate." That really resonated with me. We live in a time where it feels like we're being bombarded with cool things that we should be interested in. It is easy to run across something cool on the internet, and go buy all the poo poo, because hey, we're always supposed to be looking for that next passion, right? The media tells us this - we're not living our best lives unless we're super passionate about things. We need to road cycle, we need to bake bread, we need to garden, we need to do photography, we need to learn an instrument, etc. Even books - I know so many wannabe intellectuals who talk about the number of books they've purchased, where if you look at it mathematically, there's no loving way they could ever read a quarter of them in the time they have available in their life. They buy them because they have some image of themselves, but that's just kind of silly. It is really easy to just always be looking for the thrill of finding that next passion, without ever really developing an actual passion for something real that you go an intensively do. Shopping for things isn't a real passion - it's wasting time looking for things to buy. Like the guy who spends more time looking for his next set of golf clubs than he actually does playing golf. Or the guy who has $10,000 of photography equipment, who wanders to the local park one day and half-assed takes a bunch of photos and then puts it all away for years. Or the guy with thousands of vinyl records and all of the speakers and equipment, who listens a couple of times a year at most. I really do think that phrase was a wonderful description of a modern problem. If you're not actually executing on the things you buy, you're just wasting time and money. And realistically, most of us don't have nearly enough time to reasonably be able to follow through on the execution of all the projects and hobbies we buy things for. Don't be passionate about being passionate. SlyFrog fucked around with this message at 17:01 on Jun 17, 2020 |
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Jun 17, 2020 16:56
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