Why?

lol here's my comment

I also had issues with the article yesterday. Maybe the staff was preparing for a much needed 3 day (4 if you're lucky) weekend. The points did catch up though.

Do you ever reflect on your first job? How has the price of everyday things changed for you? Did you notice the changes right away or did they happen sneakily and suddenly (like getting older, lol)?

I remember having a paid internship at an oil company in the summer between my junior and senior years of high school (through my 2nd year of college) and a part time job at a nursing home. I was making $8/hr which was 2 or 3 dollars more than the minimum wage at that time, and I was so excited. I opened a bank account and deposited the checks but I didn't understand the importance of saving more than spending. But, it's never too late to learn the lesson and I'm grateful that I can now afford to save, spend, and donate to different charities without fear that the bottom will fall out… but, how different life would be had I been more diligent in my youth. It's kinda sad and laughable at the same time.

Speaking of donations, maybe the LifeSavers can consider offering different options for the winning scratchers… If you choose to have the $5 then but if you choose to donate the $5 maybe they can contribute an extra $5 to the charity of our choice. Just an idea…

Happy new week of saving!!

I try not to think about how better off I would be today if I had spent less when I was first living and working on my own. No one explained saving or investing to me but I'm not sure I would have even listened if they did, lol. I'm trying to show my son the rule of 72 right now because he just got his first job over the summer. I'm dumbing it down a bit but showing him that any money he invests in stock funds, like in an IRA, will essentially double every 10 years and his 30-year-old self will be so happy that he planned ahead. I'm almost 40 now and my retirement account isn't even to 5 digits - I have a lot of ground to make up!

My first job was slinging ice cream at a Dairy Queen. I started working at 15 to save for a marching band trip to Europe. In retrospect, I don't think I had to save very much (it may have been about 1700-2000 dollars?) but I managed to make that and my pocket money over summer. I wish I had saved more as well, but I didn't learn a lot of financial advice until I was well into my late 20s and lost out on all that sweet compounding interest.

@Katie P My retirement is a little behind as well and one of the things that has me worried. My catchup plan for now is to increase my contribution by 1% while paying down debt until I'm putting a total 15% (my 11% plus my employer match at 4%) right now I am at 5% (so putting in 9% total) and plan on increasing to 6% Jan 1 and 7% when I get my cost of living increase next year. Thanks to my work history, I think I max out on my SS benefits, but I am wary of including them in my calculations because of uncertainty in how they are going to be funded.

I should have most of our short term debt (credit card and car loan) paid off by Jan 1. Then all we will have are student loans and a solar loan for our solar system. I am not sure which loan to attack first, two have really low interest rates (2.88% for one student loan; 0.99% for the solar) but one of those two has the lowest balance. Still deciding if I should snowball or avalanche it, but I suppose that a problem for another fiscal year. :)

I like your posts Candice P. Ooo… I thought real hard about that one.

Katie, one of my aunts is an accountant and she asked me to speak at a finance event while I was in college and I had to explain the Rule of 72… even with that knowledge at that point in time it didn't sink in, smh. But, as stated, I can't change the past so I may as well not think about it too intently. How the rule is applied with today's interest rates is unreal. 1% interest equals 72 yrs to double the money.

Sarah, my student loan is my final piece of debt and I also have the option of snowball or avalanche but if I do it will wipe out most of my sinking funds and have me down to a little more than emergency funding… I noticed there was an article about this topic under the article of the day so maybe they can highlight that one tomorrow to give us more insight and help us form solid and consistent plans.

Cantrell, I am so excited to hear your thoughts. What were you thinking and what was the conclusion?

Hmm

Sarah, your retirement contribution goals are mine, almost exactly. I'm only at 4% with 15% as my goal. It's frustrating because I can only change the percentage twice a year so I'm always crunching numbers to decide how much to increase while still having enough to pay expenses and keep the emergency fund growing. It will help when I can get to that elusive "6 months emergency" amount.

When I was paying off debt I did a combination - focused on paying off the higher interest accounts, until one of the lower interest accounts had a small enough balance to pay off in full without disrupting the plan. That made me feel like I was being fiscally smart for the most part but I allowed myself to make a "less smart" decision to feel the accomplishment of getting rid of an account. Getting rid of debt is the most amazing feeling!

@Candice P: My first job, I didn't really have expenses (due to being in high school and family not asking for rent), but I did put it all into savings account. I was fortunate to have an required economics class and knew the importance of savings, but I did not consider the interest rate v. inflation and purchasing power was drastically reduced.

I did know that I probably should have started a rothIRA or invest in something, but I was too intimidated and thought I would do it when I understood. Still don't understand it fully, but I do at least have a rothIRA started, now and a little in investments.

Not sure what percentage my goal is for retirement. I am currently at 6% due to that being the highest percentage my employer will match, but whether I try to increase in the future is a mystery. Currently plan to keep it at that until my personal [family funded student] loan is paid, emergency savings is at 6-8 months, and perhaps a sinking fund for a trip I want to provide at least a family member….but that one is long way away if my income does not increase.

It sounds like a lot of us didn't make great money decisions in the past when it comes to saving, knowing what we all know now, but hindsight is always 20/20. It also sounds like everyone is trying their best now and I think that's what counts. It's hard for me sometimes because the saving seems so slow, but it helps to look back at my account balances from a year ago and see the progress I've made.

The good thing is knowing what I know now, I can help my kid make better decisions. I'm really grateful that my bad experiences will lessen her bad experiences and set her up right when it come to this kind of stuff.

My retirement was at 3%. I increased it to 5% last week. After I pay of the final bit of debt (student loan) I plan to increase it again. That should be January at the latest.
It is hard not to think about the past. It's like seeing old photos and wondering, "What was I wearing?" "What was I thinking?" LOL, you know you can't change it; It just looks weird because we're at different growth points.
I can try to help my son make good financial decisions but at the end of the day, it will be up to him to practice what he's learned first hand. I'm still not sure of what his mindset is around spending but I'm always up for the discussion if he wants to have it. Maybe then I can get him a pre-paid Visa card so he can practice with allowance earnings.

@Candice P: I do not actually nor have I ever used [pre-paid Visa cards], but I thought Pre-paid Visas only held the amount for a certain period and then started deducting a certain percentage (if not used?) until the balance is zero. Do I misunderstand?

Agreed this is the most effective path forward; thanks for this excellent advice.

On the topic of the daily article on refinancing a mortgage, I'm curious where everyone is at on that subject.

I'm what they call "house poor" because I own a really large, expensive house and most of my income goes to those expenses, making saving for other things difficult. I have four children and my retired father lives with me so I've made peace with this being my responsibility for now, until my situation changes and I can relocate to a smaller house. I recently refinanced, cutting my interest rate nearly in half. I had a hard time coming to terms with the fact that I won't be able to pay off my mortgage so that can't be a goal for me, and that's alright.

What does your housing look like? Anyone saving for a down payment, rent-to-own, paid off a mortgage? My first house was a Habitat for Humanity house, anyone looking into something like that?

Kristen, I haven't really checked it out yet but I thought it was more like a gift card that you don't have to use at a specific vendor. I like the thought of it because he will have to choose which place to spend his funds and be in control of how much he's willing to spend… after all, it is his allowance that will be uploaded to the card.

Hi Mike!!

Katie, I bought my home when I was in my late 20s (before getting married) and rented it out while we relocated to different stations (before divorcing). Somewhere in the mix, I did refinance for a lower interest rate and decided to sell it a few years ago. When I sold it, I had to replace the roof and get a whole new air conditioning unit put in because the old one went out right before I sold it. Even with paying those thousands of dollars I still came out with a profit. That's how I was able to start a trust for the little and how I will be able to pay off the student loan.
I have been considering buying a duplex and renting out one unit until I decide my next steps (possible relocation) but property is really expensive here and I haven't found anything and I really haven't found anything eye-catching.

@Candice P: I had forgotten to respond to a part of your earlier post: "Perhaps a donation option" and maybe a [capped] match to a charity of [the person who choses to donate] choice? Considering that SaverLife is currently a charity and (as far as I understand) relies on donations and gifts for its purpose, I do not think that it would be viable to offer a match. A choice to donate would probably have to simply be accept the $5, but then donate yourself.

Of course, with the [new] saverlife banking account set-up that might change.

@Candice, I've recently been thinking about getting into real estate investing and becoming a landlord on the side. I'm completely unaware of the tax implications of starting something like that and I find it intimidating. I'd love if you shared your experience and perspective!

I have a problem and customer service is not responding to my messages :/

@Francisco L. I am sorry you have an issue, but if you've contacted support (and it was successful) I think you would have a ticket number sent to your email for SaverLife. May need to check your spam folder. I haven't had to contact support for a while, but I think last time it took about 2-3 days to receive a reply, but a reply was sent and issue resolved. (Follow ups usually happened within 24 hours). I do not know about their other (non email) contact options.

For today's article, it got me thinking: exact credit formulas are not given to the public, but what about those who work in the industry and have the knowledge…are they allowed credit scores? Is it something like investing where you know but are not allowed to act upon "not public information" (whatever that means, but I've heard of it in my investing research)..?

Customer service has helped me with two points-earning issues recently and my experience was like you described, Kristen, I received an email of the ticket and within a week the issues were resolved and I received the resolution email and the points reimbursement.

That's an interesting thought on the credit score "insider knowledge" subject. I would think that anyone with a social security number and any credit history is assigned a score by the entities that devise them. I also think that, over a certain number, credit score doesn't matter. A person with a "perfect" score doesn't receive a better loan rate than someone with, say, 820, for example.

Nerdwallet just had a podcast about the tabulation of credit scores and how much/what goes into calculating them. It was pretty interesting because the original question was about how paying a loan off is a thing that can make your credit score go down. I didn't even realize that was a thing!! But I guess it makes sense since your credit score is actually just a measure of how well you use credit and how able you are to pay things back.

As for refinancing, we recently bought our house in 2020. I was thinking about a refi, but there is a ratio of how much of an interest rate reduction/how long you have been in the house and how long you intend to stay in the house that determines if its the right option for you. I think Nerdwallet and Bankrate both have calculators for that. I put in our info and it wasn't a great option for us right now. We have a great interest rate and got a great deal on the house we bought, so a refi comes out pretty much a wash for us.

@Candice my husband also wants to start looking at purchasing a rental; I am apprehensive because of the responsibility costs: maintenance, emergency fixes, etc. We probably will have a while before we have the savings to try, but I would also like to hear about your experience!

@Katie we were lucky enough to get a good deal on our house, but the local taxes in the area we live in are killer. I believe we are paying just under 500 a month in property taxes alone. Worth it to us to live in an area with great schools, etc. and I think most of that is covered by the standard tax deduction. I didn't itemize last year since we are back on W-2 income and not a small business anymore (and I am not missing saving every single receipt!)

Good

Hi All, just checking in. I will have to go back and re-read some of the posts so that I can answer the questions.

I @ candice p. I love that u respond & reply to people, that makes me like this page & follow it, its nice to have people to interact with & actually pay attention so ty for that!!