Laceshawl's Personal Finance Blog

Here's an idea I read about ages ago. Since this is the shortest month make it one where you spend as little as possible. We're talking basics here; only groceries, utiliities, transport and health care. Keep the eating out and movie going till later in the year after you have saved up a comfortable cushion. I reckon I should be able to save 50% of my income this Feb. This is where the scrooge genes I inherited from grandma come into play.

I earned $300 more than I spent last month, so went to transfer the savings into my EF. I realised I has earned nz$5.47 in interest on that account. Yay.

It's nowhere Financial Independence yet, but I get the feeling my money is working for me rather than just me working for money.

The cornmeal curse continued last night with me boiling dry the beans, but didn't burn the pot too badly.

I went to the art center where I remembered I still owed them some money for jewellry materials. Noone could figure out the exact amount so I gave them nz$9. Now I can say truly I don't owe nuttin' to nobody.

They played a movie at lunchtime and provided food to eat, club sandwiches and sausage rolls. Very filling so I didn't eat much for dinner, just a couple salad bananas for 30 cents. Now I have 60 cents left in my purse and don't intend to take out any more till Wednesday.

I have some cornmeal which has been sitting in my pantry for a while so decided to use it. Yesterday I made polenta but when I tried to then fry it I hadn't made it thick enough and it turned into a big mess in the skillet.

So this mornign I tried making cornmeal pancakes but discovered I had run out of baking powder so my pancakes were flat and stodgy instead of light and fluffy.

Never mind persevere. I'll try tortillas next, with vege chilli as it's a cool damp day.

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I guess it's possible to retire in 5 years if you live a bare essentials existence and have a $80,000 income, but when your earnings are much more average and you want some of the things that make life a little more pleasant you're looking at a longer working life.

Still, it got me thinking. If living a minimalist existance for 5 years would guarantee I'd never have to work again, how much would I be prepared to give up?

No car? Don't have one anyway.

Shop in thrift stores forever after? Fine by me.

Never eat icecream and cake again? I guess so.

Give up drinking tea? Umm, I may have to think about this.

Spend the rest of my life knitting from my stash? Noooo you can't do this to me. I defend my right to buy more wool even if I'm working in Mcd's at 90.

How far are you prepared to go?

I borrowed a book from the library last month called The Armchair Economist by Steven Landsburg. I was so diligently perusing it trying to educate myself I forget to return it on time and it cost me 30 cents. Still beats signing up for a semester study on the subject.

I have decided the problem with economists, financial policy advisors and others of that ilk is they are all doing better than average so support whatever system enables them to do well. If economists earned minimum wage I bet we'd see some very different economic theories.

On my way to work this mornig I found 10 cents. When I got back tonite there were three letters in my mailbox - all from the IRD.

The first said my student loan, which was supposed to have been paid in full in 2002, actually had a balance of $5.13, but they are writing this off so I now officially owe nothing.

The second said I had qualified for an interest write off in 2002 which hadn't been credited, so they would be shortly sending me a refund.

The third contained my refund check - for $14.24.

I was left wondering how much it cost them to process all that little lot and considering how to spend my windfall. The wool sale is now safely over so I quess it will have to go in my EF.

Oo it's hard to be working in the January sales. People all around you snapping up bargains and you wonder if there'll be any left for you. Plus there's that staff discount. All too easy to pull out the debit card and there's one purchase of nz$51.90 and another of 119.70 and I'm carrying home my winter wardrobe to be knitted. I justify it by telling myself I can wear my jerseys at work, but really, I don't think I'd have bought so much wool if I'd had to pull a wad of notes out of my wallet. So I'm going to go to a cash basis and see if the pain of parting with the greens makes me spend less.

I've been listeneing to Dave Ramsey online and I like what he has to say about getting focused on one goal at a time. At the moment I'm putting a little bit here and a little bit there for half a dozen things, and I feel like I'm not making any progress. Getting one goal acheived before going on to the next strikes me as a good idea.

So today I took the nz$800 I'd saved in my travel account and added it to my EF, bringing the total to $2500. When that is completed I will increase my contribution to Kiwisaver, and after that focus on the trip saving.

I wonder why it seems so much harder to save money than pay off debt. With the money sitting in the bank, there's always something to spend it on and it grows so slooooowly.

I haven't totalled up the exact amount of dollars and cents, but I'm pretty certain I'm better off than I was 12 months ago. So my New Year resolution is to keep going as I am. By December 31st 2010 I should have:

nz$5,000 in fully funded emergancy fund

be saving 8% of gross income into Kiwisaver for retirement

have saved nz$2,000 for airplane tickets to Britain

pretty grown up for the teenage decade.

So the pet shop down the road has baby alpacas for sale. They are so cool. I could have yarn for spinning while they are taking care of my overgrown grass.

Anyone got a spare nz$350?

If you're trying to cut out sugar so you can lose weight and someone gives you rhubarb which you love so you go and have to buy sugar, did you save any money? And since rhubarb is very good for you, will eating it stewed ruin your diet?

I'm haveing rhubarb crumble anyway.

Today I took nz$2,285.11 and paid off the last of my loan at the credit union. From today I am officially debt free! Hallelujah!

I have st aside $6,000 for house painting next year, and I'm still left with $2,199.96 in my emergency fund. I shall be earning extra money in the January sales, so aim to get it up to $5,000. Then I shall reward myself with a trip to Britain.

This morning I switched to a new package from my phone company. By combing my phone and ISP in the same deal I get twice as much Broadband, with no overage charges, and cheap calling rates to NZ and Australia any time of the day or night. Plus I'll be saving nz$1.30 a month. I decided to get rid of the call waiting feature too as I never use it - I think it's rude to ask someone to hang on while you talk to someone else - so that is another .50 cents a month saved. Yippee, 22.60 a year.

So on Saturday I saw an ad for some nice cotton tops, only $14. Gee I wanted one, even though I didn't need it, but I wasn't going to make a special trip to town to buy one. I figured if it was meant to be there'd be one left for me. Today I made my usual trip and looked in the store, but... they had sold out. Phew, money saved. I'm quite happy about it, maybe because today has been quite cold and wet, definitely not cotton top weather.

The greengrocers on the corner has a good deal, 4 avocadoes for nz$2. Alas I cannot eat 4 whole avocado all by my little self so I must pay .59 cnets for a single one. If I buy one a week that adds up to an extra $4.68 a year. I protest!

Seriously ,There are all manner of politicians promising all manner of sweet deals for families - how about some rebates for us single people. You know, us ones who don't keep having kids we can't afford to bring up without govt help.

if you feed the hungry. At this morning's service we had an infant dedication followed by morning tea with andwiches and all manner of goodies. Then this evening we had a baptism followed by supper with samosas, savories and all manner of goodies. I didn't need to cook at all today. Don't understand why more people don't come to church

today the 13th was a lucky day for me. I found .30 cents.

No I wasn't sick tese last couple of weeks, but I've decided my life is too boring. So I signed up for nanowrimo.org and decided to write a novel. It might even make me some money if it was good enough.

well, 22,000 words into the thing and i'm suffering major writers block and the whole thing stinks. so i'm going to kill off all my characters in wwI , since yesterday was Armistice Day. At least they won't have to worry about dealing with their finances then.

Oh, but I could have a judgment day, couldn't I? in which they're called to account for how they spent their money while alive. Hmm, goes off to hopefully write another few hundred words.

I really don't think nz$5 is all that expensive for a knitting pattern because you can use it any number of times, or resell it on trademe. But people grumble about the price.

This afternoon a customer asked me if they could take away a pattern and photocopy it!! When I got over my surprise I explained that wasn't possible because of copyright law and she went off muttering. When I looked again, she was sitting at the pattern table with pen and paper, copying out by hand!!!

Well, what can you do? the customer is always right and this one spends a lot on wool, so the manager said to leave her. But honestly, if you're that set against paying for a pattern why not look in the thrift stores or borrow a book on designing from the library and create your own.

Reasons to be Financially Independent no 53

So you don't have to take a day off work when the repairman is coming.

The Red Cross shop had a dollar a bag sale. I didn't need much, but I got two pairs of black pants, because you can never have too many pairs of black work pants.

this, folks, has turned into a no hold barred pro wrestling match. In the black corner is tina, ably seconded by her Efund. In the red corner, the villain of the piece, Murphy.

And Murphy has just attempted a low blow. After knocking out tina's tooth last week, he proceeded to infect the empty socket this week. However, the dentist treated it and made no charge!!!Murphy came back almost immediately with another kinghit - a tax demand from the regional council that has gone up over 20%! Tina is now sitting down and writing out her request for a rates rebate. Stay tuned for the ref's decision on this one.

Well, it's been a disaster of a weekend. In the last 48 hours the washing machine stopped functioning (I'm guessing a blocked pump); then an element on the stove top stopped functioning ( as it is a very old stove I'm expecting to be told it's not repairable so will have to buy a new stove); finally the electric kettle stopped functioning ( I went to KMart today to buy a cheapie replacement, but all the jugs they had were fancy schmancy stainless steel and cost too much, so I'm temporarily boiling water in a pan)

All this and I'm still smiling. I have over nz$3000 in my EF fund to deal with these setbacks. Murphy - you're out!

I was working in the shop this afternoon. It's interesting that most people chose to make even small purchases with thier debit card. I guess they just don't carry cash any more. I only made $47 in cash sales, all the rest was electronic transfer of funds. Wonder if they'll do away with cash one day. Hooray - no more balancing the cash register at the end of the day.

my tooth. Goshdarn grit in an apple. Because I have previously had a root canal on that particular tooth there was no pain, but it was past saving. The dentist neatly extracted it, along with nz$245 from my savings account. This, she says with a gap toothed smile, is what emergency savings are for.

As I was waiting for the bus I noticed a 20 cent coin on the street. I waited for a gap in the traffic so I could go over and pick it up, but no traffic gap before my bus came, so I had to leave it. Sob! I want my free money!

Today was a good day for saving money. I hung the laundry out on the line, opened all the windows to let the natural air conditioning thru, enjoyed some free vitamin D on my skin and thanked God he doesn't charge us for universal power.

I often pick up fruit and veges at a little Asian store not far from me. They are cheap but you have to use them quickly as they sell them near their best by date.

I had some pumpkin in the fridge I was meaning to get round to using. I delayed too long and it turned all soft and slimy. Ugh, I had to throw it away. 99 cents wasted. Maybe I should start doing like grandma and buy my greens every day.

In the meantime, a note to self. When you buy something and don't use it you are throwing money away. Remember that dress you thought you would wear to a party some time and never did? nz$120 thrown away (actually a donation to the Sally Army that time) Always, always, always ask yourself before purchasing whether you are going to truly use it or you just want it. You are going to have to save up $200 now to generate that $1 pumpkin income in retirement.

Thankfully it was only a 24 hour bug, so I'm back on my feet again. I am eating some chocolate which is a cure for all human ailments of body, mind and soul.