HisHersMoney

After a long weekend in the coding trenches, immersed in the inner-workings of Wordpress, it looks as though I’m finally 99% happy with our little website. There’s still a little tweak or two to be made at some point but I’m not fretting about it. So what exactly was done?

Well, with Wordpress 2.5 released, I upgraded to that. Easily done as we were already running the pre-release version here. I also had become less than happy (already!) with the look of the site and rebuilt it by modifying the freely available Xplosive Reloaded theme from Blog Oh! Blog. Make sure you try out the different color schemes by using the links on the top-right! In trying to not completely geek out on everyone and in keeping with the personal finance theme, here’s a list of the tools I used and the cost associated with them. Note that I use a Mac so these programs may not be available to you.

• CSSEdit – Shareware – 29.95€ – A wonderful CSS editor that lets you extract styles directly from websites and edit them in real-time to see the results.
• GIMP – Open-Source – Free – If you don’t need to do a ton of image-editing or if you’re just too poor (like me) to purchase Photoshop, the GIMP is an excellent free alternative.
• Yummy FTP – Shareware – $25 – My favorite FTP program ever. Performance is good. Their folder sync feature is what I use to backup my websites. Transmit is another good yet more expensive alternative for Mac users and Cyberduck is an open-source alternative.
• TextMate – Shareware – 39€ – One of the leading text editors around. Fairly expensive, in fact the most expensive piece of software listed. But if you do any coding, from HTML, PHP, C++, etc… this is a great program. The best part for me is that it interacts with YummyFTP and lets me edit files directly on the web server. TextWrangler is a free version of BBEdit for those looking to save money.

You’ll notice that I use mostly shareware or open-source software. I find the quality to be just as good if not better than that of the giant software publishers. It also normally is much cheaper and I end up supporting small business owners that are passionate about their products.

For you other bloggers out there. What tools do YOU use to keep everything up and running?

Well, if you read the post below that His wrote earlier today you will see his comments regarding the Bose Home Theater speakers that he is currently “jonesing” for. Well, let me let you in on a little secret: Prior to the current transformation that His is experiencing, those said speakers somehow found their way to our house! Now, I’m not talking about a brochure or picture of them, but the actual speakers. Delivered in a big box, direct from Bose themselves.

Paid for of course by, oh wait, they weren’t paid for, they were financed.

I utilized the Return to Sender option and told Mr UPS to take them right back where they came from and when His got home from work I informed him of his decision to return the speakers and hold off on that purchase. For some reason he didn’t remember making that decision but I think he realized that this wasn’t one of those battles worth fighting.

So, why am I telling you this? So you can see just how far he has come in only two months. It was just late January when those speakers temporarily escaped from the Bose factory only to be returned safe and sound. Now he is using some of his allowance funds to save for them. I am so proud of him!

As part of the Group Writing Project -> Saving over at wereindebt I’m going to detail my current plan, why I think it’s going to work, and where I am at in the process.

I used to have just a plain-jane savings account through USAA, which is the bank that I use for probably 90% of my banking and insurance needs. Overall they provide excellent customer service and good rates for my credit cards and loans. However, the interest rate on their savings accounts sucks and because I tend to spend money when I have easy access to it, it is not the best place for me to be using for savings.

I was slow to the bandwagon in opening an ING account. But Hers already had one and so we were able to get us both some extra $$$ when I funded my account $250 to start. Extra money is always a bonus! I’m impressed with their website and their interest rates even though they’re falling along with every other bank. One advantage with ING is that I have easy but NOT instant access to my money. With a few days to think about that withdrawal I am more likely to realize that I don’t have to spend that money. Therefore, this is going to be my emergency account. I already have it set up to automatically take out $50 every paycheck.

Now that the main emergency account was set up, I was on a roll. Hers saw the offer that TDAmeritrade was running through Suze Orman for their Money Market accounts. Just borrow a copy of Suze’s Women & Money book or look for it at a bookstore to get the code that is inside. Fund a new account and after 12 monthly automatic deposits of $50 or more and you get a free $100! That along with a decent interest rate was enough for me to sign up right away. I have my account set up for the withdrawals and it will sit there until I receive the bonus. At that point I will either throw what’s into my account into an IRA or plus up the emergency account at ING.

I also realized that I could not completely stop my spending habits cold-turkey. I’ve been jonesing for a set of Bose home theater speakers for a long time now. However, since we are trying to be smart with our money, I decided that there was no way I was going to put them on a credit card or finance them through Bose even with a 0% offer. I signed up for a SmartyPig savings account and set up the amount for the Bose speakers as a goal along with how much we had decided to spend on each other next Christmas. Now I will automatically save for both things each month and be able to pay cash along with making some interest along the way. Who knows, with SmartyPig, I might even be able to convince some friends and family to fund my speakers instead of giving me stuff I’m going to return anyway!

The key to all of this is the automatic withdrawals. Between savings and automatic bill pay for most things I’m pretty much in a set it and forget it mode right now. When you don’t have to actively manage your money it is easier to forget that it’s there and the temptation to spend is lessened.

So what do YOU do? Have you signed up with SmartyPig? Ameritrade?

So in order to take advantage of free money, Hers and I both opened up Lending Club and Prosper accounts. I’m going to post my initial reactions of both sites now and post updates as I go along.

While I don’t plan on investing heavily on either of these sites for now, I AM looking for a decent return. Especially when you look at how the interest rates are falling in all of the online savings accounts. I need to start funding my IRA fully, but am waiting the few months until Hers and I get married. She has a pretty large account with Ameriprise and I can just get added to her account after the wedding.

So with that in mind, here’s the lowdown below the fold:

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There are some purchases which are fun to make and you can thoroughly enjoy making them and enjoy the item to it fullest after the purchase, and then there buying a vacuum cleaner. Nothing fun there. Our vacuum cleaner pretty much sucked, well actually it didn’t suck enough or we would have kept it. The on and off switch had stopped working long ago and now the suction was quickly disappearing. So, we had to buy a new vacuum.

His would loved to have bought a Dyson, as if we had just an abundance of disposable cash lying around. I was heavily leaning towards the adequate, does the job type of model. My budget was $200 and I hoped to stay as far below that number as possible. We have two cats so cat hair is always a concern so I understand the need to have a decent vacuum. We ended up with a Hoover, which on sale came out to be around $165, a price I can live with.

I did have to pull him away from the over-priced Dysons in the store to settle on the Hoover though. He is all about the gadgetry things that cost way too much and are definitely not needed. It really doesn’t matter what the item is, if it’s touted and the “thing” and it’s expensive, he’s all about it. If I can just get him to think of women’s shoes this way!

Below is a paragraph from a poker-playing friend of mine from California who has so simply summed up the majority of my feelings concerning the entire subprime housing ‘crisis’ that I had to share it with everyone. Head over to Blinders’ site to read the entire article and to share your comments.

Blinders: Subprime Mess – Who Are The Real Victims?: “Now if interest rates were rising it would be a different story. If the fully indexed rate is 6% and you can afford to make those payments when you take out the loan, but interest rates rise to 8% by the time the payment adjusts up you can have unplanned issues. The problem is that interest rates are not rising. If somebody took out a subprime loan exactly 2 years ago the federal funds rate was 4.75%. Today the rate is 2.25%. Two year old sub-prime loans adjusting today are adjusting to a rate that is 2.5% below what was planned. The fully indexed non-teaser payment is much less today than what would have been planned for when the loan was taken out. How this can lead to massive foreclosures is beyond me. Adjustable Rate mortgages get more affordable every time the fed lowers rates, and rates are dropping fast.”

Our near term goal is to get some accounts set up to automatically save money as well as earn us a decent return on our investment. The key to saving money is to make it automatic. If you wait until you get your paycheck, pay all your bills and then see what’s left over you will very rarely ever move the money into a savings vehicle. If the money comes out automatically you will be forced to work with the remaining funds.

Recent New Investments:

His:
ING Savings Account $250 initial, $50 bi-monthly
TD Ameritrade: $50 a month w/ $100 bonus after 12 months (offer #701)
Prosper: In the process of confirming account
Lending Club: In the process of confirming account

Hers: (already has an ING account)
TD Ameritrade: $50 a month w/ $100 bonus after 12 months (offer #701)
Prosper: In the process of funding account ($100 to start)
Lending Club: In the process of funding account ($100 to start)

One key characteristic to note about these accounts is that with Prosper and Lending Club you do not have access to your money. They are investments where your full capital is locked up for 3 years. You receive a portion of it back every month as the loan is repaid. The ING account can be withdrawn from but it does take a couple business days to move the money.

It is important to have some sort of savings account that you have access to right away in case of emergency. I have mine with my credit union and I can go online and move the money to my checking account instantly.

What else are we missing? I know there are other offers out there that are worth taking advantage of. Please let us know!

As I have previously posted, I am a foodie at heart. Everyone knows that dining out on a daily basis will have a shrinking effect on your wallet and an expanding effect on your waist line. Our goal is to avoid both of these side effects as much as possible while still enjoying non-ramen meals. His takes his breakfast and lunch with him to work each day and I (hers) take my coffee and lunch with me to work each day which really helps.

Weekly grocery bills: 3/15/08 $47.74 Grocery Store & 3/15/08 $13.64 Costco

Breakfast for the week is bagels and cream cheese, cereal & apples.

Lunch is left over lasagna, left over chili or tuna sandwich.

Dinner Menu:

Sun: Loaded Baked potatoes with bacon, sour cream, cheese & broccoli

Mon: BBQ Chicken

Tues: Lamb Chops

Wed: Tacos with ground beef

Thurs: Penne Pasta with pesto

Fri: sushi (eating out)

Sat: Salmon Burgers

Each night we always add vegetables or a salad and a small side starch. So, you can see how two people can eat pretty well on a reasonable amount of money. We usually get sushi on Friday nights and a couple glasses of wine out at a local restaurant. Our bill this week was about $60 so combined with out grocery bills we usually stay within our $125 budget.

Stayed tuned next week when I try out a new idea I saw over on Dimples’ Divine Domain to cook an entire chicken in the crock pot! I never would have thought of it but I’m looking forward to trying it.

Well things are starting to look a little better around here. At least if you’re using any web browser except for IE6. For those of you that haven’t upgraded yet, there will be a few issues on this site because of the CSS code that I’m using. I’ve test in IE7, Firefox, Safari, and Opera. They all handle it well and I’m confidant that most of the people who will be visiting should get the correct look.

We’re not using much in the way of images so hopefully everything will load pretty quickly. However, if you are having any problems, please let me know and I’ll try to correct them.

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming!

Today I finally took the time to properly fill out the information for my profile on NetworthIQ. As you can see from either there or my badge to the right, I have a negative net worth. This is not surprising to me as I know that I have too much debt (especially credit cards) and that I have not bothered to start saving for retirement. That last part is obviously a mistake even though I should be getting a military pension starting at age 43. Hers and I actually had a tiff about this the other night. I was trying to figure out the current ‘value’ of my retirement to include in my net worth. She was insisting that until I was fully vested, that it was worth nothing.

I now have seen the light and realize that to be the case. Until I hit my 20 years of active federal service, I get nothing at age 43. Heck, I don’t even get the partial National Guard retirement at 60 unless I complete another 7 1/2 years. Obviously I was counting my chickens before they were hatched. My plan is to continue paying down my credit card debt and building my emergency fund. Once I have that rainy day money fully in place I will open a Roth IRA and start fully funding it. Yes I could pay down debt faster instead but the compound interest will finally start working for my retirement and my highest interest rate right now is still only 9.9% on my credit card from USAA.