HisHersMoney

We haven’t posted anything here on the site about Him being out of work but he has actually been out of work since July 15th. He is in the Army and was mobilized for the past year. Luckily he was mobilized here locally so we didn’t have to deal with long distance pressures. When his orders ended he was left in a state of limbo where he didn’t know if his orders were going to be renewed and if they were when it would happen.

Financially things haven’t been that tight as he was paid through the middle of July and then was also cashed out for his remaining vacation time and was also still owed two reimbursement checks for housing. UNfortunately we still haven’t received all of the payments owed to us but we did manage to squeeze by without having to put anything on the credit cards or dip into our savings.

We decided to look at other employment options for Him. I work as a Defense Contractor (like a large portion of the professional population in the Washington DC metro area) and we decided that maybe moving from the Government side so the contractor side might not be such a bad idea. So fast forward a couple weeks to today and he has received and accepted a job offer to be a contractor doing almost the same exact job as he was doing before and today is his first day!

He will still be part of the National Guard and will work his one weekend a month and of course could possibly be deployed in the future but for now he will go to work M-F like the rest of this town in a shirt and tie.

Over the next week we will be looking at how to merge His paycheck and retirement savings into our overall financial picture and will keep everyone updated.

I have definitely gotten completely sucked into the Summer Olympics lately. Every night I’m tuned in starting at 8pm until it’s time to go to sleep. As A result we have not been going out to eat or out at night which has saved us quite a bit of money. We did go out on Friday night for a good-bye send off for a friend of ours who is moving to Florida next week but other than that we haven’t been out at all.

Of course like most of the country we have been watching all of the swimming and are completely impressed with Michael Phelps and all of his and his teammates accomplishments. We have also been watching the gymnastics and really don’t even want to get into the age controversy of the Chinese women’s gymnasts. I just glad that the American women did at least get a silver medal in the team competition and a gold and silver in the individual all around competition.

We are very proud of the amazing accomplishments of all the Olympians!

We choose a 5pm basic ceremony with a few coworkers in attendance which was conveniently scheduled right before a optional company cocktail hour which started at 6pm. I got my dress on craigslist for $280 and spent $70 on alterations. The dress had never been worn or altered so I got a great deal. It was a basic cream colored strapless gown with quite a bit of stitching and beads / crystals on it.

We bought two sets of roses at Costco at a cost of $30 total. Two dozed orange roses and two dozen pink roses. I then picked the best six of each, cut down the stems to just the right length and then wrapped the stems in a white ribbon. I really have to brag on my flower job because it came out really, really nice and I received multiple comments on it.

My shoes I had found on the discount rack at DSW (what a great store) and I paid around $30 for them, I don’t quite remember the exact amount as I got them awhile ago but it was around $30.

Our wedding rings didn’t come with any great discount unfortunately but we got what we wanted. Him wanted the silver and titanium band that matched the ring that I had asked for and received my previous birthday. I wanted a diamond ten stone band that looked really nice with my engagement ring. Both were simple and reasonably priced and came to about $1000 total.

Our cocktail hour gave us an opportunity to mingle with everyone was free as it was company sponsored. It was so much fun to show up to the cocktail hour in our wedding attire and see quite a few employees do a surprised double take because they were unaware of our wedding plans that weekend.

We had dinner reservations at 7:30pm in the main dining room which was absolutely elegant and the food was wonderful. The management sent us some champagne on the house and a coworker and his wife sent us some more champagne as well so we spent absolutely nothing on drinks. The dinner was covered by the company so our five course meal also cost us nothing. The was live music in the dining room with a dance floor so we completed our “first dance” while a couple hundred people looked on.

We were originally booked into a standard room but when we arrived it seemed that the air conditioning wasn’t working in our room so once they determined that they couldn’t get the AC working they upgraded us to a suite. The suite was really beautiful and had a wonderful view of the grounds form the balcony. We ordered breakfast in on Sunday morning (on the company) and ate outside at the table and chairs that was on the balcony. It really was the prefect way to eat breakfast on the first day of your married life!

We still have to meet up with our local photographer to take our formal wedding pictures to get the shots we want but that’s already paid for and in the meantime my coworkers took a couple hundred pictures for us with their digital cameras.

It may not have been conventional but we had a great time, got married in a great location and didn’t break the bank!

Yes, we did it, we got married! I know we really didn’t post very many (or any) details of the wedding planning, wedding budget or financial choices here on the blog, but there’s a pretty good reason why. Each year my company takes all of it’s employees away for a long weekend to a really nice resort. The only requirement as to the location is that it must be within a reasonable drive and be big enough to hold approximately 300+ guests. This year we went to The Homestead in south western VA and it was absolutely gorgeous. Both the building and the grounds were breath taking beyond description.

We were to arrive midday on Friday and leave Sunday afternoon. We had a company dinner as well as a Saturday morning company meeting but other than that the time was ours and all the bills were pretty much covered. So, we decided to get married while we were there! Our goal was to have a wedding that would have cost us an absolute bundle for pennies on the dollar.

We worked with the resort to choose the perfect location on the property to hold our wedding ceremony which ended up being next to a little pond. The resort didn’t charge us anything to use the location since we didn’t require and set up or tear down and we weren’t service any food or drink down there either.

Our entire wedding costs total $1077, Wedding Rings were $1000 and our honeymoon was $3200!

Here’s the break out:

Dress: $280

Alterations: $70

Flowers: $40

Shoes: $30

His Shirt and Tie: $57

Wedding Rings: $1000

Honeymoon: $3,200

Photos $600 (including engagement pics)

Wow, I can’t believe I think that $3.78 for a gallon of gas is cheap. I guess it’s all relative. We were driving back across the State of Virginia yesterday and stopped about half way and filled up. I did notice that it’s still about $4.19 per gallon for premium here in Northern Virginia.

Everyone knows that are new car loses value the day you drive it off the lot. A used car kind of does the same thing as the retail price is higher than the trade in price. If you tried to use your used car as a trade in the day after you bought it you would not get the same value in most circumstances.

I bought my car in Oct 2005, it’s a 2004 Saab and I got a really good deal on it. New the car is right at about $30,000 and I bought mine a year old for about $18,000. Fast forward a few years and I now owe about $6500 on it. I financed it for about three and a half years and then refinanced it about a year later at a lower interest rate. My car should be paid of completely in about a year if I were to continue making the regular payment on it.

Right now my car trade in value is around $8000 so for once I actually have some equity in the thing. Out of curiosity I check what the value was for the same exact car was that was just a year older than mine was with what I projected my milage would be in another year. The trade in then becomes $6500 which is what I could expect my car to be worth in a year from now.

So, today I have about $1500 in equity in my car and next year I will have about $6500 in equity in my car. For the next year every penny I put into my car I could expect to get back from it. We did but the extended warranty directly from GM on the car so any repairs it needs will be covered in full right at the dealership. So, my only real cost for the next 12 months is gas and insurance. Insurance is about $500/year and I use about $75/month in gas, or $900 a year.

So many people are considering buying cars that use less gas these days due to high gas prices. My car has a turbo in it so it requires the premium fuel and gets about 20 miles to the gallon which isn’t a whole lot better than some of the SUVs these days. If I bought a new gas sipping car to replace this one I would have to pay on it for the next few years before I starting breaking even and then probably another year before I starting actually getting value back from my car.

We do not plan on getting rid of the Saab any time soon. It’s covered under the bumper to bumper extended warranty for another two and a half years. By keeping the car that entire time we will have saved ourselves over $8000 in payments and our only extra expenses on it will be regular maintenance.

So question to the readers: When are you no longer upside down on your car?

We stayed at the Sandals Royal Caribbean in Montego Bay, Jamaica and it was really nice. The rooms were excellent and came with a jetted tub (which we didn’t utilize), four poster beds and a balcony that looked right out over the ocean. A few little things that we appreciated with the rooms is that there was a little mini fridge in the room with bottled water and a variety of sodas in it which where included in the all inclusive and they replenished them every day. Also, the staff came and serviced your room twice a day. First in the morning for the standard daily service and then again while you were at dinner to pick up and turn down the beds. Since everyone came back to their rooms to shower from being at the pool and ocean all the day to prepare for dinner it was nice that they went in and straightened everything up.

The staff was absolutely wonderful and really made our stay super enjoyable. They did a great job in getting people involved in the activities and just making the days and nights fun. It was great to basically see the same people everyday working around the property and they do an amazing job of actually remembering everyone’s names.

The only thing we can’t really rave about was the dining. Breakfast we ordered in to our room each morning which was great. Coffee, fruit, omelets, any breakfast thing you could really want. Lunch we usually grabbed from the beach side grill and it was fine. Burgers, chicken sandwiches, chicken caesar wraps, etc. Nothing fancy but it was fine.

Dinner was the one thing we wished was just a little better. FOr one thing, I would have like some air conditioning. Later on at night it cooled off and was plenty cool outside but at dinner time it was usually just a little on the warm side. The rooms all had air conditioning in them but the dining rooms didn’t. The food was … ok…. Nothing great, but you could usually find something to eat that was ok.

So, all in all, as I sit at home drinking a Jamaican rum and coke, writing this post I can say we had a great time. We met some great people, a couple of which we exchanged email addresses with, and look back on it as a great trip. We would definitely consider going back to that or another Sandals Jamaica property.