Disneysteve's Common Cents Blog

I see a number of entries and forum posts on the topic of financial goals for 2009. As I peruse them, it occurs to me that I really don't have any such goals. My goal for 2008 was to pay off the home equity loan. I did that on Saturday. We are now debt-free except for the mortgage. I'm going to add part of the former home equity payment to the mortgage, part to general savings and part to adding texting to our cell phone service.

I really haven't identified any other goals or change in plans for 2009. Everything is cruising along smoothly. I don't anticipate any changes in my employment or DW's employment.

We haven't made any definite travel plans but have pretty much decided to go to Disney World for two weeks at the end of August.

I'm hopeful that neither of our cars will need replacing in the coming year.

There are some things we need to do around the house, but nothing overly costly that would require special planning. Just stuff that can be covered out of our regular income.

We always max our Roths. DW contributes the maximum allowed to her 401k. Thanks to paying off the HEL, I just upped my savings rate from 19% to 20%. As always, in June, I'll see where things stand and up it to 21% July 1st if that seems doable.

There just isn't anything big on the 2009 horizon.

I set up a MySpace page ages ago because one friend invited me, but I've never done anything with it and don't even visit the site.

Today, I got 4 e-mails from old college friends inviting me to Facebook. I e-mailed one of them to make sure the invites were real and not the result of some virus invading someone's address book. Once he confirmed it, I went ahead and signed up. In no time at all, I had messages from 3 of my friends. I also found a bunch of other people who I either went to college or med school with. Clearly, Facebook is the preferred site over MySpace for social networking. I will try and avoid getting sucked in and spending too much time there, but it is really neat seeing these people who I've been out of touch with for so many years.

I just want to wish all of my Jewish friends a very happy Chanukah. We made latkes tonight before lighting candles and opening presents. I hope all of you have a wonderful holiday.

Wow. I was just looking at the sidebar and realized that I started my blog in October 2006. Time really flies. I had no idea it has been that long. I've posted over 200 entries. I always feel like I don't blog much, but I guess even just a few entries each month really adds up after more than 2 years.

Thanks to all who visit.

This is not a financial post. I don't do many personal posts, but just felt like writing today.

December is a rough month in the Disneysteve household. My brother, my father and my wife's father all died in December. Today is my brother's birthday and the anniversary (on the Jewish calendar) of both our father's deaths.

My brother was 28 when he died in 1987 of a drug overdose. We weren't all that close, especially in the 6 years before his death, due to his drug use. But I still am sad about his death and about it's effect on my mom and the family.

My dad died suddenly of a heart attack in 1992, 5 months after our wedding.

My father-in-law died of lung cancer in 1993. He had been sick for a while. In fact, we really expected to lose him before my father.

We are grateful that both of them were alive for our wedding but we're sad that neither lived to know our daughter. They both loved kids and would have been great with her.

So that's where my head is today.

My last 2 ebay auctions ended last night. I will not be listing any more items until after the first of the year, so I thought I'd see how I made out. I sold on ebay very little this year - a few weeks in the spring and the past 2 weeks. My sales totaled $507.81 of which $252.94 came since 11/23. Not a lot, but just fine for the limited effort I made.

On half.com, I've had sales of $116.03. I still have items listed and will continue to add items as I get them. Since it is a fixed-price setting, I see no reason to stop listing because of the holidays.

So that's a grand total of $623.84 with the possibility of some more coming in from books sales. Certainly not an earth shattering amount, but all money I didn't have before. Virtually all of the books sold were ones I got for free, so that is pure profit. Numerous ebay auctions were for items I got for free. Others were items I bought for resale but bought so long ago that the money was gone and forgotten, so essentially, that pretty much counts as all profit at this point. Plus, every item sold is one less item taking up space in the house.

My intent is to ebay more seriously in 2009. I'd like to see sales of $100/month or more which I think is a very doable goal.

This is not a financial post, just something I wanted to share.

Those who have (or have had) a teen will understand when I say that there are brief moments in time when you get a glimpse of hope, a sign that there is a light at the end of the parenting-a-teen tunnel. We had one of those fleeting moments today.

We were finishing up dinner and out of the blue, our daughter turned to me and said thank you for introducing her to good food and cooking and stuff. Dinner wasn't even anything particularly fancy, but good home-cooked comfort food - ravioli, homemade sauce, grilled veggies, fresh grated Locatelli, and Italian bread with freshly roasted garlic. She said she's glad that we make stuff like that and that we're teaching her to cook and to appreciate good food.

I nearly fell off my chair. It isn't often that sincerity like that comes out of her mouth. I'm glad to know that she actually does appreciate things that we do for her and with her, even if she doesn't always show it or acknowledge it.

As of tonight, my ebay sales since I started listing on 11/23 total $214.69. My half.com sales since 10/1 total $96.77. That's a grand total of $311.46! Since my goal was to pick up about $200 by year end, I'm happy with that. Of course, it isn't all profit. I'll sit down and tally up what I actually made once my remaining 6 active auctions end.

I don't think I'm going to start any more auctions until after the first of the year. It is too late to list stuff for Christmas (I don't want to do 1 or 3 day auctions) and I think buyers fade as the holidays get closer.

I'll start up again in January.

I realized that I haven't posted about any casino trips for a while. We've actually gone quite a few times. My wife and I have enjoyed going to one of the PA casinos that is about 25 minutes from home, less than half the travel time as to Atlantic City. It is easier for us that way since we have to leave our daughter home alone when we go. That way, we aren't out as long. We can be there and back within 3-4 hours.

Anyway, we took a ride there yesterday. I convinced DW to play blackjack with me and stop throwing money away on slots. She likes playing them but I know the odds are horrible. At least at blackjack, you've got a good chance of winning.

So we both sat down at a $10 blackjack table (these are electronic tables, not live dealer games). She started with $100. I started with $200. We played for about 20 minutes and she was up to $205. I was actually down a bit, maybe $170 I think. She decided to cash out and go play slots. She'll usually budget $100 for play so this way, she'd be playing just with her winnings. She also had $25 in free play that the casino had sent her.

I continued to play and ultimately walked away with $285. Not bad - a 42.5% gain on my investment. Sure beats my stock portfolio.

My wife, of course, went to a slot machine where she lost her $100 and the $25 they had given her, so she ended up ahead by just $5, though I suppose that still represents a 5% gain.

We had lunch at their diner and I had comp points for that so it was free.

This was actually my 6th winning trip out of our last 7 visits, so I've been having a pretty good run of luck. Hope it lasts.

I started listing on ebay on 11/23. Those items ended this past Sunday, 11/30. Only 1 of 3 sold, but I wasn't surprised. I grossed $23.06 for that one which I was happy with.

My next 3 auctions ended today. All 3 sold! I grossed $92.53 for those.

I also got my Half.com statement today and I earned $28.21 from book sales this sales period.

That's a total of $143.80. My goal for starting back selling was to earn $200 by the end of the year. I'm pretty close and still have 13 active items with $27.00 in bids already (on 2 items), so there's a good chance I'll hit $200 by the time this batch of items ends.

I know most people do ebay for the money, but honestly, I'm really doing it as part of my decluttering efforts. The money is just a bonus. The real accomplishment is getting the stuff out of the house.

ETA: For those who wonder if they should offer worldwide shipping on ebay, 2 of my 3 items today went to non-US buyers. One is going to Canada and the other to South Africa.

Yesterday was a roller coaster ride in the money department. While at work, I had some down time and was able to do a $30 survey online. It is always nice to earn extra money at the same time I'm earning my regular salary. That was the good news.

When I got home, my wife was waiting for me with the bad news. She had accidentally put her jeans in the wash without emptying her pockets. Her cell phone (that she just got a couple of months ago) was in her pocket. It is currently drying on the counter but does not appear as if it will come back to life. The phone will probably work but I think the screen is destroyed, making the phone kind of worthless.

Then I opened the mail and had 3 survey checks totaling $145, so that was more good news. And my wife also told me that she had gotten a bonus check at work, which neither of us was expecting, for $150. After taxes and the 401k deduction, the actual check came to $61, but $75 plus match went into the 401k.

At first, I thought she might have to buy a phone outright which can be very costly, but we checked our account and it turns out that 2 of our phones are eligible for upgrades, so she can get a new phone for free with a contract extension. In the meantime, she still has her old phone which is broken but still works, so she plugged her SIMM card into that so at least she has a phone until she gets a new one.

So more good news than bad, and the bad news turned out not so bad. I thought it would be costing us money but probably won't in the end.

For the newbies, I'm a physician and get to do various market research surveys online for doctors only.

For November, I earned $253 on surveys. That is low compared to the past when I was doing as much as $700 or so, but I had slacked off doing them for a while. Since there is a lag of several weeks between when the survey is done and when payment comes, I'm still feeling the effects of that. Lately, I've tried to get back to doing them more regularly so hopefully the December number will be higher.

As of today, the remaining balance on our home equity loan is $1,439.20. I've been working to have it paid off by the end of the year and that's exactly what we'll be doing. That balance is down $1,392.75 from last month. I'll make one more extra partial payment after my next paycheck on 12/12 and then I'll have to go in to the bank soon after to get a final payoff amount and to make sure they stop the auto-withdrawals for the regular monthly payments.

The monthly payment has been $218.00, so as of January, we will no longer have that bill. Yeah! I'm not 100% sure what to do with that money quite yet. Initially, I'll probably use it to rebuild savings a bit since we had some expensive car repairs recently and our daughter's Bat Mitzvah of course. Then, I'll probably start making some extra payments to the mortgage, our last remaining debt.

I posted a thread about this on the forum but thought it would be a good topic here, too, as I know not everyone reads both.

We went out to lunch today at a local restaurant that we like. They were having a special deal on gift cards: buy $100 worth and get $20 free. So we did just that. Not only that, but I charged them to my Discover card which has a 5% cashback bonus at restaurants through December, so I'll get $5 back on the purchase. That means I actually spent $95 and got $120 worth of gift cards. Coincidentally, our meal today came to exactly $25.00 which means the meal was basically free. We spent $95 (after the Discover cashback), got lunch for the 3 of us and walked out with $95 remaining on the gift cards.

A local mall also has a deal on gift cards. Buy 3 $20 cards and get a $15 gas card.

A few years ago, we took advantage of a deal on Marriott gift cards. I don't remember the details but I think we got $50 free for buying $200.

So be on the lookout this holiday season for gift card bonus offers, not to use for gifts, but to use for yourself to save money on things that you would be buying anyway.

I listed 3 items on ebay on Sunday 11/23. Nothing of any great value. Actually 3 things that got in my way while decluttering in our computer room. So far, one item has a bid and 3 watchers. The others have no bids and no watchers.

I'll be out Wednesday and Thursday nights but maybe Friday I can list a few more items. I'd like to take in a couple hundred dollars between now and the end of the year.

In the past year or so, I've purchased a new tuxedo and 2 suits at Mens Wearhouse. They have a rewards program and a couple of months ago (after I bought the suits) I earned a rewards coupon for $50 off my next purchase. The coupon has been sitting on my dresser ever since as I really didn't need anything else. I did pay attention, though, to the fact that the coupon expires on November 29, so I decided I should use it. Even if I didn't actually need anything, it was silly to pass up a free $50.

I just went to the store and picked up a pair of pants for $39.99 (a lot more than I usually spend for pants). I wasn't going to buy anything else and let the other $10 go to waste, but at the register, they had those sticky lint roller things. They sell for $4.99 so I got 2 of those and that took me within pennies of the $50. So I got the pants and rollers for free and didn't spend anything out of pocket. Perfect!

The cleaning and decluttering efforts are still ongoing at the Disneysteve home. My wife and daughter were out last night (to see Twilight) so I had the house to myself. I spent the entire evening in our computer room/office with only a little of that time spent on the computer. The rest of the time was spent cleaning out the file drawers. A ton of paper went either straight into the recycling bin or into the shredder and the shreddings then went into the recycling bin. I filled the shredder 3 times last night and 2 more this morning and still have a stack of papers about 4 inches high left to shred (and I'm still adding to the pile).

By getting all that paper out of the files, I was able to put a whole stack of empty file folders into the drawer and get them off the floor where they had been residing for months. I had rescued them from the trash at my office but didn't have any room in our files for them.

Then, I attacked a large accordion file that has sat on my desk for years. I use it to file our monthly bills but they generally just pile up on top of the file rather than actually in the slots. I used several of those newly placed file folders to make new homes for the bills in the drawer so that I can eliminate the accordion folder from the desktop. I haven't quite finished that task but it should be done tomorrow. That will open up a nice big space on the desk which will be very nice.

I realized that I never posted my October survey numbers.

Quick recap: I'm a physician and get to do various online (and occasionally in person) surveys. These are not available to the general public - sorry.

For October, I earned $209.25. A little of that is from Pinecone and AOL Opinion Place. The rest is the medical stuff. As I posted on the boards, I've also sold a few books that I got from doing surveys which adds another $15 or so to that total.

Periodically, I list a book or two on Half.com, usually something I got for free somewhere or something found while cleaning the house that we don't want or need. I've had mixed results, but since there's no cost for listing, I've got nothing to lose. I've sold quite a few over the years.

Lately, I've been getting these short online medical surveys that offer a selection of items to choose from as a reward. I don't want or need any of the items but one choice is a nice medical dictionary, so I've selected that. So far, I've gotten 3 of them. I sold the first one a few weeks back. The 2nd one sold today. I haven't listed the 3rd as I just received it yesterday, but I'll definitely list it now that I see how quickly the first 2 sold. And I think I have at least one more coming to me. I got $8.99 for the first and $7.98 for the second. I always make sure mine is the lowest priced listing for that item.

I also got a promotional set of diabetic cookbooks. I listed 2 of them yesterday and one sold today. I got $7.99 for that one.

So that's $25.00 for 3 books that cost me nothing. Not a bad deal at all. I'll take it.

The downside of keeping cars forever is that periodically the planets align just so and a bunch of things wear out or break at the same time.

Our van is a 2000 Toyota Sienna. I took it into the shop this morning for what I believe is a failing starter. The last time it was in for service, they also told me that the front brakes were due for replacing, the rear shocks were shot, the rear wheel cylinders were leaking and the tires were worn. I put off all that stuff at the time until we got past the Bat Mitzvah expenses, but today I told them to go ahead and fix everything. My wife has noticed the car slipping a bit on wet roads so I definitely wanted to get the tires done.

End result will be a nice big repair bill. Hopefully, though, this will hold us for a while. I don't mind spending $1,000 or so each year to maintain a good quality car.

It has been some time since I blogged about decluttering. You may remember that a few months ago I was on a mission to clean the house. I accomplished quite a bit but did eventually lose the motivation as other things took over my free time, particularly all the work we did getting ready for our daughter's Bat Mitzvah in September.

I decided even before that day that once that was past us and the synagogue retreat my wife and I run each year was over (it was last weekend), I was putting my wife and daughter on notice that it was time for ALL of us to seriously work on cleaning the house. I told them that I wanted ALL of us to start doing what I had been doing over the summer.

Every single day, each of us is to clean at least one thing. That might mean doing as little as throwing away an unneeded receipt sitting on your dresser or getting that pair of shoes that you wore last week out of the family room and back into your closet.

Of course, the hope is that most days each of us will do more than one thing. It has been a week so far and everyone is cooperating. My daughter gets annoyed when I ask if she has cleaned something each day, but she is doing it. My wife has been doing really well. I think knowing that all of us are working on it has helped motivate her.

I've certainly been doing my share. Friday I attacked a pile of stuff in the basement that has been there for ever and ever. My reason for going there was to gain access to the exam/manipulation table that was blocked by the stuff (I'm an osteopathic physician and wanted to be able to use the table to work on DW and DD's necks and backs). I threw out some stuff and put some stuff away in the storage closets and, for the first time in a few years, was actually able to use the table. In fact, it was the first time my daughter was ever on that table.

Today, I spent some time in the garage and cleared out a bunch of trash and packed the recycling bin full of boxes and papers.

I've also done a variety of things inside the house, on my desk, in the kitchen, etc.

I'm sure that if all of us keep at it, pretty soon this place will start looking a lot better.

As of 10/31, our Home Equity loan balance is $2,831.95. That is down $1,970.49 from last month.

My goal was to pay this off by the end of the year and I'm right on track. Even if the alloted percentage isn't quite enough, I have surplus funds to use to make up the difference.

So as of January 1, I will no longer have a $218.01 monthly HEL payment to make. Yeah!

I got away from blogging about my exercise routine but I didn't stop exercising. For the month of October, of the 28 days I was home (we were out of town for 3 days) I worked out on Wii Fit 9 times, so an average of about every 3 days. That's okay and far better than what I was usually doing before we got the Wii Fit program, but I still want to do better. I'd like to get up to 12-15 times/month. That's my goal for November.

We are really enjoying Wii Fit. All 3 of us use it regularly. I started doing 20 minutes or so and the past few times have done 30 minutes or more. For anyone looking for a relatively inexpensive way to get in shape and have fun doing it, I'd highly recommend it.

We went to the local casino today for a couple of hours. I had a great outing. I played video blackjack and video poker and ended up winning $343 total! I'm generally happy if I break even or don't lose too much. Coming home a big winner doesn't happen that often so it was very nice. DW lost $75, but that still works out to a nice profit on the day.

Our synagogue called yesterday and left a message for my wife that there was a check there for her. She did do some part-time work for them not long ago but she was already paid for that, so we didn't know what the check could have been for.

She picked it up last night. Turns out it was the $250 security deposit we paid to rent the room for our daughter's Bat Mitzvah a few weeks ago. Neither of us remembered that we had it coming to us. That was a nice little bonus.

I realized I haven't posted for a couple of weeks. Nothing particularly exciting has been going on but I figured I'd give some updates.

1. Even though I stopped doing the Exercise Log entries, I have not stopped exercising. I'm still working out with Wii Fit. I think I did 22 minutes tonite.

Now that I've had it for over a month, I would still highly recommend it for anyone looking for a home exercise regimen. Much more convenient than a gym, not dependent on the weather and you can exercise on your own schedule. It is even portable if you go out of town and want to pack it. As long as you have a TV to hook it to, you're all set.

Not only that, but the other night, the TV was in use so I just went upstairs and did several of the exercises I've learned from Wii in our bedroom. You can't do the balance games but can certainly do the yoga, strength training and aerobic ones.

2. My wife and I visited a local casino (Chester, PA) last week. I won $93 and she won about $12. We had a casual dinner at their sports bar and just had a nice evening out. We're planning to go again on Saturday morning while our daughter is at a school program. We'll play a little and maybe do an early lunch or snack.

3. Got the van fixed today. It had failed inspection for an emissions problem. Repairs came to almost $1,500. I know I could have had it done cheaper elsewhere but the dealership is so convenient. They provide excellent service, a free rental and I trust that they know what they're doing. They did recommend some other work be done (like front brakes and tires) but I decided to shop around for those things. Now I just have to get it back to DMV to get re-inspected.

4. We had to scrub our annual Disney World trip. My daughter was hand-picked for a special school program that meets every Saturday for 6 weeks and that conflicts with when we were going to go. We're all bummed since we have been going annually for a long time (my daughter just turned 13 and has been there 14 times). We're talking about going next summer instead. We'd love to go for more than a week so we could do that then. Can't do it during the school year.

5. Since we can't go to Disney, we may just go away for 2 days that week when my daughter has no school. We're deciding where to go. Lancaster, PA is always on our list so that's probably where we'll end up.

6. As I mentioned on the boards, I got 2 books for doing medical surveys. I put them on Half.com and sold one within 24 hours for $7.99. The other one is still listed but hasn't sold yet. Since I got them for nothing, anything I make is okay with me.

7. Watching my portfolio dissolve right along with everyone else but keeping my cool. 18 years until retirement and 6 until college so time for things to turn around. I'm sorry that I already maxed our Roths for the year. I would have liked to have been putting that $10,000 in now instead of earlier in the year like I did. Oh well.

Can't think of anything else to report at the moment.

Last night, I returned most of the unused alcohol we had bought to stock the bar for the Bat Mitzvah. We had originally spent just over $1,100 using the recommended list the caterer had given me.

We were able to return any unopened bottles of liquor or wine or unopened cases of beer. We kept 8 bottles of wine for ourselves. We also had to keep, I think, 3 12-packs of beer because we had written on the boxes. And, of course, we couldn't return any opened bottles, so we have quite a few of them at home now.

End result was I returned $554.00 worth of stuff which I was very happy about. That means we spent about $566 for alcohol including all the stuff we get to keep. Knock off the 8 bottles of wine, which really shouldn't count as a Bat Mitzvah expense, and the total was under $500. Had we gotten the liquor from the caterer instead of supplying it ourselves, the charge would have been $15/person. We had 106 people so we would have paid $1,590, meaning we saved over $1,000 doing it ourselves. Plus that way we wouldn't have gotten to keep the leftovers.

I think what really kept the liquor bill low was that I make my own homemade Lemoncello. A lot of our synagogue friends are familiar with it and many others became familiar with it that night. I brought about 4 liters of it to the affair and we used about 2.5 liters. That only cost me about $35 to make but a lot of people drank that instead of the other stuff.

The other money back came from the balloons. We had changed the original balloon order but I realized after the fact that when I picked them up on Saturday, they charged me for the original order, which was more. I went back with the receipt last night and explained the error and they credited me $54 for the overcharge.

So I got back a total of $608 dollars last night which was a nice little bit of change.

For the newbies, I'm a physician and have the opportunity to do various online surveys. These surveys are not available to the general public.

As expected, my survey income has been off sharply because I had pretty much stopped doing them, especially while I was doing all the work to prepare for our daughter's Bat Mitzvah.

Total survey income for September was only $160. Considering I was pulling in over $700/month before, that's pretty lousy.

Now that the Bat Mitzvah is behind us, I'm planning to get back on track and start doing them all again. Especially with current economic conditions, I can't afford to pass up hundreds of dollars each month in extra income.

I just redeemed $40 on my account and $20 on my wife's account for our Discover cards. We use them pretty much only to take advantage of the 5% cashback bonus offers. The past 3 months, that included gas stations so 5% back was helpful. I also signed up for the 4th quarter which is restaurants, grocery stores and movies. We won't use the movies but we'll definitely use the other two. Just have to remind DW to use the Discover card for those purchases.

As of today, our home equity loan balance is $4802.44.

That is down $1,409 from one month ago. The plan is to pay it off by the end of the year.

NOTE: Edited 9/30 to correct amounts.