Creditcardfree's Personal Finance Blog

Sold another item!! I love these Buy It Now Ebay buyers. I will drop it in the mail tomorrow. After that sale, I'm netting $67.16 on four items!!!!!

So with one item left, I decided to add another listing tonight. It is also a Buy It Now listing. I expect it should sell pretty quickly, too.

I have a few other, possibly less profitable items, to list on Sunday ready to go also.

A very good round of Ebay this week makes me happy. What makes you happy?

I sold two more items today on ebay. Obviously, they were sold with a Buy It Now option, which was the more expensive option for the buyer. And a little more profit for me!!

I only have two items left. I'm sure one will sell. The other is a little iffy. However, I might relist with a lower price if it doesn't sell this week.

I will attempt to pull some more items out this week that can be sold and have them ready to list on Sunday. I'll try to make a several week cycle of ebay sales.

I will also be putting a few things on craigslist this weekend. A tube tv, a coffee maker, and a stereo receiver.

My old neighbors (and really good friends) are having a garage sale in my old town at the end of the month. We did garage sale together for the last five years I think. I'm interested in going mostly for the social aspect. Any profits I make would hopefully help cover the cost of gas. I will be traveling close to two hours each direction. Luckily, one of them would put me up for the night if I decide to stay over. Decisions, decisions.

That the selling status update from here!

I already sold an item on ebay. Remember how I mentioned Box Tops for Education several months back? That's what I sold. A simple buy it now transaction. I haven't added up my proceeds, but likely close to $10. Not bad for a little bit of paper and limited work.

My biggest advice for selling on ebay...consider everything as a possible ebay item. Take the time to look up the completed listings to see if anyone has sold the item recently and for how much. It only takes a moment to check!

What is the most unusal or profitable item you have sold on ebay in the past?

I pulled out about 5 items yesterday that I should be able to easily sell on ebay. I took pictures, found boxes and packaging, weighed the items, and did research for starting price.

I will upload my items this Sunday evening for 7 day auctions. Some will be fixed priced and may sell earlier.

I did notice that Halloween costumes are starting to be bought and sold. I have one I bought new for $50 Crazy, I know. I bought it knowing I could recoup more than half the cost on ebay. I will start the bidding at $29 and hope for a bit more.

What else do you think sells well this time of year? Anyone else selling on ebay right now? If not, join me, and lets make some money on our clutter!!

I did a rough estimate of our taxes for 2012. We have more income, less real estate taxes, and less interest on our mortgage(s)....so it looks like we will owe under $300 to the IRS this spring.

Sure, I do kind of want a refund, but I can handle that! Do you estimate your taxes before the end of year so you aren't surprised come tax day? Do you know where you stand today? Should you have more or less withheld to help ease the burden? Go estimate today!

As I've mentioned before, I'm collecting small bits of cash, primarily from non-income/free sources to pay for Christmas 2012. I call these snowflakes.

I received notification of a deposit from Ebates into my paypal account. The amount was $18.11!! The rebate is from a purchase of two ceiling fans.

I also received $3 from Pinecone from completing a survey for them yesterday.

I'm transferring that cash to my bank account where I'm keeping track of all the Christmas money I have thus far.

And if I haven't mentioned it, I already redeemed $20 worth of Swagbucks for Amazon gift cards this month!! I am only 15 away from redeeming one more.

I hope to get some things listed on ebay or craigslist this weekend. That cash will go to pay for Christmas as well!

It's practically a snowstorm around here! How is your Christmas Fund?

I heard back from Wells Fargo today. I did have to email customer service as Petunia 100 suggested. Our lending consultant never returned my email, which is fine. It probably isn't her job to handle those adjustments.

I indicated to them that our escrow account and payment was much too high considering taxes for the next year are very low.

Our payment will change from $1313.61 to $1083.56. A savings of $230.05 per month. There is an excess of funds in our escrow account in the amount of $1,840.33. I have requested they mail this money back to us. I know that the taxes will increase next year. I will likely hold the escrow money for when the taxes are increased.

However, it's our money! We should earn the interest on it, even if it is a small amount.

I do like how prompt they were in reviewing the account. I'm glad I can make the request and adjustments when necessary! It's almost like handling own escrow. Almost.

Now what to do with the payment savings? I'm thinking the truck loan might just need to benefit!

About two weeks ago, I finally moved the proceeds from our house sale to our money market account. Of course, it was a very simple transfer.

We are earning 1.35% on the money, as a special offer from FNBO Direct. Along with the other money in the account we earned a whopping $17.05 in August. It's something that is better than nothing.

Are you earning a good interest rate on your savings? How much? And where?

I've been adding small amounts of money since the beginning of the year, which I refer to as snowflakes, towards our Christmas Fund. As of August 31, the balance of our fund is $856.86!! My goal was $750 and we have surpassed that this month.

Here's where the money came from this month:


Can you believe it? $174 in one month!!

We also have accumulated reward points on a debit and credit card that so far could be redeemed for cash in the amount of $152.75. I have yet to redeem so that cash is not included in our snowflake total.

This snowball is rolling! And there will be no need to worry about money for Christmas gifts.

I'm not going to be frugal with water today. I know a complete opposite post for a savings blog!!

I have to wash sheets for guests this weekend. I bought new towels that need to be washed. Also, a few of the guests are allergic to cats, so I'm washing all the bedding in that room to get it extra cat hair free! I will also do a deep vacuum cleaning in there too. And then close the door until their arrival. It's the least I can do, right?

I should also water the plants so they survive this mini heat wave we are having again. And while I'm at it, I might reach for about 8 glasses of water to drink.

Not exactly frugal, but sometimes it is just what you have to do!

Today and yesterday I redeemed

Swagbucks points for gift cards. I snagged two $5 Amazon gift cards and two $10 Gap gift cards. The Gap gift cards were on sale at Swagbucks for fewer points than usual. They call this a Braggable Bargain. I guess it is since I'm talking about it!

I have quite a few teen neices that these gift cards will be perfect for. Not sure yet, if that is the entire gift, or if I will add more. The last few years I've only given them $15 in cash, which isn't a lot, but they get plenty of gifts, so I think they are fine with it.

I have more Swagbucks I plan to redeem tomorrow. They sure help make Christmas shopping easy and free-er! I will update my Christmas Fund account status in a few days. It's been a good month! You just might be shocked at how much I've earned. Any guesses?

I'm thinking about Christmas already. I decided to pull the trigger and order two different gift cards using the points I've accumulated thus far with MyPoints.

I redeemed 3700 points for a $25 Red Robin gift card and another 1700 points for a $10 BP gift card. Both should arrive in the mail in 4-6 weeks. If I remember correctly, they usually arrive much sooner.

I will add these to my Christmas Fund. I already know who the lucky recipients are. Nice planning if I do say so myself!

I still have another 200 some points and if i accumulate enough for another gift card then good for me. Anyone else a MyPoints member? Have you redeemed anything recently or racked up a huge amount of points?

Our first new mortgage payment is coming up in a few days. I was reviewing our mortgage documents and checked our taxes due with the county that are also due on the same day. The amount due is $371. Wells Fargo is estimating taxes to be $1,751. They have collected enough funds to make that payment, too!

I think the escrow account needs to be adjusted. I want our money back!! I sent an email to our mortgage consultant. She may refer me to customer service, but I thought I'd start with her.

Our house is new construction, so I know that our taxes will eventually be a similar amount to what they estimated. But they don't need to hold that much money for over a year!

I would much rather be handling my own escrow account, but it didn't work out that way with this house and lender. I'll let you know when I have that money back in our bank account.

It seems the market is doing okay these days. I just checked out balances and it looks like things are back up. The last time I looked was in June. The S&P 500 year to date return is over 12% since the beginning of the year. Very nice!!

Have you checked your retirement balances recently. Are you happy with where things are headed? You are investing for your retirement right?

I think I have been doing so well saving up for 2012 Free Christmas because my snowflakes have a job. I read an article by The Family Ceo where she does something similar in several categories. It is kind of a way to budget, too. Check it out and let me know what you think!

Giving Income Streams New Jobs

My husband did some traveling for the Army last month. He was finally paid from the trip. Some went towards the his government card and another $200 came to us. I'm not sure at this point what his actually expenses were that may have come from our accounts originally. Not much, so I guess this is profit!

It has been over two years since he has done much traveling for the military. I don't remember how we handled it before. I'd like to save the profits towards something. I think he'd like it if I suggested another flat screen tv. We can get a deal through his brother who will sell it to us at cost. That goal will help with the motivation and help us put a system in place to track the money.

We are going to lunch today (a date), so I hope to discuss then. Perfect timing, as he is traveling back to our last town, for four days of work! More travel money might be in our future.

Do you ever profit from work traveling? Does the business offer per diem or simple reimbursement of expenses? If you profit, what do you do with the money?

I am not on a good schedule following our finances lately. I sure hope I haven't forgotten to pay a bill. What I did forget was that the automatic loan payment on our truck occurred on Friday.

We paid $29.82 in interest and $299.31 towards the principal. The new loan balance is $10,037.30.

When I saw the balance, I remembered that last month I pondered sending in additional principal to bring the balance under $10K. Obviously, I forgot that too! I'm thankful that we owe less than we did last month.

Now I'm going to cull my email to make sure I haven't missed a notice about a bill that I haven't paid.

The army has finally paid the last of our moving entitlements. This one was for 10 days of hotel expenses, just over $1200. Yippee!!

I get frustrated at how slow and inefficient the system for these travel payments are. It doesn't help that my DH doesn't always fill the travel vouchers out correctly either. You would think he could get it right after 20+ years! I do give him a break on the moving ones, since we have only done that twice now.

We were busy here last week getting the girls ready for school. We only bought 'needs' for school clothes. Bought the supplies on the list. Now for school pictures! I always buy them, because the grandparents really seem to appreciate. I always think I will hang the pictures up, but I never do! I hope this year I will.

Do you buy the school pictures? Do you give the pictures away or just buy for yourself? If you don't buy them, do you do something else?

It's nice that I check the Money Saving Mom website today. First I found that deal on haircuts for kids (see previous post) and

now $5 off a $5 purchase at Toys R Us. There are quite a few other deals that may interest you on the site as well.

I rarely shop at Toys R Us because it seems their prices are inflated and most of the things my girls want now don't come from toy stores. I did print the coupon off with my nephew in mind. His birthday is next month and he will be visiting me just before.

I did spent just over $4 out of pocket after the coupon was tallied. I purchased three things, primarily Hot Wheels! I hope the gift is a hit. If not, I included a gift receipt.

Nice to have one thing crossed off my list. I likely got him a little more than I would have without the coupon! That makes me happy.

I noticed in JC Penney's store a couple days ago that kids can get a free haircut in the month of August. You do need to call to schedule an appointment and it is for kids K-6.

Here's a link to the Penney's website for more details.

Turns out I already paid to get my girls haircut and they are over the cutoff in age as well. It's all good though. I hope someone else gets a chance to get something for free!

Did you already take advantage of the offer? Tell us about it!

I have received $6 in Pinecone survey money this month and accumulated over 1700 Swagbucks so far. So the snowflakes are coming along!

I haven't been blogging as much because school activities are ramping up as the school year is set to begin this week. School shopping, orientations, band camp and parent meetings definitely take some time!

The finances are a bit of a mess, but the cash is there and will be cleaned up soon. We are still waiting on a payment from the government for our hotel stay. Fingers crossed it is finally approved and paid this week!

We received all of our new utility bills. The phone, internet, basic tv is the worst. It is a combined bill and includes installation and activation fees. It is also prorated for the first month and then the full amount for August. It's nearly $300! It looks like monthly it is about $110, which still seems a bit crazy. We have never paid for 'cable' before. We are a much more rural this time and wanted to make sure we had at least basic reception...which is about $30 a month.

The water was better at about $80. It includes trash, water, sewer and sewer debt (of $18). I would rather pay $18 a month for sewer lines than to do without!!

And the electric bill was not for a full month and it was during the hottest month ever. Well it sure felt like it! It came in at $98.

Now it's time to pay them. And figure out which paycheck I should/can pay them from going forward. Time to budget!!

We sold all of our moving boxes to a craigslist buyer last night for $75 cash. The couple is moving into a house pretty close to us. It's a local move for them, but they need to store their things for about a month before their house will be ready to move into.

So I guess this qualifies as our first snowflake for August! And we have met our Christmas fund goal of $750. Our new total is $757.86. I expect to keep adding to the fund until shopping begins!

We purchased two ceiling fans online to match some that were installed in our house. The girls feel a little stuffy in their room without fans. It's pretty typical for us to have to add them in all the homes we have been in. I've even installed one all by myself before!

I attempted to use ShopatHome, but there was not rebate with them for the site I was using. I used Ebates for the first time. I used a coupon for 12% off, and then ebates offered $5 for a sign up bonus and a rebate of 5%. I also used our Chase card that will give another 1% back. On what have been a nearly $300 purchase, I saved $56.49!!

I will add the rebate money to our Christmas fund. I'm expecting $75 today when we sell our moving boxes to a craigslist buyer. I'll add that to the fund as well.

Do you use Ebates or ShopatHome for your online purchases? What is your best online saving tip for shopping?

We purchased two ceiling fans online to match some that were installed in our house. The girls feel a little stuffy in their room without fans. It's pretty typical for us to have to add them in all the homes we have been in. I've even installed one all by myself before!

I attempted to use ShopatHome, but there was not rebate with them for the site I was using. I used Ebates for the first time. I used a coupon for 12% off, and then ebates offered $5 for a sign up bonus and a rebate of 5%. I also used our Chase card that will give another 1% back. On what have been a nearly $300 purchase, I saved $56.49!!

I will add the rebate money to our Christmas fund. I'm expecting $75 today when we sell our moving boxes to a craigslist buyer. I'll add that to the fund as well.

Do you use Ebates or ShopatHome for your online purchases? What is your best online saving tip for shopping?

Well, no mortgage payment is due this month since we closed at the beginning of last month. We already paid the interest that was due when we closed. Next month our mortgage payment will be about $1300.

If I was smart and thought it would work I'd make an extra principal payment, but it seems when you move there are so many things to buy! I'd rather hold on to that cash for now.

So far we have purchased blinds, paint, queen mattress and bedding (for guests), a drill, and a high speed router. Tomorrow we have a water softener being intalled. We will rent that, since don't know if we could recoup the upfront cost while we live here. I dislike the extra payment, but I'm sure I can set up on billpay and not think too much more about it!

For now I'll just enjoy the lack of paying a bank for another month! What would you do? Make a payment, partial payment or enjoy a mortgage free month?

Here are the snowflakes accumulated in July:



I'm in shock! I had no idea that I added so much to our Christmas fund this month. Nearly $100. I guess I was motivated. It sure helps to have goals on Swagbucks everyday too. Apparently, I'm a sucker for quite a few of those!

Our Christmas fund is so close to our $700 goal with $682.86. Or was our goal $750? Either way we are close! I'm guessing I'll exceed it by quite a bit.

How is your Christmas fund coming along? Have you started saving yet? Something saved is better than nothing. Start today!! And join

Swagbucks if you need a way to make a few dollars. Yes, that is a referral link. Good luck!

As a way to help our girls adjust to our new home we promised to paint their rooms. I did one yesterday and the other is half done at this point. One daughter picked the same color she had in the last house, which does remind us of the old house. The other picked a bold aqua color!

We needed to buy two gallons for each room. After the first room we did end up with half gallon left over. I expect the same for the second room. We always do two coats, but this paint from Lowe's seems to be covering pretty well after one. But since we bought it and can't return it we are using the second gallon. Lesson learned with this paint, we might just need one coat in future rooms! Sure saves time and money.

Do you do your own painting? Or do you hire it out? Or do you decorate in another way?

I redeemed my accumulated Swagbucks in the last two days. Here's what I redeemed them for:

3 $5 Amazon Gift Cards
1 $10 Banana Republic Gift Card

I also donated 100 Swagbucks to the chariy of the month which is

charity:water. I hope to accumulate some more before the end of the month that I will donate as well. This is the first month I felt motivated to donate to the charity. I think it is such a good one. Who doesn't need clean water to drink and bathe with?

I'm adding the gift cards to my snowflake balance for July. I will update the increase for July at the end of the month!

My husband received a check in the mail from the apartment complex. His deposit was $125 last July. They deducted $45 for carpet cleaning, even though he left the carpet in clean shape. The check that arrived was for $80.

We are happy with the amount considering that the apartment complex seemed to nickel and dime everything. Finally, we are done dealing with them!!

My daughter also received a $25 birthday check from her grandma. She seems to have quite a bit of money now. She went through some old papers recently and found cash in one birthday card and a Target gift card in another. I believe it was $35. We are pretty sure that money is from her birthday prior to the one she had this month!

A couple of cat pictures since everyone liked the partial shot in the bedroom pictures in my last post:


Sleeping in the kennel at the hotel.

Big yawn captured by my older daughter.

A new favorite sleeping spot.

The new spot is on a ledge between the window and our couch. Cozy!

Sleeping upside down on my youngest daughter's bed. My cat knew I was taking the picture. She doesn't mind!