Creditcardfree's Personal Finance Blog

next week!!

I mentioned last week when I made a $1000 payment to our home equity loan that I hoped the Army would pull through with some money so that I could pay off the loan before April 1. The good news! Yes. The money I was hoping for will be here next week.

I peeked at my husband's pay stub for next week. They are not withholding taxes and have paid us the Hazard Fire Pay that he is due from being in the zone this month. (I expect him home Sunday. Happy Dance!) This is an extra $780!!

I already have $917, okay let's round that to $920, that I plan to pull from the regular paycheck funds.

If you are following along, you know that equals $1700 to put toward the loan payoff next week.

I'm also scheduled to make our regular payment of $118.01, which at least $116 will go to principal, if I make the big payment first!

It seems I will be about $183 short of paying this loan off. I'm now looking for some extra cash. In the end I think I'll pull it from some emergency funds. I can pay us back when my husband gets paid midmonth!

We are so close. Yipee!!

Yes, I do. I calculate things for fun. It can be inspiring and upsetting, but it is mostly just for fun.

Recently, I decided to calculate how quickly we could pay off ALL of our debt. This would include the home equity loan, our van loan and our mortgage.

I made some assumptions in our calculations. That we wouldn't save for college. That we aren't moving. That nothing unexpected would happen. Remember this is just for fun. I also assumed we wouldn't sell the car and purchase my husband a truck.

So, how long? You want to know, right? Just under 4.5 years! OMG! I couldn't believe we could achieve that so quickly. Turns out that would be just before my oldest daughter graduates high school and heads of to college.

The calculations get you thinking. Would this be a worthy goal? Is it possible? Do we want to have our mortgage paid off while we put two kids through college? It sounds like a nice idea.

I highly recommend calculating for fun. It opens doors of possibilities. At least for me!

The first entry regarding this: the loan on our Honda Odyssey.

We bought it used 1.5 years ago. The interest rate is 3.9%. We borrowed $26,955. I don't like writing that number, but I do LOVE driving my van. It's the most expensive vehicle we have ever owned. Prior to this, the most we spent on a vehicle was about $12K. The plan is to keep it as long as possible, which could be a long time. It's a Honda.

Today our current loan balance is $18,579.87. I just made our regular payment and $433 went to principal.

This will be the next debt we attack once we finish up the home equity loan. It's almost like starting over again with the home equity loan. In fact, it is MORE money than the home equity loan was.

And in case your curious. Our only other debt is our first mortgage on our home.

Went to the dealer for an oil change on our Honda Odyssey. They have changed owners and no longer price match competitors. Darn!

Turns out I need a couple filters, tire rotation and alignment. I let them change the filters. They were pretty gross! I don't think I want to comment on how much they were. I only wonder, if I could have picked them up cheaper elsewhere and changed them myself. The van is still new, so lot of the parts, are not available elsewhere. We had it happen with the rear windshield wiper blade. I will look into it, so I'm better prepared next time!

I will definitely get the rotation and tire alignment, but probably next month. I need to get through winter and stop running into pot holes first! This will cost just under $250. Ugh! Apparently well worth it to extend the life of our expensive tires. The van is on its first set, makes me wonder how much the tires are!

I'm taking a break from selling on ebay. It does become a bit of a chore at times. I also have a lot going on here at home with my husband out of town. In fact, I had to get up early and shovel the driveway! I'm volunteering some of my time up at the elementary school book fair, as well.

I have more things to sell, so I will get back to it in the next week or two. How is everyone else doing with their sales?

My valentine is in another country and I still got an email wishing me a Happy Valentine's Day! I'll take it.

We don't usually go all out on this day anyway. Some cards and a few flowers are given. This year, I bought the girls each a card, and one bag of candy that I divided up for them. I snuck a few pieces for myself, too. Tonight we will have pasta for dinner by candlelight, which is also a tradition.

------------

I requested a cash out from My Survey last night. I will get a $10 check in a couple of weeks. It seems they are awarding fewer points for each survey.

Last week, for Super Bowl Sunday, we opened a block of Kraft cheese to find mold on the sides. Eww! We threw it out. I ran to the store for more (picked another brand). On Monday, I emailed Kraft about the issue. Kraft responded with an apology. They are also sending me a $2 check to reimburse me for the purchase. Kraft is good!

Since we are getting very close to paying off the home equity loan, I decided to check in to the payoff procedures. It looks like I will need to mail certified funds. Our bank will charge us $5 for the check, which I can request online and have them mail for us. No charge for snail mail.

Right now, I make all of our payments online, so I find this certified funds a little annoying. Seriously, if my electronic funds have been good thus far why do the last few dollars have to be official? Okay...I do kind of get why, since they are releasing the lien the bank wants to know the funds are good. Right? Just a tad irritating. I'll deal with it.

I plan to pay most of the loan electronically and leave the last $50 to $100 to be sent by certified check. The location for this check to be mailed to is just down the road from me. Might take two minutes to get there if I drove a check down, but I guess they probably don't accept walk ins!

Makes me think I should go get a job down the road processing mortgage payments. That might be fun.

I made a big $1000 payment to our home equity loan today. Nearly $200 of that came from recent sales for my ebay challenge. The remaining amount came from earned income.

New Balance: $1,999

We are getting so close. I really hope by this time next month we have the loan paid off!!

We have had over 50 inches of snow this year in my city. Normal year is 19 inches! As you can imagine the snow piles up. It especially piles up on the section between the street and the sidewalk. We also happen to live the second house from a corner. As a result, my neighbor and I get a lot of snow dumped at the bottom of our driveways when they plow the streets. So we get our our shovels and snowblowers and add it to the pile by the sidewalks!

The snow pile by the sidewalk was starting to affect my ability to get mail because so much snow was wrapped around the mail box and piling up into the street. It was even getting difficult to lift the snow onto the pile that is over my shoulders! I contacted my city Wednesday afternoon about removing some snow near our driveway and mailbox. I included my neighbor in my request.

The city was out first thing yesterday morning with a plow and dump truck hauling away our snow. There is still some snow, but it looks so much better and will be easier to deal with when the next snow round comes. Turns out that is tomorrow!

I love quick service.

I withdrew $120 of my ebay and book sale proceeds from my paypal account. This money will arrive in my account in a couple days.

The really exciting news about this is that it will all go to the home equity loan! I think I can get the loan to under $2K once we hit pay day. You know that makes me happy!

-------
I did get to talk to my husband twice yesterday before his plane left. That always relaxes me. He's probably still in the air...it is a long flight!

My husband left today for a 10 day trip to the combat zone where he'll be stationed this year. Yep, one of the lucky ones to be up high enough on the chain to go check out what the mission will be. That means we get a trial run here at home. I'm so NOT excited.

If you haven't already discovered the freedom or escrow account for paying bills, you are missing out. A freedom account allows you to save up to pay for semiannual or annual expenses. You could even use it to save up for unexpected and expected auto repairs.

On my sidebar you can look at 'Our Escrow Account' to see the things we save up for and pay out of our freedom account. Often, it can be difficult to start this type of account because you need to fund it with a beginning amount, so that when the first bill comes in you have the money ready to pay. This is especially true, if your auto registrations are two months away and would only have a month or so of funding available.

If you want to start one, you might consider starting yours with your tax refund. Or part of your tax refund. I find it is helpful to keep these funds in a second checking account. Ours is mixed in with some other funds, but I keep track of our freedom account balance in an Excel spreadsheet.

Just something to think about. It really does wonders for your finances.

Our auto insurance increased six months ago and now has decreased. We will save about $5/month or $30 for six months. It gets confusing when they make changes to premiums even though we did not make any changes ourselves.

When the policy renewal came, it was mentioned that we could sign up for accident forgiveness for less than $1/month. Turns out for us, it is $0.24 per month or $2.88 per year. I decided to sign up. The benefits outway the costs!

We pay for our auto insurance every six months, but save for it each pay day in our escrow account. Right now I put $78 away each payday towards auto insurance and other non monthly bills. You can see our details on Escrow Account page on my sidebar. I'm not going to adjust the savings because of this auto premium change. It just means there will be a little extra available should any other items increase.

How often do you pay for auto insurance? Monthly? Semiannually?

My ebay auctions just ended. I sold 5 items for $41.01! Two auctions did not sell. I'm not going to list those again right now.

2010 Ebay Challenge Total
January: $201.89
February: $46.40

I've been in need of a winter coat for awhile. In became quite dire, last weekend when my zipper decided to start ripping away from the coat.

Yesterday, I hit the jackpot at Kohl's. Most of their coats are now on clearance, ranging from 60% to 80% off. I picked up a Columbia 3 in 1 coat. The original tag reads $220. It was 80% off yesterday. I had an additional 15% off purchase coupon. With tax, I paid $39.64 for this great coat. You have no idea how excited I am!

It is a little amusing to me that I did get this coat. I tried it on before Christmas when it was on a regular sale of 40% off. At the time, I couldn't justify the expense to myself. On Monday, I was at Kohl's and this same coat was only 30% off. I skipped this one, but looked at others and didn't buy because the sizes were wrong in the others. This led me to another Kohl's on Friday to find the size I wanted in this other coat. The second choice coat was not marked down nearly as much as the one I ended up buying. It just seems to have worked out! I love it when that happens.

I wore it yesterday while I shoveled the driveway. It was very warm. Yipee!

I made another half.com sale today! I will add $5.39 to my Ebay challenge totals. I have 7 listings on Ebay that end Sunday, so I will have another update then.

2010 Ebay Challenge Total
January: $201.89
February: $5.39

I didn't get the email about the half.com sale until late this afternoon, after the mailman had come by already. I will mail the item tomorrow. If I can fit the item in my mailbox, I save myself the trip of going to the post office.

I converted two thirds of our Traditional IRA accounts to Roth IRA's today. It's a bit scary to pull the trigger, when you know it is a taxable event.

I'm have already looked into the tax consequences and they are quite favorable for us as most of our earned income will not be taxed this year due to the combat zone exclusion. Of course, we still have to pay taxes, but not much different than a normal year for us.

I will decide about the remainder of the IRA balances later.

is becoming flush with funds! I usually don't hold any money in there, but with the ongoing ebay sales the funds are accumulating.

Yesterday, Powell's books deposited my proceeds from the books I sent them. They did reject one small paperback and deducted $0.50 for it. I'm okay with that.

I also decided to let Pinecone Research start depositing my survey payments in my paypal account as well. I look forward to getting paid more quickly! Now, I just need them to send me another survey. It seems like they have dried up a bit. My last paid survey with them was early January and before that it was in October.

Right now, I'm thinking I will just hold on to my paypal funds. I might designate it the Christmas fund or at some point cash out and send it to the home equity loan. The latter is probably the best idea. We'll see if I need it to make my mid March goal.

My girls are home early today from school. We pulled out the red and pink construction paper and made heart decorations for the house. The front window is overflowing with hearts now.

My youngest still exchanges with classmates at school. She made her Valentines out of pink and red card stock we already owned. She stenciled on some decor in marker. She is writing each name, as well as her own. We also bought a bag of Jolly Rancher's to attach one candy to each valentine card. I spent about $2!

Did you every think what a 'jolly rancher' must look like when you buy those candies? For some reason I find it a bit humorous!

There will not be any other big spending on Valentine's here. We usually keep it low key with a normal dinner by candle light. The girls think it is fantastic!

Do you do anything special for Valentine's day? Is it frugal or extravagant?

Finally! I get to report that the balance on our home equity loan is lower.

I made a regular payment on Friday. The principal portion was $93.85. Today, I made a large extra principal payment in the amount of $906.69.

Home Equity Loan Balance = $2,999.00

We are getting closer to getting this paid in full. I hope to finish it off in March if some extra money from the Army comes to fruition. Fingers are crossed!

I just sold 4 more items on ebay this evening for $23.67! I also listed another 7 items that will end next Sunday. These new sales mean my total for the Ebay challenge this month is twice my goal of $100!

2010 Ebay Challenge Total
January: $201.89

What are you waiting for? It's time to sale that clutter on ebay!

In light of my previous post, where my husband and I determined that we will pay off our van loan before saving for a truck, I revised the 2010 goals.

1) Max out our Roth IRA's = $10,000
2) Save 7% of basic pay in TSP
3) Pay off home equity loan
4) Save money for college = $3,300
5) Add money to emergency fund = $7,000
6) Pay off van beginning balance = $19,444
7) Convert IRA's to Roth IRA's

I have deleted the goal to save for the truck in 2010. We will end up being able to save quite a bit of cash at the beginning of 2011 for the truck.

Since, I have already made one regular van payment in 2010, our current balance is now, $19,012.14. I will start a ticker on the side once this becomes our primary goal. This will not occur until at least June of this year.

It is good to have goals and know what you want to accomplish. I'm looking forward to working on this new plan!

Just had a discussion with my husband about whether to pay down the van loan or just make regular payments and save the extra funds towards his new truck. He said focus on the debt we have!

His reason was simply that he has not decided which vehicle to get when he returns from deployment. I will have about $10K to put toward this purchase even with a paid off van.

Obviously, I'm still first and foremost focused on the home equity loan. Following that will be the van loan.

I updated our 2010 financial goals on my page to the left. Previously, I had left the amounts blank. I did not know at the time what amounts I could allocate to each area. Now I know.

1) Max out our Roth IRA's = $10,000
2) Save 7% of basic pay in TSP
3) Pay off home equity loan
4) Save money for college = $3,300
5) Add money to our emergency fund = $7,000
6) Pay down van loan = $7,500
7) Save cash for a truck = $7,350
8) Convert IRA's to Roth IRA's

I'm not entirely decided about paying extra on the van loan. It is at 3.9% interest rate. The next truck loan will probably be higher, so it may be better to simply save for the truck, to reduce the amount we would need to borrow. It's hard to decide when it is over a year away.

I'm just realizing that most of our goals are saving! Cool.

I made another sale on half.com! I actually sold two dvd's to one customer. My net proceeds were $6.13.

2010 Ebay Challenge Total
January: $178.22

What is up with half.com's notification of sales? I actually went to the site early this morning and it didn't show any new sales. Then around 11am today, I receive an email about the sales that was stamped 3:44am! What? Half.com could you improve your notification, please!!

I found some more items to sell on ebay. It looks like I will have at least 7 listings to start on Sunday.

I usually leave my husband's things alone. But I did ask yesterday, if he had any books to get rid of. He brought me 5 out of probably the 15 he owns! One will be a money maker since it is a recent book release. The others will go on half.com until the next garage sale.

Since last summer, I have had the girls Bratz dolls, Barbie dolls and My Little Pony's to get rid of. I tried listing the Bratz dolls on craigslist, but did not get a response. I might try that route again with all three items. They do sell on ebay, but because shipping can be high for a big lot, the price people pay isn't what I want out of them. I don't believe we have anything rare that would bring a higher price. I will keep thinking about it.

I'm having a good time with the sales. I'm very motivated with this goal this year!!

I e-filed our taxes last Wednesday. Both were accepted in less than 24 hours!

I can see that the state refund is a pending deposit in our checking account for tomorrow. I expect to see our federal refund on Friday, since that is the expected deposit date they listed when our return was accepted.

Fast. I like fast.

I hope to get some of this money in to our home equity loan next week. I will finally get to write an update!!

I sold a CD on Half.com today. My net profit after the commission and shipping is $1.28. Can't complain, right?

Ebay Challenge Totals:
January $172.09

I already have a bid on one of my ebay items this week. I also have people watching two of the other three. The auctions still have six more days to go, so I'm very pleased.

Last night all three of my auctions sold!! I'm amazed sometimes at what people will pay for things. It is always a nice surprise.

My total sales were $46.49. I sold four items between the three auctions. Much better than a garage sale!

Ebay Challenge Totals:
January $170.81

I have another set of 4 auctions up for this week. They are primarily books. I will spend some of my time this week, getting auctions ready to start on Sunday. I might as well keep going, since it is going so well.

I think we can convert our Roth IRA's in 2010 without any money out of pocket. In fact, I expect we will still get a refund.

Approximate calculations:
$54,940 AGI
($12,100) itemized deductions
($14,600) personal exemptions (4)
$23,240 Taxable Income

$3,398 Tax before credits
($2,000) Child tax credits (2)
($400) Retirement savings credit
$998 Total Tax

$814 Withholding
$800 Making work pay credit
$1,614 Total Payments

Payments - Tax = $616 Refund

AGI includes 2010 taxable income, roth conversions, interest income and 2009 state refund. Most of our income in 2010 will be non taxable because of it will be earned in a combat zone.

We qualify, just barely income wise, for the retirement saver's credit on our 2010 roth contributions, which we will max out this year.

I'm being very conservative with our itemized deductions as well. We may end up donating more or having a little bit more interest to deduct since we have yet to pay off the home equity loan.

If I convert less money to the roth's we could actually qualify for the earned income tax credit. Crazy. Financially, it will be our best year yet. One scenario I ran where we qualified for the EITC, we would receive a refund of $2875.

Can you see anything wrong with the detailed plan above?