Yeeeeah…September has been a budgetary failure for me. There are many reasons why this is the case, but in simple terms there are more fixed and semi-fixed costs that I have to take care of, and I haven’t yet reduced my variable costs to compensate. I’m not made of money; I shouldn’t act like I am. Anyway, I have decided that October will be a well-budgeted month. No surprises, I hope. No feeling sorry for myself.
Tag Archive: budget
Borrowing to get ahead?
Last year, due to all of the contract weirdness I ended up with some cash bonuses which sent me into another bracket. At the time I decided to put a chunk of change into my RRSP to offset the increase. Knowing that I was taxed heavily, I was determined to get some of it back at refund time. A few months ago, prior to the RRSP deadline I was nudged by the bank to borrow to get ahead. The sold me on the low interest rate. In my mind I figured that using my refund I could dump the money into paying back what I borrowed. I could swing that! I’d be getting more money back from the government and boosting my RRSP with minimal pain. At least, that’s what I thought. Months later, I’m sort of cursing my decision. I followed through, to be sure. Still, the refund wasn’t enough to cover what I borrowed: I’m still paying that bit of debt off. It has been squeezing my budget for the past few months. My goal is to erase that borrowed debt as fast as I can so I’ve been sending fair bits to it, but it’s made me uncomfortable. Borrowing to get ahead? Sucks! You have to pay things back eventually. The rewards aren’t worth the gut issues.
Do I really need it?
Earlier today I met up with a friend to check out the local Costco. My big intention for heading there was to pick up a duvet. In my condo, overnight I turn down the thermostat to about 62°F (16-17°C) in order to conserve energy. Despite being under a heavy blanket, I usually find myself chilly, especially during nights when the winds are out of control. So, I decided that I should graduate to having a duvet. I’d never had one in the past, so it never really crossed my mind. It wasn’t until I had read up on them that I thought, why the heck don’t I have one of those? Scandanavians seem to use them all the time. Why not us here?
So, over in Costco we just started out by wandering around the aisles, looking around and pawing at the merchandise. It’s such a mad house in there. So many shoppers! Through the food aisles we had good laughs at the container sizes of each thing. Is there really a need for a 3.78L (1 gallon) container of Miracle Whip? How about like…2.5 kilos of tuna in one can? I suppose there is a need if you have a big family. Where does that leave single people like us though? There’s absolutely no need for us to be in there, right? At least, that’s what I thought until I saw some decent prices for the non-food stuff. I had to control my urges to buy things that I didn’t really mind. For example, I saw a great price for the Garmin Forerunner 305. I have a 205 and I use that in conjunction with a Polar F6 heart rate monitor. When I run, I wear both watches. I might look like a fool but they get the job done. A 305 would combine both, and provide the ability to graph all of the info together. I told myself that I was perfectly fine with the two watches, so I just moved on. Walking through Costco is truly an exercise in restraint. I constantly have to ask: do I really need it?
I did make it out with my Queen-sized duvet, however I also bought some clothes and a Wii game, so…yeah…I didn’t do I great job staying on task. Pity. Tomorrow I’ll go hunting for a duvet cover. I’ll be able to stay warm tonight, but at the expense of a lighter wallet.
*sigh*
Examining the grocery bill
I honestly need to be a little bit more careful when I go grocery shopping. The past few times I’ve gone I’ve ended up buying so much food. You’d think I was preparing for some big approaching natural disaster. OK, so maybe that’s an exaggeration. If I think about it, the last time I went grocery shopping was right after Thanksgiving. Still, was there really any reason me to fill up two of those black PC bags and a green bin? Really.
Perhaps it’s because I’m still in that phase where I’m stocking up on basics. For example, there would be no reason for me to buy olive oil every time I go out, right? That was $5.99. Meat is pretty expensive, too. Luckily one tray of meat tends to last for a few days. I bought bacon and separated it into 3-strip packages prior to freezing it. I don’t eat that daily, so it’ll last for around 3 weeks. Have you tried to buy boxed fish lately? I got a box of High Liner fish fillets, and that cost me $11.49. That’s ridiculous! I think I recall that being cheaper in previous years. Or perhaps I’m thinking of the really oily fish cuts–those tend to be cheaper. Even if they’re cheaper, it doesn’t mean I want them. A few weeks ago I bought a box of English-style haddock fillets. I’m sure that was cheaper than this box. Thing is, holy crap, that fish was ridiculously oily. I had to blot the pieces prior to eating them. Even after that, I just didn’t feel great eating them. In that case, the extra cost is worth it.
I wonder how much this new healthy streak is affecting what I’m getting. Remember how I was talking about buying a lot of fresh fruit before? I got carried away this time as well. Maybe it’s for the best. Some of the fruit I bought last week went bad and I had to bin it. I told myself that next time I get fruit I better work hard to eat it all before it goes to waste. Well, with that much in the fridge, I better make sure to get in the recommended servings of fruits and veggies or else it’ll be like I’m just tossing cash to the wind. Part of the solution is knowing what spoils quickly, and to plan to eat all that as soon as possible.
So, OK. All things considered, I guess I don’t have that much useless stuff on the list. Everything is stashed properly and should hold long enough for me to get to it. It’s part of the price of independence, isn’t it?
Prospects for the future
I’m not really one to write out whole end-of-year run downs at this time of year. I usually save that type of post for my birthdays because doing it then makes it so much more personal in my mind. Regardless of that though, I guess I don’t mind thinking about what 2009 has in store for me.
It’s obvious that big things are on the way. I mean, I’m going to be living on my own, and taking on a mortgage. What exactly does that mean, though? Well, for one, it means that I’m going to have to find my footing to see if I can still maintain my quality of life with all of the new outward flows of cash. The most desirable outcome is to be able to live my life as comfortably as I’m living right now with my parents. However, to I have enough cash floating around to keep it up? That remains to be seen.
Career-wise, I don’t see too much change in 2009. I’d venture that there’s a 50/50 chance of reviews happening and me getting a nice raise. Four of us on a team of seven started at about the same time. If something doesn’t happen soon in terms of someone out there providing incentive to stay, I’m figuring that there will be a shakeup in the group, and morale will plummet. I know that’s not a rosy picture, but as it is I don’t think the team (as solid as it is right now) can stay as is forever.
My activity of running will continue. I’m still on the fence about joining the marathon group, but once again, that’s a bridge I’ll cross when I come to it. I’m going to need to figure out how to make the commute from my new digs to the store north of the city. It’ll be tough, and I know that I’m going to get with with gas costs, but Im so familiar with the people there that I can’t imagine running at any other location. Good thing I have a car.
Anyway, I have a headache right now. I think I may have picked up some random illness from someone at work. I’m coughing and feeling gross overall. I might just curl up in bed and sleep off the night. Yes, it’s such a kill joy thing to do, but I can’t say I’m interested enough to usher in the new year awake.
(Plus I think I’m just really tired).
In any case, I wish everyone reading this a very happy new year. May it being each one of you much happiness in these gloomy times.
Tentative to confirmed
I came home to find a registered letter from the condo builder. I knew it was possible that the letter would contain good news, but I knew that it was even more likely to contain something more bittersweet. Seems my hunch was correct. For the longest time, talk of the possession date has been prefaced with the term “tentative.” With this letter the term has now changed to “confirmed.” Great! Right? That’s all well and good, but the actual quoted date has changed from April 8 to May 25.
Unlike the last time the date changed, I’m actually quite at peace with this change. This move means I’ll have another two pay cheques banked by this new date. I’ve mentioned this as well last time: it allows me more time to gather more resources. I’ll have enough to post a 20% down payment, but is that a good use of money when I need cash to pay for appliances and furniture as well? We’ll see.
Once again, I’ve reset the clock on the widget to the right. Right now it’s saying “Only 5 months and 7 days left.” All in all, that’s not that long from now. I’m still psyched–none of this will dampen my enthusiasm. 2009 will be an awesome year.
Meeting again with the design consultant
I had an appointment with the builder’s design consultant this morning. Apparently the company that was originally going to supply the cabinetry for all the condo units went under, meaning that I had to come in to see and approve the substitutions. I parked at the station lot and made the short walk over to the office. As I walked by my future building I noticed that my unit had the windows and patio doors installed. Wow, man. That means that my unit is now enclosed and somewhat shielded from the weather. That’s really good news because with the cold weather encroaching upon us I don’t want any delays due to construction people not being able to do anything useful in the skin-numbing winds. That’s pretty much what the consultant told me: they wanted to get the shell up as soon as possible so that they could continue working through winter. Makes sense.
Next to the condo building, work is already well under way on a new recreation centre. I really appreciate the fact that there’ll be such a place just a few steps away from where I’ll be. There’s been talk that the factory north of the community will be torn down and replaced with commercial developments including a bank and maybe a grocery store. God, there’s so much going on around this place that it’s almost unbelievable, you know? I’m completely looking forward to seeing just how transformed this area will be in two years. Right now it’s a tad bleak, but the potential is all there.
Anyway, the appointment was really quick and painless. The original cabinets were labelled as having the stain colour “espresso” but who are they kidding? The colour was basically black. This new cabinet stain colour by the new company is also labelled “espresso” but isn’t black. Instead, it’s a dark brown that’s somewhat warmer than the previous ones. I think this is a great substitution because dark brown is simply more visually interesting. For these cabinets, I was given a choice among a wide selection of handles. For the old cabinets, there was no choice–either I took the ugly handles that they had or just specified them not to put the handles on at all. I opted to not have the handles installed because the specified ones were just damn ugly. In its place, I was planning on just getting these long, chunky metallic ones. I had the image in mind and was determined to have it look right. Well, among the selection of handles for the new cabinets was basically the type of handle I was thinking of. Sure, the sample was smaller than I had imagined, but it had the same aesthetic. And it was free! So yeah, that was one less thing I had on my mind.
One of the upgrades that I signed for was to switch the electrical switches from the skinny ones to the fat Decora switches. For whatever reason, that option suddenly became standard, meaning that the several hundred I paid for that option was going to be refunded to me. That extra $500+ was already basically a sunk cost in my mind so I asked if there was anything else I could throw the money toward. I ended up asking for a cold water line for my fridge. Even with that added though it seems that the builder will still end up refunding me some cash. Really, I have to ask, how the heck did that happen? In effect, I’ve added another option, and they still owe me. Ha!
There are only four months and a bit left before I can move in. I am ridiculously excited!
Stay locked, damn it!
On the way in this morning it started to rain a little bit so I turned on the wipers. That’s the point when my day turned sour because all of a sudden my car problem started occurring once more.
Damn it!
The car was doing well for the past week or so. I wasn’t having any issues with the lights at night. I didn’t attempt to use the wipers because frankly I was afraid that the problem would reappear. Go figure that it took a bit of rain to get me to actually test them out.
On the train, all I could think about was how draining this issue was. I’m spending a lot of energy just taking the car in to let the mechanic have a look. My mind was going through some tough scenarios. For example, what if the mechanic just can’t find the issue? I can’t risk driving at night in the wintertime with the problem there. What if the lights cut out and the wipers stop working during a storm? That’s not only a safety hazard to myself but also to everyone around me. In my worst case scenario, I’d have to look for another new/used car. That’s all well and good, but damn, can I even afford to go down that route? Those financial experts on TV say that a person’s debt load should not go over 32% of the person’s net income. Well, with my mortgage on the horizon I don’t think I can reasonably swing making car payments with going into 50-60%. That’s certainly no way to live, is it? I was feeling downright sick to my stomach thinking about how all of this will relate to my income. Sure, I can afford a car, but if it means relying on Mr. Noodle for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for a good long while then there just isn’t any sense in doing in.
Oh, but of course, there’s no point freaking out about hunting for a car just yet. I have to wait and see what the mechanic has in mind. I’m certainly still have faith in his abilities. However, this type of thing may be beyond anyone’s ability. That kind of scares me.
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