moving is stressful

The title basically says it all. Not much posting going on this week, since it's been all about packing up in the morning and unpacking after work at night. We were lucky enough to get the keys to the new condo on Monday, so we've been moving in the small stuff a few boxes at a time.

Of course, the moving expenses just never stop. We've already spent the aforementioned $48 on boxes, and now we can add to that $147 for the moving truck, plus Canada Post wanted $40 for 6 months of mail forwarding. I figure that's a pretty good deal, but that was the minimum! I wish there was an option for 3 months at $20. Last time we did the mail forward I had all my mail coming directly to the new address within a month!

I've saved up my last paycheque in anticipation of all this. I scaled back my debt repayment, we haven't done a lot of grocery shopping, and I've done zero shopping for anything else. This way I will have the moving expenses covered, along with my half of the June rent for the place we're leaving (boy, I sure feel like I'm throwing $250 away but it can't be avoided). This way, when June 1st comes along, I will be starting on my new budget with a clean slate and a regular-sized paycheque.

But I won't lie, I'm nervous. Having to put part of my first month's rent on credit was a little scary. I know I won't let it happen again, and it didn't happen under normal circumstances, but it still makes me anxious. I'm really hoping everything comes together and we make it work.

More to come on that next week after we're moved in...!

how it all started

When I opened a chequing account at a new bank a few years ago, they also handed me a line of credit worth $15,000 without me even asking. Then I opened a credit card through them as well, and they gave me a limit of $6,000. All of a sudden I had a lot of money available to me. I wasn't used to this, I only had a student credit card with a $1,000 limit. So I didn't know what to do with all the new money. In fact, it intimidated me. So I left it alone. I never touched the LOC. I put aside my student credit card (with it's exorbitantly high interest rate) and started using the new credit card (low introductory rate, of course). I never carried much of a balance. If I did, I was disciplined enough to pay it off within two or three months. And the line of credit just sat there. When I logged into my bank account, every day I saw it there - $15,000.

Last January, my good old car began looking for a place to die. It was clearly time for a new one. But I had no savings (no savings account, even). And when a family member offered to sell me a great car at a huge discount, I had to take it. But how would I pay for it? Well, I walked into the bank and asked for $3000 from my line of credit. In seconds I had an envelope stuffed with $100 bills. And later that day, I had no envelope but I had a fantastic car.

But then things got sticky. Something from my past came up to bite me shortly after I got the car. See, back in '07 I made a really big mistake. I bought a new computer on impulse. I spent $1,700 on it. Bad, right? It gets worse. I opened a store credit card to do it, so I had a year of no payments, no interest on that $1,700. I made a token effort in the beginning to pay it off before the year was up, and got it down to $1,500. But then I had other bills to deal with, and I just sort of left that card alone.

Unfortunately, shortly after I bought my car, that one-year anniversary on the store card was coming up fast. And if I didn't pay off that $1,500, I was going to face an interest rate of 28% (retroactive too!). And again I thought to myself, what am I going to do? So I paid off the card in one fell swoop, using the trusty line of credit. I did this before I made a single payment towards my car.

All of a sudden that intimidating money wasn't so scary anymore. I could use it, and I could manage it! Right? No. Life happens. Shit happens. And I got myself in trouble. Just when I would start hacking that thing down and getting close to the original $3,000 balance, something would come up. Another purchase of some kind. Car repairs. Emergency surgery for my cat (that alone was $1,000 - and that's just my half). I impulse bought another computer (a Mac this time, at least) last year again - as if I hadn't learned my lesson the first time! And any good work I had done was wiped out yet again as I again paid my credit card with the line of credit to avoid the bigger interest.

At it's worst, I had just over $6,000 on the LOC. And at one time I was paying over $500 a month in a desperate attempt to get it under control. But something would always come up, and since I bought my car, I've never gotten the account down to that original $3,000. I've gotten close though - the lowest I've had it was $3,900.

Anyway, this year I have been making pretty good progress. I was cutting it down, cutting it down. I was approaching $4,000 at a pretty good pace and was almost there. But life happens, yet again. All of a sudden my job transfers me, and we have to move. Of course, a new place requires a security deposit - half a month's rent. And because we have cats, there's a pet damage deposit of another half month's rent. For our new condo, that totals $1,500. And then we have to pay June 1st's rent on top of that. So now we are writing a cheque for $3,000 and we never saw it coming.

How did I manage it this time? I drained my vacation savings account of it's measly $200. I just about drained my chequing account with a $500 withdrawl. And then I looked to my line of credit for the final $800. What about J's half? Well - he bled his chequing account dry ($300) and my line of credit had to fund the remaining $1,200.

He's promised to pay that $1,200 back over two paycheques. And he will - I've loaned him large sums of money many, many times and he's always paid it back very quickly. The question is, how quickly can I pay myself back?

Here's my current picture:

• My balance on my LOC (minus J's balance) is $5,400.
• My balance on my credit card is $820 (J has $515 on there as well - we used my card to pay for our vacation this summer, and he's paying it off a lot faster than I am).
• I have just $300 to speak of in my new RRSP account. $50 goes in there every two weeks automatically.
• I have a pension that just started through work and is worth about $600 or so.
• I have a mutual fund that tanked like everybody else's - my $1500 is worth about $600 right now.
• I have stock options that I could exercise and get about $9,000 - but not long ago, they were worth $13,000!

All told I have $6,200 of debt to pay off. I've opened a standard savings account and I absolutely must get an emergency fund in there and keep it at a respectable balance (ideally I'd like three months of living expenses, but that will take me awhile). And lastly, I've opened a high-interest, tax-free savings account that I'd like to use to save up a down payment for a house.

I've also come up with a budget that we will be using as of June 1st (will put that up in another post). That includes a plan of debt repayment at $300 per month, $100 into the RRSP, $100 into the emergency fund, and $0 into the TFSA. If I have money leftover at the end of the month, half of it will go towards debt repayment and the other half into the TFSA. I'm not counting on having any spare pennies, though.

So now you see how I got myself into this position. I know I'm not nearly as bad off as some people, but for me, this situation seems just barely manageable right now. Some days I don't think I'll ever be able to make it out and be okay. But starting now, I'm going to really and truly try.

the move begins!

Today the packing starts! I actually don't mind packing, since it gives me a chance to itemize everything we have. When we move, we're going to adjust our contents insurance. We've bought a lot of stuff since we first got our policy, so I don't think our coverage amount is adequate anymore. We're sitting at $20,000 right now and I'm thinking of boosting it to $30,000. Better to be a little on the high side! I've also gathered model & serial numbers for our electronics (we have a lot - two flat screen TV's, Wii, PS3, HD-PVR, digital box, surround sound, Macbook, desktop PC, laptop PC, two cell phones) so once I just organize the rest of our stuff a bit, I'll know for sure what we have and draw up a final list. That way if anything happens, we'll know exactly what we need to get our lives back together and be organized for insurance purposes.

Packing puts everything into perspective for me. We have a lot of stuff. We have spent a lot of money. Most of the electronics listed above were things that J bought on his own, but I definitely threw some money down too. At least we know where it all went, but at some point, you've got to step back and be happy with what you've got. And now's the time to do it! It's going to be hard for J though, I think. He's used to having a lot of disposable cash and those electronics speak for it. Today he called me wanting to buy a new mouse for his laptop, even though there's nothing wrong with his current one. He put it back, which is good...but I know it will be hard for him to get in the habit.

As for other things going on today, we picked up our first moving expense. We spent $48 on a bunch of boxes and tape from Budget. Last time we moved, we didn't buy a single thing and just collected boxes from the grocery store or wherever. This time, we opted to buy nice, sturdy, standard size boxes because we're actually going to hang onto them and put them to use. We currently rent a storage locker for things we don't have space for but need/want to keep (childhood keepsakes, winter coats, summer stuff, etc). The locker is an absolute DISASTER. The boxes are all old, falling apart, they don't match and stack well, some stuff isn't in boxes...ugh I just can't even think about it. So, after the move is done, we're going to take the boxes to storage and pack up everything properly. Our new condo comes with a storage space, so we want to make good use of it and not turn it into a pigsty!

I didn't buy too many boxes so we can reuse them all instead of waste our money by recycling them when we're done. It means we don't have enough for everything though, so we're definitely going to have to make a few trips on the move. I'm just hoping it goes smoothly and we get it over with ASAP!

simple stuff, better than nothing!

I've been sticking with a couple lifestyle changes over the past couple months - might as well celebrate even the small ones! They're nothing groundbreaking, but they work.

First up, I started cooking at home a lot more and found that I really enjoy it! My job takes a lot of creative energy and is highly stressful, so when I get home I'm not good for much of anything. Basically I either go for a run (on the good days) or sit around on the couch watching TV and surfing the net (on the bad days!). Cooking dinner has turned out to be great for unwinding. I get to work with my hands and do something constructive, eat a lot better than takeout, and have leftovers for the next day. I even get to indulge my shopaholic side by doing a bit of extra grocery shopping :)

But in the end, it's become a huge money saver. I don't get takeout for dinner nearly as much anymore, and I'm not buying lunch at work either. Most recipes I use will make 4-6 servings. Since it's just J and I, all we really need for a meal is 2 servings - but instead of halving the recipe, I make it as directed and package up two tupperware containers of leftovers that make an easy lunch.

I used to spend about $10 on lunch at least twice a week. And I probably spent about $30 on various takeout/prepared dinner. So I could go through $50 easily in one week...$200 in one month. And I'd still be buying $50 worth of groceries (boxed/frozen stuff) each week. Now I spend around $40-$50 per week on groceries (meats/produce/dairy), and as close to $0 as I can get on takeout, saving myself almost $200 a month.

The other big one was COFFEE. I never did get up early enough to hit Starbucks before work each morning, but at some point during the afternoon or evening I would grab a $5 coffee without even thinking about it. I would get maybe three or four a week, meaning I was spending up to $80 a month of coffee. No more. I set the coffeepot timer at night and take a mug in the car on my way to work, which usually satisfies the craving for the entire day. I'll still get one Starbucks coffee on the weekend, but I limit myself to just that. And I usually order the smallest size now, so I'm spending a little less (about $3.50 or so).

All in all, that's a total savings of $280 a month. Now I know that my spending wouldn't be that high every month, but even one month at that rate is pretty wasteful! And now I just need to get J on board. He still buys coffee pretty regularly and he's terrible at remembering to grab lunch out of the fridge in the morning (but I refuse to be THAT much of a mommy and pack it up all nice for him every night, know what I mean?) So he's throwing a lot of money away. Here's hoping that once we move he realizes he's gotta change that! ;)

bright lights, big city...big bills!

Here's the situation.

J and I are moving in T-minus 13 days. We're moving from a two bedroom basement suite in the country to a two bedroom condo in the city. The catch? Oh, nothing much - only about $1000. Per month.

That's right, our rent is increasing three times over. We're paying $500 a month up here in the backwoods, but that's just not going to cut it when you're talking luxury condo - so hello $1500 rent!

Somehow we have to make this work. And it's going to be tough - we've lived the life of having extra cash to throw around, but those days got us in a bit of trouble. Now we have to clean it up. We've got to get ourselves out from under thousands of dollars of debt, put money aside to buy our own house within 5 years, and start saving for retirement - all while stretching our paycheques to the max just to have a roof over our heads.

Well, good thing I like a challenge. We're going to get through - and I'm going to blog about it along the way, because I've got a lot to learn and I need to keep myself accountable!