budget

Questions, Questions . . .

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Got some for me? Questions about The Money Roadmap program? About me? How about a previous post on the site? Or maybe questions about money management in general? Advice?

Just ask!

I’ll be adding another feature called “Q & Amy”. If you have a question for me, simply go to the ‘Contact’ page, fill out the quick online form and send it. Or, you can now email me at amy@themoneyroadmap.com! I’ll do my very best to answer your questions as soon, and as thoroughly, as I can. I will post the questions and answers on the website. Who knows, your question may help someone else! And don’t worry – I won’t use your name. I promise. And if you’d rather keep the question between us, just let me know. Not everyone wants their questions posted and I completely understand.

I hope to hear from you soon!

 

Please keep in mind that I will only answer questions related to the subject matter on this website. I will not entertain solicitations, spam, profanity, or otherwise inappropriate material.

TMR Tip: Get Back to School for Less

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Ah yes . . . just when summer really gets rolling, it comes to an abrupt halt. Time for school!

And back-to-school shopping.

That task alone is enough to send some of us into hiding. Or a panic. I, personally, don’t like shopping of any kind. My motto: Get in, get it, and get out! Which is why I’m always looking for shortcuts. You too? These tips might help . . .

  1. Figure out what you actually need. My kids sort all their unused supplies and check them against their new supply lists. They highlight only the things that they need. That instantly reduces how much I’m going to spend at the store. Why buy things we already have?
  2. Check out all the ads. Every retailer has deals on school supplies. Glance through the ads to find the best prices. (By the way, Gregory Karp of the Chicago Tribune says that if a store puts a limit on how many you can buy, then it’s a really good deal.)
  3. Spread it out. I usually favor the once-and-done tactic, but if I find a great deal at another time, I buy it. Not everything goes on sale the same week and some weeks I can find better deals than others. You just need to keep an eye out for them.
  4. Use coupons and/or discounts. Whether you clip coupons or subscribe to a retailer’s email program, use them to your advantage. Find the best deal, then break out the discounts.
  5. Look where you least expect to find a deal. Karp suggests looking at places that aren’t on the typical back-to-school radar. He says places like Menards can have awesome deals on supplies that end up being free after the rebate.
  6. Take advantage of your smartphone. There’s at least one app (and I’m sure a few more) that lets you scan the bar code on an item and instantly compare prices as you’re standing in the store. My hubby thinks this is really cool and has a little too much fun with it.
  7. Get it tax-free. Many retailers are offering “tax-free” days. You can load up on school supplies and save money simply by not paying sales tax. Check the papers and online ads to find out which stores participate.

Hopefully these tips will help alleviate some of the anxiety that comes with shopping for school supplies – and clothes, for that matter. Apply these same strategies when trying to dress your children for the next big step. Happy shopping!

TMR Tip: Light My Fire!

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We love camping, but my husband and I always seem to have . . . difficulties . . . starting a fire. To be perfectly honest, we suck at it. And the store-bought fire starters don’t seem to work very well. They light easily enough, but they appear to be the only things that burn, leaving the kindling a smoldering mess. So, short of dousing the wood with lighter fluid, and possibly losing a couple of eyebrows in the process, I thought maybe I’d try to make some of my own.

I searched various websites for instructions and several of them suggested melting wax blocks or candles in a double boiler, then pouring it over a cardboard egg carton filled with dryer lint. Once cut, you have 12 individual fire starters. That sounded easy enough. I had an egg carton. I had dryer lint. I had scented wax tarts that would substitute for candles (and perhaps keep the bugs away with the aroma?), but I didn’t have a double boiler. I could fashion one using a pot of water and a bowl, but I didn’t want to deal with trying to clean the bowl out. But I did have electric warmers . . .

So I set everything up, melted the tarts, poured the liquid wax over the lint-filled egg carton, and then cut them apart. Now all that remained was to test them on vacation.

The result? Fire!

We were elated to say the least. We used 2 just to make sure the kindling caught, but still – we made fire! It was a glorious success. It burned bright and beautiful. We nearly danced and sang around it, like Tom Hanks in CastAway. We were so proud of ourselves, we had to celebrate.

S’mores, anyone?

TMR Tip: From Faded to Fabulous

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My husband and I are what you might call DIYers. We enjoy doing things ourselves. We take on projects usually for two reasons: 1) for the challenge of it – and that awesome feeling we get when we succeed and 2) to save some money. In this “disposable world” we tend to toss things in the trash when we don’t want them or, sometimes, because it’s cheaper to get a new one rather than get the old one repaired or upgraded. But sometimes I feel that it would just be a shame to throw something away, especially if it seems to have a lot of usefulness left in it.

So, when we decided to have the families over to celebrate our children’s promotion from 8th grade, we took one look at our patio set and knew we needed to make a decision: toss it (and buy a new one) or DIY it (and save some serious cash). My husband looked at me and said, “What do you think? Can we save it? What could we do with it? Or should we just buy a new set? Can we afford it?” I thought about it. And I thought about it. What I really wanted to do was buy a new one. This one was about 12 years old and the metal frames were incredibly faded from the sun. Plus, I had a lot to do anyway to get ready for the party and knew it would just be soooooo much easier if we just went out and bought a new one. But this one was still in good condition. We hadn’t abused it. It hadn’t rusted at all. I cringed inwardly and had to admit that it probably could be saved. I sighed, put my selfishness aside for a moment, and told him I could try spray painting it. He thought that was a great idea. We headed to the hardware store and picked out a color that would match the fabric.

And so it began. I tried the paint on one of the chairs. It looked great. I kept going – a little at a time until I’d finished the table, the umbrella stand, and 6 chairs. There they were in all their Spruce Green glory. I’d spent more than I wanted to on paint, but saved hundreds by not buying a new set. And the results were terrific. In fact, someone at the party asked if we’d gotten a new patio set. Go figure.

It’s something anyone can do, really. The sense of accomplishment you feel when you’re done and it looks great? Aaahhhhh. And it might just save you a bunch . . .

Here’s a picture of the before and after . . . Happy DIYing!

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TMR Tip: Does it Pay to Sign Up for Retail Rewards?

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How many times have we heard, “Do you have our rewards card?” I don’t know about you, but I’ve lost count. It seems that virtually every retailer has its own rewards program nowadays. They offer everything from percentage and dollars off to money back and store credits. There are so many – too many – and it can leave us confused and frustrated. So how do we decide which ones are worth signing up for? Here are several things to keep in mind when standing at the checkout, trying to make a split-second decision about that rewards program . . .

1) Make sure it’s FREE. If it’s not, forget it. Walk away now.

2) Find out what the rewards are. Dollars off? Percentage discount? Points? Rebate or reward checks?

3) Find out what you have to do to earn the rewards. Do you accrue the rewards with every purchase, over the course of a year, or only if you spend a certain amount? (Or all of the above?)

4) Find out how you can redeem the rewards. Are there restrictions on what you can buy? Can you combine it with sale prices or other discounts? Is there a time limit? Is it in-store? Online?

5) Find out if there are other perks associated with the program. Do you get extra opportunities to earn rewards? Do they offer cardholders/members a higher percentage off? Do you get to shop the sales earlier than the general public?

6) Consider how often you shop at that particular store. Do you rarely make an appearance or do they know you by name?

It only takes about 30 to 60 seconds to find out this information. You alone can determine whether or not to sign up for a retailer’s rewards program. I don’t recommend jumping on board for every one that you’re offered. Too many cards and you won’t be able to close your wallet or fit your key chain in your pocket. But if you can find a few that save you money and give you a little something to show their gratitude for being a loyal customer, (and a reason to go back!) then go for it. It’s your time and money. You do have control.

Things Are A-Changin’

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That’s right. I’m making a few changes around here. Several, actually, that I hope to unveil over the next few months. So please, bear with me while I work to make things better. I’ll start slowly . . .

First, I’ve changed the look of my website a bit. Nothing drastic, but an improvement, I think. Brighter. More inviting. I’ll be changing some of the items as I go. Check it out. I hope you like it.

Second, we can say ‘goodbye’ to Tuesday’s Tip. Why? I feel that publishing only on Tuesdays is no longer productive or practical for me. I want to write and post articles whenever I feel inspired or when I have noteworthy tidbits to share with you. Therefore, that’s what I’ll do. The new title? Simple. TMR Tip. After all, that’s what this is really about, isn’t it? Navigating our own routes with The Money Roadmap. And who couldn’t use some tips along the way? I know I do. In fact, I’ve been doing quite a bit of reading and I’ll be sharing my findings very soon.

Thanks for your continued patience and support as I work on making my passions a reality. I hope you come back to visit soon!

P.S. Be sure to sign up for email alerts by clicking “Follow The Money Roadmap”, then enter your email address. It’s the easy way to keep up with what’s new on TMR!

Tuesday’s Tip: Take a Retirement Quiz – Part 2

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In Part 1, I posed the question “Are you ready for retirement?” If you’re like me, you answered “YES!” right away. But it’s really kind of a trick question. More of a 2-part math problem to solve. First, ‘do you have enough money’? Hopefully you’ve had a chance to visit the website I mentioned to find out the answer. Second, ‘do you know how to make it last’? A much tougher question, which I’ll address today.

Let’s begin by talking about how long retirement will last. No, we can’t predict it, but we have to start somewhere, so let’s say it’ll last 30 years. Based on that, many financial planners suggest following the “4 percent rule”. According to Gail MarksJarvis, it “refers to how much you can afford to remove from your savings each year . . . and avoid the risk of running out of money”. Here’s the basic idea: you take out (use) 4% of your savings the first year, then adjust the next year based on expenses, inflation, and general cost of living. For example, if you have $500,000 saved up, you’d use $20,000 that first year, then take a look at your finances and decide how to proceed. Do you need a bit more? Could you do with less?

Be careful about taking more, though, says Gail. Taking 5-6% per year could spell disaster later on, and yet 16% of the retired people who took that original quiz said they thought they’d be safe taking 6-8%. Chances are they’d run out of money. Not good.

There are steps you can take to help ease the uncertainty of making your money last. First, don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Bill Bengen, creator of the “4 percent rule”, says a more diverse portfolio is best. Invest in stocks and bonds, for example, instead of just one or the other. (And don’t just let it sit in the bank – the return is terrible!) Second, Gail MarksJarvis says that you need to consider how much things will cost. We don’t know exact numbers now, of course, but we can make an educated guess based on current prices. Third, keep in mind the effects of a spouse’s death because that could mean getting reduced Social Security and even the loss of their pension. That will most definitely affect what you can spend. Finally, MarksJarvis suggests waiting until you’re 70 years old before starting to collect Social Security. If you’re healthy and family genes point to a long life, you’ll be better off if you wait.

Of course, in my opinion, good money management is key to making sure you set aside enough throughout your working life to live on during retirement, but also to help you make it last. And I feel it’s never too late to start. Luckily, there’s a book for that.

Tuesday’s Tip: Take a Retirement Readiness Quiz – Part 1

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“Are you ready for retirement?” Gail MarksJarvis (a money expert) asked in a newspaper article. When I read that question, I immediately thought to myself, Heck yeah, I’m ready to retire! Not work anymore? Count me in! Then I read the next sentence, which explained that she didn’t mean ‘not work anymore’, but rather ‘do you have enough money to retire and do you know how to make it last?’ My shoulders instantly sagged like a failed soufflé. What really made me sad, though, was my next thought: WILL we have enough money to retire? And can we make it last?

Nowadays, with the economy being what it is, it’s hard to figure out just how much you’re going to need. And even if you do have money saved up, do you know how to make it last so that you’re not eating peanut butter and jelly or beans every day for the rest of your life?

So, let’s begin by focusing on the first question: Do you have enough money for retirement?

Obviously, the goal here is to have plenty, but how does that translate to yearly savings? How much should we set aside per year to make sure we reach that goal? Are we saving anything at all? Is it enough?

According to the March 2015 survey conducted by Bankrate.com, Chief Financial Analyst Greg McBride says that approximately 28% of the 1000 people surveyed are putting away 5% or less, while 16% are saving nothing at all. That’s a little scary. Almost half of the people surveyed have little to no savings. The good news is that 24% are stashing away 6-10% of their income per year, and about 24% are saving 11% or more per year. McBride adds that the middle class are doing the best job of saving. He says that’s because they’re taking matters into their own hands, knowing they’ll have to do it all themselves. “They don’t have the six-figure income to fall back on” to pay for everything later in life, and “nobody is going to do it for them”.

It’s not hopeless. But the questions still remain: Do I have enough? How much will I need when I retire? How much do I need to save every year until then?

Thankfully, there are many calculators available to help you in your quest to be able to eat and be comfortable once you retire. Try heading to http://www.bankrate.com, hover over the Retirement tab, then choose Calculators from the menu. They have everything from 401(k) and IRA calculators to Social Security and investment calculators. There’s even an Investment Goals calculator you can try. Then take a look at your current finances to decide if you’re saving enough to get you to your goal. Remember that all the numbers are approximate. We can’t possibly know exactly how much we’ll need, but we can make a well-educated guess and shoot for it.

Yes, you want to live your life now, but you also want to make sure you can live out the rest of your life with a little comfort, right? McBride says, “It doesn’t matter how much you make, it’s what you have left over” that’s important. The best thing you can do for yourself now is to make sure you’re living within your means. A good way to do that is through smart money management. Need some help with that? Click on the “Buy it” tab at the top of the screen. There’s a little book that can show you the way . . .

Tuesday’s Tip: Give Yourself Some Wiggle Room

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How many of us have begun a diet with gusto, resisting all the foods we’re not supposed to eat, vowing never to give up . . . only to chuck it to the curb when we’ve slipped a bit, indulging in 1 or 2 (or 3 or 4) no-nos and ended up feeling guilty? How many of us have embarked on a new fitness routine, promising to find time to work out 3, 4, or 5 days a week so we can shed those winter pounds and not be embarrassed to walk out on the beach or show up at the pool . . . only to quit when we didn’t reach our weight goal or missed a few workouts and wallowed in our disappointment in ourselves?

We, as humans, tend to take on enormous pressure to achieve certain goals that we’ve imposed on ourselves. We also, many times, find ourselves dining on self-loathing when we fail. It’s happened time and time again. So what’s the cure?

1) Set reasonable goals.

2) Give yourself some wiggle room.

It may be somewhat safe to assume that the majority of us have heard the first one before. If you set goals that are impossible, or can’t be reached within the time frame you’ve given yourself, then success is always going to be the proverbial ‘dangling carrot’ you can’t quite capture. While setting priorities is important, you also have to know yourself and what you’re capable of, which is why it’s sometimes better to start off small and add to it once you’ve established a routine and know you can manage it.

The second one isn’t very common. It’s kind of like forgiving yourself – we frown upon that. A lot. Our expectations are so high that when we slip up, we beat ourselves into the ground, admonishing ourselves for being careless, stupid, weak . . . you choose the destructive adjective. But it doesn’t have to be that way. And the way to do that is to establish a goal with a range. While dedication is paramount to successfully managing your money, you have to be flexible, too, and understand that Life has a funny way of messing with everything you’ve planned. That’s where wiggle room comes in.

Let’s say, for example, that you’d like to save up for some kind of home improvement, special vacation, whatever. You decide to put $300 away every month so you reach your goal. It goes well until you need to replace the hot water heater and you’re unable to set aside the money that month. You’re not happy. That puts you behind. So you may think, then, that you’ll need to double it the next month so you can catch up. Well, guess what? You can’t quite scrape together enough. You panic, thinking that now you’re even further behind. How are you ever going to reach  your goal?! Finally, after a few months of beating yourself up, you give up and say, “I just can’t do it.”

Now try this on for size. Set a range for your goal. Instead of setting a strict time frame, give yourself a few months or so as a buffer. So, rather than 12 months, set your goal at 12 to 16 months. If Life tosses you a zinger, it’s not the end of the world. You’re still within your time range. And don’t think you need to double the amount the next month. Maybe try just putting a little extra over the course of a few months to make up for it.

Setting a range works with the monthly amount, too. You’d like to set aside $300 every single month, but we all know how Life works and it may not always happen. So how about giving yourself a range of, say, $100 to $300 per month? That way, if something happens and you can’t put the full $300, you can still shoot for as little as $100. And, coupled with the time range, you can still reach your goal and enjoy whatever it is you were saving for.

Yes, it takes a little patience. Yes, it takes dedication, too. But if you build in a buffer to allow for Life’s little surprises, you can accomplish your goal and revel in the feeling of success.

Tuesday’s Tip: Build a Rainy Day Fund

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When people ask me how my money management system works, I tell them that it’s a way to take the money they earn and put it where it needs to go so that their bills are paid in full and on time. They can also use the system to put money aside for other necessities, savings, or things they want. I strongly urge people to have a ‘rainy day fund’ for those unexpected things that pop up from time to time. If you think rainy day savings are unnecessary, think again.

Case in point: my family and I went on vacation recently to Virginia. We set up our camper in Williamsburg for a week and hit all the great tourist attractions like Colonial Williamsburg, Jamestown, Yorktown, and Water Country USA. Then, we headed to Staunton and set up camp for another week. We relaxed by the lake, fished, and hiked a few trails in the Shenandoah National Forest. We even took a trip  to Monticello (Thomas Jefferson’s home) – and that’s when trouble hit.

We’d been caught in a storm on the mountain, the roads were a little slick, and the grade of the road was a bit steep. Suddenly, the van’s gears wouldn’t engage. We heard a strange noise. We managed to pull over, turn the car off, then restart it. My husband put it in drive. It moved forward. We got on the highway and made it to our exit – barely. We ended up limping into the parking lot of an auto parts store. And that’s where she died. Old Blue wasn’t going anywhere. Reverse? Nope. Drive? No way. Fourth? Uh uh. Park was all that worked.

In the next 30 minutes, we scrambled to arrange for a rental car and a tow truck to haul Old Blue to the dealership nearby. We visited her the next day and the diagnosis sent us reeling: the transmission was shot. Gone. There was no saving it. She needed a whole new one.

Ugh.

To add insult to injury, we found out the axle was locked and had to be torched off. The parts wouldn’t be in for another several days. We were scheduled to leave for home the next day. After a lot of discussion, we decided we had to leave her there for a while so she could be fixed. We simply could not stay for an unknown length of time. (My husband likes his job and wants to keep it!) So, we secured storage for our camper, stuffed ourselves into a little sedan, and spent the next 2 days in virtual silence, trying to absorb all that had happened and figuring out what we were going to do now.

As it turns out, 2 weeks later, my husband and I had to fly out to Virginia, pick up Old Blue, get our camper out of storage, and drive home. I’m not going to divulge how much we’ve had to spend on a rental car, tow, repairs, plane tickets, a hotel room, and food, but suffice it to say that we were incredibly glad we had our ‘rainy day fund’. It literally saved the day. Now we don’t have to take money that’s supposed to go for paying the mortgage, our regular bills, or kids’ college savings. We’ll have to, basically, start all over again to build it back up, but I’m grateful we had it.

Now we can move forward . . . and so can our van.