Monday, March 17, 2008
Where are my RRSP receipts?
I’m still waiting for my 2008, 60-day RRSP receipts from my investment co. The last day to contribute was Februrary 29th so I should have them by now. I called the company on Thursday and spoke to someone who said they were produced on March 4th. Shouldn’t they be here by now? My husband and I want to get our taxes done ASAP. I’ll be getting a very large return due to my severance payout. It’s driving me crazy that I can’t get that $$ in my grubby little hands. I’ll be using it to buy a few furniture items and then saving the rest for next year. But still, I want that money – now! Come on Canada Post… speed up your mail.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Phil Town
Last week I went to an Anthony Robbins seminar (my company paid for the ticket). It was a one day seminar featuring Anthony but it featured other speakers as well. One of these speakers was Phil Town. I had never heard of him before. He’s basic story is that he served in Vietnam for 2 years, came back to the US, struggled, turned in to a long-haired, leather wearing, biker (his own words) and became a river guide on Grand Canyon’s Colorado River. On one of his tours, he took a group of Outward Bound trustees and ran into some trouble. He got them out of trouble fine and so one of the trustees offered to teach Phil everything he knew about investing. Phil is now a multi-millionaire.
During the session, Phil showed a way to invest and gain 25+% returns versus 8-10% you typically get on standard investments. He made it all seem very easy. He had everyone riled up about this knowledge. Then he hits us with what seemed like an infomercial. He told everyone that in order to be able to do what he does using the tools he showed in his presentation; you need to take a two day course (being offered in the upcoming weekend and the following week). The course, normally priced at around $6,400 was available to us, today, for one low price of only $995. And you had to sign up in the next 15 minutes. You should have seen the people run up the stairs to sign up. I even considered it myself – if I didn’t have a toddler – hmmmmm.
Anyway, the colleagues I was with all looked at each other and asked “Are you going to do it? Are you?”. None of us did but one guy said he’d look to see if there was another product that would provide us with the same tools but for free (or very cheap). I’ve yet to receive any info from him although I’ve looked around a bit myself. I’ll continue to research and post what info I can. I did a search on Phil to see if there were any negative postings, etc. there on him that would lead me to believe he’s not being straight but I haven’t found anything yet of note.
In the meantime, I’m keen to see if there’s any way for me to move to the next step of investing and/or increase income. Please provide me with any suggestions or ideas you have about any of this.
During the session, Phil showed a way to invest and gain 25+% returns versus 8-10% you typically get on standard investments. He made it all seem very easy. He had everyone riled up about this knowledge. Then he hits us with what seemed like an infomercial. He told everyone that in order to be able to do what he does using the tools he showed in his presentation; you need to take a two day course (being offered in the upcoming weekend and the following week). The course, normally priced at around $6,400 was available to us, today, for one low price of only $995. And you had to sign up in the next 15 minutes. You should have seen the people run up the stairs to sign up. I even considered it myself – if I didn’t have a toddler – hmmmmm.
Anyway, the colleagues I was with all looked at each other and asked “Are you going to do it? Are you?”. None of us did but one guy said he’d look to see if there was another product that would provide us with the same tools but for free (or very cheap). I’ve yet to receive any info from him although I’ve looked around a bit myself. I’ll continue to research and post what info I can. I did a search on Phil to see if there were any negative postings, etc. there on him that would lead me to believe he’s not being straight but I haven’t found anything yet of note.
In the meantime, I’m keen to see if there’s any way for me to move to the next step of investing and/or increase income. Please provide me with any suggestions or ideas you have about any of this.
Monday, February 25, 2008
So much financial stuff to do
I feel like paying off our cc is just a small piece of our financial puzzle. There are so many other things to consider…
- Should we focus on paying off the student loans or put money towards some short-term savings for emergencies, paying off next year’s taxes and/or going on maternity leave?
- Should we take advantage of a large tax return to not only purchase some furniture items but to do things such as have the yard fenced? Or should we put some money away for the reasons outlined in the first item?
- How much should I be putting away in to RRSPs before and after my company matching kicks in?
- When should we start my daughter’s RESP? How much should we contribute per month and/or year?
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Do you watch every penny you spend?
I don’t. Except for the 3 or 4 months last summer that we tracked every penny that we spent, we are pretty easy going with our spending. I know that we waste a lot of money - especially when it comes to eating out. We both buy our lunches multiple times a week and we get take out or go out for dinner at least once a week. This isn’t cheap. And we basically buy what we want for groceries each week. I do keep an eye out for items on sale and use coupons when I can. But we buy expensive meats and treats and don’t bat an eye.
At the same time, I find that I can be cheap about things. I hate to pay full price for anything. I love a great deal. And I certainly don’t shop at expensive clothing or shoe stores unless I have to. But chasing sales can cause overspending too. If I see things on sale I think I should buy them. And then you end up spending more than you would have if the item(s) had not been on sale.
It’s all a constant struggle between trying to stay within a budget or at least spend less than you make and not living on bread and water. And when there are sales, do you buy for the future or wait until a particular event is approaching before you buy something?
At the same time, I find that I can be cheap about things. I hate to pay full price for anything. I love a great deal. And I certainly don’t shop at expensive clothing or shoe stores unless I have to. But chasing sales can cause overspending too. If I see things on sale I think I should buy them. And then you end up spending more than you would have if the item(s) had not been on sale.
It’s all a constant struggle between trying to stay within a budget or at least spend less than you make and not living on bread and water. And when there are sales, do you buy for the future or wait until a particular event is approaching before you buy something?
Monday, February 18, 2008
How quickly can you spend money?
I just posted that we paid off our cc (with a small balance left on one card - $370 – that I’ll be paying off tonight) and then we ran out on Saturday and bought a new computer! Not even 24 hours of having a $0 balance before we charged something new on the card.
Our computer was really old and probably would have died pretty soon. This was one item on our list of need to buy items with the tax refund I am anticipating. We probably should have waited until we had the refund in our grubby little hands but we were both impatient (wonder how we got in this mess? :) ) and saw a pretty good deal. My husband is a techy guy in his job and I’m at an ok level compared to most users so we didn’t want a basic level computer. We have a lot of pics, videos, etc. that will take up a fair amount of hard drive space and we wanted a good processor and significant memory to run our applications, etc. So, with the CPU, a 22 inch monitor, 2 year warranty plan, some video software I wanted to get and taxes, the total came to over $2,000. Yeah, I know, not cheap. But hopefully this will last us a little while and provide us with the speed/space we need. I have cash to put towards it until I submit my taxes (still waiting on the necessary receipts, forms, etc.) that will bring the balance owing down by the time I get my refund. I'm hoping we'll only owe around $1,000 by that time.
Our computer was really old and probably would have died pretty soon. This was one item on our list of need to buy items with the tax refund I am anticipating. We probably should have waited until we had the refund in our grubby little hands but we were both impatient (wonder how we got in this mess? :) ) and saw a pretty good deal. My husband is a techy guy in his job and I’m at an ok level compared to most users so we didn’t want a basic level computer. We have a lot of pics, videos, etc. that will take up a fair amount of hard drive space and we wanted a good processor and significant memory to run our applications, etc. So, with the CPU, a 22 inch monitor, 2 year warranty plan, some video software I wanted to get and taxes, the total came to over $2,000. Yeah, I know, not cheap. But hopefully this will last us a little while and provide us with the speed/space we need. I have cash to put towards it until I submit my taxes (still waiting on the necessary receipts, forms, etc.) that will bring the balance owing down by the time I get my refund. I'm hoping we'll only owe around $1,000 by that time.
Friday, February 15, 2008
It's paid off!!!
Last night the final payment was made on our 0% interest cc with a balance of $9381 (I paid $1000 on it earlier this week). We now have less than $400 to pay on our Visa that we charged the down payment on our new car that we are leasing. I know, it's probably not the smartest financial move to lease a car but it makes sense for us at the moment.
Now that we are so close to being cc free, we need to stay that way. We'll still use our ccs to pay for items but then pay them off that month. That way we'll get the rewards. I guess we should think about closing some of the cc's though. Here are our current cc's with their credit limits:
Visa - $13,000
MC 1 - $22,000
MC 2 - $22,000
MC 3 - $11,700
Amex - $11,700
Store 1 - $2,500
Store 2 - $700
Total - $83,600
Now that we are so close to being cc free, we need to stay that way. We'll still use our ccs to pay for items but then pay them off that month. That way we'll get the rewards. I guess we should think about closing some of the cc's though. Here are our current cc's with their credit limits:
Visa - $13,000
MC 1 - $22,000
MC 2 - $22,000
MC 3 - $11,700
Amex - $11,700
Store 1 - $2,500
Store 2 - $700
Total - $83,600
I’m addicted to my finances
Since we decided to focus on our finance issues last spring I’ve been pretty diligent in keeping track of our finances. I started this blog, visit others blogs and financial forums regularly, created a budget, tracked our expenditures, moved cc debt around to low interest (or no interest) ccs, and paid as much spare cash as we could on our cc debt. I had a period of time in the fall where I wasn’t as diligent as I had been in tracking everything or writing in my blog but I was still monitoring the situation. But now I have a renewed interest in our finances - to a point of being a bit obsessive about it. I am excited that we now have the cash to pay off our cc debt, focus on student loan debt and make some furniture/home improvement purchases. I find myself thinking about it constantly and going in and playing with the spreadsheet every chance I get.
Once we pay off those ccs over the next week, then I’ll be focusing on the other things… including filing my taxes that will net me a large return (I expect). And although my co. isn’t going to match my RRSP contributions until I’ve been here for 6 months, I’m going to contribute on my own in anticipation of A. needing the contributions to offset what I’ll owe in taxes next year and B. saving for my retirement. We also have to open an RESP for my daughter, save some of the tax refund for taxes next year, have some short term savings available for emergencies, etc.
There are still lots to do and think about so I’m a bit addicted to it. But it’s all good addiction, right?!?
Once we pay off those ccs over the next week, then I’ll be focusing on the other things… including filing my taxes that will net me a large return (I expect). And although my co. isn’t going to match my RRSP contributions until I’ve been here for 6 months, I’m going to contribute on my own in anticipation of A. needing the contributions to offset what I’ll owe in taxes next year and B. saving for my retirement. We also have to open an RESP for my daughter, save some of the tax refund for taxes next year, have some short term savings available for emergencies, etc.
There are still lots to do and think about so I’m a bit addicted to it. But it’s all good addiction, right?!?
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