This company sucks. Or at least their advertising does, and because of that I will never buy their product.
I'm not sure what I was watching on television or what demographic the powers that be were hoping to snag, but I have to say that I was completely offended by a recent television advertisement from Free Credit Report dot com. Here's the gist: the scene opens on some fictional indie-band singing a cautionary tale about a young man who married the girl of his dreams. The problem was, the blushing bride had defaulted on a couple of credit cards a few years back and her credit score was in the toilet. (Sigh.) Because of her ignorance, she and the husband were unable to qualify for a home loan and are currently living in her parents' basement. Zoom in on the young man as he bemoans the fact that he hadn't investigated his true love's financial health before the wedding. Because if he had, "he'd be a happy bachelor with a dog and a yard."
Now, I'm all for financial transparency in intimate relationships. And I'll even go as far as to say that a person's spending and saving habits can provide important clues to their values. Still, I was offended by this advertisment because it stereotypically positions the woman as being irresponsible about money and - instead of counseling the couple to learn and grow together - suggests that the guy would be better off without her. I wonder if there is a comparable ad where the roles are reversed. Somehow I doubt it.
I recently read this book for young people that not only offers advice for building a financial life with a romantic partner, but also provides concrete suggestions for what to do if one person has significantly better credit than the other. I recommend it completely.
What about you? Do you have any stories (horror or otherwise) of melding finances after marriage?
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Monday, December 31, 2007
It's Cold Outside!
Not really, but it is snowing, if you catch my drift.
I started to get serious about personal finance a couple of months ago. A lot was changing for me: I had just switched jobs and received a 12K salary bump and things were starting to get serious with a guy I had been casually dating. It's easy to live an extended adolescence in New York - I'm 31 years old and live in a cute, but smallish apartment with a roommate - but for the first time I could start to see adulthood creeping up on the horizon.
I'm currently making literally twice what my salary was when I first moved to here in June, 2003. My paycheck has increased steadily over the years thanks to a lot of hard work and a couple of bumps and promotions, but my lifestyle and credit card debt went up as well. Some of this is forgiveable: I live in the one of the most expensive cities in the world and was just starting out in my career. I tried (and contine to try) to live as frugally as I can. I slept on a matress on the floor for a while, but I eventually needed furniture. And work clothes. And food. But I also attended 13 weddings in 36 months, the vast majority of which require travel. Stuff like that went on the card.
Anyway, here we are. I'm officially making about $1K a month more than I need to live a relatively comfortable life, albeit one that does not include serious saving or investing in the future. (Although, to my credit, I have a regular and a ROTH IRA, but I don't fund either agressively.) My first plan for this extra money was to ditch the roommate and live on my own. I thought about that for a while. I researched neighborhoods and priced apartments. I poured over decorating magazines as if they were porn. But then I realized that if I moved out on my own right now I'd always have credit card debt. In fact, I think it was an act of consumate maturity that I decided to stick with the co-habitation for another year and use the extra cash for debt reduction and savings. So that's where we are.
I don't make a ton of money. I work in nonprofit communications and my salary is fairly average. But for the first time I can see myself getting married and figure that my financial house should be in order before I do that.
When I first started reading personal finance blogs, snowflaking was a term that I saw popping up all over the place, so I decided to give it a try. This month alone I've snowflaked $201.80 to my Discover Card, cash that came from selling some books and DVDs on Amazon and some leftover money in my utilities budget. I don't expect to send that much every month, but I'm loving the progress.
More to come in the new year. Hope it is a happy one for all!
I started to get serious about personal finance a couple of months ago. A lot was changing for me: I had just switched jobs and received a 12K salary bump and things were starting to get serious with a guy I had been casually dating. It's easy to live an extended adolescence in New York - I'm 31 years old and live in a cute, but smallish apartment with a roommate - but for the first time I could start to see adulthood creeping up on the horizon.
I'm currently making literally twice what my salary was when I first moved to here in June, 2003. My paycheck has increased steadily over the years thanks to a lot of hard work and a couple of bumps and promotions, but my lifestyle and credit card debt went up as well. Some of this is forgiveable: I live in the one of the most expensive cities in the world and was just starting out in my career. I tried (and contine to try) to live as frugally as I can. I slept on a matress on the floor for a while, but I eventually needed furniture. And work clothes. And food. But I also attended 13 weddings in 36 months, the vast majority of which require travel. Stuff like that went on the card.
Anyway, here we are. I'm officially making about $1K a month more than I need to live a relatively comfortable life, albeit one that does not include serious saving or investing in the future. (Although, to my credit, I have a regular and a ROTH IRA, but I don't fund either agressively.) My first plan for this extra money was to ditch the roommate and live on my own. I thought about that for a while. I researched neighborhoods and priced apartments. I poured over decorating magazines as if they were porn. But then I realized that if I moved out on my own right now I'd always have credit card debt. In fact, I think it was an act of consumate maturity that I decided to stick with the co-habitation for another year and use the extra cash for debt reduction and savings. So that's where we are.
I don't make a ton of money. I work in nonprofit communications and my salary is fairly average. But for the first time I can see myself getting married and figure that my financial house should be in order before I do that.
When I first started reading personal finance blogs, snowflaking was a term that I saw popping up all over the place, so I decided to give it a try. This month alone I've snowflaked $201.80 to my Discover Card, cash that came from selling some books and DVDs on Amazon and some leftover money in my utilities budget. I don't expect to send that much every month, but I'm loving the progress.
More to come in the new year. Hope it is a happy one for all!
Monday, December 24, 2007
Changing My Behavior
I'm in suburbia at the moment, like many of you who celebrate Christmas. I love it - I get to spend the week at my mother's house in Massachusetts, with her fantastic shower pressure and fully-loaded cable television. However, in return for these luxuries, she often asks me to run errands. Like yesterday, when I found myself at Walmart with a shopping list and $30 in my pocket.
To be clear, I hate Walmart. My boyfriend and I were front row center at this play not too long ago and I firmly believe in buying locally from independent retailers. But my mother had a fudge emergency and couldn't go another minute without having some gentle stove cleaning solution (sugar was hardening on her brand-spanking-new burners at an alarming rate) and so I went, barely able to suppress a panic attack.
I wandered around a tiny bit, hoping to find some of my favorite Christmas specials on DVD (a budgeted purchase I had thought about for a couple of weeks). I didn't have any luck, but during my search I happened about this gigantic bin of movies - 2 for $10. My first impulse was to dig through the boxes. Of course, it wasn't long before I found a couple of classics, Don't Tell Mom, The Babysitter's Dead and American Beauty. I carried them around with me as I shopped for my mother's items. This is a mere two weeks after I sold every DVD in my collection that wasn't a favorite for debt snowflakes to send to Discover card.
The movies made it all the way to the check-out isle. I even put them on the conveyor belt. But I pulled them off right before the cashier scanned them. I'm thinking this is progress.
I ran the NYC Marathon in 2006. During my training, my coach would always say: "Getting through this race is easy. Just put one foot in front of the other and repeat. For about 5 hours."
That advice is just as applicable to financial fitness as it is to getting through 26.2 miles. Just because you have the money to buy something, doesn't mean you should.
Here's to living below your means. It's a struggle now, but I'll get through it, one little step at a time.
To be clear, I hate Walmart. My boyfriend and I were front row center at this play not too long ago and I firmly believe in buying locally from independent retailers. But my mother had a fudge emergency and couldn't go another minute without having some gentle stove cleaning solution (sugar was hardening on her brand-spanking-new burners at an alarming rate) and so I went, barely able to suppress a panic attack.
I wandered around a tiny bit, hoping to find some of my favorite Christmas specials on DVD (a budgeted purchase I had thought about for a couple of weeks). I didn't have any luck, but during my search I happened about this gigantic bin of movies - 2 for $10. My first impulse was to dig through the boxes. Of course, it wasn't long before I found a couple of classics, Don't Tell Mom, The Babysitter's Dead and American Beauty. I carried them around with me as I shopped for my mother's items. This is a mere two weeks after I sold every DVD in my collection that wasn't a favorite for debt snowflakes to send to Discover card.
The movies made it all the way to the check-out isle. I even put them on the conveyor belt. But I pulled them off right before the cashier scanned them. I'm thinking this is progress.
I ran the NYC Marathon in 2006. During my training, my coach would always say: "Getting through this race is easy. Just put one foot in front of the other and repeat. For about 5 hours."
That advice is just as applicable to financial fitness as it is to getting through 26.2 miles. Just because you have the money to buy something, doesn't mean you should.
Here's to living below your means. It's a struggle now, but I'll get through it, one little step at a time.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
I Did Not Die
So my own personal "spend nothing day" went off without a hitch. There was some awkwardness when a colleague came over to ask if I'd ate lunch, since he didn't see me go out at the usual hour, but that was all. In fact, the whole thing was so painless that I'm thinking of adopting the practice as a weekly exercise in restraint. I had a teacher in high school who fasted for one meal a week and then gave the money she would have spent on food to charity. Maybe I can do the same, except I'll send the money to debt.
Hunger wasn't the issue with this one - the trigger was security. Not having my wallet meant there was nothing between me and the unexpected. It was kind of like the bag lady fears that your read about in newspapers where they say that half of all women are afraid of losing everything and becoming homeless at some point in their life.
I guess this is why I'm undertaking my larger, get out of debt experiment. Someday, I'd like to own an overpriced Brooklyn apartment, not just rent one.
Hunger wasn't the issue with this one - the trigger was security. Not having my wallet meant there was nothing between me and the unexpected. It was kind of like the bag lady fears that your read about in newspapers where they say that half of all women are afraid of losing everything and becoming homeless at some point in their life.
I guess this is why I'm undertaking my larger, get out of debt experiment. Someday, I'd like to own an overpriced Brooklyn apartment, not just rent one.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
I'm Not Spending Any Money Today
It's not entirely by choice, and I realize that this is an auspicious beginning for a personal finance blog. But I forgot my wallet at home. So I'm at work, trying to convince my stomach that it's not yet time for lunch. I feel like I'm a member of the Congressional Food Stamp Challenge
Things are not as bad as they could be, by any means. I ate breakfast this morning. In addition to the standard water cooler, my office provides free coffee, tea and hot chocolate. Luckily, I packed a string cheese in my bag for a snack and also a packet of almonds and some cookies. There is a yogurt in the refridgerator from last week that I didn't eat and a packet of instant oatmeal to take the edge off in a pinch. So really, I am fine. In fact, I'm wondering why my original plan for the day was to include buying an $8 salad as a treat.
What's interesting to me is the profound anxiety I'm feeling about not having my wallet with me, about not having the potential for spending power even though I clearly have no need for it right now. Food and transportation costs are covered. My forgetfulness will lead to a little more hassle later on this evening - I had planned to go to the grocery store on my way home from work and now I'll have to stop off at my apartment first - but no real harm was done. A lot of the stress is self-imposed and comes from how I think others will perceive me: what if someone had asked me to lunch today and I had to refuse? What assumptions will people make if they see me eating oatmeal out of a cup instead of over-priced vegetables when 1pm roles around?
I'm choosing to look at this experience as a useful exercise. Lunch spending is definitely one area of my budget where I can trim a little excess. Maybe there is more potential than I thought.
Things are not as bad as they could be, by any means. I ate breakfast this morning. In addition to the standard water cooler, my office provides free coffee, tea and hot chocolate. Luckily, I packed a string cheese in my bag for a snack and also a packet of almonds and some cookies. There is a yogurt in the refridgerator from last week that I didn't eat and a packet of instant oatmeal to take the edge off in a pinch. So really, I am fine. In fact, I'm wondering why my original plan for the day was to include buying an $8 salad as a treat.
What's interesting to me is the profound anxiety I'm feeling about not having my wallet with me, about not having the potential for spending power even though I clearly have no need for it right now. Food and transportation costs are covered. My forgetfulness will lead to a little more hassle later on this evening - I had planned to go to the grocery store on my way home from work and now I'll have to stop off at my apartment first - but no real harm was done. A lot of the stress is self-imposed and comes from how I think others will perceive me: what if someone had asked me to lunch today and I had to refuse? What assumptions will people make if they see me eating oatmeal out of a cup instead of over-priced vegetables when 1pm roles around?
I'm choosing to look at this experience as a useful exercise. Lunch spending is definitely one area of my budget where I can trim a little excess. Maybe there is more potential than I thought.
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