Monday, December 21, 2009

have a pantry

One great way to stretch a buck is to have a pantry and know your prices. It's not enough to just stock up on stuff, you have to know how much to pay. For many years I only bought pasta when it was at fifty cents a pound. I kept a pantry stocked up with what I really needed. The days of fifty cent pasta has come and gone. Now the going rate is about a buck. Sometimes it's less, so that's when I stock up. I try to keep on hand what I am likely to use in 6 to 8 months. I also keep other staples on hand, but only if I can get them at a good price. I don't particularly like frozen meats, but peas and mixed veggies are always good to have on hand for soup making. I use leftovers to make soup. I just throw everything in with some canned broth and heat it up. Great for those cold Northeastern evenings. This weekend we had a storm and although I couldn't shop I had enough in the refrigerator to scare up some soup after shoveling all the snow. I keep lentils and barley in my pantry too.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Tax time

The best way to save money is to keep more of it. You have to pay your taxes, but a good tax accountant can help you keep more of your money. You want to keep your money and invest it for yourself. A good tax man can help you with this. When I first started working as a schoolteacher I was not making much money. On top of that I was spending my own cash to supplement materials for my students. I filled out that first income tax form all on my own. I was frustrated and unhappy for a whole day and I got practically nothing back. After the fact, I heard that certain work expenses can be written off. The following year I went to an accountant to do my taxes. It was easy breezy and I got back much more money. The service fee was well worth it. My refund was more than double on essentially the same income. I have never done my own taxes since. Certain businesses and professions require the use of a good accountant. For example, anyone involved in real estate needs professional help to navigate the tax code. This money is well spent. Some things cannot be done on the cheap. Find a good account. Spend the two hundred or so it costs. You won't regret it. P.S.when looking for a professional, never use the yellow pages. Always rely on word of mouth. Those ads cost money and guess who gets to pay for the advertising in the form of higher fees. The bigger the ad, the larger the fees. Many times just a name and number signals the most competitive provider. Find someone who doesn't need to advertise because he's got plenty of repeat and referral business.

Friday, November 20, 2009

buy rental property

Now this is a tricky one because of all the problems in the real estate lately. However, if you have already fixed yourself up with a cheap place to live. It wouldn't be a bad idea to set aside savings to buy an investment property. People are always going to need a place to live. Rental property can serve their needs and your own. This market may not touch bottom for a long time. Save your money and buy your freedom. A nice two family house can be a great way to start. You can live in one part and rent the other side. Rental income can help with the mortgage and taxes.

Getting a foreclosure might be tricky, but the thing is don't to be afraid of doing a little work. I brought my first apartment at one third below market price because it needed a paint job and the floors sanded. It also needed a new sink in the bathroom. I knew a plumber so I wasn't to worried about the cost. I spent less than $2000 to bring it up to speed and saved more than $10,000. The rest of what I put in was sweat equity. I had to clean all the kitchen CABINETS AND A SINK THAT HAD NEARLY AN INCH OF CRUDE ON IT. IT TOOK ME A COUPLE OF DAYS BUT IN NO TIME EVERYTHING WAS SHINING AND SPARKLING. THEN I SPRAY PAINTED THE HANDLES AND THE KITCHEN LOOKED FRESH AND NEW. RECENTLY I BOUGHT A HOUSE WHICH NEEDED THE SAME KIND OF WORK. My handyman husband did most of it and now our house is gorgeous. In the kitchen, I sanded and my husband refinished the cabinets. We went to a discount retailer and bought some wonderful chrome handles. The real estate lady Linda couldn't believe the difference.

Now when I looked for a house or an apartment, I bought something cheep. I didn't get fooled into buying the best house in the best neighborhood. I brought a nice little house in a convenient location. I stayed within my budget. I wanted to pay less not more. I HAVE NOTHING TO PROVE TO THE WORLD. I AM WHO I AM. I WAS GLAD THAT I DID WHAT I DID BECAUSE JUST WEEKS AFTER MOVING IN, I HAD A STROKE AND COULDN'T GO BACK TO WORK. A BIG MORTGAGE WOULD HAVE MADE MY LIFE A LOT WORSE. ALWAYS REMEMBER THAT LIFE IS VERY RANDOM. It can side swipe you without notice. Be prepared for bad things to happen. Be in a place where you can face anything. Have savings. Keep overhead low and don't need things. Don't feel the need to have a brand new car and don't worry about what people think. Live for yourself and not for the capitalist economy. Now I love capitalism and the goods it produces, but it is subject to boom and bust cycles. God forbid you get caught in the downturn without the external economic resources and internal resilience to make the best of a bad moment. Those with a little extra money are out there buying houses. Renting them for income until the cycle returns to boom. Then they sell and wait for the bust to buy again. Stocks drop quickly, but houses can take ten years to touch bottom This is how people make real money.

Finally buy a house in a place that is nice and safe, but, for whatever reason, slightly undervalued. My mother did this with her first property. She sold it at the top of the market and then bought someplace that was cheaper and got a great bang for her buck. She rented the house for almost 20 years. It paid her back it's purchase price. And then she sold it for triple what she paid. This is very basic economics. Now she's buying more. Plans to rent and make more money. I am trying to save every nickel so I can to buy my own investment property and I plan to get a mortgage. If the pundits are right and inflation comes, a mortgage could end up making me money because if inflation outpaces a mortgage interest rate, it gets easier and easier to make a payment. That translates into early repayment or money in my pocket. Inflation can be good in certain markets.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

hook up

There is nothing moe important to creating happiness than finding a someone to walk with you through this life. Loving and giving has always been at the center of my being. I looked and looked when I was young and got rejected more than once, but I never gave up the search for my special loved one. I did get desprate at one point, so I asked the universe to send me someone to take care of, send me someone who needs to be cared for. I never looked in bars or such like places because that is not what I w anted. Eventually I met my husband in a local choral group. We both had an interest in music and that united us. Later we found we had other things in common as our relationship grew. My husband turned out to be a handyman which was wonderful. His first gift to me was to scrape and repaint my tiny bathroom. this cheap woman fell in love. I had bought my first place a few years before at one third below market value because it looked terrible. It needed lots of paint and the floors needed sanding. The bathroom had a cracked and chipped sink which had to be replaced, All in all it cost me about $2000 to get the place turnkey. I had saved over $10,000 on the purchase price. Knowing how to fix things is very important and can save tons of money in the long run. Some poeople look down on those who work with their hands and know how to fix stuff as if it is contemptible. Luckily never felt that way because my father, although highly educated, was a Mr Fixit also.
Irecognized the value of those skills early on and had been watching Fix It Shows like THIS OLD HOUSE FOR YEARS. This knowledge enabled me to re-wire a lamp I found at significant savings. Learning how to fix things has advantages. Find someone who you can help and who can help you in turn. But most importantly find someone with whom you can do nothing at all. Our best days together have been the times when we lay around in bed all day doing nothing at all. There is nothing better than just being able to hang out with your partner.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

SAVING WITH PURPOSE

When I started out, it didn't take me long to realize that my biggest monthly expense was rent. It came to more than half of my take home pay and as a consequence, it made me feel very poor at the end of the month. I figured the best way to counteract that feeling was to think about the day when I would own my own place and not have to pay rent. There has to be a purpose and a goal to saving money. Just to watch a bank account get bigger is not enough. Although the past couple of years have been bad for the real estate market and prices are still low making it a good time to buy, my feeling are that prices will go even lower. It will be 2015 before we touch the bottom of this market. Be ready for that day, whenever it comes by building up a nice little nest egg to put down on a place to live cheaply.
My view is to buy in a place that is undervalued for whatever reason, pay it off quick and then only worry about incidental expenses like taxes and water bills. Now some people may feel that all this scrimping and saving is bad for the soul,. But I know from my own experience that there is nothing better than owning the place you call home. It gives a sense of freedom and security that can't be matched. Yes, you might now be treating yourself to Starbucks in the morning because you work hard and you deserve. But how about treating yourself to a vacation in your own home. Abundance will surely follow. There is nothing worse than having to give up the majority of your money every month for a roof. A roof provides safety and security. A roof makes you strong. If you have your roof paid off you won't have to cower before any boss.

Monday, October 5, 2009

CHEAP EATS

the cheapest woman alive is a blog about saving money but with a twist. I want to show people how to save money in order to create abundance and hopefully free themselves from dependence on their paychecks. A rising tide may raise all boats but it can also drown many swimmers. When I graduated from college in the early 1980's, I was able to pay off my college loans in about three years because I only had $5000.00 in debt. Which begs the question are we better off now than we were 30 years ago. After years of Reaganism, I would say not. Now I don't really want this to be a poltiical blog but a lot of what will be done here is politics because it concerns people and how to create a society. In my opinion the middle class had been sold down the river into perpetual slavery with no chance of escape. By the time kids graduate from college their debt load can easily hit the six figures and that is without a professional degree. How do you dig your way out? Then comes buying a house and growing a family which usually means more expense and more debt. Instead of focusing on the debt though, let's look at how to create riches.

My best advice for someone starting out is to become at good simple cook. buying prepared food is expensive and usually unhealthy because of the amount of fat and salt found in many prepared foods. For the very busy working long hours, nothing beats making a big pot of soup once week . Just keep reheating and eating. It takes let less than ten minutes to heat and serve. And soup has the added benefit od being a comfort food that filsl you up and makes you feel full with fewer calories. Eat well and stay slim. A big pot of soup can be made for less than $5 dollars. Spend the savings some place else. Another quick meal is eggs, which cook in no time and are packed full of nutrients at very little cost. In the summer instead of soup I used to make tubs of pasta salad which I pour over greens. It was cooling and very economical even though I bought the beans in cans. Add your own cheap eats to the menu