Stacking Pennies . . .

I think I mentioned I'm re-applying to graduate school. I have 9/30 credits completed (through distance education while working) at "University A", in the state I formerly lived in. I could continue on this path, taking 3 credits a semester (6 a year) and graduate in 3.5 years. University A is usually ranked in the 30s or 40s in my field.

My new job is more flexible about where you do your education. (Actually, they'll pay for almost anything, even non-job related. I think I'm taking sailing this spring!) I now have access to another (distance education) program at "University B" a top 10 engineering college. Even better, they are on the quarter system, require just nine courses, and I can take four each year. They also will accept two transfer credits, meaning if they accept my application, I'll be done in under two years! It'll also be a boost to my resume, as I went to a relatively no-name undergrad university. It also probably will be a lot more work and a very difficult two years... but it should pay off big time in the long run.

I was already really sold on this idea but I just came up with yet another great benefit. At "University B", each class is four credits, which by their system would classify me as a "half time" student. So what does that mean? Well, my student loans are Federal Subsidized Stafford loans, meaning while I'm enrolled in school at least half time, the government will pay the interest for me. I could also completely cease making payments if I wanted, freeing up $133 extra each month to invest/save. WOW! (I'll have to decide exactly what I plan to do when/if this whole thing is a reality)

In dollar terms, what does this mean? Well, last month the interest on my loan was roughly $75, so if I'm in this program for roughly two years, it'll save me about $1800. I can't wait until September to get this started! Let's hope that they accept me! I should find out within a few months!

After yesterday's post on being impatient to enroll in my company's 401k, today I found that I was finally "in the system" and could enroll! I eagerly got to the screen where I could indicate I wanted to save 15% of my pretax income. Then came the fund allocation screen....

Crap. I wasn't 100% prepared for this despite it being on my to-do list from about a week ago. I do have a loose plan of what I want to do, but haven't figure out how to align my three accounts into one asset allocation.

My overall goal for my asset allocation goal is as follows:

• Stocks/Bonds: 88%/12%
• Within stocks, Domestic/International: 60%/40%
• Within Domestic, Large Cap/Small Cap/REIT: 75%/15%/15%

I also would like 10% of my international allocations in emerging markets, and someday I may want to do something fancier with bonds as I hear a lot about TIPS and Treasury and things I don't know anything about (right now I just use a bond index fund).

Overall, this breaks down to 6 funds allocated as follows:

• Large Cap 37%
• Small Cap 8%
• REIT 8%
• Int. Index 32%
• Emerg. Mkts 4%
• Bond Idx 12%

Do you think I'm missing anything important?

There are some issues with this right now. It is pretty impossible for me to actually get the 4% emerging markets allocation or even the 8% REIT allocation. I don't have those options in my 401k, and Vanguard requires minimum investments of $3000, which is currently 15% of my portfolio. Besides, I don't really know exactly what my current allocation is, mostly because Fidelity's 2040 fund has about a zillion different holdings.

So, what is my plan? First, I need to move both my Roth IRA and old 401k to Vanguard, while rolling the 401k to an IRA. Then I want to roll $5000 of the 401k into the Roth. Why just $5000? Because I don't want to get hit with taxes on the full $15k this year. I figure I'll roll it into my Roth over a period of 2-3 years, hurrying it along if it becomes necessary (meaning, if I end up planning to get married before then, as the income limits are harder to meet if you aren't single). Perhaps more on the rollover later, as I contemplate all the implications of it.

Within the Roth, I want to buy $3000 of the REIT index fund, and put the rest in the Vangaurd 2040 fund (which does have a small percent emerging markets). I'll then set my future contributions to the 2040 fund and most likely put my old 401k into the 2040 fund as well. When my portfolio grows more, I may invest more into the emerging markets fund, but probably not any time in 2008.

Last I'll use the index funds in my 401k to balance out my other allocations (small cap, large cap, index, and bonds) as closely as I can to my goal.

What do you think? I do want to have real estate be part of my portfolio, as I don't own property and don't plan on it soon. Should I just wait on the REITs until I can keep them a smaller percent of the portfolio? Or, given the housing market, will they decline all on their own, so I won't have to worry?? :)

In a side note, I temporarily regretted posting anything about my relationship yesterday. People sometimes jump to conclusions based on limited information. I wrote a post detailing things, intending to "clear up" some things. It was wordy and not very personal finance related anyway, so I'll just say it in a concise fashion. It's been 3.5 years. When we were both students, we split things fairly evenly. He would never need a loan from me and is good with money, and will most likely be very successful (someday). He really is on a tight budget as we live in an expensive city. He does pay for things now and then, including dinners, just not this weekend. He spent hours helping me set up my furniture and hang pictures and is really helpful with that kind of thing. I eat his food when I'm at his place (but my food is so much better!) We discussed it briefly, he acknowledged it, and I'll see if it is an issue in the future. If so, I will write about it, but I have to remind myself not to get (too) defensive about the comments!

I still can't sign up for my company's 401k, but not because I'm ineligible. You are eligible immediately (and vested immediately too!), though they a pension plan too which takes a year to be eligible and 5 years to vest.

I can't sign up because the website doesn't recognize my userid. I'm not "in the system" despite already getting a huge packet of information from them. Since I'm not in the system, when I call them, they are totally helpless:
"I can't take your password over the phone, you have to go through the system and punch it in"
"I did. But I wasn't given any menu options, so I pressed zero for help."
"Well. I can put you back through the system, and you can enter your password."
". . . But that obviously didn't work."

Gah! They did say it may take 7-10 days to become active. If they mean business days, it has been seven. If they mean actual days, it has been 11. I'll give it until the end of the week....

But I'm really anxious to start contributing! I'm going to see if I can handle contributing 15% of my income. If I do that, I'll be able to get about $10k in my 401k and 5k in my Roth, for a total of 15k of my money in retirement contributions for 2008, just over 21% of my gross income. There also should be roughly 4k from the company match. Barring an ever declining market, that should almost double my account value in 2008! However, with such a shaky market and all this recession talk, I specifically set my goals in dollars of contributions, not account value. Go long term investing!

I think 15% will be a stretch for me, at least while I'm growing the e-fund. I varied between 12% and 15% at my last job, and rent was much lower. We'll have to see how it goes. My budget says I can do it, but I'm not much of a budgeter.

While I'm waiting, I've been putting a little extra in my Roth IRA to get the year started off on the right foot.

So, you aren't supposed to keep score in relationships. Still, I can't help it sometimes.

My boyfriend is a poor poor grad student who makes less than half of what I do (stipend). My savings is going up, his is staying flat at best. Naturally, I don't expect him to spend much on us. He is content with not going out to eat much and living quite cheaply, which is great for us in the long run because I'm fairly frugal too. We should never have problems living within our means. Still, sometimes I want treats, so I provide them for us.

This weekend (starting on Thursday) I paid for:
Pizza: $13, a good deal though, for 3 medium pizza's that fed us almost all weekend. I will say nothing about the healthfulness of it...
Sam Adam's White Ale: $14
Lunch at Ikea: $11 (though my fault, since we wouldn't have otherwise been at Ikea and he was helping me pick out and build stuff)
Random Food that we ate: Coffee, cereal, milk, juice, burritos from Trader Joe's.... Plus he made a smoothie that neither of us really needed/wanted (which was much to thick) with my frozen strawberries right before dinner for no logical reason!

Also, he doesn't have a car, so I'm always driving and using my gas. And he definitely ate/drank more of all that stuff than I did.

It isn't that I'm not generous with this kind of thing. I am actually quite generous: "Thanks for coming to Ikea... do you want to stop at the cafe? How about this Mango Sorbet too, that looks delicious!" Then I do my budget, see that I want to save more, then regret my generosity. Ooops.

Then again, how petty is it for me to quibble about $37 spent on "us" when i spent about $200 on me and my apartment at Ikea? It is hard to justify that.

I guess it's the principle rather than the dollar amount. When we stopped at the store to buy juice (potentially for future smoothies or to mix in drinks), he could have paid for it. It was only about $3, so it makes no difference in the scheme of things, but it makes me feel a little less like I'm being taken advantage of. I know that really isn't the case... I offer to do all these things and he would be fine if I stopped. Sometimes I can't help but be bothered by it though.

I guess I need to be careful with my generosity, and really think about it before I offer to pay for things for "us". I need to make sure I won't regret it. Spending money doesn't show love (though, I can't help but think it does, at least a little). I think (hope) that my attitude would be different if we were engaged/married and money spent on us was truly ours and not mine/his. I also think his attitude would be a little different as well. But it just isn't like that right now. It is my money, and if I'm going to share it, I need to make sure I'm sharing it within my budget.

I'm quite certain that I wasn't tagged for this, but I saw a few other bloggers doing it and it seemed fun. I don't use a traditional wallet. For better or worse, I use a little wristlet that my sister gave me. I stick it in my purse, or if I'm traveling light I put it on my wrist and don't carry a purse . While it doesn't have the organizational capabilities of a wallet, I don't carry too much with me, so it works well.


What is there?

• Drivers License: I just got this about a week ago. I heart California! Also, I so wish I wouldn't have worn red, as it sort of clashes with the yellow background.
  
• Cash: I usually don't carry any cash, but I happened to hit the ATM a few days before, so I have $23. I also have some quarters, which I hoard for laundry money.
• Credit Cards: My awesome pink Discover Card, and a Chase Visa. Also a seldom used Wells Fargo debit card, and a Health Savings Account debit card from my HSA at my last job.
• Library Card: Brand new! No, I'm not afraid that you know that I live somewhere in the vast LA area.
• Ralph's receipt: It is for Orange Juice. Trader Joe's was all out of OJ (well, out of the $3 kind, they did have a $5.50 jug) so we swung into Ralph's. I don't need this receipt. We don't need to bring ink and paper into this. I can't imagine a scenario that I would have to prove that I bought OJ. To some skeptical friend, "Don't even act like I didn't get that OJ. I've got the documentation right here. It's in my file at home. Under O." (So much funnier coming from the late Mitch Hedberg, but if you got that reference, I automatically like you extra.)
• H&M Gift card: It has less than $5 on it, but I put it in there hoping I'll use it someday...
• AAA card: Because my parents love me and got it for me. Personally, I'd probably join the much greener Better World Club.

I don't tag you, but if you think this seems fun, feel free to participate!

So.... If you are observant, you might have noticed earlier this week I requested to be added to the blog roll of anyone who regularly reads this, yet didn't follow through on my promise to create one myself. I'm a bad person! But I have an excuse: I think I'm moving to wordpress, but I'm just not quite ready to move in over there. I hate that you can't edit the CSS for free, but let's be honest... I don't want to deal with editing the code anyway. I'll get this taken care of SOON, either way.

I consider myself reasonably successful, and I hope to continue down the road to success as I get older. Trent over at the The Simple Dollar recently wrote an interesting post in which he shares some tips to improve your life. In light of this, I want to share with you exactly how I got to where I am today, and outline how you can do even better than I did! Here are the main four things I did right to get where I am today:

Luck: I was born in the USA, lucky me! I think that is the single most important thing to my success (though other first world countries could have been acceptable).

Family: We were not in poverty, though there were some money issues at times. That helps a heck of a lot when trying to get through life. I was well fed and actually went to a private high school. Most of all, there was a ton of emotional support. My dad in particular placed high priority on education, as he did not finish college himself. We were encouraged to participate in extra-curricular activities, and my parents shelled out for a lot of lessons, sports and extra classes. I used to go to summer school for fun to take extra classes! They provided some minor monetary support in college, and allowed me to stay at home rent free while for a couple semesters.

Natural ability: Not everyone can get through the engineering coursework with good grades. I'm not meaning to be arrogant--there are a ton of things that I stink at. But my ability to understand math is genetic--I did nothing special to earn it.

Hard work: I have spent many many hours investing in my education and myself. It isn't always fun, but it is rewarding.

To a lesser degree, the following two things helped:

Federal Support: I received scholarships and financial aid to attend college. Without it, I'd be at least 20k more in student loan debt. For a state school!

Social connections: I got the interview for my current job because my boyfriend was going to a top grad school, met someone who worked here, and passed on my resume. Most people who work here are from big name schools. Not I! Other than that, I didn't get a lot of advantages from social connections, yet. My parents don't have powerful friends, nor did I go to a prestigious school. But I've seen it happen with others a lot.

Based in my successes, I have three surefire tips for success. You'll may have to combine these with hard work to guarantee success. Still, with just a little work, you'll have a good shot at a successful life if you do these three things:

1. Be born in a good country. Even better, pick a good neighborhood, and maybe consider avoiding being a minority group. You could even consider being male, though I wasn't and don't want to be!
2. Have a good family. The more money the easier it will be for you, but even more importantly, they have to care about you. Not only that, they must have the time and knowledge to invest in your future, as well as the ability to lead you along in your early years. And maybe in your young adult years too, if you are lucky!
   
3. Be gifted. Intelligence is a good gift to have, or perhaps extreme artistic talent. Both would be great, but there are some other options I'm sure. Have some charisma and a go-getter personality. While you are at it, make sure you are healthy and it wouldn't hurt to be attractive too.

What, you don't like my advice? Okay, okay... Then I suggest you read Trent's good advice that can actually be followed, no matter what has happened with my three tips!

All joking aside, hard work is very important and can help a lot of people. What about "working smart"? Personally, that term gets on my nerves. I think it is overused and largely meaningless. However, if you think you can find a way to "work smart", go for it. If you don't really understand what "work smart" means in your life (I don't!) just work hard while you are contemplating it.

My point is, you do have to play your cards right, but it is silly to pretend we all got a similar hand.

I have been using two online savings accounts for about a year, ING and HSBC. Both have been dropping rates like crazy, and neither are very competitive anymore. There simply are better options out there. I'm not going to stand for this anymore!

I did a little research, and decided to switch to the Vanguard Prime Money Market Fund to house the majority of my savings. It currently has a yield of 4.22%. While are HYSAs and CDs out there with better rates, they aren't consistently higher. I'm not going to rate chase. This is a solid account that has continually been competitive to HYSA. I first did the analysis last summer, and the tax free money market account actually came out ahead of any savings account. Try out this awesome calculator to compare. These days, the taxable account is a better deal for me. I was wavering between EmigrantDirect (solid reviews, solid rates) and Vanguard, and honestly the final decision was sort of impulsive. I figure I'll eventually roll over my 401k into an IRA there, and move my Roth from Fidelity... So it will simplify my finances in the long run.

I funded it with $4000 to start, about half of my HSBC balance. I already have a lot of stuff linked up with my HSBC account, so I'm waiting to completely pull the plug on it... But it will happen. I already set up my Vanguard account for direct deposit and will be sending my tax refund there as well.

What about ING? Well I'm not too impressed with them either, but they will be staying around. I'll be using them for some shorter term savings (car insurance, travel fund) and for now, for my student loan payback account and new car fund. Why? I like the subaccounts. Yeah, I can do it in excel. Whatever, I don't want to. For such small balances I'm not as concerned about getting the best rate.

Why else? The $10 referral bonuses and the sweepstakes I am entered in for using direct deposit. So it's lame to trade interest rates for sweepstakes... but whatever, you'll be jealous when I win $30,000!

I was clicking along through TaxAct, and it asked if I'd made any contribution to an Health Savings Account (HSA) this year. It instructed me not to include employer contributions or contributions made by my employer through a cafeteria plan. I thought, "why yes, I did make contributions. My salary was reduced by $1500 this year, and it went into my account." Cafeteria plan? I pictured my workplace cafeteria, and wondered how they were involve in health care. I never ate there, so that probably didn't apply to me.

Uh....

I later noticed that my $1500 was double counted as a deduction. I looked up "cafeteria plan" and realized that was exactly what my HSA was funded through! Ooops. I had selected my benefits from a "menu" of choices, thus it was a cafeteria plan. Ohhhh, I see! Why don't they just say what they meant?!? I corrected it, and my refund fell by several hundred dollars. Still, I haven't received any tax information from my HSA administrator, so I suppose I should wait to file until I get that. Which doesn't make sense to me, because those distributions were tax free anyway. Why would I even need to report them?

To be honest, I'm not certain I filed my 2006 taxes right with regards to my HSA. I got a lonely form that looked suspiciously like a tax document sometime in March, long after I filed my taxes. I do know that I paid the right amount: Money taken from the account is tax free and my contributions were pre-tax. Simple. I just don't know if I documented it right.

Also, I moved to California this January and I obviously entered my current address on my tax return. TaxAct helpfully assumed I would need a CA state return in addition to my Iowa one. I had to click through the entire California state return for it to figure out that I didn't owe any taxes here for 2007, nor do I have to file a return.

Well anyway, I'll hold off a week on officially filing them, and if nothing shows up from my HSA, I'll give them a call.

Projected refund is about $1000 total. I owe the state $200 and the federal government owes me $1200. Oh sure I'm giving the government a tax free loan, blah blah blah. Assuming a 5% return in my savings (which isn't likely these days) I missed out on $50 of interest, which would have been taxed anyway.... And now I have $1000 that I did not spend and can use to replenish the e-fund. It is already back to about $8500, so another thousand will boost it quite close to the 10k goal.

While filing my taxes using TaxAct, I clicked on a pop-up that gave me tax tips for 2008. One interesting suggestion that had was to own a home.

A Real Tax Shelter
Purchasing a home is one of the best tax shelters available. The interest and points that you pay for the purchase are deductible as itemized deductions. The property taxes that you pay on the home are also deductible as itemized deductions. Best of all, when you sell the home, you probably will not need to pay any tax at all on the gain. There is no other investment that can provide the tax advantages like home ownership.

Though it was a friendly little tip, it got me thinking and got me a little mad. Why is does owning a home provide such great tax benefits? (Deductions for dependents is another story.... But raising kids is ridiculously expensive so this doesn't bother me much.) Is it fair? If so, why is it fair? Do most developed countries do this? Where did this idea come from? Of course, popular belief is that the main reason is to encourage people to own homes. It is the American Dream. But why? Why does the government want to encourage home ownership for everyone? Why am I seen less favorably because I'm priced out and relatively uninterested in locking myself to a property?

How about another viewpoint? The New York Times says that is simply a nice "American folk legend: the government invented the mortgage-interest deduction to help people buy their own homes, and the level of homeownership has risen ever since." The real story, they claim, is much less middle class friendly. It stems from the government originally having all interest as deductible, which was really intended to help business. The average American didn't have a mortgage (or credit card) and wasn't paying interest in the first place (can you believe that!), so interest was a business expense and therefore deductible. Later this broad rule was changed, for obvious reasons, but the mortgage interest stayed (for less obvious reasons.) Further, the author claims tax is actually regressive with "the rewards are greatly skewed in favor of the moderately to the conspicuously rich." Wow. This is stuff I'd never heard of before. I will stop myself from regurgitating the whole article, but it is a great read!

So, how much of an impact does this really make on me anyway? I assume if you own property, you must itemize deductions. I generally take the standard deduction. What kind of itemized deduction would someone on my salary with property get, assuming my rent is equal to their housing expenses? It would be an interesting exercise. The more expensive the house, the bigger the difference.

Ho much impact does it make on the government? A lot, actually: "The mortgage-interest deduction. We all love the deduction for home-mortgage interest. But renters and those who own their homes free and clear get nothing. Cost to the government: $402.7 billion." That number is from 2006.

If most people are deducting mortgage interest, why can't I deduct anything for my rent? There is interest and taxes built into the price of my apartment. Is someone else taking those deductions for me? Actually, a few states do allow a small tax break for renters, based on the fact that we indirectly are paying someone else's property taxes. In California, it is only for senior citizens with low incomes. Yet you can deduct interest on mortgages values over $1 million.

What can a renter do? This article suggests deducting student loan interest (which saved me a couple hundred this year) or a hybrid car deduction (can't afford a hybrid). For some reason, I don't feel like that evens things out at all. Apparently all I can do is write my congressman or buy a house.

What do you think? And is your view skewed by the fact that you either do or do not own property? Is it possible that eliminating this deduction could actually benefit the majority of people?

I get paid tomorrow (yes, on Thursdays) and finally was able to view my paycheck online. Though I only am being paid for 40 hrs instead of 80 this period, they did process my signing bonus in the first check (yes!) so I finally have some money to work with. They got all my direct deposit stuff set up in time (nice work!). I have it split between three different accounts, checking, short term savings (insurance, travel, car) and a long term savings (e-fund, maybe house/condo fund one day). I still may have to transfer between these, but this should minimize that. Make savings automatic!

I'm still not ready to finalize a budget, as I'm not certain what my take home pay will be. I tried to figure out exactly how much I'll be paying in taxes each month by taking total taxes paid divided by total gross pay in this check. I came up with about a 39% tax rate! Yikes, that can't be right! Google tells me that taxes on bonuses, while calculated as normal income, are withheld at a different rate, up to 40%. Well, that makes more sense! Good to know.

Is it logical to just use 25%, my marginal tax rate? Then again, what about FICA, Social Security, etc? If I do that, I come up with about $1700 after 401k and medical or $1500 if I go all the way up to 20% in my 401k. It isn't likely I can live off the $3000/month, at least not if I want to grow my cash savings. Though the way some people dream about buying a house, I dream about maxing out my 401k....

My 401k still isn't ready for me to enroll. I hate when systems are not automated enough. My last job I could enroll in my 401k on the first day (through Fidelity). It has been a full week and CitiStreet still isn't recognizing my user ID. When I called the number to ask if this was normal, I was told "Please listen carefully as options have recently changed." Then, there was a single ring, then silence. More silence. I was never given any options! I hung up and tried again, only to have it happen again. I pressed all the numbers and was directed to an operator who could not help me unless I "went through the system and entered my PIN" (which I did!). He suggested waiting another week, or trying the number again. Lame.

I was going to go hang out with the boyfriend tonight, but I think I'll cancel. He has a lot of school work, and I have needed to do laundry for at least a week. This will give me time to start working on yesterdays to-do list. First up, taxes!

I have some major financial housekeeping to do within the next month (or maybe two months). With switching jobs and moving 2000 miles, I feel like everything is a mess! It is time for some clean-up.

Taxes: Self explanatory! I did start them on TaxAct, but got distracted.

Retirement Accounts:
Well, first, I assign myself some homework. I've had "Random Walk Guide to Investing" hanging out on my bookshelf for months. I need to read it. I also want to re-read Jonathan's series at MyMoneyBlog.com about asset allocation, and look for other good internet information. I need to consider rolling over my old 401k to an IRA or even to a Roth IRA. I want to at least consider moving my Roth from Fidelity to Vanguard. I need to get enrolled in my new 401k ASAP, and contribute at least 8% to get the match.

Emergency fund: I want to get it back up to 10k, then evaluate if I need to increase it further due to increased costs. It briefly hit 10k before Christmas, but has dwindled to just over 7k (!) in the move process. Well, 1k went to the Roth to kick off 2008 so it isn't so bad. This should easily be taken care of if I simply apply the relocation allowance and signing bonus. Also, I want to investigate moving it from HSBC to something better.

Actually implement plan to buy car insurance. I have to do this soon, because I have get my car registered in my new state. It's just... I recently designated an ING accout to save up for bi-yearly insurance purchases... but so far I've only stuck $25 in it! Ug.

Figure out a reasonable budget. Having scaled back income and paying two rents for a month has totally messed with my head. I have no idea what I can afford, what is a splurge, and what I absolutely shouldn't be buying. So I'm just guessing. . .

Rebates, rebates, rebates: I need to send in rebates for my cable service, my internet service ($50 each), and for my modem (about $80). Then I need to sell my modem online, since it turns out I didn't even need it! After that, I might cancel cable since I haven't been watching it at all.

Set some 2008 goals: It's been hard to do with so much up in the air.

Well, I feel a little better just writing it all down.....

I'm thinking it is (way past) time to add a blog roll to this site. If I've ever commented on your blog, that means I read you and probably will be adding you to the list of blogs I read anyway. But perhaps I have a reader or two whose blogs I have not yet discovered. I have a special interest in twenty-something females, particularly unmarried ones, because I relate best. But of course, I do read all sorts of blogs!

If you want to be added, you can comment on this post, or send me an email. I can be reached at SJean0 (and that is a zero, not the letter "O"). I use Google for my mail.

I also need to update my sidebars and goals to be current. I like writing, but the backend part of blogging is so unappealing to me. I have a mini-dream of getting a prettier site (wordpress?), but it seems like a lot of work. I also don't think that I can justify shelling out the cash to pay someone to figure this out for me... So I will do it myself, eventually!

Also, if you do read my blog, please consider adding me to your blogroll if you have one and if you feel like it. Thanks!

I feel like I'm being scammed out of my money left and right!

I signed up for cable service online (because I do everything possible online) and followed the clear instructions on the web page to obtain a cable modem before the cable guy came. There was a promotion for a "free" modem, after rebate, which turned out to be about $20 with shipping and tax (after rebates... which are always a bit sketchy to redeem).

Yesterday the cable guy set up my internet and TV, and started installing a cable modem from the company. I said I had one already, and would not be needing to rent one from the cable company (as that is how it often works.) He told me that there was no rental, the modem was part of the service.

I am still fuming about this, a little. (Ok, a lot, if you ask my boyfriend.) Why would they tell me I needed to buy a modem when I didn't? Now I have a modem that put almost $100 on my credit card bill for the month (which I pay off, of course) and two rebate forms to fill out and hope get credited to me. What a hassle!

I looked up the modems on Amazon (I'm not very ebay literate, but i should probably check out ebay too) and I can probably sell my new modem for at least $35, even if I cut off the upc to get the rebate. In theory that is a small profit, but it is a bit of a hassle to do all this.

I'm super annoyed that they convinced me to buy a modem I didn't need!

Also, as mentioned in my last post, I ordered some transcripts from my undergraduate institution. I ordered that two official transcripts be sent to the graduate university I am applying to. Yesterday I received two transcripts at my home address, clearly stamped with "issued to student". I didn't need or want these. I can only assume they didn't send any to the university. Now I have to call them and find out what happened. I hope I don't have to pay $12 to have them do this again!

Last, I sent my laptop in for repair in early December, and they sent it back with a note that the battery had failed. It was still under warranty, so I called them and asked why they didn't replace the battery. They said, "Hmm, I'm not sure! I'll send you a new one!" Which they did, along with a box for me to send the broken battery back in. In the meantime, I moved cross country and the old battery and box are long gone. Vanished! They just sent me a letter requesting that I return the part, or they will bill me for it. I assume a battery is around $100. Ouch.

This battery incident is primarily my fault (though they could have just replaced it when they had my laptop), but still annoying. I can see why they make people send in defective parts, but I'm going to call them and see if there is any flexibility in this policy. I don't have high hopes, but it can't hurt to call, explain the situation, and ask if they really have to bill me for a new battery. I've had mixed results with companies forgiving things like this, but it never hurts to ask.

I am frustrated that my money is disappearing for these things. Granted, they aren't really scams (except maybe the modem promotion), but I'm not getting anything of value out of them.

I just completed my first week at my new job, and will get paid next week. Let me just stay, I can not wait!

Work, so far, is horribly boring. I know it will get better, but they haven't exactly fit me into a program, so I've just been chillin' and doing a LOT of online training. But I'm a hard worker, so it is frustrating to just be sitting here, when I know all my friends at my last job are working their butts off.

By the way, applying to graduate school is expensive. I was accepted to a pretty good school at my last job (usually ranked about 30 or so in my major), but I now have access to a degree from top ten university. They will accept 2 of the 3 classes I have taken, and are on a quarter system, so I will be done with my M.S. degree more quickly. It will be a lot of work, but a better education overall. It will also help my resume out, as my undergrad institution is relatively unknown. My current company will pay for pretty much everything, including books.

In order to apply to the new school, I have paid:
-$60 application fee
-$24 for 2 transcripts from my previous grad school
-$12 for 2 transcripts from my undergrad school

I have opted NOT to send transcripts from my study abroad university (too much of a hassle, probably only about $15 plus international mail) and not order official GRE scores ($20 or so). Still, it is easily $100 a school to apply!

They will eventually be reimbursed to me, as long as I remember to file for it once I've completed my first class. My fees for the previous school I applied for were also reimbursed (and the GRE fee), so I am fortunate. But had I gone to grad school right away, I'd be facing these costs as a poor college student. That just seems wrong, but there aren't many ways around it.

This is one of many reasons I am really excited for my paycheck. Thank goodness for a healthy savings account!

Common knowledge is to always try to negotiate your starting salary. In most cases, the worst that can happen is they will say no. There is a possible exception for entry level positions at large companies, when it is hard to distinguish yourself from the next person holding a similar degree. You hear entry level people claim they are special because they have good grades, an internship or two, and extracurriculars. Well, great, but so do most people (good) companies interview. It isn't that you aren't special, it is just that the company probably doesn't know it yet. The company I worked for right out of school had a standard "new hire" offer, and it was basically take it or leave it. Smaller companies probably are more flexible. It still might not hurt to ask if the offer is negotiable, but be prepared to back up your request with reasons why you deserve more.

When I was job shopping for my relocation, I was in a unique position. In my industry you typically are moved up from Engineer 1 to Engineer 2" after roughly two years, if you are a good performer. (While I was almost certainly doing Engineer 2 work by the end of my last job, HR had strict rules about minimum amount of experience.) I was job shopping with 1.5 years of experience, so I still had to look for Engineer I jobs. Yet I didn't want to be caught by a "standard new hire offer", since I did have some experience and some graduate coursework.

I think that my first job offer was a standard new hire offer. I easily negotiated an extra 2k and a 3k signing bonus. The second job offer seemed to take my experience into consideration, and came in 2k than negotiated first offer, and a similar signing bonus. I chose the second, not entirely for monetary reasons.

With the salary being just 1k below my hope of 70k-75k range, I was faced with the decision of whether or not to ask for more. I thought the offer was fair. I thought they took my experience and graduate coursework into consideration. If I were to ask if it was negotiable, I'm not sure what I'd say when they asked "why do you think you deserve more?" So I didn't negotiate.

Now that I'm on the inside, I have acess to their salary tables. Here they are for my job category:

Level Low Mid High
1 $42000 $62000 $78000
2 $49000 $72000 $90000
3 $60000 $88000 $110000
4 $72000 $105000 $132000
5 $88000 $129000 $162000
6 $102000 $150000 $187000

So, you can see that my offer was above the middle for Engineer 1, and poised quite nicely to be moved into an Engineer 2 position, provided I perform well. Could I have asked for more? Yes. Would they have given it to me? Maybe. Maybe not. The range I was hoping for more closely lines up with the middle of the Engineer 2 range.

While maybe I could have squeezed out a few more dollars, I do feel very fortunate to be here. It's a top company, and has many graduates from top universities. There are lots of brilliant people here. I went to a state school with a good regional reputation (at best) and no reputation in this area. I now have an opportunity to finish my MS degree at a top ten university in my field. On their dime. I should be done in less than two years if they accept my transfer credits. Nice. The competition here is more stiff than at my last company--I would have easily been a star at my last company--but that will be good for me. Always surround yourself with people smarter than you are.

I signed up for health insurance benefits at my new company today. I had essentially three choices.

HMO
I've never used an HMO, and though I have heard some negative press about them, I think it would work ok for me. I don't have health issues and am a low maintenance customer. Free to me, minimal copays ($15 for my monthly prescription). I don't think I would mind being forced to deal with a Primary Care Physician.

Traditional PPO account
This cost about $16 per a bi weekly pay period, so just $416 year for premiums. Same copays as the HMO. You can see any in-network doctor and have a lot more freedom in your medical care. You can see out of network doctors for reduced benefits.

PPO + Health Savings Account (HSA)
This is free to me, but is a high deductible plan. Preventative care is covered 100%, but everything else is out of pocket up to the deductible, then benefits kick in. With this plan, I am eligible for a HSA to put pre-tax dollars in to spend on medical care, which carry over year to year. My company will contribute $700 to this account. I believe the yearly deductible is about $1500, but I can't quite recall.

I used a HSA at my last job (which had worse benefit options) so I'm already comfortable with them. I felt doubts about my HSA at the end of last year, because almost all the money I put in I took back out to buy my prescriptions with. My company didn't contribute. However, regular insurance was still 60/mo, so I came out... Well, I think I came out a little behind using the Health savings Account at my last job. But you live, you learn. I pretty much immediately ruled out the traditional PPO, because it seemed so similar to the HMO, except you could see more doctors and you had to pay money for it. I didn't need the freedom. The HMO seemed like a really cheap option, so I considered it.

I was left to debate the HMO and the PPO+HSA. Barring catastrophe, I need very little medical care. I see the doctor once a year for a women's health check-up, and use birth control each month, which does cost $45 without coverage. Last year I got an eye infection and was fixed up for about $100. I exercise, but I don't play any physical sports. Or any sports, really.

So, I went with the HSA, and chose to contribute $1500 of my own money to it. At first glance, that seems like the most expensive choice. My company contribution will cover my prescription costs, and probably nearly all other costs, so the plan is still free to me. Except I'll also have $1500 stored up for future health expenses. Next year, I shouldn't have to contribute much at all, though I probably will try to build it a little each year. In the short term, it is less cash in my pocket now. But the money being set aside is mine. It offers flexibility in the long term.

Something to note, a big disadvantage of HSA's are the fees. Most plans you can find online have high fees and/or no investment options. My HSA administrator really is no better, but the company pays the fees for me. I'm not intending to use this account as a sort of IRA for health (as suggested by Jonathan on MyMoneyBlog), so investment opportunities aren't a big priority either.

Did I make the right choice? Well, it depends on if I have any major surprise medical issues this year. Let's hope it was a good choice.

It is that time of the month again.... Time for a net worth update!

As expected, my net worth took a hit this month. I switched jobs and was only paid for less than 2 weeks in the new year. Plus I front loaded my pre-tax Health Savings Account at my old job, so my paycheck was extra small. Not to mention the dip in my investments and extra spending associated with moving. Oh, and I paid rent in two places this month---$575 in Iowa and an astounding $1425 in Los Angeles. (And my new place is quite a bit smaller.) Luckily, I really am only obligated to pay for half of January, so come February 1st, I have to pay "only" $762.50. There was also a $500 security deposit for my new place (I'm due $100 from my old place), and a modem that will be eventually covered by rebates for $100.

With all that said, here are the results:

January Net Worth: $11,235, down $1,824, or -13.97% from $13,059.

The detailed numbers can be seen on my NetworthIQ page (sidebar). I did move $1000 to Roth IRA, which hurt my cash savings. The rest of the loss was expenses described above. It is worth noting that I should make up all of that next month (and more), provided my relocation money and signing bonus are processed.

I took a break from monthly goals for December and January, due to all the transitions. I'm going to do the same for February, at least until I get my first paycheck and I know exactly what I'm working with.

I went on my first full shopping trip since relocating and moving into my apartment. I looked at the current balance of my grocery bill in horror. How on earth was it at $79 already? And they still were ringing up my order!! The grand total was $95, then they swiped my Ralph's card and it dropped to $70. It is ridiculous that they do that. It is just forcing you to use a grocery card if you want any discounts at all.

Anyway, $70 is still much more than I spend on weekly groceries. About double! Although part of it was because I'm restocking almost everything, it still was a bit excessive. I think my solution will be to make this last two weeks.... so no new groceries until Februrary 12th! I am pretty sure I can do it. When I complain there is no food to eat, I usually mean, there is nothing I feel like cooking and eating.

What on earth did I buy? Well, I won't copy my whole long receipt, but here are some of the more expensive items on the list.
Chicken breast fillets $8.90. I don't usually buy meat, actually. I'm not vegetarian, but I'm not a big fan of meat and I don't really know how to prepare it well.
Frozen Strawberries, huge bag, $8.50 (should last a very long time. For smoothies)
Lunch meat, 2 packages, $5 (much cheaper than buying a sandwhich!)
Peperoni to make English muffin pizza's: $3.50
Lunch cheese: $4.19, I forgot to price shop this I think
I also bought butter, milk, bananas, coffee creamer, 2 boxes of cereal, frozen broccoli and lots of other miscellaneous items.

There were some things on the list I didn't get. I had a frugal recipe that called for ziti, so I set out to the pasta isle. When I didn't find it, I realized I wasn't entirely sure if ziti was pasta at all. Maybe it was a cheese? So I'm back at home, ziti-less and just looked it up. It was pasta after all. I also could not find any muffin mix to make bran muffins. Maybe no one else likes them?

I liked to have a grocery budget of about $120/month, but I may have to up it. We'll see.

I must have lost a little weight over the course of the last year, as most of my jeans have been getting a little baggy. It wasn't a significant ammount, but I'm small already, so five pounds in either direction can make my clothes fit differently. Then seven to ten pounds means a whole new pants size. Seems like Mapgirl is having the opposite problem which is admittedly more common. Anyway, to remedy this, I ordered some jeans from Banana Republic on sale for $31.99. I couldn't try them on, so I crossed my fingers on the size, 2L. I only need "Long" sometimes, but that was all that was left. This was before I picked up two new pairs on sale at Jcrew for about $35 each. I really didn't need 3 new pairs, just two! The jeans arrived yesterday, and are too long, as I suspected they might be. It is a bit of a releif, now I don't have to decide weather or not to return them. Obviously, they must go back. They were cute jeans too, so I would have been tempted to keep them. I have to eat $6.00 in shipping (couldn't find a free shipping code), but I will still get $32 back on my card. That'll teach me to buy jeans without trying them on. (They were only available online anyway. The ones in the store didn't work out either.

My new rule on clothes is nothig that isn't directly appropriate for work for the next six months. Does that really mean no fun clothes until June 29th? Yes! It is not as ambitious as other young bloggers no clothing resoluitions (Meg and Wanda are two examples), but it is a step in the right direction. Also, I just donated a huge pile of clothes I never wore to Goodwill, so another rule is, for every item that comes into the closet, something has to go in a donation pile. That is super logical, will help with clutter, and will inspire extra cautioun in purchasing! An exception may be made for shoes, but with caution.

Also, I have a couple pairs of pants I had made for me when I was in Hong Kong that are now a little too big as well. Some don't have belt loops, so they are nearly unwearable. In fact, I wore one pair with a safety pin in an emergency situation. Classy! I think it is time to find a tailor and get those pants wearable again. Much more frugal than buying more dress pants! Do any of you have experience with using a tailor? And if I get them taken in, can they later be taken out if necessary?

Either that or I can fatten up a little bit... but that is also expensive because my metabolism would require a big calorie surplus to accomplish that!

My internet and cable aren't being installed until Saturday. Yet here I am, on the internet from the comfort of my own apartment. That's right, I'm mooching off someone else's unsecured connection.

How unethical do you consider this? I know some people who do it regularly as their primary source of internet. I usually do it in situations like this--I don't have legitimate access to the internet, but I have a legitimate desire to be on it!

To be honest, I'm not certain of the security concerns of this. If I'm connected to their network, could they potentially access my computer? I don't think so.

I spent the day settling in to my new apartment. While I filled up my new Ikea dresser, it tipped over and nearly killed me. No worries, the only casualty was a barely noticeable cosmetic piece we are going to try to repair later this week. I listened to NPR all day, and I am pretty sure that once my six month deal runs out for cable, I will be able to do without it. I'm not going to lie, I'll miss some of the absolute crap TV shows that I watch but my life is probably better off without them (example: Real Housewives of Orange County). The shows that I really love (when there isn't a writers strike) are all available online (Office and Grey's).

Internet I couldn't live without.... but could I just mooch off a neighbors connection? I probably wouldn't. Not only because of the moral concerns, but because it may not be reliable and completely secure. What do you think?

I think I mentioned I'm re-applying to graduate school. I have 9/30 credits completed (through distance education while working) at "University A", in the state I formerly lived in. I could continue on this path, taking 3 credits a semester (6 a year) and graduate in 3.5 years. University A is usually ranked in the 30s or 40s in my field.

My new job is more flexible about where you do your education. (Actually, they'll pay for almost anything, even non-job related. I think I'm taking sailing this spring!) I now have access to another (distance education) program at "University B" a top 10 engineering college. Even better, they are on the quarter system, require just nine courses, and I can take four each year. They also will accept two transfer credits, meaning if they accept my application, I'll be done in under two years! It'll also be a boost to my resume, as I went to a relatively no-name undergrad university. It also probably will be a lot more work and a very difficult two years... but it should pay off big time in the long run.

I was already really sold on this idea but I just came up with yet another great benefit. At "University B", each class is four credits, which by their system would classify me as a "half time" student. So what does that mean? Well, my student loans are Federal Subsidized Stafford loans, meaning while I'm enrolled in school at least half time, the government will pay the interest for me. I could also completely cease making payments if I wanted, freeing up $133 extra each month to invest/save. WOW! (I'll have to decide exactly what I plan to do when/if this whole thing is a reality)

In dollar terms, what does this mean? Well, last month the interest on my loan was roughly $75, so if I'm in this program for roughly two years, it'll save me about $1800. I can't wait until September to get this started! Let's hope that they accept me! I should find out within a few months!

After yesterday's post on being impatient to enroll in my company's 401k, today I found that I was finally "in the system" and could enroll! I eagerly got to the screen where I could indicate I wanted to save 15% of my pretax income. Then came the fund allocation screen....

Crap. I wasn't 100% prepared for this despite it being on my to-do list from about a week ago. I do have a loose plan of what I want to do, but haven't figure out how to align my three accounts into one asset allocation.

My overall goal for my asset allocation goal is as follows:

• Stocks/Bonds: 88%/12%
• Within stocks, Domestic/International: 60%/40%
• Within Domestic, Large Cap/Small Cap/REIT: 75%/15%/15%

I also would like 10% of my international allocations in emerging markets, and someday I may want to do something fancier with bonds as I hear a lot about TIPS and Treasury and things I don't know anything about (right now I just use a bond index fund).

Overall, this breaks down to 6 funds allocated as follows:

• Large Cap 37%
• Small Cap 8%
• REIT 8%
• Int. Index 32%
• Emerg. Mkts 4%
• Bond Idx 12%

Do you think I'm missing anything important?

There are some issues with this right now. It is pretty impossible for me to actually get the 4% emerging markets allocation or even the 8% REIT allocation. I don't have those options in my 401k, and Vanguard requires minimum investments of $3000, which is currently 15% of my portfolio. Besides, I don't really know exactly what my current allocation is, mostly because Fidelity's 2040 fund has about a zillion different holdings.

So, what is my plan? First, I need to move both my Roth IRA and old 401k to Vanguard, while rolling the 401k to an IRA. Then I want to roll $5000 of the 401k into the Roth. Why just $5000? Because I don't want to get hit with taxes on the full $15k this year. I figure I'll roll it into my Roth over a period of 2-3 years, hurrying it along if it becomes necessary (meaning, if I end up planning to get married before then, as the income limits are harder to meet if you aren't single). Perhaps more on the rollover later, as I contemplate all the implications of it.

Within the Roth, I want to buy $3000 of the REIT index fund, and put the rest in the Vangaurd 2040 fund (which does have a small percent emerging markets). I'll then set my future contributions to the 2040 fund and most likely put my old 401k into the 2040 fund as well. When my portfolio grows more, I may invest more into the emerging markets fund, but probably not any time in 2008.

Last I'll use the index funds in my 401k to balance out my other allocations (small cap, large cap, index, and bonds) as closely as I can to my goal.

What do you think? I do want to have real estate be part of my portfolio, as I don't own property and don't plan on it soon. Should I just wait on the REITs until I can keep them a smaller percent of the portfolio? Or, given the housing market, will they decline all on their own, so I won't have to worry?? :)

In a side note, I temporarily regretted posting anything about my relationship yesterday. People sometimes jump to conclusions based on limited information. I wrote a post detailing things, intending to "clear up" some things. It was wordy and not very personal finance related anyway, so I'll just say it in a concise fashion. It's been 3.5 years. When we were both students, we split things fairly evenly. He would never need a loan from me and is good with money, and will most likely be very successful (someday). He really is on a tight budget as we live in an expensive city. He does pay for things now and then, including dinners, just not this weekend. He spent hours helping me set up my furniture and hang pictures and is really helpful with that kind of thing. I eat his food when I'm at his place (but my food is so much better!) We discussed it briefly, he acknowledged it, and I'll see if it is an issue in the future. If so, I will write about it, but I have to remind myself not to get (too) defensive about the comments!

I still can't sign up for my company's 401k, but not because I'm ineligible. You are eligible immediately (and vested immediately too!), though they a pension plan too which takes a year to be eligible and 5 years to vest.

I can't sign up because the website doesn't recognize my userid. I'm not "in the system" despite already getting a huge packet of information from them. Since I'm not in the system, when I call them, they are totally helpless:
"I can't take your password over the phone, you have to go through the system and punch it in"
"I did. But I wasn't given any menu options, so I pressed zero for help."
"Well. I can put you back through the system, and you can enter your password."
". . . But that obviously didn't work."

Gah! They did say it may take 7-10 days to become active. If they mean business days, it has been seven. If they mean actual days, it has been 11. I'll give it until the end of the week....

But I'm really anxious to start contributing! I'm going to see if I can handle contributing 15% of my income. If I do that, I'll be able to get about $10k in my 401k and 5k in my Roth, for a total of 15k of my money in retirement contributions for 2008, just over 21% of my gross income. There also should be roughly 4k from the company match. Barring an ever declining market, that should almost double my account value in 2008! However, with such a shaky market and all this recession talk, I specifically set my goals in dollars of contributions, not account value. Go long term investing!

I think 15% will be a stretch for me, at least while I'm growing the e-fund. I varied between 12% and 15% at my last job, and rent was much lower. We'll have to see how it goes. My budget says I can do it, but I'm not much of a budgeter.

While I'm waiting, I've been putting a little extra in my Roth IRA to get the year started off on the right foot.

So, you aren't supposed to keep score in relationships. Still, I can't help it sometimes.

My boyfriend is a poor poor grad student who makes less than half of what I do (stipend). My savings is going up, his is staying flat at best. Naturally, I don't expect him to spend much on us. He is content with not going out to eat much and living quite cheaply, which is great for us in the long run because I'm fairly frugal too. We should never have problems living within our means. Still, sometimes I want treats, so I provide them for us.

This weekend (starting on Thursday) I paid for:
Pizza: $13, a good deal though, for 3 medium pizza's that fed us almost all weekend. I will say nothing about the healthfulness of it...
Sam Adam's White Ale: $14
Lunch at Ikea: $11 (though my fault, since we wouldn't have otherwise been at Ikea and he was helping me pick out and build stuff)
Random Food that we ate: Coffee, cereal, milk, juice, burritos from Trader Joe's.... Plus he made a smoothie that neither of us really needed/wanted (which was much to thick) with my frozen strawberries right before dinner for no logical reason!

Also, he doesn't have a car, so I'm always driving and using my gas. And he definitely ate/drank more of all that stuff than I did.

It isn't that I'm not generous with this kind of thing. I am actually quite generous: "Thanks for coming to Ikea... do you want to stop at the cafe? How about this Mango Sorbet too, that looks delicious!" Then I do my budget, see that I want to save more, then regret my generosity. Ooops.

Then again, how petty is it for me to quibble about $37 spent on "us" when i spent about $200 on me and my apartment at Ikea? It is hard to justify that.

I guess it's the principle rather than the dollar amount. When we stopped at the store to buy juice (potentially for future smoothies or to mix in drinks), he could have paid for it. It was only about $3, so it makes no difference in the scheme of things, but it makes me feel a little less like I'm being taken advantage of. I know that really isn't the case... I offer to do all these things and he would be fine if I stopped. Sometimes I can't help but be bothered by it though.

I guess I need to be careful with my generosity, and really think about it before I offer to pay for things for "us". I need to make sure I won't regret it. Spending money doesn't show love (though, I can't help but think it does, at least a little). I think (hope) that my attitude would be different if we were engaged/married and money spent on us was truly ours and not mine/his. I also think his attitude would be a little different as well. But it just isn't like that right now. It is my money, and if I'm going to share it, I need to make sure I'm sharing it within my budget.

I'm quite certain that I wasn't tagged for this, but I saw a few other bloggers doing it and it seemed fun. I don't use a traditional wallet. For better or worse, I use a little wristlet that my sister gave me. I stick it in my purse, or if I'm traveling light I put it on my wrist and don't carry a purse . While it doesn't have the organizational capabilities of a wallet, I don't carry too much with me, so it works well.


What is there?

• Drivers License: I just got this about a week ago. I heart California! Also, I so wish I wouldn't have worn red, as it sort of clashes with the yellow background.
  
• Cash: I usually don't carry any cash, but I happened to hit the ATM a few days before, so I have $23. I also have some quarters, which I hoard for laundry money.
• Credit Cards: My awesome pink Discover Card, and a Chase Visa. Also a seldom used Wells Fargo debit card, and a Health Savings Account debit card from my HSA at my last job.
• Library Card: Brand new! No, I'm not afraid that you know that I live somewhere in the vast LA area.
• Ralph's receipt: It is for Orange Juice. Trader Joe's was all out of OJ (well, out of the $3 kind, they did have a $5.50 jug) so we swung into Ralph's. I don't need this receipt. We don't need to bring ink and paper into this. I can't imagine a scenario that I would have to prove that I bought OJ. To some skeptical friend, "Don't even act like I didn't get that OJ. I've got the documentation right here. It's in my file at home. Under O." (So much funnier coming from the late Mitch Hedberg, but if you got that reference, I automatically like you extra.)
• H&M Gift card: It has less than $5 on it, but I put it in there hoping I'll use it someday...
• AAA card: Because my parents love me and got it for me. Personally, I'd probably join the much greener Better World Club.

I don't tag you, but if you think this seems fun, feel free to participate!

So.... If you are observant, you might have noticed earlier this week I requested to be added to the blog roll of anyone who regularly reads this, yet didn't follow through on my promise to create one myself. I'm a bad person! But I have an excuse: I think I'm moving to wordpress, but I'm just not quite ready to move in over there. I hate that you can't edit the CSS for free, but let's be honest... I don't want to deal with editing the code anyway. I'll get this taken care of SOON, either way.

I consider myself reasonably successful, and I hope to continue down the road to success as I get older. Trent over at the The Simple Dollar recently wrote an interesting post in which he shares some tips to improve your life. In light of this, I want to share with you exactly how I got to where I am today, and outline how you can do even better than I did! Here are the main four things I did right to get where I am today:

Luck: I was born in the USA, lucky me! I think that is the single most important thing to my success (though other first world countries could have been acceptable).

Family: We were not in poverty, though there were some money issues at times. That helps a heck of a lot when trying to get through life. I was well fed and actually went to a private high school. Most of all, there was a ton of emotional support. My dad in particular placed high priority on education, as he did not finish college himself. We were encouraged to participate in extra-curricular activities, and my parents shelled out for a lot of lessons, sports and extra classes. I used to go to summer school for fun to take extra classes! They provided some minor monetary support in college, and allowed me to stay at home rent free while for a couple semesters.

Natural ability: Not everyone can get through the engineering coursework with good grades. I'm not meaning to be arrogant--there are a ton of things that I stink at. But my ability to understand math is genetic--I did nothing special to earn it.

Hard work: I have spent many many hours investing in my education and myself. It isn't always fun, but it is rewarding.

To a lesser degree, the following two things helped:

Federal Support: I received scholarships and financial aid to attend college. Without it, I'd be at least 20k more in student loan debt. For a state school!

Social connections: I got the interview for my current job because my boyfriend was going to a top grad school, met someone who worked here, and passed on my resume. Most people who work here are from big name schools. Not I! Other than that, I didn't get a lot of advantages from social connections, yet. My parents don't have powerful friends, nor did I go to a prestigious school. But I've seen it happen with others a lot.

Based in my successes, I have three surefire tips for success. You'll may have to combine these with hard work to guarantee success. Still, with just a little work, you'll have a good shot at a successful life if you do these three things:

1. Be born in a good country. Even better, pick a good neighborhood, and maybe consider avoiding being a minority group. You could even consider being male, though I wasn't and don't want to be!
2. Have a good family. The more money the easier it will be for you, but even more importantly, they have to care about you. Not only that, they must have the time and knowledge to invest in your future, as well as the ability to lead you along in your early years. And maybe in your young adult years too, if you are lucky!
   
3. Be gifted. Intelligence is a good gift to have, or perhaps extreme artistic talent. Both would be great, but there are some other options I'm sure. Have some charisma and a go-getter personality. While you are at it, make sure you are healthy and it wouldn't hurt to be attractive too.

What, you don't like my advice? Okay, okay... Then I suggest you read Trent's good advice that can actually be followed, no matter what has happened with my three tips!

All joking aside, hard work is very important and can help a lot of people. What about "working smart"? Personally, that term gets on my nerves. I think it is overused and largely meaningless. However, if you think you can find a way to "work smart", go for it. If you don't really understand what "work smart" means in your life (I don't!) just work hard while you are contemplating it.

My point is, you do have to play your cards right, but it is silly to pretend we all got a similar hand.

I have been using two online savings accounts for about a year, ING and HSBC. Both have been dropping rates like crazy, and neither are very competitive anymore. There simply are better options out there. I'm not going to stand for this anymore!

I did a little research, and decided to switch to the Vanguard Prime Money Market Fund to house the majority of my savings. It currently has a yield of 4.22%. While are HYSAs and CDs out there with better rates, they aren't consistently higher. I'm not going to rate chase. This is a solid account that has continually been competitive to HYSA. I first did the analysis last summer, and the tax free money market account actually came out ahead of any savings account. Try out this awesome calculator to compare. These days, the taxable account is a better deal for me. I was wavering between EmigrantDirect (solid reviews, solid rates) and Vanguard, and honestly the final decision was sort of impulsive. I figure I'll eventually roll over my 401k into an IRA there, and move my Roth from Fidelity... So it will simplify my finances in the long run.

I funded it with $4000 to start, about half of my HSBC balance. I already have a lot of stuff linked up with my HSBC account, so I'm waiting to completely pull the plug on it... But it will happen. I already set up my Vanguard account for direct deposit and will be sending my tax refund there as well.

What about ING? Well I'm not too impressed with them either, but they will be staying around. I'll be using them for some shorter term savings (car insurance, travel fund) and for now, for my student loan payback account and new car fund. Why? I like the subaccounts. Yeah, I can do it in excel. Whatever, I don't want to. For such small balances I'm not as concerned about getting the best rate.

Why else? The $10 referral bonuses and the sweepstakes I am entered in for using direct deposit. So it's lame to trade interest rates for sweepstakes... but whatever, you'll be jealous when I win $30,000!

I was clicking along through TaxAct, and it asked if I'd made any contribution to an Health Savings Account (HSA) this year. It instructed me not to include employer contributions or contributions made by my employer through a cafeteria plan. I thought, "why yes, I did make contributions. My salary was reduced by $1500 this year, and it went into my account." Cafeteria plan? I pictured my workplace cafeteria, and wondered how they were involve in health care. I never ate there, so that probably didn't apply to me.

Uh....

I later noticed that my $1500 was double counted as a deduction. I looked up "cafeteria plan" and realized that was exactly what my HSA was funded through! Ooops. I had selected my benefits from a "menu" of choices, thus it was a cafeteria plan. Ohhhh, I see! Why don't they just say what they meant?!? I corrected it, and my refund fell by several hundred dollars. Still, I haven't received any tax information from my HSA administrator, so I suppose I should wait to file until I get that. Which doesn't make sense to me, because those distributions were tax free anyway. Why would I even need to report them?

To be honest, I'm not certain I filed my 2006 taxes right with regards to my HSA. I got a lonely form that looked suspiciously like a tax document sometime in March, long after I filed my taxes. I do know that I paid the right amount: Money taken from the account is tax free and my contributions were pre-tax. Simple. I just don't know if I documented it right.

Also, I moved to California this January and I obviously entered my current address on my tax return. TaxAct helpfully assumed I would need a CA state return in addition to my Iowa one. I had to click through the entire California state return for it to figure out that I didn't owe any taxes here for 2007, nor do I have to file a return.

Well anyway, I'll hold off a week on officially filing them, and if nothing shows up from my HSA, I'll give them a call.

Projected refund is about $1000 total. I owe the state $200 and the federal government owes me $1200. Oh sure I'm giving the government a tax free loan, blah blah blah. Assuming a 5% return in my savings (which isn't likely these days) I missed out on $50 of interest, which would have been taxed anyway.... And now I have $1000 that I did not spend and can use to replenish the e-fund. It is already back to about $8500, so another thousand will boost it quite close to the 10k goal.

While filing my taxes using TaxAct, I clicked on a pop-up that gave me tax tips for 2008. One interesting suggestion that had was to own a home.

A Real Tax Shelter
Purchasing a home is one of the best tax shelters available. The interest and points that you pay for the purchase are deductible as itemized deductions. The property taxes that you pay on the home are also deductible as itemized deductions. Best of all, when you sell the home, you probably will not need to pay any tax at all on the gain. There is no other investment that can provide the tax advantages like home ownership.

Though it was a friendly little tip, it got me thinking and got me a little mad. Why is does owning a home provide such great tax benefits? (Deductions for dependents is another story.... But raising kids is ridiculously expensive so this doesn't bother me much.) Is it fair? If so, why is it fair? Do most developed countries do this? Where did this idea come from? Of course, popular belief is that the main reason is to encourage people to own homes. It is the American Dream. But why? Why does the government want to encourage home ownership for everyone? Why am I seen less favorably because I'm priced out and relatively uninterested in locking myself to a property?

How about another viewpoint? The New York Times says that is simply a nice "American folk legend: the government invented the mortgage-interest deduction to help people buy their own homes, and the level of homeownership has risen ever since." The real story, they claim, is much less middle class friendly. It stems from the government originally having all interest as deductible, which was really intended to help business. The average American didn't have a mortgage (or credit card) and wasn't paying interest in the first place (can you believe that!), so interest was a business expense and therefore deductible. Later this broad rule was changed, for obvious reasons, but the mortgage interest stayed (for less obvious reasons.) Further, the author claims tax is actually regressive with "the rewards are greatly skewed in favor of the moderately to the conspicuously rich." Wow. This is stuff I'd never heard of before. I will stop myself from regurgitating the whole article, but it is a great read!

So, how much of an impact does this really make on me anyway? I assume if you own property, you must itemize deductions. I generally take the standard deduction. What kind of itemized deduction would someone on my salary with property get, assuming my rent is equal to their housing expenses? It would be an interesting exercise. The more expensive the house, the bigger the difference.

Ho much impact does it make on the government? A lot, actually: "The mortgage-interest deduction. We all love the deduction for home-mortgage interest. But renters and those who own their homes free and clear get nothing. Cost to the government: $402.7 billion." That number is from 2006.

If most people are deducting mortgage interest, why can't I deduct anything for my rent? There is interest and taxes built into the price of my apartment. Is someone else taking those deductions for me? Actually, a few states do allow a small tax break for renters, based on the fact that we indirectly are paying someone else's property taxes. In California, it is only for senior citizens with low incomes. Yet you can deduct interest on mortgages values over $1 million.

What can a renter do? This article suggests deducting student loan interest (which saved me a couple hundred this year) or a hybrid car deduction (can't afford a hybrid). For some reason, I don't feel like that evens things out at all. Apparently all I can do is write my congressman or buy a house.

What do you think? And is your view skewed by the fact that you either do or do not own property? Is it possible that eliminating this deduction could actually benefit the majority of people?

I get paid tomorrow (yes, on Thursdays) and finally was able to view my paycheck online. Though I only am being paid for 40 hrs instead of 80 this period, they did process my signing bonus in the first check (yes!) so I finally have some money to work with. They got all my direct deposit stuff set up in time (nice work!). I have it split between three different accounts, checking, short term savings (insurance, travel, car) and a long term savings (e-fund, maybe house/condo fund one day). I still may have to transfer between these, but this should minimize that. Make savings automatic!

I'm still not ready to finalize a budget, as I'm not certain what my take home pay will be. I tried to figure out exactly how much I'll be paying in taxes each month by taking total taxes paid divided by total gross pay in this check. I came up with about a 39% tax rate! Yikes, that can't be right! Google tells me that taxes on bonuses, while calculated as normal income, are withheld at a different rate, up to 40%. Well, that makes more sense! Good to know.

Is it logical to just use 25%, my marginal tax rate? Then again, what about FICA, Social Security, etc? If I do that, I come up with about $1700 after 401k and medical or $1500 if I go all the way up to 20% in my 401k. It isn't likely I can live off the $3000/month, at least not if I want to grow my cash savings. Though the way some people dream about buying a house, I dream about maxing out my 401k....

My 401k still isn't ready for me to enroll. I hate when systems are not automated enough. My last job I could enroll in my 401k on the first day (through Fidelity). It has been a full week and CitiStreet still isn't recognizing my user ID. When I called the number to ask if this was normal, I was told "Please listen carefully as options have recently changed." Then, there was a single ring, then silence. More silence. I was never given any options! I hung up and tried again, only to have it happen again. I pressed all the numbers and was directed to an operator who could not help me unless I "went through the system and entered my PIN" (which I did!). He suggested waiting another week, or trying the number again. Lame.

I was going to go hang out with the boyfriend tonight, but I think I'll cancel. He has a lot of school work, and I have needed to do laundry for at least a week. This will give me time to start working on yesterdays to-do list. First up, taxes!

I have some major financial housekeeping to do within the next month (or maybe two months). With switching jobs and moving 2000 miles, I feel like everything is a mess! It is time for some clean-up.

Taxes: Self explanatory! I did start them on TaxAct, but got distracted.

Retirement Accounts:
Well, first, I assign myself some homework. I've had "Random Walk Guide to Investing" hanging out on my bookshelf for months. I need to read it. I also want to re-read Jonathan's series at MyMoneyBlog.com about asset allocation, and look for other good internet information. I need to consider rolling over my old 401k to an IRA or even to a Roth IRA. I want to at least consider moving my Roth from Fidelity to Vanguard. I need to get enrolled in my new 401k ASAP, and contribute at least 8% to get the match.

Emergency fund: I want to get it back up to 10k, then evaluate if I need to increase it further due to increased costs. It briefly hit 10k before Christmas, but has dwindled to just over 7k (!) in the move process. Well, 1k went to the Roth to kick off 2008 so it isn't so bad. This should easily be taken care of if I simply apply the relocation allowance and signing bonus. Also, I want to investigate moving it from HSBC to something better.

Actually implement plan to buy car insurance. I have to do this soon, because I have get my car registered in my new state. It's just... I recently designated an ING accout to save up for bi-yearly insurance purchases... but so far I've only stuck $25 in it! Ug.

Figure out a reasonable budget. Having scaled back income and paying two rents for a month has totally messed with my head. I have no idea what I can afford, what is a splurge, and what I absolutely shouldn't be buying. So I'm just guessing. . .

Rebates, rebates, rebates: I need to send in rebates for my cable service, my internet service ($50 each), and for my modem (about $80). Then I need to sell my modem online, since it turns out I didn't even need it! After that, I might cancel cable since I haven't been watching it at all.

Set some 2008 goals: It's been hard to do with so much up in the air.

Well, I feel a little better just writing it all down.....

I'm thinking it is (way past) time to add a blog roll to this site. If I've ever commented on your blog, that means I read you and probably will be adding you to the list of blogs I read anyway. But perhaps I have a reader or two whose blogs I have not yet discovered. I have a special interest in twenty-something females, particularly unmarried ones, because I relate best. But of course, I do read all sorts of blogs!

If you want to be added, you can comment on this post, or send me an email. I can be reached at SJean0 (and that is a zero, not the letter "O"). I use Google for my mail.

I also need to update my sidebars and goals to be current. I like writing, but the backend part of blogging is so unappealing to me. I have a mini-dream of getting a prettier site (wordpress?), but it seems like a lot of work. I also don't think that I can justify shelling out the cash to pay someone to figure this out for me... So I will do it myself, eventually!

Also, if you do read my blog, please consider adding me to your blogroll if you have one and if you feel like it. Thanks!

I feel like I'm being scammed out of my money left and right!

I signed up for cable service online (because I do everything possible online) and followed the clear instructions on the web page to obtain a cable modem before the cable guy came. There was a promotion for a "free" modem, after rebate, which turned out to be about $20 with shipping and tax (after rebates... which are always a bit sketchy to redeem).

Yesterday the cable guy set up my internet and TV, and started installing a cable modem from the company. I said I had one already, and would not be needing to rent one from the cable company (as that is how it often works.) He told me that there was no rental, the modem was part of the service.

I am still fuming about this, a little. (Ok, a lot, if you ask my boyfriend.) Why would they tell me I needed to buy a modem when I didn't? Now I have a modem that put almost $100 on my credit card bill for the month (which I pay off, of course) and two rebate forms to fill out and hope get credited to me. What a hassle!

I looked up the modems on Amazon (I'm not very ebay literate, but i should probably check out ebay too) and I can probably sell my new modem for at least $35, even if I cut off the upc to get the rebate. In theory that is a small profit, but it is a bit of a hassle to do all this.

I'm super annoyed that they convinced me to buy a modem I didn't need!

Also, as mentioned in my last post, I ordered some transcripts from my undergraduate institution. I ordered that two official transcripts be sent to the graduate university I am applying to. Yesterday I received two transcripts at my home address, clearly stamped with "issued to student". I didn't need or want these. I can only assume they didn't send any to the university. Now I have to call them and find out what happened. I hope I don't have to pay $12 to have them do this again!

Last, I sent my laptop in for repair in early December, and they sent it back with a note that the battery had failed. It was still under warranty, so I called them and asked why they didn't replace the battery. They said, "Hmm, I'm not sure! I'll send you a new one!" Which they did, along with a box for me to send the broken battery back in. In the meantime, I moved cross country and the old battery and box are long gone. Vanished! They just sent me a letter requesting that I return the part, or they will bill me for it. I assume a battery is around $100. Ouch.

This battery incident is primarily my fault (though they could have just replaced it when they had my laptop), but still annoying. I can see why they make people send in defective parts, but I'm going to call them and see if there is any flexibility in this policy. I don't have high hopes, but it can't hurt to call, explain the situation, and ask if they really have to bill me for a new battery. I've had mixed results with companies forgiving things like this, but it never hurts to ask.

I am frustrated that my money is disappearing for these things. Granted, they aren't really scams (except maybe the modem promotion), but I'm not getting anything of value out of them.

I just completed my first week at my new job, and will get paid next week. Let me just stay, I can not wait!

Work, so far, is horribly boring. I know it will get better, but they haven't exactly fit me into a program, so I've just been chillin' and doing a LOT of online training. But I'm a hard worker, so it is frustrating to just be sitting here, when I know all my friends at my last job are working their butts off.

By the way, applying to graduate school is expensive. I was accepted to a pretty good school at my last job (usually ranked about 30 or so in my major), but I now have access to a degree from top ten university. They will accept 2 of the 3 classes I have taken, and are on a quarter system, so I will be done with my M.S. degree more quickly. It will be a lot of work, but a better education overall. It will also help my resume out, as my undergrad institution is relatively unknown. My current company will pay for pretty much everything, including books.

In order to apply to the new school, I have paid:
-$60 application fee
-$24 for 2 transcripts from my previous grad school
-$12 for 2 transcripts from my undergrad school

I have opted NOT to send transcripts from my study abroad university (too much of a hassle, probably only about $15 plus international mail) and not order official GRE scores ($20 or so). Still, it is easily $100 a school to apply!

They will eventually be reimbursed to me, as long as I remember to file for it once I've completed my first class. My fees for the previous school I applied for were also reimbursed (and the GRE fee), so I am fortunate. But had I gone to grad school right away, I'd be facing these costs as a poor college student. That just seems wrong, but there aren't many ways around it.

This is one of many reasons I am really excited for my paycheck. Thank goodness for a healthy savings account!

Common knowledge is to always try to negotiate your starting salary. In most cases, the worst that can happen is they will say no. There is a possible exception for entry level positions at large companies, when it is hard to distinguish yourself from the next person holding a similar degree. You hear entry level people claim they are special because they have good grades, an internship or two, and extracurriculars. Well, great, but so do most people (good) companies interview. It isn't that you aren't special, it is just that the company probably doesn't know it yet. The company I worked for right out of school had a standard "new hire" offer, and it was basically take it or leave it. Smaller companies probably are more flexible. It still might not hurt to ask if the offer is negotiable, but be prepared to back up your request with reasons why you deserve more.

When I was job shopping for my relocation, I was in a unique position. In my industry you typically are moved up from Engineer 1 to Engineer 2" after roughly two years, if you are a good performer. (While I was almost certainly doing Engineer 2 work by the end of my last job, HR had strict rules about minimum amount of experience.) I was job shopping with 1.5 years of experience, so I still had to look for Engineer I jobs. Yet I didn't want to be caught by a "standard new hire offer", since I did have some experience and some graduate coursework.

I think that my first job offer was a standard new hire offer. I easily negotiated an extra 2k and a 3k signing bonus. The second job offer seemed to take my experience into consideration, and came in 2k than negotiated first offer, and a similar signing bonus. I chose the second, not entirely for monetary reasons.

With the salary being just 1k below my hope of 70k-75k range, I was faced with the decision of whether or not to ask for more. I thought the offer was fair. I thought they took my experience and graduate coursework into consideration. If I were to ask if it was negotiable, I'm not sure what I'd say when they asked "why do you think you deserve more?" So I didn't negotiate.

Now that I'm on the inside, I have acess to their salary tables. Here they are for my job category:

Level Low Mid High
1 $42000 $62000 $78000
2 $49000 $72000 $90000
3 $60000 $88000 $110000
4 $72000 $105000 $132000
5 $88000 $129000 $162000
6 $102000 $150000 $187000

So, you can see that my offer was above the middle for Engineer 1, and poised quite nicely to be moved into an Engineer 2 position, provided I perform well. Could I have asked for more? Yes. Would they have given it to me? Maybe. Maybe not. The range I was hoping for more closely lines up with the middle of the Engineer 2 range.

While maybe I could have squeezed out a few more dollars, I do feel very fortunate to be here. It's a top company, and has many graduates from top universities. There are lots of brilliant people here. I went to a state school with a good regional reputation (at best) and no reputation in this area. I now have an opportunity to finish my MS degree at a top ten university in my field. On their dime. I should be done in less than two years if they accept my transfer credits. Nice. The competition here is more stiff than at my last company--I would have easily been a star at my last company--but that will be good for me. Always surround yourself with people smarter than you are.

I signed up for health insurance benefits at my new company today. I had essentially three choices.

HMO
I've never used an HMO, and though I have heard some negative press about them, I think it would work ok for me. I don't have health issues and am a low maintenance customer. Free to me, minimal copays ($15 for my monthly prescription). I don't think I would mind being forced to deal with a Primary Care Physician.

Traditional PPO account
This cost about $16 per a bi weekly pay period, so just $416 year for premiums. Same copays as the HMO. You can see any in-network doctor and have a lot more freedom in your medical care. You can see out of network doctors for reduced benefits.

PPO + Health Savings Account (HSA)
This is free to me, but is a high deductible plan. Preventative care is covered 100%, but everything else is out of pocket up to the deductible, then benefits kick in. With this plan, I am eligible for a HSA to put pre-tax dollars in to spend on medical care, which carry over year to year. My company will contribute $700 to this account. I believe the yearly deductible is about $1500, but I can't quite recall.

I used a HSA at my last job (which had worse benefit options) so I'm already comfortable with them. I felt doubts about my HSA at the end of last year, because almost all the money I put in I took back out to buy my prescriptions with. My company didn't contribute. However, regular insurance was still 60/mo, so I came out... Well, I think I came out a little behind using the Health savings Account at my last job. But you live, you learn. I pretty much immediately ruled out the traditional PPO, because it seemed so similar to the HMO, except you could see more doctors and you had to pay money for it. I didn't need the freedom. The HMO seemed like a really cheap option, so I considered it.

I was left to debate the HMO and the PPO+HSA. Barring catastrophe, I need very little medical care. I see the doctor once a year for a women's health check-up, and use birth control each month, which does cost $45 without coverage. Last year I got an eye infection and was fixed up for about $100. I exercise, but I don't play any physical sports. Or any sports, really.

So, I went with the HSA, and chose to contribute $1500 of my own money to it. At first glance, that seems like the most expensive choice. My company contribution will cover my prescription costs, and probably nearly all other costs, so the plan is still free to me. Except I'll also have $1500 stored up for future health expenses. Next year, I shouldn't have to contribute much at all, though I probably will try to build it a little each year. In the short term, it is less cash in my pocket now. But the money being set aside is mine. It offers flexibility in the long term.

Something to note, a big disadvantage of HSA's are the fees. Most plans you can find online have high fees and/or no investment options. My HSA administrator really is no better, but the company pays the fees for me. I'm not intending to use this account as a sort of IRA for health (as suggested by Jonathan on MyMoneyBlog), so investment opportunities aren't a big priority either.

Did I make the right choice? Well, it depends on if I have any major surprise medical issues this year. Let's hope it was a good choice.

It is that time of the month again.... Time for a net worth update!

As expected, my net worth took a hit this month. I switched jobs and was only paid for less than 2 weeks in the new year. Plus I front loaded my pre-tax Health Savings Account at my old job, so my paycheck was extra small. Not to mention the dip in my investments and extra spending associated with moving. Oh, and I paid rent in two places this month---$575 in Iowa and an astounding $1425 in Los Angeles. (And my new place is quite a bit smaller.) Luckily, I really am only obligated to pay for half of January, so come February 1st, I have to pay "only" $762.50. There was also a $500 security deposit for my new place (I'm due $100 from my old place), and a modem that will be eventually covered by rebates for $100.

With all that said, here are the results:

January Net Worth: $11,235, down $1,824, or -13.97% from $13,059.

The detailed numbers can be seen on my NetworthIQ page (sidebar). I did move $1000 to Roth IRA, which hurt my cash savings. The rest of the loss was expenses described above. It is worth noting that I should make up all of that next month (and more), provided my relocation money and signing bonus are processed.

I took a break from monthly goals for December and January, due to all the transitions. I'm going to do the same for February, at least until I get my first paycheck and I know exactly what I'm working with.

I went on my first full shopping trip since relocating and moving into my apartment. I looked at the current balance of my grocery bill in horror. How on earth was it at $79 already? And they still were ringing up my order!! The grand total was $95, then they swiped my Ralph's card and it dropped to $70. It is ridiculous that they do that. It is just forcing you to use a grocery card if you want any discounts at all.

Anyway, $70 is still much more than I spend on weekly groceries. About double! Although part of it was because I'm restocking almost everything, it still was a bit excessive. I think my solution will be to make this last two weeks.... so no new groceries until Februrary 12th! I am pretty sure I can do it. When I complain there is no food to eat, I usually mean, there is nothing I feel like cooking and eating.

What on earth did I buy? Well, I won't copy my whole long receipt, but here are some of the more expensive items on the list.
Chicken breast fillets $8.90. I don't usually buy meat, actually. I'm not vegetarian, but I'm not a big fan of meat and I don't really know how to prepare it well.
Frozen Strawberries, huge bag, $8.50 (should last a very long time. For smoothies)
Lunch meat, 2 packages, $5 (much cheaper than buying a sandwhich!)
Peperoni to make English muffin pizza's: $3.50
Lunch cheese: $4.19, I forgot to price shop this I think
I also bought butter, milk, bananas, coffee creamer, 2 boxes of cereal, frozen broccoli and lots of other miscellaneous items.

There were some things on the list I didn't get. I had a frugal recipe that called for ziti, so I set out to the pasta isle. When I didn't find it, I realized I wasn't entirely sure if ziti was pasta at all. Maybe it was a cheese? So I'm back at home, ziti-less and just looked it up. It was pasta after all. I also could not find any muffin mix to make bran muffins. Maybe no one else likes them?

I liked to have a grocery budget of about $120/month, but I may have to up it. We'll see.

I must have lost a little weight over the course of the last year, as most of my jeans have been getting a little baggy. It wasn't a significant ammount, but I'm small already, so five pounds in either direction can make my clothes fit differently. Then seven to ten pounds means a whole new pants size. Seems like Mapgirl is having the opposite problem which is admittedly more common. Anyway, to remedy this, I ordered some jeans from Banana Republic on sale for $31.99. I couldn't try them on, so I crossed my fingers on the size, 2L. I only need "Long" sometimes, but that was all that was left. This was before I picked up two new pairs on sale at Jcrew for about $35 each. I really didn't need 3 new pairs, just two! The jeans arrived yesterday, and are too long, as I suspected they might be. It is a bit of a releif, now I don't have to decide weather or not to return them. Obviously, they must go back. They were cute jeans too, so I would have been tempted to keep them. I have to eat $6.00 in shipping (couldn't find a free shipping code), but I will still get $32 back on my card. That'll teach me to buy jeans without trying them on. (They were only available online anyway. The ones in the store didn't work out either.

My new rule on clothes is nothig that isn't directly appropriate for work for the next six months. Does that really mean no fun clothes until June 29th? Yes! It is not as ambitious as other young bloggers no clothing resoluitions (Meg and Wanda are two examples), but it is a step in the right direction. Also, I just donated a huge pile of clothes I never wore to Goodwill, so another rule is, for every item that comes into the closet, something has to go in a donation pile. That is super logical, will help with clutter, and will inspire extra cautioun in purchasing! An exception may be made for shoes, but with caution.

Also, I have a couple pairs of pants I had made for me when I was in Hong Kong that are now a little too big as well. Some don't have belt loops, so they are nearly unwearable. In fact, I wore one pair with a safety pin in an emergency situation. Classy! I think it is time to find a tailor and get those pants wearable again. Much more frugal than buying more dress pants! Do any of you have experience with using a tailor? And if I get them taken in, can they later be taken out if necessary?

Either that or I can fatten up a little bit... but that is also expensive because my metabolism would require a big calorie surplus to accomplish that!

My internet and cable aren't being installed until Saturday. Yet here I am, on the internet from the comfort of my own apartment. That's right, I'm mooching off someone else's unsecured connection.

How unethical do you consider this? I know some people who do it regularly as their primary source of internet. I usually do it in situations like this--I don't have legitimate access to the internet, but I have a legitimate desire to be on it!

To be honest, I'm not certain of the security concerns of this. If I'm connected to their network, could they potentially access my computer? I don't think so.

I spent the day settling in to my new apartment. While I filled up my new Ikea dresser, it tipped over and nearly killed me. No worries, the only casualty was a barely noticeable cosmetic piece we are going to try to repair later this week. I listened to NPR all day, and I am pretty sure that once my six month deal runs out for cable, I will be able to do without it. I'm not going to lie, I'll miss some of the absolute crap TV shows that I watch but my life is probably better off without them (example: Real Housewives of Orange County). The shows that I really love (when there isn't a writers strike) are all available online (Office and Grey's).

Internet I couldn't live without.... but could I just mooch off a neighbors connection? I probably wouldn't. Not only because of the moral concerns, but because it may not be reliable and completely secure. What do you think?

I think I mentioned I'm re-applying to graduate school. I have 9/30 credits completed (through distance education while working) at "University A", in the state I formerly lived in. I could continue on this path, taking 3 credits a semester (6 a year) and graduate in 3.5 years. University A is usually ranked in the 30s or 40s in my field.

My new job is more flexible about where you do your education. (Actually, they'll pay for almost anything, even non-job related. I think I'm taking sailing this spring!) I now have access to another (distance education) program at "University B" a top 10 engineering college. Even better, they are on the quarter system, require just nine courses, and I can take four each year. They also will accept two transfer credits, meaning if they accept my application, I'll be done in under two years! It'll also be a boost to my resume, as I went to a relatively no-name undergrad university. It also probably will be a lot more work and a very difficult two years... but it should pay off big time in the long run.

I was already really sold on this idea but I just came up with yet another great benefit. At "University B", each class is four credits, which by their system would classify me as a "half time" student. So what does that mean? Well, my student loans are Federal Subsidized Stafford loans, meaning while I'm enrolled in school at least half time, the government will pay the interest for me. I could also completely cease making payments if I wanted, freeing up $133 extra each month to invest/save. WOW! (I'll have to decide exactly what I plan to do when/if this whole thing is a reality)

In dollar terms, what does this mean? Well, last month the interest on my loan was roughly $75, so if I'm in this program for roughly two years, it'll save me about $1800. I can't wait until September to get this started! Let's hope that they accept me! I should find out within a few months!

After yesterday's post on being impatient to enroll in my company's 401k, today I found that I was finally "in the system" and could enroll! I eagerly got to the screen where I could indicate I wanted to save 15% of my pretax income. Then came the fund allocation screen....

Crap. I wasn't 100% prepared for this despite it being on my to-do list from about a week ago. I do have a loose plan of what I want to do, but haven't figure out how to align my three accounts into one asset allocation.

My overall goal for my asset allocation goal is as follows:

• Stocks/Bonds: 88%/12%
• Within stocks, Domestic/International: 60%/40%
• Within Domestic, Large Cap/Small Cap/REIT: 75%/15%/15%

I also would like 10% of my international allocations in emerging markets, and someday I may want to do something fancier with bonds as I hear a lot about TIPS and Treasury and things I don't know anything about (right now I just use a bond index fund).

Overall, this breaks down to 6 funds allocated as follows:

• Large Cap 37%
• Small Cap 8%
• REIT 8%
• Int. Index 32%
• Emerg. Mkts 4%
• Bond Idx 12%

Do you think I'm missing anything important?

There are some issues with this right now. It is pretty impossible for me to actually get the 4% emerging markets allocation or even the 8% REIT allocation. I don't have those options in my 401k, and Vanguard requires minimum investments of $3000, which is currently 15% of my portfolio. Besides, I don't really know exactly what my current allocation is, mostly because Fidelity's 2040 fund has about a zillion different holdings.

So, what is my plan? First, I need to move both my Roth IRA and old 401k to Vanguard, while rolling the 401k to an IRA. Then I want to roll $5000 of the 401k into the Roth. Why just $5000? Because I don't want to get hit with taxes on the full $15k this year. I figure I'll roll it into my Roth over a period of 2-3 years, hurrying it along if it becomes necessary (meaning, if I end up planning to get married before then, as the income limits are harder to meet if you aren't single). Perhaps more on the rollover later, as I contemplate all the implications of it.

Within the Roth, I want to buy $3000 of the REIT index fund, and put the rest in the Vangaurd 2040 fund (which does have a small percent emerging markets). I'll then set my future contributions to the 2040 fund and most likely put my old 401k into the 2040 fund as well. When my portfolio grows more, I may invest more into the emerging markets fund, but probably not any time in 2008.

Last I'll use the index funds in my 401k to balance out my other allocations (small cap, large cap, index, and bonds) as closely as I can to my goal.

What do you think? I do want to have real estate be part of my portfolio, as I don't own property and don't plan on it soon. Should I just wait on the REITs until I can keep them a smaller percent of the portfolio? Or, given the housing market, will they decline all on their own, so I won't have to worry?? :)

In a side note, I temporarily regretted posting anything about my relationship yesterday. People sometimes jump to conclusions based on limited information. I wrote a post detailing things, intending to "clear up" some things. It was wordy and not very personal finance related anyway, so I'll just say it in a concise fashion. It's been 3.5 years. When we were both students, we split things fairly evenly. He would never need a loan from me and is good with money, and will most likely be very successful (someday). He really is on a tight budget as we live in an expensive city. He does pay for things now and then, including dinners, just not this weekend. He spent hours helping me set up my furniture and hang pictures and is really helpful with that kind of thing. I eat his food when I'm at his place (but my food is so much better!) We discussed it briefly, he acknowledged it, and I'll see if it is an issue in the future. If so, I will write about it, but I have to remind myself not to get (too) defensive about the comments!

I still can't sign up for my company's 401k, but not because I'm ineligible. You are eligible immediately (and vested immediately too!), though they a pension plan too which takes a year to be eligible and 5 years to vest.

I can't sign up because the website doesn't recognize my userid. I'm not "in the system" despite already getting a huge packet of information from them. Since I'm not in the system, when I call them, they are totally helpless:
"I can't take your password over the phone, you have to go through the system and punch it in"
"I did. But I wasn't given any menu options, so I pressed zero for help."
"Well. I can put you back through the system, and you can enter your password."
". . . But that obviously didn't work."

Gah! They did say it may take 7-10 days to become active. If they mean business days, it has been seven. If they mean actual days, it has been 11. I'll give it until the end of the week....

But I'm really anxious to start contributing! I'm going to see if I can handle contributing 15% of my income. If I do that, I'll be able to get about $10k in my 401k and 5k in my Roth, for a total of 15k of my money in retirement contributions for 2008, just over 21% of my gross income. There also should be roughly 4k from the company match. Barring an ever declining market, that should almost double my account value in 2008! However, with such a shaky market and all this recession talk, I specifically set my goals in dollars of contributions, not account value. Go long term investing!

I think 15% will be a stretch for me, at least while I'm growing the e-fund. I varied between 12% and 15% at my last job, and rent was much lower. We'll have to see how it goes. My budget says I can do it, but I'm not much of a budgeter.

While I'm waiting, I've been putting a little extra in my Roth IRA to get the year started off on the right foot.

So, you aren't supposed to keep score in relationships. Still, I can't help it sometimes.

My boyfriend is a poor poor grad student who makes less than half of what I do (stipend). My savings is going up, his is staying flat at best. Naturally, I don't expect him to spend much on us. He is content with not going out to eat much and living quite cheaply, which is great for us in the long run because I'm fairly frugal too. We should never have problems living within our means. Still, sometimes I want treats, so I provide them for us.

This weekend (starting on Thursday) I paid for:
Pizza: $13, a good deal though, for 3 medium pizza's that fed us almost all weekend. I will say nothing about the healthfulness of it...
Sam Adam's White Ale: $14
Lunch at Ikea: $11 (though my fault, since we wouldn't have otherwise been at Ikea and he was helping me pick out and build stuff)
Random Food that we ate: Coffee, cereal, milk, juice, burritos from Trader Joe's.... Plus he made a smoothie that neither of us really needed/wanted (which was much to thick) with my frozen strawberries right before dinner for no logical reason!

Also, he doesn't have a car, so I'm always driving and using my gas. And he definitely ate/drank more of all that stuff than I did.

It isn't that I'm not generous with this kind of thing. I am actually quite generous: "Thanks for coming to Ikea... do you want to stop at the cafe? How about this Mango Sorbet too, that looks delicious!" Then I do my budget, see that I want to save more, then regret my generosity. Ooops.

Then again, how petty is it for me to quibble about $37 spent on "us" when i spent about $200 on me and my apartment at Ikea? It is hard to justify that.

I guess it's the principle rather than the dollar amount. When we stopped at the store to buy juice (potentially for future smoothies or to mix in drinks), he could have paid for it. It was only about $3, so it makes no difference in the scheme of things, but it makes me feel a little less like I'm being taken advantage of. I know that really isn't the case... I offer to do all these things and he would be fine if I stopped. Sometimes I can't help but be bothered by it though.

I guess I need to be careful with my generosity, and really think about it before I offer to pay for things for "us". I need to make sure I won't regret it. Spending money doesn't show love (though, I can't help but think it does, at least a little). I think (hope) that my attitude would be different if we were engaged/married and money spent on us was truly ours and not mine/his. I also think his attitude would be a little different as well. But it just isn't like that right now. It is my money, and if I'm going to share it, I need to make sure I'm sharing it within my budget.

I'm quite certain that I wasn't tagged for this, but I saw a few other bloggers doing it and it seemed fun. I don't use a traditional wallet. For better or worse, I use a little wristlet that my sister gave me. I stick it in my purse, or if I'm traveling light I put it on my wrist and don't carry a purse . While it doesn't have the organizational capabilities of a wallet, I don't carry too much with me, so it works well.


What is there?

• Drivers License: I just got this about a week ago. I heart California! Also, I so wish I wouldn't have worn red, as it sort of clashes with the yellow background.
  
• Cash: I usually don't carry any cash, but I happened to hit the ATM a few days before, so I have $23. I also have some quarters, which I hoard for laundry money.
• Credit Cards: My awesome pink Discover Card, and a Chase Visa. Also a seldom used Wells Fargo debit card, and a Health Savings Account debit card from my HSA at my last job.
• Library Card: Brand new! No, I'm not afraid that you know that I live somewhere in the vast LA area.
• Ralph's receipt: It is for Orange Juice. Trader Joe's was all out of OJ (well, out of the $3 kind, they did have a $5.50 jug) so we swung into Ralph's. I don't need this receipt. We don't need to bring ink and paper into this. I can't imagine a scenario that I would have to prove that I bought OJ. To some skeptical friend, "Don't even act like I didn't get that OJ. I've got the documentation right here. It's in my file at home. Under O." (So much funnier coming from the late Mitch Hedberg, but if you got that reference, I automatically like you extra.)
• H&M Gift card: It has less than $5 on it, but I put it in there hoping I'll use it someday...
• AAA card: Because my parents love me and got it for me. Personally, I'd probably join the much greener Better World Club.

I don't tag you, but if you think this seems fun, feel free to participate!

So.... If you are observant, you might have noticed earlier this week I requested to be added to the blog roll of anyone who regularly reads this, yet didn't follow through on my promise to create one myself. I'm a bad person! But I have an excuse: I think I'm moving to wordpress, but I'm just not quite ready to move in over there. I hate that you can't edit the CSS for free, but let's be honest... I don't want to deal with editing the code anyway. I'll get this taken care of SOON, either way.

I consider myself reasonably successful, and I hope to continue down the road to success as I get older. Trent over at the The Simple Dollar recently wrote an interesting post in which he shares some tips to improve your life. In light of this, I want to share with you exactly how I got to where I am today, and outline how you can do even better than I did! Here are the main four things I did right to get where I am today:

Luck: I was born in the USA, lucky me! I think that is the single most important thing to my success (though other first world countries could have been acceptable).

Family: We were not in poverty, though there were some money issues at times. That helps a heck of a lot when trying to get through life. I was well fed and actually went to a private high school. Most of all, there was a ton of emotional support. My dad in particular placed high priority on education, as he did not finish college himself. We were encouraged to participate in extra-curricular activities, and my parents shelled out for a lot of lessons, sports and extra classes. I used to go to summer school for fun to take extra classes! They provided some minor monetary support in college, and allowed me to stay at home rent free while for a couple semesters.

Natural ability: Not everyone can get through the engineering coursework with good grades. I'm not meaning to be arrogant--there are a ton of things that I stink at. But my ability to understand math is genetic--I did nothing special to earn it.

Hard work: I have spent many many hours investing in my education and myself. It isn't always fun, but it is rewarding.

To a lesser degree, the following two things helped:

Federal Support: I received scholarships and financial aid to attend college. Without it, I'd be at least 20k more in student loan debt. For a state school!

Social connections: I got the interview for my current job because my boyfriend was going to a top grad school, met someone who worked here, and passed on my resume. Most people who work here are from big name schools. Not I! Other than that, I didn't get a lot of advantages from social connections, yet. My parents don't have powerful friends, nor did I go to a prestigious school. But I've seen it happen with others a lot.

Based in my successes, I have three surefire tips for success. You'll may have to combine these with hard work to guarantee success. Still, with just a little work, you'll have a good shot at a successful life if you do these three things:

1. Be born in a good country. Even better, pick a good neighborhood, and maybe consider avoiding being a minority group. You could even consider being male, though I wasn't and don't want to be!
2. Have a good family. The more money the easier it will be for you, but even more importantly, they have to care about you. Not only that, they must have the time and knowledge to invest in your future, as well as the ability to lead you along in your early years. And maybe in your young adult years too, if you are lucky!
   
3. Be gifted. Intelligence is a good gift to have, or perhaps extreme artistic talent. Both would be great, but there are some other options I'm sure. Have some charisma and a go-getter personality. While you are at it, make sure you are healthy and it wouldn't hurt to be attractive too.

What, you don't like my advice? Okay, okay... Then I suggest you read Trent's good advice that can actually be followed, no matter what has happened with my three tips!

All joking aside, hard work is very important and can help a lot of people. What about "working smart"? Personally, that term gets on my nerves. I think it is overused and largely meaningless. However, if you think you can find a way to "work smart", go for it. If you don't really understand what "work smart" means in your life (I don't!) just work hard while you are contemplating it.

My point is, you do have to play your cards right, but it is silly to pretend we all got a similar hand.

I have been using two online savings accounts for about a year, ING and HSBC. Both have been dropping rates like crazy, and neither are very competitive anymore. There simply are better options out there. I'm not going to stand for this anymore!

I did a little research, and decided to switch to the Vanguard Prime Money Market Fund to house the majority of my savings. It currently has a yield of 4.22%. While are HYSAs and CDs out there with better rates, they aren't consistently higher. I'm not going to rate chase. This is a solid account that has continually been competitive to HYSA. I first did the analysis last summer, and the tax free money market account actually came out ahead of any savings account. Try out this awesome calculator to compare. These days, the taxable account is a better deal for me. I was wavering between EmigrantDirect (solid reviews, solid rates) and Vanguard, and honestly the final decision was sort of impulsive. I figure I'll eventually roll over my 401k into an IRA there, and move my Roth from Fidelity... So it will simplify my finances in the long run.

I funded it with $4000 to start, about half of my HSBC balance. I already have a lot of stuff linked up with my HSBC account, so I'm waiting to completely pull the plug on it... But it will happen. I already set up my Vanguard account for direct deposit and will be sending my tax refund there as well.

What about ING? Well I'm not too impressed with them either, but they will be staying around. I'll be using them for some shorter term savings (car insurance, travel fund) and for now, for my student loan payback account and new car fund. Why? I like the subaccounts. Yeah, I can do it in excel. Whatever, I don't want to. For such small balances I'm not as concerned about getting the best rate.

Why else? The $10 referral bonuses and the sweepstakes I am entered in for using direct deposit. So it's lame to trade interest rates for sweepstakes... but whatever, you'll be jealous when I win $30,000!

I was clicking along through TaxAct, and it asked if I'd made any contribution to an Health Savings Account (HSA) this year. It instructed me not to include employer contributions or contributions made by my employer through a cafeteria plan. I thought, "why yes, I did make contributions. My salary was reduced by $1500 this year, and it went into my account." Cafeteria plan? I pictured my workplace cafeteria, and wondered how they were involve in health care. I never ate there, so that probably didn't apply to me.

Uh....

I later noticed that my $1500 was double counted as a deduction. I looked up "cafeteria plan" and realized that was exactly what my HSA was funded through! Ooops. I had selected my benefits from a "menu" of choices, thus it was a cafeteria plan. Ohhhh, I see! Why don't they just say what they meant?!? I corrected it, and my refund fell by several hundred dollars. Still, I haven't received any tax information from my HSA administrator, so I suppose I should wait to file until I get that. Which doesn't make sense to me, because those distributions were tax free anyway. Why would I even need to report them?

To be honest, I'm not certain I filed my 2006 taxes right with regards to my HSA. I got a lonely form that looked suspiciously like a tax document sometime in March, long after I filed my taxes. I do know that I paid the right amount: Money taken from the account is tax free and my contributions were pre-tax. Simple. I just don't know if I documented it right.

Also, I moved to California this January and I obviously entered my current address on my tax return. TaxAct helpfully assumed I would need a CA state return in addition to my Iowa one. I had to click through the entire California state return for it to figure out that I didn't owe any taxes here for 2007, nor do I have to file a return.

Well anyway, I'll hold off a week on officially filing them, and if nothing shows up from my HSA, I'll give them a call.

Projected refund is about $1000 total. I owe the state $200 and the federal government owes me $1200. Oh sure I'm giving the government a tax free loan, blah blah blah. Assuming a 5% return in my savings (which isn't likely these days) I missed out on $50 of interest, which would have been taxed anyway.... And now I have $1000 that I did not spend and can use to replenish the e-fund. It is already back to about $8500, so another thousand will boost it quite close to the 10k goal.

While filing my taxes using TaxAct, I clicked on a pop-up that gave me tax tips for 2008. One interesting suggestion that had was to own a home.

A Real Tax Shelter
Purchasing a home is one of the best tax shelters available. The interest and points that you pay for the purchase are deductible as itemized deductions. The property taxes that you pay on the home are also deductible as itemized deductions. Best of all, when you sell the home, you probably will not need to pay any tax at all on the gain. There is no other investment that can provide the tax advantages like home ownership.

Though it was a friendly little tip, it got me thinking and got me a little mad. Why is does owning a home provide such great tax benefits? (Deductions for dependents is another story.... But raising kids is ridiculously expensive so this doesn't bother me much.) Is it fair? If so, why is it fair? Do most developed countries do this? Where did this idea come from? Of course, popular belief is that the main reason is to encourage people to own homes. It is the American Dream. But why? Why does the government want to encourage home ownership for everyone? Why am I seen less favorably because I'm priced out and relatively uninterested in locking myself to a property?

How about another viewpoint? The New York Times says that is simply a nice "American folk legend: the government invented the mortgage-interest deduction to help people buy their own homes, and the level of homeownership has risen ever since." The real story, they claim, is much less middle class friendly. It stems from the government originally having all interest as deductible, which was really intended to help business. The average American didn't have a mortgage (or credit card) and wasn't paying interest in the first place (can you believe that!), so interest was a business expense and therefore deductible. Later this broad rule was changed, for obvious reasons, but the mortgage interest stayed (for less obvious reasons.) Further, the author claims tax is actually regressive with "the rewards are greatly skewed in favor of the moderately to the conspicuously rich." Wow. This is stuff I'd never heard of before. I will stop myself from regurgitating the whole article, but it is a great read!

So, how much of an impact does this really make on me anyway? I assume if you own property, you must itemize deductions. I generally take the standard deduction. What kind of itemized deduction would someone on my salary with property get, assuming my rent is equal to their housing expenses? It would be an interesting exercise. The more expensive the house, the bigger the difference.

Ho much impact does it make on the government? A lot, actually: "The mortgage-interest deduction. We all love the deduction for home-mortgage interest. But renters and those who own their homes free and clear get nothing. Cost to the government: $402.7 billion." That number is from 2006.

If most people are deducting mortgage interest, why can't I deduct anything for my rent? There is interest and taxes built into the price of my apartment. Is someone else taking those deductions for me? Actually, a few states do allow a small tax break for renters, based on the fact that we indirectly are paying someone else's property taxes. In California, it is only for senior citizens with low incomes. Yet you can deduct interest on mortgages values over $1 million.

What can a renter do? This article suggests deducting student loan interest (which saved me a couple hundred this year) or a hybrid car deduction (can't afford a hybrid). For some reason, I don't feel like that evens things out at all. Apparently all I can do is write my congressman or buy a house.

What do you think? And is your view skewed by the fact that you either do or do not own property? Is it possible that eliminating this deduction could actually benefit the majority of people?

I get paid tomorrow (yes, on Thursdays) and finally was able to view my paycheck online. Though I only am being paid for 40 hrs instead of 80 this period, they did process my signing bonus in the first check (yes!) so I finally have some money to work with. They got all my direct deposit stuff set up in time (nice work!). I have it split between three different accounts, checking, short term savings (insurance, travel, car) and a long term savings (e-fund, maybe house/condo fund one day). I still may have to transfer between these, but this should minimize that. Make savings automatic!

I'm still not ready to finalize a budget, as I'm not certain what my take home pay will be. I tried to figure out exactly how much I'll be paying in taxes each month by taking total taxes paid divided by total gross pay in this check. I came up with about a 39% tax rate! Yikes, that can't be right! Google tells me that taxes on bonuses, while calculated as normal income, are withheld at a different rate, up to 40%. Well, that makes more sense! Good to know.

Is it logical to just use 25%, my marginal tax rate? Then again, what about FICA, Social Security, etc? If I do that, I come up with about $1700 after 401k and medical or $1500 if I go all the way up to 20% in my 401k. It isn't likely I can live off the $3000/month, at least not if I want to grow my cash savings. Though the way some people dream about buying a house, I dream about maxing out my 401k....

My 401k still isn't ready for me to enroll. I hate when systems are not automated enough. My last job I could enroll in my 401k on the first day (through Fidelity). It has been a full week and CitiStreet still isn't recognizing my user ID. When I called the number to ask if this was normal, I was told "Please listen carefully as options have recently changed." Then, there was a single ring, then silence. More silence. I was never given any options! I hung up and tried again, only to have it happen again. I pressed all the numbers and was directed to an operator who could not help me unless I "went through the system and entered my PIN" (which I did!). He suggested waiting another week, or trying the number again. Lame.

I was going to go hang out with the boyfriend tonight, but I think I'll cancel. He has a lot of school work, and I have needed to do laundry for at least a week. This will give me time to start working on yesterdays to-do list. First up, taxes!

I have some major financial housekeeping to do within the next month (or maybe two months). With switching jobs and moving 2000 miles, I feel like everything is a mess! It is time for some clean-up.

Taxes: Self explanatory! I did start them on TaxAct, but got distracted.

Retirement Accounts:
Well, first, I assign myself some homework. I've had "Random Walk Guide to Investing" hanging out on my bookshelf for months. I need to read it. I also want to re-read Jonathan's series at MyMoneyBlog.com about asset allocation, and look for other good internet information. I need to consider rolling over my old 401k to an IRA or even to a Roth IRA. I want to at least consider moving my Roth from Fidelity to Vanguard. I need to get enrolled in my new 401k ASAP, and contribute at least 8% to get the match.

Emergency fund: I want to get it back up to 10k, then evaluate if I need to increase it further due to increased costs. It briefly hit 10k before Christmas, but has dwindled to just over 7k (!) in the move process. Well, 1k went to the Roth to kick off 2008 so it isn't so bad. This should easily be taken care of if I simply apply the relocation allowance and signing bonus. Also, I want to investigate moving it from HSBC to something better.

Actually implement plan to buy car insurance. I have to do this soon, because I have get my car registered in my new state. It's just... I recently designated an ING accout to save up for bi-yearly insurance purchases... but so far I've only stuck $25 in it! Ug.

Figure out a reasonable budget. Having scaled back income and paying two rents for a month has totally messed with my head. I have no idea what I can afford, what is a splurge, and what I absolutely shouldn't be buying. So I'm just guessing. . .

Rebates, rebates, rebates: I need to send in rebates for my cable service, my internet service ($50 each), and for my modem (about $80). Then I need to sell my modem online, since it turns out I didn't even need it! After that, I might cancel cable since I haven't been watching it at all.

Set some 2008 goals: It's been hard to do with so much up in the air.

Well, I feel a little better just writing it all down.....

I'm thinking it is (way past) time to add a blog roll to this site. If I've ever commented on your blog, that means I read you and probably will be adding you to the list of blogs I read anyway. But perhaps I have a reader or two whose blogs I have not yet discovered. I have a special interest in twenty-something females, particularly unmarried ones, because I relate best. But of course, I do read all sorts of blogs!

If you want to be added, you can comment on this post, or send me an email. I can be reached at SJean0 (and that is a zero, not the letter "O"). I use Google for my mail.

I also need to update my sidebars and goals to be current. I like writing, but the backend part of blogging is so unappealing to me. I have a mini-dream of getting a prettier site (wordpress?), but it seems like a lot of work. I also don't think that I can justify shelling out the cash to pay someone to figure this out for me... So I will do it myself, eventually!

Also, if you do read my blog, please consider adding me to your blogroll if you have one and if you feel like it. Thanks!

I feel like I'm being scammed out of my money left and right!

I signed up for cable service online (because I do everything possible online) and followed the clear instructions on the web page to obtain a cable modem before the cable guy came. There was a promotion for a "free" modem, after rebate, which turned out to be about $20 with shipping and tax (after rebates... which are always a bit sketchy to redeem).

Yesterday the cable guy set up my internet and TV, and started installing a cable modem from the company. I said I had one already, and would not be needing to rent one from the cable company (as that is how it often works.) He told me that there was no rental, the modem was part of the service.

I am still fuming about this, a little. (Ok, a lot, if you ask my boyfriend.) Why would they tell me I needed to buy a modem when I didn't? Now I have a modem that put almost $100 on my credit card bill for the month (which I pay off, of course) and two rebate forms to fill out and hope get credited to me. What a hassle!

I looked up the modems on Amazon (I'm not very ebay literate, but i should probably check out ebay too) and I can probably sell my new modem for at least $35, even if I cut off the upc to get the rebate. In theory that is a small profit, but it is a bit of a hassle to do all this.

I'm super annoyed that they convinced me to buy a modem I didn't need!

Also, as mentioned in my last post, I ordered some transcripts from my undergraduate institution. I ordered that two official transcripts be sent to the graduate university I am applying to. Yesterday I received two transcripts at my home address, clearly stamped with "issued to student". I didn't need or want these. I can only assume they didn't send any to the university. Now I have to call them and find out what happened. I hope I don't have to pay $12 to have them do this again!

Last, I sent my laptop in for repair in early December, and they sent it back with a note that the battery had failed. It was still under warranty, so I called them and asked why they didn't replace the battery. They said, "Hmm, I'm not sure! I'll send you a new one!" Which they did, along with a box for me to send the broken battery back in. In the meantime, I moved cross country and the old battery and box are long gone. Vanished! They just sent me a letter requesting that I return the part, or they will bill me for it. I assume a battery is around $100. Ouch.

This battery incident is primarily my fault (though they could have just replaced it when they had my laptop), but still annoying. I can see why they make people send in defective parts, but I'm going to call them and see if there is any flexibility in this policy. I don't have high hopes, but it can't hurt to call, explain the situation, and ask if they really have to bill me for a new battery. I've had mixed results with companies forgiving things like this, but it never hurts to ask.

I am frustrated that my money is disappearing for these things. Granted, they aren't really scams (except maybe the modem promotion), but I'm not getting anything of value out of them.

I just completed my first week at my new job, and will get paid next week. Let me just stay, I can not wait!

Work, so far, is horribly boring. I know it will get better, but they haven't exactly fit me into a program, so I've just been chillin' and doing a LOT of online training. But I'm a hard worker, so it is frustrating to just be sitting here, when I know all my friends at my last job are working their butts off.

By the way, applying to graduate school is expensive. I was accepted to a pretty good school at my last job (usually ranked about 30 or so in my major), but I now have access to a degree from top ten university. They will accept 2 of the 3 classes I have taken, and are on a quarter system, so I will be done with my M.S. degree more quickly. It will be a lot of work, but a better education overall. It will also help my resume out, as my undergrad institution is relatively unknown. My current company will pay for pretty much everything, including books.

In order to apply to the new school, I have paid:
-$60 application fee
-$24 for 2 transcripts from my previous grad school
-$12 for 2 transcripts from my undergrad school

I have opted NOT to send transcripts from my study abroad university (too much of a hassle, probably only about $15 plus international mail) and not order official GRE scores ($20 or so). Still, it is easily $100 a school to apply!

They will eventually be reimbursed to me, as long as I remember to file for it once I've completed my first class. My fees for the previous school I applied for were also reimbursed (and the GRE fee), so I am fortunate. But had I gone to grad school right away, I'd be facing these costs as a poor college student. That just seems wrong, but there aren't many ways around it.

This is one of many reasons I am really excited for my paycheck. Thank goodness for a healthy savings account!

Common knowledge is to always try to negotiate your starting salary. In most cases, the worst that can happen is they will say no. There is a possible exception for entry level positions at large companies, when it is hard to distinguish yourself from the next person holding a similar degree. You hear entry level people claim they are special because they have good grades, an internship or two, and extracurriculars. Well, great, but so do most people (good) companies interview. It isn't that you aren't special, it is just that the company probably doesn't know it yet. The company I worked for right out of school had a standard "new hire" offer, and it was basically take it or leave it. Smaller companies probably are more flexible. It still might not hurt to ask if the offer is negotiable, but be prepared to back up your request with reasons why you deserve more.

When I was job shopping for my relocation, I was in a unique position. In my industry you typically are moved up from Engineer 1 to Engineer 2" after roughly two years, if you are a good performer. (While I was almost certainly doing Engineer 2 work by the end of my last job, HR had strict rules about minimum amount of experience.) I was job shopping with 1.5 years of experience, so I still had to look for Engineer I jobs. Yet I didn't want to be caught by a "standard new hire offer", since I did have some experience and some graduate coursework.

I think that my first job offer was a standard new hire offer. I easily negotiated an extra 2k and a 3k signing bonus. The second job offer seemed to take my experience into consideration, and came in 2k than negotiated first offer, and a similar signing bonus. I chose the second, not entirely for monetary reasons.

With the salary being just 1k below my hope of 70k-75k range, I was faced with the decision of whether or not to ask for more. I thought the offer was fair. I thought they took my experience and graduate coursework into consideration. If I were to ask if it was negotiable, I'm not sure what I'd say when they asked "why do you think you deserve more?" So I didn't negotiate.

Now that I'm on the inside, I have acess to their salary tables. Here they are for my job category:

Level Low Mid High
1 $42000 $62000 $78000
2 $49000 $72000 $90000
3 $60000 $88000 $110000
4 $72000 $105000 $132000
5 $88000 $129000 $162000
6 $102000 $150000 $187000

So, you can see that my offer was above the middle for Engineer 1, and poised quite nicely to be moved into an Engineer 2 position, provided I perform well. Could I have asked for more? Yes. Would they have given it to me? Maybe. Maybe not. The range I was hoping for more closely lines up with the middle of the Engineer 2 range.

While maybe I could have squeezed out a few more dollars, I do feel very fortunate to be here. It's a top company, and has many graduates from top universities. There are lots of brilliant people here. I went to a state school with a good regional reputation (at best) and no reputation in this area. I now have an opportunity to finish my MS degree at a top ten university in my field. On their dime. I should be done in less than two years if they accept my transfer credits. Nice. The competition here is more stiff than at my last company--I would have easily been a star at my last company--but that will be good for me. Always surround yourself with people smarter than you are.

I signed up for health insurance benefits at my new company today. I had essentially three choices.

HMO
I've never used an HMO, and though I have heard some negative press about them, I think it would work ok for me. I don't have health issues and am a low maintenance customer. Free to me, minimal copays ($15 for my monthly prescription). I don't think I would mind being forced to deal with a Primary Care Physician.

Traditional PPO account
This cost about $16 per a bi weekly pay period, so just $416 year for premiums. Same copays as the HMO. You can see any in-network doctor and have a lot more freedom in your medical care. You can see out of network doctors for reduced benefits.

PPO + Health Savings Account (HSA)
This is free to me, but is a high deductible plan. Preventative care is covered 100%, but everything else is out of pocket up to the deductible, then benefits kick in. With this plan, I am eligible for a HSA to put pre-tax dollars in to spend on medical care, which carry over year to year. My company will contribute $700 to this account. I believe the yearly deductible is about $1500, but I can't quite recall.

I used a HSA at my last job (which had worse benefit options) so I'm already comfortable with them. I felt doubts about my HSA at the end of last year, because almost all the money I put in I took back out to buy my prescriptions with. My company didn't contribute. However, regular insurance was still 60/mo, so I came out... Well, I think I came out a little behind using the Health savings Account at my last job. But you live, you learn. I pretty much immediately ruled out the traditional PPO, because it seemed so similar to the HMO, except you could see more doctors and you had to pay money for it. I didn't need the freedom. The HMO seemed like a really cheap option, so I considered it.

I was left to debate the HMO and the PPO+HSA. Barring catastrophe, I need very little medical care. I see the doctor once a year for a women's health check-up, and use birth control each month, which does cost $45 without coverage. Last year I got an eye infection and was fixed up for about $100. I exercise, but I don't play any physical sports. Or any sports, really.

So, I went with the HSA, and chose to contribute $1500 of my own money to it. At first glance, that seems like the most expensive choice. My company contribution will cover my prescription costs, and probably nearly all other costs, so the plan is still free to me. Except I'll also have $1500 stored up for future health expenses. Next year, I shouldn't have to contribute much at all, though I probably will try to build it a little each year. In the short term, it is less cash in my pocket now. But the money being set aside is mine. It offers flexibility in the long term.

Something to note, a big disadvantage of HSA's are the fees. Most plans you can find online have high fees and/or no investment options. My HSA administrator really is no better, but the company pays the fees for me. I'm not intending to use this account as a sort of IRA for health (as suggested by Jonathan on MyMoneyBlog), so investment opportunities aren't a big priority either.

Did I make the right choice? Well, it depends on if I have any major surprise medical issues this year. Let's hope it was a good choice.

It is that time of the month again.... Time for a net worth update!

As expected, my net worth took a hit this month. I switched jobs and was only paid for less than 2 weeks in the new year. Plus I front loaded my pre-tax Health Savings Account at my old job, so my paycheck was extra small. Not to mention the dip in my investments and extra spending associated with moving. Oh, and I paid rent in two places this month---$575 in Iowa and an astounding $1425 in Los Angeles. (And my new place is quite a bit smaller.) Luckily, I really am only obligated to pay for half of January, so come February 1st, I have to pay "only" $762.50. There was also a $500 security deposit for my new place (I'm due $100 from my old place), and a modem that will be eventually covered by rebates for $100.

With all that said, here are the results:

January Net Worth: $11,235, down $1,824, or -13.97% from $13,059.

The detailed numbers can be seen on my NetworthIQ page (sidebar). I did move $1000 to Roth IRA, which hurt my cash savings. The rest of the loss was expenses described above. It is worth noting that I should make up all of that next month (and more), provided my relocation money and signing bonus are processed.

I took a break from monthly goals for December and January, due to all the transitions. I'm going to do the same for February, at least until I get my first paycheck and I know exactly what I'm working with.

I went on my first full shopping trip since relocating and moving into my apartment. I looked at the current balance of my grocery bill in horror. How on earth was it at $79 already? And they still were ringing up my order!! The grand total was $95, then they swiped my Ralph's card and it dropped to $70. It is ridiculous that they do that. It is just forcing you to use a grocery card if you want any discounts at all.

Anyway, $70 is still much more than I spend on weekly groceries. About double! Although part of it was because I'm restocking almost everything, it still was a bit excessive. I think my solution will be to make this last two weeks.... so no new groceries until Februrary 12th! I am pretty sure I can do it. When I complain there is no food to eat, I usually mean, there is nothing I feel like cooking and eating.

What on earth did I buy? Well, I won't copy my whole long receipt, but here are some of the more expensive items on the list.
Chicken breast fillets $8.90. I don't usually buy meat, actually. I'm not vegetarian, but I'm not a big fan of meat and I don't really know how to prepare it well.
Frozen Strawberries, huge bag, $8.50 (should last a very long time. For smoothies)
Lunch meat, 2 packages, $5 (much cheaper than buying a sandwhich!)
Peperoni to make English muffin pizza's: $3.50
Lunch cheese: $4.19, I forgot to price shop this I think
I also bought butter, milk, bananas, coffee creamer, 2 boxes of cereal, frozen broccoli and lots of other miscellaneous items.

There were some things on the list I didn't get. I had a frugal recipe that called for ziti, so I set out to the pasta isle. When I didn't find it, I realized I wasn't entirely sure if ziti was pasta at all. Maybe it was a cheese? So I'm back at home, ziti-less and just looked it up. It was pasta after all. I also could not find any muffin mix to make bran muffins. Maybe no one else likes them?

I liked to have a grocery budget of about $120/month, but I may have to up it. We'll see.

I must have lost a little weight over the course of the last year, as most of my jeans have been getting a little baggy. It wasn't a significant ammount, but I'm small already, so five pounds in either direction can make my clothes fit differently. Then seven to ten pounds means a whole new pants size. Seems like Mapgirl is having the opposite problem which is admittedly more common. Anyway, to remedy this, I ordered some jeans from Banana Republic on sale for $31.99. I couldn't try them on, so I crossed my fingers on the size, 2L. I only need "Long" sometimes, but that was all that was left. This was before I picked up two new pairs on sale at Jcrew for about $35 each. I really didn't need 3 new pairs, just two! The jeans arrived yesterday, and are too long, as I suspected they might be. It is a bit of a releif, now I don't have to decide weather or not to return them. Obviously, they must go back. They were cute jeans too, so I would have been tempted to keep them. I have to eat $6.00 in shipping (couldn't find a free shipping code), but I will still get $32 back on my card. That'll teach me to buy jeans without trying them on. (They were only available online anyway. The ones in the store didn't work out either.

My new rule on clothes is nothig that isn't directly appropriate for work for the next six months. Does that really mean no fun clothes until June 29th? Yes! It is not as ambitious as other young bloggers no clothing resoluitions (Meg and Wanda are two examples), but it is a step in the right direction. Also, I just donated a huge pile of clothes I never wore to Goodwill, so another rule is, for every item that comes into the closet, something has to go in a donation pile. That is super logical, will help with clutter, and will inspire extra cautioun in purchasing! An exception may be made for shoes, but with caution.

Also, I have a couple pairs of pants I had made for me when I was in Hong Kong that are now a little too big as well. Some don't have belt loops, so they are nearly unwearable. In fact, I wore one pair with a safety pin in an emergency situation. Classy! I think it is time to find a tailor and get those pants wearable again. Much more frugal than buying more dress pants! Do any of you have experience with using a tailor? And if I get them taken in, can they later be taken out if necessary?

Either that or I can fatten up a little bit... but that is also expensive because my metabolism would require a big calorie surplus to accomplish that!

My internet and cable aren't being installed until Saturday. Yet here I am, on the internet from the comfort of my own apartment. That's right, I'm mooching off someone else's unsecured connection.

How unethical do you consider this? I know some people who do it regularly as their primary source of internet. I usually do it in situations like this--I don't have legitimate access to the internet, but I have a legitimate desire to be on it!

To be honest, I'm not certain of the security concerns of this. If I'm connected to their network, could they potentially access my computer? I don't think so.

I spent the day settling in to my new apartment. While I filled up my new Ikea dresser, it tipped over and nearly killed me. No worries, the only casualty was a barely noticeable cosmetic piece we are going to try to repair later this week. I listened to NPR all day, and I am pretty sure that once my six month deal runs out for cable, I will be able to do without it. I'm not going to lie, I'll miss some of the absolute crap TV shows that I watch but my life is probably better off without them (example: Real Housewives of Orange County). The shows that I really love (when there isn't a writers strike) are all available online (Office and Grey's).

Internet I couldn't live without.... but could I just mooch off a neighbors connection? I probably wouldn't. Not only because of the moral concerns, but because it may not be reliable and completely secure. What do you think?

I think I mentioned I'm re-applying to graduate school. I have 9/30 credits completed (through distance education while working) at "University A", in the state I formerly lived in. I could continue on this path, taking 3 credits a semester (6 a year) and graduate in 3.5 years. University A is usually ranked in the 30s or 40s in my field.

My new job is more flexible about where you do your education. (Actually, they'll pay for almost anything, even non-job related. I think I'm taking sailing this spring!) I now have access to another (distance education) program at "University B" a top 10 engineering college. Even better, they are on the quarter system, require just nine courses, and I can take four each year. They also will accept two transfer credits, meaning if they accept my application, I'll be done in under two years! It'll also be a boost to my resume, as I went to a relatively no-name undergrad university. It also probably will be a lot more work and a very difficult two years... but it should pay off big time in the long run.

I was already really sold on this idea but I just came up with yet another great benefit. At "University B", each class is four credits, which by their system would classify me as a "half time" student. So what does that mean? Well, my student loans are Federal Subsidized Stafford loans, meaning while I'm enrolled in school at least half time, the government will pay the interest for me. I could also completely cease making payments if I wanted, freeing up $133 extra each month to invest/save. WOW! (I'll have to decide exactly what I plan to do when/if this whole thing is a reality)

In dollar terms, what does this mean? Well, last month the interest on my loan was roughly $75, so if I'm in this program for roughly two years, it'll save me about $1800. I can't wait until September to get this started! Let's hope that they accept me! I should find out within a few months!

After yesterday's post on being impatient to enroll in my company's 401k, today I found that I was finally "in the system" and could enroll! I eagerly got to the screen where I could indicate I wanted to save 15% of my pretax income. Then came the fund allocation screen....

Crap. I wasn't 100% prepared for this despite it being on my to-do list from about a week ago. I do have a loose plan of what I want to do, but haven't figure out how to align my three accounts into one asset allocation.

My overall goal for my asset allocation goal is as follows:

• Stocks/Bonds: 88%/12%
• Within stocks, Domestic/International: 60%/40%
• Within Domestic, Large Cap/Small Cap/REIT: 75%/15%/15%

I also would like 10% of my international allocations in emerging markets, and someday I may want to do something fancier with bonds as I hear a lot about TIPS and Treasury and things I don't know anything about (right now I just use a bond index fund).

Overall, this breaks down to 6 funds allocated as follows:

• Large Cap 37%
• Small Cap 8%
• REIT 8%
• Int. Index 32%
• Emerg. Mkts 4%
• Bond Idx 12%

Do you think I'm missing anything important?

There are some issues with this right now. It is pretty impossible for me to actually get the 4% emerging markets allocation or even the 8% REIT allocation. I don't have those options in my 401k, and Vanguard requires minimum investments of $3000, which is currently 15% of my portfolio. Besides, I don't really know exactly what my current allocation is, mostly because Fidelity's 2040 fund has about a zillion different holdings.

So, what is my plan? First, I need to move both my Roth IRA and old 401k to Vanguard, while rolling the 401k to an IRA. Then I want to roll $5000 of the 401k into the Roth. Why just $5000? Because I don't want to get hit with taxes on the full $15k this year. I figure I'll roll it into my Roth over a period of 2-3 years, hurrying it along if it becomes necessary (meaning, if I end up planning to get married before then, as the income limits are harder to meet if you aren't single). Perhaps more on the rollover later, as I contemplate all the implications of it.

Within the Roth, I want to buy $3000 of the REIT index fund, and put the rest in the Vangaurd 2040 fund (which does have a small percent emerging markets). I'll then set my future contributions to the 2040 fund and most likely put my old 401k into the 2040 fund as well. When my portfolio grows more, I may invest more into the emerging markets fund, but probably not any time in 2008.

Last I'll use the index funds in my 401k to balance out my other allocations (small cap, large cap, index, and bonds) as closely as I can to my goal.

What do you think? I do want to have real estate be part of my portfolio, as I don't own property and don't plan on it soon. Should I just wait on the REITs until I can keep them a smaller percent of the portfolio? Or, given the housing market, will they decline all on their own, so I won't have to worry?? :)

In a side note, I temporarily regretted posting anything about my relationship yesterday. People sometimes jump to conclusions based on limited information. I wrote a post detailing things, intending to "clear up" some things. It was wordy and not very personal finance related anyway, so I'll just say it in a concise fashion. It's been 3.5 years. When we were both students, we split things fairly evenly. He would never need a loan from me and is good with money, and will most likely be very successful (someday). He really is on a tight budget as we live in an expensive city. He does pay for things now and then, including dinners, just not this weekend. He spent hours helping me set up my furniture and hang pictures and is really helpful with that kind of thing. I eat his food when I'm at his place (but my food is so much better!) We discussed it briefly, he acknowledged it, and I'll see if it is an issue in the future. If so, I will write about it, but I have to remind myself not to get (too) defensive about the comments!

I still can't sign up for my company's 401k, but not because I'm ineligible. You are eligible immediately (and vested immediately too!), though they a pension plan too which takes a year to be eligible and 5 years to vest.

I can't sign up because the website doesn't recognize my userid. I'm not "in the system" despite already getting a huge packet of information from them. Since I'm not in the system, when I call them, they are totally helpless:
"I can't take your password over the phone, you have to go through the system and punch it in"
"I did. But I wasn't given any menu options, so I pressed zero for help."
"Well. I can put you back through the system, and you can enter your password."
". . . But that obviously didn't work."

Gah! They did say it may take 7-10 days to become active. If they mean business days, it has been seven. If they mean actual days, it has been 11. I'll give it until the end of the week....

But I'm really anxious to start contributing! I'm going to see if I can handle contributing 15% of my income. If I do that, I'll be able to get about $10k in my 401k and 5k in my Roth, for a total of 15k of my money in retirement contributions for 2008, just over 21% of my gross income. There also should be roughly 4k from the company match. Barring an ever declining market, that should almost double my account value in 2008! However, with such a shaky market and all this recession talk, I specifically set my goals in dollars of contributions, not account value. Go long term investing!

I think 15% will be a stretch for me, at least while I'm growing the e-fund. I varied between 12% and 15% at my last job, and rent was much lower. We'll have to see how it goes. My budget says I can do it, but I'm not much of a budgeter.

While I'm waiting, I've been putting a little extra in my Roth IRA to get the year started off on the right foot.

So, you aren't supposed to keep score in relationships. Still, I can't help it sometimes.

My boyfriend is a poor poor grad student who makes less than half of what I do (stipend). My savings is going up, his is staying flat at best. Naturally, I don't expect him to spend much on us. He is content with not going out to eat much and living quite cheaply, which is great for us in the long run because I'm fairly frugal too. We should never have problems living within our means. Still, sometimes I want treats, so I provide them for us.

This weekend (starting on Thursday) I paid for:
Pizza: $13, a good deal though, for 3 medium pizza's that fed us almost all weekend. I will say nothing about the healthfulness of it...
Sam Adam's White Ale: $14
Lunch at Ikea: $11 (though my fault, since we wouldn't have otherwise been at Ikea and he was helping me pick out and build stuff)
Random Food that we ate: Coffee, cereal, milk, juice, burritos from Trader Joe's.... Plus he made a smoothie that neither of us really needed/wanted (which was much to thick) with my frozen strawberries right before dinner for no logical reason!

Also, he doesn't have a car, so I'm always driving and using my gas. And he definitely ate/drank more of all that stuff than I did.

It isn't that I'm not generous with this kind of thing. I am actually quite generous: "Thanks for coming to Ikea... do you want to stop at the cafe? How about this Mango Sorbet too, that looks delicious!" Then I do my budget, see that I want to save more, then regret my generosity. Ooops.

Then again, how petty is it for me to quibble about $37 spent on "us" when i spent about $200 on me and my apartment at Ikea? It is hard to justify that.

I guess it's the principle rather than the dollar amount. When we stopped at the store to buy juice (potentially for future smoothies or to mix in drinks), he could have paid for it. It was only about $3, so it makes no difference in the scheme of things, but it makes me feel a little less like I'm being taken advantage of. I know that really isn't the case... I offer to do all these things and he would be fine if I stopped. Sometimes I can't help but be bothered by it though.

I guess I need to be careful with my generosity, and really think about it before I offer to pay for things for "us". I need to make sure I won't regret it. Spending money doesn't show love (though, I can't help but think it does, at least a little). I think (hope) that my attitude would be different if we were engaged/married and money spent on us was truly ours and not mine/his. I also think his attitude would be a little different as well. But it just isn't like that right now. It is my money, and if I'm going to share it, I need to make sure I'm sharing it within my budget.

I'm quite certain that I wasn't tagged for this, but I saw a few other bloggers doing it and it seemed fun. I don't use a traditional wallet. For better or worse, I use a little wristlet that my sister gave me. I stick it in my purse, or if I'm traveling light I put it on my wrist and don't carry a purse . While it doesn't have the organizational capabilities of a wallet, I don't carry too much with me, so it works well.


What is there?

• Drivers License: I just got this about a week ago. I heart California! Also, I so wish I wouldn't have worn red, as it sort of clashes with the yellow background.
  
• Cash: I usually don't carry any cash, but I happened to hit the ATM a few days before, so I have $23. I also have some quarters, which I hoard for laundry money.
• Credit Cards: My awesome pink Discover Card, and a Chase Visa. Also a seldom used Wells Fargo debit card, and a Health Savings Account debit card from my HSA at my last job.
• Library Card: Brand new! No, I'm not afraid that you know that I live somewhere in the vast LA area.
• Ralph's receipt: It is for Orange Juice. Trader Joe's was all out of OJ (well, out of the $3 kind, they did have a $5.50 jug) so we swung into Ralph's. I don't need this receipt. We don't need to bring ink and paper into this. I can't imagine a scenario that I would have to prove that I bought OJ. To some skeptical friend, "Don't even act like I didn't get that OJ. I've got the documentation right here. It's in my file at home. Under O." (So much funnier coming from the late Mitch Hedberg, but if you got that reference, I automatically like you extra.)
• H&M Gift card: It has less than $5 on it, but I put it in there hoping I'll use it someday...
• AAA card: Because my parents love me and got it for me. Personally, I'd probably join the much greener Better World Club.

I don't tag you, but if you think this seems fun, feel free to participate!

So.... If you are observant, you might have noticed earlier this week I requested to be added to the blog roll of anyone who regularly reads this, yet didn't follow through on my promise to create one myself. I'm a bad person! But I have an excuse: I think I'm moving to wordpress, but I'm just not quite ready to move in over there. I hate that you can't edit the CSS for free, but let's be honest... I don't want to deal with editing the code anyway. I'll get this taken care of SOON, either way.

I consider myself reasonably successful, and I hope to continue down the road to success as I get older. Trent over at the The Simple Dollar recently wrote an interesting post in which he shares some tips to improve your life. In light of this, I want to share with you exactly how I got to where I am today, and outline how you can do even better than I did! Here are the main four things I did right to get where I am today:

Luck: I was born in the USA, lucky me! I think that is the single most important thing to my success (though other first world countries could have been acceptable).

Family: We were not in poverty, though there were some money issues at times. That helps a heck of a lot when trying to get through life. I was well fed and actually went to a private high school. Most of all, there was a ton of emotional support. My dad in particular placed high priority on education, as he did not finish college himself. We were encouraged to participate in extra-curricular activities, and my parents shelled out for a lot of lessons, sports and extra classes. I used to go to summer school for fun to take extra classes! They provided some minor monetary support in college, and allowed me to stay at home rent free while for a couple semesters.

Natural ability: Not everyone can get through the engineering coursework with good grades. I'm not meaning to be arrogant--there are a ton of things that I stink at. But my ability to understand math is genetic--I did nothing special to earn it.

Hard work: I have spent many many hours investing in my education and myself. It isn't always fun, but it is rewarding.

To a lesser degree, the following two things helped:

Federal Support: I received scholarships and financial aid to attend college. Without it, I'd be at least 20k more in student loan debt. For a state school!

Social connections: I got the interview for my current job because my boyfriend was going to a top grad school, met someone who worked here, and passed on my resume. Most people who work here are from big name schools. Not I! Other than that, I didn't get a lot of advantages from social connections, yet. My parents don't have powerful friends, nor did I go to a prestigious school. But I've seen it happen with others a lot.

Based in my successes, I have three surefire tips for success. You'll may have to combine these with hard work to guarantee success. Still, with just a little work, you'll have a good shot at a successful life if you do these three things:

1. Be born in a good country. Even better, pick a good neighborhood, and maybe consider avoiding being a minority group. You could even consider being male, though I wasn't and don't want to be!
2. Have a good family. The more money the easier it will be for you, but even more importantly, they have to care about you. Not only that, they must have the time and knowledge to invest in your future, as well as the ability to lead you along in your early years. And maybe in your young adult years too, if you are lucky!
   
3. Be gifted. Intelligence is a good gift to have, or perhaps extreme artistic talent. Both would be great, but there are some other options I'm sure. Have some charisma and a go-getter personality. While you are at it, make sure you are healthy and it wouldn't hurt to be attractive too.

What, you don't like my advice? Okay, okay... Then I suggest you read Trent's good advice that can actually be followed, no matter what has happened with my three tips!

All joking aside, hard work is very important and can help a lot of people. What about "working smart"? Personally, that term gets on my nerves. I think it is overused and largely meaningless. However, if you think you can find a way to "work smart", go for it. If you don't really understand what "work smart" means in your life (I don't!) just work hard while you are contemplating it.

My point is, you do have to play your cards right, but it is silly to pretend we all got a similar hand.

I have been using two online savings accounts for about a year, ING and HSBC. Both have been dropping rates like crazy, and neither are very competitive anymore. There simply are better options out there. I'm not going to stand for this anymore!

I did a little research, and decided to switch to the Vanguard Prime Money Market Fund to house the majority of my savings. It currently has a yield of 4.22%. While are HYSAs and CDs out there with better rates, they aren't consistently higher. I'm not going to rate chase. This is a solid account that has continually been competitive to HYSA. I first did the analysis last summer, and the tax free money market account actually came out ahead of any savings account. Try out this awesome calculator to compare. These days, the taxable account is a better deal for me. I was wavering between EmigrantDirect (solid reviews, solid rates) and Vanguard, and honestly the final decision was sort of impulsive. I figure I'll eventually roll over my 401k into an IRA there, and move my Roth from Fidelity... So it will simplify my finances in the long run.

I funded it with $4000 to start, about half of my HSBC balance. I already have a lot of stuff linked up with my HSBC account, so I'm waiting to completely pull the plug on it... But it will happen. I already set up my Vanguard account for direct deposit and will be sending my tax refund there as well.

What about ING? Well I'm not too impressed with them either, but they will be staying around. I'll be using them for some shorter term savings (car insurance, travel fund) and for now, for my student loan payback account and new car fund. Why? I like the subaccounts. Yeah, I can do it in excel. Whatever, I don't want to. For such small balances I'm not as concerned about getting the best rate.

Why else? The $10 referral bonuses and the sweepstakes I am entered in for using direct deposit. So it's lame to trade interest rates for sweepstakes... but whatever, you'll be jealous when I win $30,000!

I was clicking along through TaxAct, and it asked if I'd made any contribution to an Health Savings Account (HSA) this year. It instructed me not to include employer contributions or contributions made by my employer through a cafeteria plan. I thought, "why yes, I did make contributions. My salary was reduced by $1500 this year, and it went into my account." Cafeteria plan? I pictured my workplace cafeteria, and wondered how they were involve in health care. I never ate there, so that probably didn't apply to me.

Uh....

I later noticed that my $1500 was double counted as a deduction. I looked up "cafeteria plan" and realized that was exactly what my HSA was funded through! Ooops. I had selected my benefits from a "menu" of choices, thus it was a cafeteria plan. Ohhhh, I see! Why don't they just say what they meant?!? I corrected it, and my refund fell by several hundred dollars. Still, I haven't received any tax information from my HSA administrator, so I suppose I should wait to file until I get that. Which doesn't make sense to me, because those distributions were tax free anyway. Why would I even need to report them?

To be honest, I'm not certain I filed my 2006 taxes right with regards to my HSA. I got a lonely form that looked suspiciously like a tax document sometime in March, long after I filed my taxes. I do know that I paid the right amount: Money taken from the account is tax free and my contributions were pre-tax. Simple. I just don't know if I documented it right.

Also, I moved to California this January and I obviously entered my current address on my tax return. TaxAct helpfully assumed I would need a CA state return in addition to my Iowa one. I had to click through the entire California state return for it to figure out that I didn't owe any taxes here for 2007, nor do I have to file a return.

Well anyway, I'll hold off a week on officially filing them, and if nothing shows up from my HSA, I'll give them a call.

Projected refund is about $1000 total. I owe the state $200 and the federal government owes me $1200. Oh sure I'm giving the government a tax free loan, blah blah blah. Assuming a 5% return in my savings (which isn't likely these days) I missed out on $50 of interest, which would have been taxed anyway.... And now I have $1000 that I did not spend and can use to replenish the e-fund. It is already back to about $8500, so another thousand will boost it quite close to the 10k goal.

While filing my taxes using TaxAct, I clicked on a pop-up that gave me tax tips for 2008. One interesting suggestion that had was to own a home.

A Real Tax Shelter
Purchasing a home is one of the best tax shelters available. The interest and points that you pay for the purchase are deductible as itemized deductions. The property taxes that you pay on the home are also deductible as itemized deductions. Best of all, when you sell the home, you probably will not need to pay any tax at all on the gain. There is no other investment that can provide the tax advantages like home ownership.

Though it was a friendly little tip, it got me thinking and got me a little mad. Why is does owning a home provide such great tax benefits? (Deductions for dependents is another story.... But raising kids is ridiculously expensive so this doesn't bother me much.) Is it fair? If so, why is it fair? Do most developed countries do this? Where did this idea come from? Of course, popular belief is that the main reason is to encourage people to own homes. It is the American Dream. But why? Why does the government want to encourage home ownership for everyone? Why am I seen less favorably because I'm priced out and relatively uninterested in locking myself to a property?

How about another viewpoint? The New York Times says that is simply a nice "American folk legend: the government invented the mortgage-interest deduction to help people buy their own homes, and the level of homeownership has risen ever since." The real story, they claim, is much less middle class friendly. It stems from the government originally having all interest as deductible, which was really intended to help business. The average American didn't have a mortgage (or credit card) and wasn't paying interest in the first place (can you believe that!), so interest was a business expense and therefore deductible. Later this broad rule was changed, for obvious reasons, but the mortgage interest stayed (for less obvious reasons.) Further, the author claims tax is actually regressive with "the rewards are greatly skewed in favor of the moderately to the conspicuously rich." Wow. This is stuff I'd never heard of before. I will stop myself from regurgitating the whole article, but it is a great read!

So, how much of an impact does this really make on me anyway? I assume if you own property, you must itemize deductions. I generally take the standard deduction. What kind of itemized deduction would someone on my salary with property get, assuming my rent is equal to their housing expenses? It would be an interesting exercise. The more expensive the house, the bigger the difference.

Ho much impact does it make on the government? A lot, actually: "The mortgage-interest deduction. We all love the deduction for home-mortgage interest. But renters and those who own their homes free and clear get nothing. Cost to the government: $402.7 billion." That number is from 2006.

If most people are deducting mortgage interest, why can't I deduct anything for my rent? There is interest and taxes built into the price of my apartment. Is someone else taking those deductions for me? Actually, a few states do allow a small tax break for renters, based on the fact that we indirectly are paying someone else's property taxes. In California, it is only for senior citizens with low incomes. Yet you can deduct interest on mortgages values over $1 million.

What can a renter do? This article suggests deducting student loan interest (which saved me a couple hundred this year) or a hybrid car deduction (can't afford a hybrid). For some reason, I don't feel like that evens things out at all. Apparently all I can do is write my congressman or buy a house.

What do you think? And is your view skewed by the fact that you either do or do not own property? Is it possible that eliminating this deduction could actually benefit the majority of people?

I get paid tomorrow (yes, on Thursdays) and finally was able to view my paycheck online. Though I only am being paid for 40 hrs instead of 80 this period, they did process my signing bonus in the first check (yes!) so I finally have some money to work with. They got all my direct deposit stuff set up in time (nice work!). I have it split between three different accounts, checking, short term savings (insurance, travel, car) and a long term savings (e-fund, maybe house/condo fund one day). I still may have to transfer between these, but this should minimize that. Make savings automatic!

I'm still not ready to finalize a budget, as I'm not certain what my take home pay will be. I tried to figure out exactly how much I'll be paying in taxes each month by taking total taxes paid divided by total gross pay in this check. I came up with about a 39% tax rate! Yikes, that can't be right! Google tells me that taxes on bonuses, while calculated as normal income, are withheld at a different rate, up to 40%. Well, that makes more sense! Good to know.

Is it logical to just use 25%, my marginal tax rate? Then again, what about FICA, Social Security, etc? If I do that, I come up with about $1700 after 401k and medical or $1500 if I go all the way up to 20% in my 401k. It isn't likely I can live off the $3000/month, at least not if I want to grow my cash savings. Though the way some people dream about buying a house, I dream about maxing out my 401k....

My 401k still isn't ready for me to enroll. I hate when systems are not automated enough. My last job I could enroll in my 401k on the first day (through Fidelity). It has been a full week and CitiStreet still isn't recognizing my user ID. When I called the number to ask if this was normal, I was told "Please listen carefully as options have recently changed." Then, there was a single ring, then silence. More silence. I was never given any options! I hung up and tried again, only to have it happen again. I pressed all the numbers and was directed to an operator who could not help me unless I "went through the system and entered my PIN" (which I did!). He suggested waiting another week, or trying the number again. Lame.

I was going to go hang out with the boyfriend tonight, but I think I'll cancel. He has a lot of school work, and I have needed to do laundry for at least a week. This will give me time to start working on yesterdays to-do list. First up, taxes!

I have some major financial housekeeping to do within the next month (or maybe two months). With switching jobs and moving 2000 miles, I feel like everything is a mess! It is time for some clean-up.

Taxes: Self explanatory! I did start them on TaxAct, but got distracted.

Retirement Accounts:
Well, first, I assign myself some homework. I've had "Random Walk Guide to Investing" hanging out on my bookshelf for months. I need to read it. I also want to re-read Jonathan's series at MyMoneyBlog.com about asset allocation, and look for other good internet information. I need to consider rolling over my old 401k to an IRA or even to a Roth IRA. I want to at least consider moving my Roth from Fidelity to Vanguard. I need to get enrolled in my new 401k ASAP, and contribute at least 8% to get the match.

Emergency fund: I want to get it back up to 10k, then evaluate if I need to increase it further due to increased costs. It briefly hit 10k before Christmas, but has dwindled to just over 7k (!) in the move process. Well, 1k went to the Roth to kick off 2008 so it isn't so bad. This should easily be taken care of if I simply apply the relocation allowance and signing bonus. Also, I want to investigate moving it from HSBC to something better.

Actually implement plan to buy car insurance. I have to do this soon, because I have get my car registered in my new state. It's just... I recently designated an ING accout to save up for bi-yearly insurance purchases... but so far I've only stuck $25 in it! Ug.

Figure out a reasonable budget. Having scaled back income and paying two rents for a month has totally messed with my head. I have no idea what I can afford, what is a splurge, and what I absolutely shouldn't be buying. So I'm just guessing. . .

Rebates, rebates, rebates: I need to send in rebates for my cable service, my internet service ($50 each), and for my modem (about $80). Then I need to sell my modem online, since it turns out I didn't even need it! After that, I might cancel cable since I haven't been watching it at all.

Set some 2008 goals: It's been hard to do with so much up in the air.

Well, I feel a little better just writing it all down.....

I'm thinking it is (way past) time to add a blog roll to this site. If I've ever commented on your blog, that means I read you and probably will be adding you to the list of blogs I read anyway. But perhaps I have a reader or two whose blogs I have not yet discovered. I have a special interest in twenty-something females, particularly unmarried ones, because I relate best. But of course, I do read all sorts of blogs!

If you want to be added, you can comment on this post, or send me an email. I can be reached at SJean0 (and that is a zero, not the letter "O"). I use Google for my mail.

I also need to update my sidebars and goals to be current. I like writing, but the backend part of blogging is so unappealing to me. I have a mini-dream of getting a prettier site (wordpress?), but it seems like a lot of work. I also don't think that I can justify shelling out the cash to pay someone to figure this out for me... So I will do it myself, eventually!

Also, if you do read my blog, please consider adding me to your blogroll if you have one and if you feel like it. Thanks!

I feel like I'm being scammed out of my money left and right!

I signed up for cable service online (because I do everything possible online) and followed the clear instructions on the web page to obtain a cable modem before the cable guy came. There was a promotion for a "free" modem, after rebate, which turned out to be about $20 with shipping and tax (after rebates... which are always a bit sketchy to redeem).

Yesterday the cable guy set up my internet and TV, and started installing a cable modem from the company. I said I had one already, and would not be needing to rent one from the cable company (as that is how it often works.) He told me that there was no rental, the modem was part of the service.

I am still fuming about this, a little. (Ok, a lot, if you ask my boyfriend.) Why would they tell me I needed to buy a modem when I didn't? Now I have a modem that put almost $100 on my credit card bill for the month (which I pay off, of course) and two rebate forms to fill out and hope get credited to me. What a hassle!

I looked up the modems on Amazon (I'm not very ebay literate, but i should probably check out ebay too) and I can probably sell my new modem for at least $35, even if I cut off the upc to get the rebate. In theory that is a small profit, but it is a bit of a hassle to do all this.

I'm super annoyed that they convinced me to buy a modem I didn't need!

Also, as mentioned in my last post, I ordered some transcripts from my undergraduate institution. I ordered that two official transcripts be sent to the graduate university I am applying to. Yesterday I received two transcripts at my home address, clearly stamped with "issued to student". I didn't need or want these. I can only assume they didn't send any to the university. Now I have to call them and find out what happened. I hope I don't have to pay $12 to have them do this again!

Last, I sent my laptop in for repair in early December, and they sent it back with a note that the battery had failed. It was still under warranty, so I called them and asked why they didn't replace the battery. They said, "Hmm, I'm not sure! I'll send you a new one!" Which they did, along with a box for me to send the broken battery back in. In the meantime, I moved cross country and the old battery and box are long gone. Vanished! They just sent me a letter requesting that I return the part, or they will bill me for it. I assume a battery is around $100. Ouch.

This battery incident is primarily my fault (though they could have just replaced it when they had my laptop), but still annoying. I can see why they make people send in defective parts, but I'm going to call them and see if there is any flexibility in this policy. I don't have high hopes, but it can't hurt to call, explain the situation, and ask if they really have to bill me for a new battery. I've had mixed results with companies forgiving things like this, but it never hurts to ask.

I am frustrated that my money is disappearing for these things. Granted, they aren't really scams (except maybe the modem promotion), but I'm not getting anything of value out of them.

I just completed my first week at my new job, and will get paid next week. Let me just stay, I can not wait!

Work, so far, is horribly boring. I know it will get better, but they haven't exactly fit me into a program, so I've just been chillin' and doing a LOT of online training. But I'm a hard worker, so it is frustrating to just be sitting here, when I know all my friends at my last job are working their butts off.

By the way, applying to graduate school is expensive. I was accepted to a pretty good school at my last job (usually ranked about 30 or so in my major), but I now have access to a degree from top ten university. They will accept 2 of the 3 classes I have taken, and are on a quarter system, so I will be done with my M.S. degree more quickly. It will be a lot of work, but a better education overall. It will also help my resume out, as my undergrad institution is relatively unknown. My current company will pay for pretty much everything, including books.

In order to apply to the new school, I have paid:
-$60 application fee
-$24 for 2 transcripts from my previous grad school
-$12 for 2 transcripts from my undergrad school

I have opted NOT to send transcripts from my study abroad university (too much of a hassle, probably only about $15 plus international mail) and not order official GRE scores ($20 or so). Still, it is easily $100 a school to apply!

They will eventually be reimbursed to me, as long as I remember to file for it once I've completed my first class. My fees for the previous school I applied for were also reimbursed (and the GRE fee), so I am fortunate. But had I gone to grad school right away, I'd be facing these costs as a poor college student. That just seems wrong, but there aren't many ways around it.

This is one of many reasons I am really excited for my paycheck. Thank goodness for a healthy savings account!

Common knowledge is to always try to negotiate your starting salary. In most cases, the worst that can happen is they will say no. There is a possible exception for entry level positions at large companies, when it is hard to distinguish yourself from the next person holding a similar degree. You hear entry level people claim they are special because they have good grades, an internship or two, and extracurriculars. Well, great, but so do most people (good) companies interview. It isn't that you aren't special, it is just that the company probably doesn't know it yet. The company I worked for right out of school had a standard "new hire" offer, and it was basically take it or leave it. Smaller companies probably are more flexible. It still might not hurt to ask if the offer is negotiable, but be prepared to back up your request with reasons why you deserve more.

When I was job shopping for my relocation, I was in a unique position. In my industry you typically are moved up from Engineer 1 to Engineer 2" after roughly two years, if you are a good performer. (While I was almost certainly doing Engineer 2 work by the end of my last job, HR had strict rules about minimum amount of experience.) I was job shopping with 1.5 years of experience, so I still had to look for Engineer I jobs. Yet I didn't want to be caught by a "standard new hire offer", since I did have some experience and some graduate coursework.

I think that my first job offer was a standard new hire offer. I easily negotiated an extra 2k and a 3k signing bonus. The second job offer seemed to take my experience into consideration, and came in 2k than negotiated first offer, and a similar signing bonus. I chose the second, not entirely for monetary reasons.

With the salary being just 1k below my hope of 70k-75k range, I was faced with the decision of whether or not to ask for more. I thought the offer was fair. I thought they took my experience and graduate coursework into consideration. If I were to ask if it was negotiable, I'm not sure what I'd say when they asked "why do you think you deserve more?" So I didn't negotiate.

Now that I'm on the inside, I have acess to their salary tables. Here they are for my job category:

Level Low Mid High
1 $42000 $62000 $78000
2 $49000 $72000 $90000
3 $60000 $88000 $110000
4 $72000 $105000 $132000
5 $88000 $129000 $162000
6 $102000 $150000 $187000

So, you can see that my offer was above the middle for Engineer 1, and poised quite nicely to be moved into an Engineer 2 position, provided I perform well. Could I have asked for more? Yes. Would they have given it to me? Maybe. Maybe not. The range I was hoping for more closely lines up with the middle of the Engineer 2 range.

While maybe I could have squeezed out a few more dollars, I do feel very fortunate to be here. It's a top company, and has many graduates from top universities. There are lots of brilliant people here. I went to a state school with a good regional reputation (at best) and no reputation in this area. I now have an opportunity to finish my MS degree at a top ten university in my field. On their dime. I should be done in less than two years if they accept my transfer credits. Nice. The competition here is more stiff than at my last company--I would have easily been a star at my last company--but that will be good for me. Always surround yourself with people smarter than you are.

I signed up for health insurance benefits at my new company today. I had essentially three choices.

HMO
I've never used an HMO, and though I have heard some negative press about them, I think it would work ok for me. I don't have health issues and am a low maintenance customer. Free to me, minimal copays ($15 for my monthly prescription). I don't think I would mind being forced to deal with a Primary Care Physician.

Traditional PPO account
This cost about $16 per a bi weekly pay period, so just $416 year for premiums. Same copays as the HMO. You can see any in-network doctor and have a lot more freedom in your medical care. You can see out of network doctors for reduced benefits.

PPO + Health Savings Account (HSA)
This is free to me, but is a high deductible plan. Preventative care is covered 100%, but everything else is out of pocket up to the deductible, then benefits kick in. With this plan, I am eligible for a HSA to put pre-tax dollars in to spend on medical care, which carry over year to year. My company will contribute $700 to this account. I believe the yearly deductible is about $1500, but I can't quite recall.

I used a HSA at my last job (which had worse benefit options) so I'm already comfortable with them. I felt doubts about my HSA at the end of last year, because almost all the money I put in I took back out to buy my prescriptions with. My company didn't contribute. However, regular insurance was still 60/mo, so I came out... Well, I think I came out a little behind using the Health savings Account at my last job. But you live, you learn. I pretty much immediately ruled out the traditional PPO, because it seemed so similar to the HMO, except you could see more doctors and you had to pay money for it. I didn't need the freedom. The HMO seemed like a really cheap option, so I considered it.

I was left to debate the HMO and the PPO+HSA. Barring catastrophe, I need very little medical care. I see the doctor once a year for a women's health check-up, and use birth control each month, which does cost $45 without coverage. Last year I got an eye infection and was fixed up for about $100. I exercise, but I don't play any physical sports. Or any sports, really.

So, I went with the HSA, and chose to contribute $1500 of my own money to it. At first glance, that seems like the most expensive choice. My company contribution will cover my prescription costs, and probably nearly all other costs, so the plan is still free to me. Except I'll also have $1500 stored up for future health expenses. Next year, I shouldn't have to contribute much at all, though I probably will try to build it a little each year. In the short term, it is less cash in my pocket now. But the money being set aside is mine. It offers flexibility in the long term.

Something to note, a big disadvantage of HSA's are the fees. Most plans you can find online have high fees and/or no investment options. My HSA administrator really is no better, but the company pays the fees for me. I'm not intending to use this account as a sort of IRA for health (as suggested by Jonathan on MyMoneyBlog), so investment opportunities aren't a big priority either.

Did I make the right choice? Well, it depends on if I have any major surprise medical issues this year. Let's hope it was a good choice.

It is that time of the month again.... Time for a net worth update!

As expected, my net worth took a hit this month. I switched jobs and was only paid for less than 2 weeks in the new year. Plus I front loaded my pre-tax Health Savings Account at my old job, so my paycheck was extra small. Not to mention the dip in my investments and extra spending associated with moving. Oh, and I paid rent in two places this month---$575 in Iowa and an astounding $1425 in Los Angeles. (And my new place is quite a bit smaller.) Luckily, I really am only obligated to pay for half of January, so come February 1st, I have to pay "only" $762.50. There was also a $500 security deposit for my new place (I'm due $100 from my old place), and a modem that will be eventually covered by rebates for $100.

With all that said, here are the results:

January Net Worth: $11,235, down $1,824, or -13.97% from $13,059.

The detailed numbers can be seen on my NetworthIQ page (sidebar). I did move $1000 to Roth IRA, which hurt my cash savings. The rest of the loss was expenses described above. It is worth noting that I should make up all of that next month (and more), provided my relocation money and signing bonus are processed.

I took a break from monthly goals for December and January, due to all the transitions. I'm going to do the same for February, at least until I get my first paycheck and I know exactly what I'm working with.

I went on my first full shopping trip since relocating and moving into my apartment. I looked at the current balance of my grocery bill in horror. How on earth was it at $79 already? And they still were ringing up my order!! The grand total was $95, then they swiped my Ralph's card and it dropped to $70. It is ridiculous that they do that. It is just forcing you to use a grocery card if you want any discounts at all.

Anyway, $70 is still much more than I spend on weekly groceries. About double! Although part of it was because I'm restocking almost everything, it still was a bit excessive. I think my solution will be to make this last two weeks.... so no new groceries until Februrary 12th! I am pretty sure I can do it. When I complain there is no food to eat, I usually mean, there is nothing I feel like cooking and eating.

What on earth did I buy? Well, I won't copy my whole long receipt, but here are some of the more expensive items on the list.
Chicken breast fillets $8.90. I don't usually buy meat, actually. I'm not vegetarian, but I'm not a big fan of meat and I don't really know how to prepare it well.
Frozen Strawberries, huge bag, $8.50 (should last a very long time. For smoothies)
Lunch meat, 2 packages, $5 (much cheaper than buying a sandwhich!)
Peperoni to make English muffin pizza's: $3.50
Lunch cheese: $4.19, I forgot to price shop this I think
I also bought butter, milk, bananas, coffee creamer, 2 boxes of cereal, frozen broccoli and lots of other miscellaneous items.

There were some things on the list I didn't get. I had a frugal recipe that called for ziti, so I set out to the pasta isle. When I didn't find it, I realized I wasn't entirely sure if ziti was pasta at all. Maybe it was a cheese? So I'm back at home, ziti-less and just looked it up. It was pasta after all. I also could not find any muffin mix to make bran muffins. Maybe no one else likes them?

I liked to have a grocery budget of about $120/month, but I may have to up it. We'll see.

I must have lost a little weight over the course of the last year, as most of my jeans have been getting a little baggy. It wasn't a significant ammount, but I'm small already, so five pounds in either direction can make my clothes fit differently. Then seven to ten pounds means a whole new pants size. Seems like Mapgirl is having the opposite problem which is admittedly more common. Anyway, to remedy this, I ordered some jeans from Banana Republic on sale for $31.99. I couldn't try them on, so I crossed my fingers on the size, 2L. I only need "Long" sometimes, but that was all that was left. This was before I picked up two new pairs on sale at Jcrew for about $35 each. I really didn't need 3 new pairs, just two! The jeans arrived yesterday, and are too long, as I suspected they might be. It is a bit of a releif, now I don't have to decide weather or not to return them. Obviously, they must go back. They were cute jeans too, so I would have been tempted to keep them. I have to eat $6.00 in shipping (couldn't find a free shipping code), but I will still get $32 back on my card. That'll teach me to buy jeans without trying them on. (They were only available online anyway. The ones in the store didn't work out either.

My new rule on clothes is nothig that isn't directly appropriate for work for the next six months. Does that really mean no fun clothes until June 29th? Yes! It is not as ambitious as other young bloggers no clothing resoluitions (Meg and Wanda are two examples), but it is a step in the right direction. Also, I just donated a huge pile of clothes I never wore to Goodwill, so another rule is, for every item that comes into the closet, something has to go in a donation pile. That is super logical, will help with clutter, and will inspire extra cautioun in purchasing! An exception may be made for shoes, but with caution.

Also, I have a couple pairs of pants I had made for me when I was in Hong Kong that are now a little too big as well. Some don't have belt loops, so they are nearly unwearable. In fact, I wore one pair with a safety pin in an emergency situation. Classy! I think it is time to find a tailor and get those pants wearable again. Much more frugal than buying more dress pants! Do any of you have experience with using a tailor? And if I get them taken in, can they later be taken out if necessary?

Either that or I can fatten up a little bit... but that is also expensive because my metabolism would require a big calorie surplus to accomplish that!

My internet and cable aren't being installed until Saturday. Yet here I am, on the internet from the comfort of my own apartment. That's right, I'm mooching off someone else's unsecured connection.

How unethical do you consider this? I know some people who do it regularly as their primary source of internet. I usually do it in situations like this--I don't have legitimate access to the internet, but I have a legitimate desire to be on it!

To be honest, I'm not certain of the security concerns of this. If I'm connected to their network, could they potentially access my computer? I don't think so.

I spent the day settling in to my new apartment. While I filled up my new Ikea dresser, it tipped over and nearly killed me. No worries, the only casualty was a barely noticeable cosmetic piece we are going to try to repair later this week. I listened to NPR all day, and I am pretty sure that once my six month deal runs out for cable, I will be able to do without it. I'm not going to lie, I'll miss some of the absolute crap TV shows that I watch but my life is probably better off without them (example: Real Housewives of Orange County). The shows that I really love (when there isn't a writers strike) are all available online (Office and Grey's).

Internet I couldn't live without.... but could I just mooch off a neighbors connection? I probably wouldn't. Not only because of the moral concerns, but because it may not be reliable and completely secure. What do you think?