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Browsing tag: money

  • March 21, 2009

    Financial snapshot

    We got hit with both water and power bills this week. Water is something I haven’t been budgeting for (along with irregulars like insurance. I am trying to put away some for BF’s car insurance in May but that hasn’t been possible yet. At least we have a little bit aside for the car registration which is due..next month?) Luckily I’m getting a tax refund from my overpaying on my overdue tax from last year…..so that will help.

    We also have a new flatmate who cleans, is tidy and fairly quiet and pays EVERYTHING on time.

    Unfortunately, HF is still here.

    Our power bills have also soared. I get the fact that prices have increased slightly, but not all that much. I get the fact that we now have people at home during the day, whereas last year nobody was home during the weekdays. But does that explain our bills almost DOUBLING? It’s really frustrating, as I know I’m barely home and am certainly not sucking up the electricity.

    Am considering changing providers, and according to Powerswitch we could save around $450 a year by changing. Something must be faulty though. I did the calculations myself…For example if we were with Mercury this month we woulda paid about $368. We are paying $381.. about $13 difference.

    It’s so hard to actually really compare providers! They say they take the various payment discounts into account, but maybe they don’t. Energy Online ahs a 20% prompt payment discount which is pretty generous, and is the only thing that stops me totally freaking out every month – we saved almost $100 this month.

    On the bright side, student loan on BF’s behalf is now done with! And more so. In fact, it’s been overpaid by $108. I’m wondering if we’ll get that $108 credit refunded? We should, technically.

    Gotta love the bureaucracy. The other day a statement arrived showing that $108 credit. Right below was “Overdue repayments from 2008, $200 something – please pay immediately”. Never mind the fact that the loan was actually now paid in full. Thankfully the next day a letter came confirming full payment and to stop repayments, yadda yadda yadda.

  • March 20, 2009

    Brilliant Your Views comment…

    “Anyway, what sort of stupidity gives tax cuts to the wealthy instead of the lower paid, then asks that people hand their tax cuts over to the needy? Why didn’t the government target the tax cuts towards those in need?”

    Thank you, couldn’t have phrased it better myself.

    Thumbs up also to editingtheherald– nice take on John Key’s comments…. I totally agree with everything said there, but I have to disagree with him and everyone else who’s bashing Americans. Yeah, their housing bubble imploded and consequently sent the rest of the world’s economies down the loo, etc, but looking at the PEOPLE (not govt. or the corporations),  the American way of giving should be commended (and actually does exist, contrary to popular belief).

    From what I’ve observed, everyday Americans are pretty charitable. so many people in the PF blogosphere give money to charity/church. So many come on the MSN Money boards and tithes are a line in their budget – and most of the time they WILL NOT budge on that for whatever reason. Yet, they are in debt or can barely feed or house themselves but for some ridiculous reason insist on donating money they don’t have. That’s commitment. Whether it’s for religious reasons or whatever, the fact remains is that people are committed to giving part of their income away. Hell, so many people on the boards make their kids tithe out of their POCKET MONEY. I’ve never heard of anyone doing that. Ever.

    If you didn’t already know, the next round of tax cuts take place from 1 April. Those under $40k won’t get anything (or will only get at most $10 they say). The tax cuts are aimed at everyone ABOVE that income level. I doubt I’ll be receiving anything. BF got an extra $11 a week when the first round took place last year, but then he got made redundant. Key suggested Kiwis should donate their tax cuts to charity if they could afford to, citing the “American style” culture of giving/donating.

  • March 9, 2009

    Eating well…

    is expensive!

    autumn-produce-533154-sw

    One of my pet peeves is that we don’t eat enough greens. Hardly any veggies or fruit. (I’m picky, and BF thinks it’s fine to live off meat, sugar and cereal). This week we’re going to eat better, with fresher stuff – no more mashed potato with processed sausages, etc. We used to shop separately for meat and produce, but lately have just been doing it all at the supermarket (prices have been surprisingly good). Today we went to the butcher and vege shop and ended up $25 over budget. Why? Well, bananas are almost $3 a kilo. Kumara and potatoes, although not too expensive, are heavy. Tomatoes around $4 a kilo, and spring onions 99c a bunch (not vital, but we like them). Melons and the tropical fruits go from about $3 to 6 a kilo; mandarins were even more and looked nasty. Honestly, it would not be hard to spend $5 to $10 on fruit alone if you were so inclined! We bought onions, garlic, kumara and potatoes for a roast dinner. It was over $10. That’s for sides to one meal. ARGH.

  • February 19, 2009

    To BT or not to BT?

    Just did a quick calculation on Sorted to figure out whether it’s worth transferring BF’s loan balance over to Kiwibank’s 4.99% card.

    It would only shave one month off the repayment (1 year 3 months instead of 1 year 4 months) but it would save around $200 in interest.

    Worth it?

    Maybe we should just apply anyway, see if he qualifies…

    UPDATE: The introductory rate is only good for 6months, so nix on the balance transfer…might look at BT rates later in the year, but I assume by then the savings will be negligible.

  • February 16, 2009

    Worth it?

    money-coins-enlargeWe often go to the Avondale markets on a Sunday morning and wander around looking at the crap (and occasional gem) people are hawking. Once we saw BF’s new phone for sale, for $100 less than we paid at Parallel Imported (which was at the time $50 cheaper than all the other stores we saw it in!) Sometimes it bugs me, because we don’t usually go for any particular reason or with anything in mind to look for. And because the roads around there are INSANE, we pay $3 to park in the parking lot.

    But I figure, $3 for half an hour of good healthy fun (doesn’t cost us anything more, except the odd $1 drink or $2 kebab, and we’re walking around the whole time) is pretty cheap – and it’s worth it. It makes BF happy and gives us something to do, close to home…you can’t even get a decent milkshake for $3 these days!

  • February 15, 2009

    Boys and their cars

    Sigh. $180, for a wheel bearing and something else underneath the car needing tightening. BF also informed me that the left hand bearing needed replacing.

    “So why didn’t you get that done?”

    “I said we didn’t have the money,” says he.

    So in a couple of weeks or so we’ll be right back there, handing over another $200 or so to get this bloody car fixed. I don’t even want to IMAGINE how much we’ve spent on it. It is the biggest piece of crap ever. I sincerely hope that next car is a reliable, sensible, economical, boring as fuck car, the best we can afford. The amount poured into this has been ridiculous. Tyres. Clutch. Tons of oil. Other fiddly bits and pieces under the hood. Brakes. Plus repairs from last year’s accident. And it is not just his money, it’s mine. I am involved. The boy-car love affair will just have to wait, unless he wins lotto (which we don’t even play). A car gets you from A to B. Who cares what it looks like? As long as it moves, is safe and warrantable, and doesn’t need money thrown at it every three months.

  • February 13, 2009

    I don’t get it

    I haven’t had the luxury of a summer off since high school. I doubt I’ll ever have another one, come to think of it, which is a bit sad, but c’est la vie. It got me thinking though. Why don’t more people work full summers? Do they just not get how large their student loans are gonna be and what a huge amount they’re saddled with? By the time they come out and start accruing interest – well. I make over 2k a month full time – one summer would easily pay for a year’s tuition (unless I was a med student. Still, all the more reason to work). Of course I have a relatively well paying job, so let’s go with minimum wage. Should be about $1500 take home a month. That’s $4500 in three months, and if you have exams early on you can have up to a four month summer. Again, that’s a hefty amount of money, and not something  to sniff at. It might not cover tuition for everyone, but would you rather owe $9000 or $4500? And if you don’t want to give up your ENTIRE holiday, then work half time, or for three quarters of the summer, you know, find an in between balance!

    I understand money really isn’t as important to most people my age. That’s cool. They’ll learn. But even stepping up and working a day or two a week could be put towards those monster loans – you have months of free time and if you’re sticking around close to home, why on earth not make some extra money to save or get started attacking your loans with?

    Engineering students also have to do a truckload of work exp to graduate – like 400 hours or so. My mum was asking me why my friends are bumming around, doing nothing and working at Countdown instead of doing time at an engineering firm? I didn’t have a suitable reply. Really. I still don’t.

  • February 11, 2009

    A parallel tax plan?

    4120850_bebc85a43a

    Roger Douglas’s brainchild

    It’s a really interesting proposal. I don’t know jack about economics – just last year I learned that the OCR is the benchmark for interest rates and when it goes up, savers benefit and when it goes down, borrowers benefit (still, at least i know what it IS, which is more than I can say for others) – but on the surface it doesn’t sound that bad. Of course, I have no idea what paying for healthcare would cost. If it’s anything like over the in States, give me high taxes any day. I figure you’re responsible for your own retirement savings anyway. I guess the biggest worry for low income earners would be the lack of a welfare net. People like me don’t have a large EF to fall back on. There’s no safety net to catch us. And that’s a scary thought.

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