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Meditation

Life is crazy.

“Really, Jason, that’s news?”

I spend so much time going in so many different directions.

Cleaning out our inherited hoarding house, managing the remodel, work, side hustles, kids, friends, family, relationships, maintaining our house, maintaining a relationship with my wife, garage sales, school starting, junior high football season, insurance policies, probate, rush hour, insomnia.

Some days, I feel insanely scattered. I can’t focus. I have a hard time making decisions. I waste time.

Those days, I need to clear my head.

That’s where meditation comes in.

I don’t do the money hum. (Om mone padme, Om)

Instead, I have three activities that demand a total focus. They drive out any scattered thoughts or unimportant concerns.

They have to because, quite frankly, they can be dangerous if I don’t concentrate.

1. I shave. I use a double-edged safety razor, so bleeding for the throat is a real concern. For 10 minutes, nothing else in the world matters. It has only recently struck me how valuable this is. That value makes me want to start shaving every day, with a straight razor. More focus, more often.

2. I ride. For the past couple of years, it’s been hard to find time get my motorcycle out. Small children seem to want attention every day. It got to the point where I was ready to sell my bike. This spring, it was seriously misbehaving. Finally, at the end of the summer, a friend got it running better than it ever has. I took it out for a couple of hours and came back feeling more clearheaded than I have in a long time. I won’t be selling my bike until I have its replacement.

3. I shoot. Shooting involves a series of simple actions that require concentration to do well. Load the gun, line up the sights, which eye is dominant, breathe, don’t breathe, squeeze the trigger, hole in the paper. Again, it’s not an activity that’s conducive to worrying about the bills or work. It’s a way to shut out the world for a few minutes.

For me, a few moments or a few hours of shutting down everything except one thing is the way to stay sane and focused.

How do you deal with it when the world comes crashing in from every direction?

How Do WWE Stars Make Money?

Uncategorized

Have you ever wondered how your favorite WWE stars make their living? The answer can be complicated, because many of the biggest stars receive benefits above and beyond their salaries, and because the salaries vary

Darren Young & Nick (Photo credit: Climbing Kilimanjaro)

greatly between the true “star” wrestlers and less famous WWE competitors. Here is a look at how WWE wrestlers are paid:

Base Salaries
All WWE wrestlers are signed to a contract and paid a base salary. The contracts generally range from 1 to 5 years and the salaries vary widely. The biggest WWE names can make over a million per year, while the average WWE wrestler is more likely to make something just north of $100,000. The highest paid wrestler is Triple H, who draws a base salary of about $2,000,000 per year. Other superstars, like John Cena and Shawn Michaels, make about $1,000,000. Most other wrestlers hover closer to the $100,000 average, which sounds like a lot, but must take into account the fact that wrestling careers can be relatively short and physically demanding.

Licensing Deals
The gap between WWE’s stars and run of the mill wrestlers is even wider than the salary differences suggest. That’s because the stars’ contracts include benefits that pay off big time. Many of WWE’s biggest stars receive licensing deals to use their likeness in advertisements and WWE promotions. This can become a major source of income for top wrestlers like Triple H and John Cena.

PPV Bonuses
Additionally, wrestlers who participate in Pay Per View matches often receive bonuses on top of their base salaries. This again can be a major income boost for wrestlers whose matches are in high demand. In especially high profile PPV matches, this bonus can be as much as six figures.

Perks
The WWE also covers 100% of the costs of all in-ring injuries sustained by its wrestlers.

So in short, WWE wrestlers can expect to make at least $100,000 in any given year, with most receiving more once PPV bonuses, licensing deals, and other perks are taken into account. There is, however, a very significant gap in pay between top and average wrestlers. Most average wrestlers draw salaries very close to $100,000. Top wrestlers take in as much as $2,000,000.

No Brakes

Finance, Life

Growing up, I was mostly poor, but I didn’t realize it. The electricity was never shut off and I never missed a meal, but there was rarely money for anything extra. Clothes were only purchased immediately before school started. Shoes were always at least one size too big. Hand-me-downs were a way of life. With very rare exceptions, new toys were given on birthdays and at Christmas. As a Christmas baby, this was unfortunate. If I wanted something during the year, I had to buy it. I had an allowance on and off–more off than on–for a few years. So, I got my first job-a paper route-when I was six. Most of the toys I accumulated as a child, I bought.

Through all of this, my parents never said “We can’t afford it.” I was simply told that if I wanted something, I could either save my money or wait for Christmas. I never saw my parents paying bills, but they got paid. I never saw a checkbook get balanced, but it did. There were only a few times money management was ever mentioned, even in passing.

Naturally, when I moved out on my own, I expected money to take care of itself, just as it had the entire time I was growing up. That wasn’t terrible until I got married, bought a house, built an addition and decided a needed a new car. There was nothing in me to apply the brakes. I can count the number of missed payments I’ve had on one hand-with fingers left over. I can’t begin to guess the number of purchases, both large and small, that I should have skipped but didn’t.

Shortages growing up coupled with absolutely no budget training turned into financial irresponsibility as an adult.

My wife grew up with almost the exact opposite training. She was also poor, but the household budget was clearly in evidence and generally taken to an extreme. Her training involved getting “the best bang for the buck”. If an item was on sale and could potentially be useful, her mother bought five. I don’t mean five similar variations. That’s five identical products, same size, same color. She still has a display box full of screwdrivers with interchangeable tips. It looked useful and it was on sale, so she bought them all.

Through all of that, the bills were always paid.

This training has made it difficult for my wife to turn down a sale price. If something is on sale-or worse, clearance-there is an excellent chance it will be coming to our house. Once again, there are no brakes.

Shortages growing up coupled with almost two decades of watching every sale turn into a purchase has turned into financial irresponsibility growing up.

Neither one of us were prepared to handle the financial aspect of being an adult. That is something we intend to improve on for our children. We intend to give them the ability to brake themselves.

Carnival of Personal Finance #307: The Silver Edition

Finance, Misc

This is the 307th Carnival of Personal Finance, the Silver Edition. As of 10:00 PM CDT last night, silver is at $43.76 per ounce. Three years ago, when I last bought silver, it was at $11.30. In honor of that, and inspired by my first editor’s pick below, I’m going to share some facts and history about silver.

The last time prices rose like this was in 1979, when the Hunt brothers bought or controlled close to 50% of the world’s silver. They managed it by leveraging their silver hoard. As they bought more, prices went up, increasing the value of their hoard, which they then used as collateral for more loans to buy more silver, which caused the prices to go up so they’d use it as collateral…. You get the idea. Prices went from $11 per ounce to $50 per ounce in less than a year, before the regulators figured out the game and changed the rules, bringing the whole thing crashing down. The resulting losses and lawsuits bankrupted the former billionaires within 10 years.

Editor’s Picks:

First, we have a post from Squirrelers, Is There a Silver Bubble? How High Can Prices Go?. This post reminded me of not only the Hunt brothers story, but the small box of silver I own. Now, I’m debating taking it to a precious metals dealer and cashing out for 400% of my purchase price.

Suba from Wealth Informatics brought Never Pay full price : How to save 10-50% on every purchase. This was entirely new to me, which surprised me. I see a lot of ideas presented in new ways, but rarely see something I know absolutely nothing about.

If you’ve got legal papers you need to fill out, or questions you need answered, you could do far worse than to start with the site Jeff Rose from Good Financial Cents gives us with 7 Free and Cheap Online Legal Resources. If you think you don’t need the resources, that means you a complete estate plan, right? You have a will?

Saving

Dimes, quarters, and half-dollars were 90% silver until 1964. Half-dollars continued to be 40% silver until 1971. At that time, the government tightly controlled the price of silver and kept it at $1.29 per ounce so the face value of the coins matched the value of silver they contained. Today, a supply of 90% silver coins with a face value of $5 can be had for the bargain price of $173.74.

Fanny from Living Richly on a Budget – Personal Budget Blog presents How to Build the Crucial $1,000 Emergency Fund, and says, “How do you finance unexpected personal expenses, such as car repairs, medical visits, home maintenance repairs, etc? The most effective way to finance these expenses is through a personal emergency fund.”

Flexo from ConsumerismCommentary presents Silent Inflation is Destroying Your Net Worth, and says, “Inflation continues to deflate individuals net worth and there are no signs of it getting any better.”

Adam Piplica from Magical Penny presents Avoid Hitting the Rocks of Financial Ruin, and says, “This post draws on a famous story in Homer’s Oddessey how a captain made it safely passed the Sirens because he had protected himself from making a poor short-term decision. It’s exactly the same thing you have to do if you want to grow your pennies.”

Clint from Accumulating Money presents Baby-Boomer Generation Must Get Serious About Planning for Retirement, and says, “The “Baby-Boomer” generation has undergone two severe business-cycle reversals in the past ten years alone. Many of these fifty and sixty year-olds are now facing a daunting task – how do you rebuild your net worth in so short a remaining time period?”

Jason from One Money Design presents Planting a Garden to Save Money, and says, “As Spring is here, planting a garden is a great way to help feed your family and save some money at the same time.”

Career

Silver is almost always found with lead. Through most of history, mining silver meant mining lead and breathing lead dust. In the ancient world, silver miners had a life span of about 3 years, so free men refused the job. This was a slave occupation.

Crystal from Budgeting in the Fun Stuff presents Job Experience – Don’t Rock The Boat, and says, “Being young and ambitious may seem like the best thing in the world but knowing your audience and environment is very important. You don’t want to come off as the young new hothead…here’s a story all about exactly that.”

Well Heeled Blog from Well Heeled Blog presents 5 Ways to Spend Your Raise, and says, “Congratulations, you got a raise! Now what? Now, what to do about this extra money? No matter what, don’t want to fritter this raise away. Here are 5 ways for the extra money to work hard for you. ”

Kathryn @ Financial Highway from Financial Highway presents 30 Common Interview Questions and How to Answer Them, and says, “This guide not only tells you what the interview questions are but also provides insight into what the interviewer is really asking and what types of answers will help you get the job.”

Credit

Around 500 BC, Athenians discovered a huge silver mine on land belonging the city-state. This find was used to finance building their first effective navy, which catapulted them to the heights of power they achieved.

Craig Ford from Money Help for Christians presents Best Ways to Maximize Cash, Credit Card, and Debit Card Rewards, and says, “How to maximize your credit cards or debit card rewards.”

Tim Chen from NerdWallet Credit Card Watch presents Premium Credit Cards: The Value Beyond the Cost, and says, “A premium credit card is a step above your average card: better rewards and extra perks offered at, well, a premium. These exclusive credit cards come with additional goodies like lounge access and free plane tickets, as well as hefty annual fees.”

Kevin (for Moolanomy) from Moolanomy presents How to Avoid Credit Cards and Credit Repair Scams, and says, “Credit cards don’t have to be a bad thing, but they definitely have their fair share of scams out there. Here’s how to avoid them.”

Real Estate

In World of Warcraft, silver is a rare spawn of tin. If you want to find silver, you should try mining tin. Over and over. (Source)

Mike from Green Panda Treehouse presents How Much Should We Spend on Housing?, and says, “How much is the right amount for housing costs?”

Ben from Money Smart Life presents How to Use a Mortgage Calculator to Compare Home Loans, and says, “A post about how to use a mortgage calculator to screen and compare the rates and costs of home loans.”

Frugality

The early discovery that water, wine, milk and vinegar stayed pure longer in silver vessels, led to its desirability as a container for long voyages. Herodotus wrote that Cyrus the Great, King of Persia, a man of vision who established a board of health and a medical dispensary for his citizens, had water drawn from a special stream, “boiled, and very many four wheeled wagons drawn by mules carry it in silver vessels, following the king wheresoever he goes at any time.” (Source)

Donna Freedman from Surviving and Thriving presents This isn’t your grandparents’ recession, and says, “When the going gets tough, it’s tempting to invoke our grandparents and their tribulations during the Great Depression. But some of their advice wouldn’t help us. ”

Glen Craig from Parenting Family Money presents Inexpensive (Cheap) Date Night Ideas for Parents, and says, “It’s tough getting out with the spouse when you have kids. With babysitting and the date it can get expensive. See some inexpensive date night ideas and how you can save on babysitting as well.”

Finance

From 1998 to 2009, Bernard von NotHaus marketed the Liberty Dollar as an alternative to U.S. government fiat currency. Liberty Dollars were made from silver and later, gold and copper. von NotHaus was later convicted of–among other things–counterfeiting coins, even though he only produced his own coinage and didn’t pretend it was the same thing.

N.W. Journey from Net Worth Journey presents What is Compound Interest?, and says, “A basic introduction to compound interest.”

Bret from Hope to Prosper presents Age 21: A Year of Change and Humility, and says, “The year I turned 21 was the most tumultuous of my life. In many ways, that one year shaped my life more than any other and determined the direction of my future.”

Economy

Colloidal silver is claimed to be a near-magical cure-all. Its proponents claim it has the ability to “benefit the immune system; kill disease-causing agents such as bacteria, viruses, and fungi; serve as an alternative to prescription antibiotics; or treat diseases such as cancer, HIV/AIDS, diabetes, tuberculosis, syphilis, scarlet fever, shingles, herpes, pneumonia, and prostatitis (inflammation of the prostate).” Scientific evidence for any of this: none. (Source)

Money Beagle from Money Beagle presents The Economy Must Be Improving, and says, “I don’t need a government report to show me that the economy is improving; I look no further than the latest coupon offerings from local restaurants!”

Darwin’s Money from Darwin’s Money presents Stop Complaining About Gas Prices, and says, “Americans are complaining about prices at the pump. I say “Stop Complaining and Look in the Mirror”. Here are some very rational reasons and real solutions.”

Investing

The best method of storing silver is in bullet form. When the werewolves attack, none of us will have long to fight back.

Mike from The Dividend Guy Blog presents 7 Deadly Sins of Investments, and says, “Are you making these mistakes with investing?”

Mike Piper from Oblivious Investor presents Replacing Index Funds in Your Portfolio, and says, “For the most cost conscious of investors, it might make sense to build a portfolio of individual securities rather than index funds.”

RJ Weiss from Gen Y Wealth presents How to Convert a 401(k) to Traditional or Roth IRA, and says, “Reviewing your options with your 401(k) when leaving or changing jobs. More specifically, to look at the steps to convert your 401K(k) to an IRA, since this is most likely the optimal choice.”

Michael from DoughRoller presents How Half a Percent Can Ruin Your Retirement, and says, “Investing for retirement is crucial to securing your financial future. Make sure to find the best interest rates available, as even half a percent can ruin your retirement aspirations. ”

Money Management

I had a silver ring in my septum for almost 10 years and, in fact, still maintain the piercing, but it’s usually empty.

Cathy Moran from Money Health Central presents An Alternate Truth About Financial Literacy, and says, “Financial literacy is grounded in understanding bigger truths about money, not in acting on those truths.”

Kara from Frugal In My Forties presents Worst Money Lessons My Family Taught Me, and says, “My parents had great financial skills: Unfortunately they weren’t really great about passing them on to their children. These are the 4 big things that I think they should have done differently!”

Mike from The Financial Blogger presents Teaching Finance In High School, and says, “A look at getting finance across at the high school level.”

Eric from Narrow Bridge Finance presents How Your Insurance Rates are Calculated, and says, “Ever wonder how insurance companies determine your monthly rates? Find out what you need to know here.”

FMF from Free Money Finance presents How Millionaires Become Millionaires, and says, “Many people mistakenly think that most millionaires have their wealth handed to them from either their relatives or some stroke of luck (like winning the lottery, being gifted with amazing abilities/talent, etc.) This is completely false. Most people with over seven-figure wealth got it the old-fashioned way, they earned it.”

Matt Bell from Matt About Money presents Money Lessons From the Royal Wedding, and says, “Amid all the royal wedding hoopla, did you notice what Prince William and his fiancée, Kate Middleton, asked for in terms of wedding gifts? Since this is one couple that truly does have everything, they asked anyone wanting to get them a gift to consider making a donation instead. For all of us commoners, there are two lessons we can learn from the royal couple’s philanthropic mindset.”

Debt

Sterling silver is 92.5% silver and 7.5% other, usually copper. Pure silver is too soft for most applications. It is, however, the most optically reflective element.

Jacob Irwin from My Personal Finance Journey presents Helping A Friend Get Out of Debt – Part 3 – Cut Your Interest Rates In Half, and says, “A look at the steps my friend and I took to get his credit card interest rates lowered, and how you can too!”

Junior Boomer from Consumer Boomer presents Top 5 Bankruptcy Myths Dispelled For You, and says, “For those who have been considering bankruptcy, but are concerned about the overall impact it could have on their financial future, we are going to break a few myths.”

Other

Silver fulminate is an explosive, ionic, fulminic acid salt of silver. Yes, silver goes boom.

Echo from Boomer & Echo presents Assessing Your Estate Plan, and says, “Before making an appointment with your lawyer take some time to assess your situation and review your estate plan.”

Sustainable PF from Sustainable Personal Finance presents Eight Favourite Blogs, and says, “There are some awesome PF blogs out there and these are 8 you shouldn’t miss!”

Nicole from Nicole and Maggie: Grumpy Rumblings presents Dissecting an emergency room bill, and says, “Nicole and Maggie discuss how a recent bead up a preschool nose cost one of them $1400. (Actually $1700– a additional bill just came.)”

Tom Drake from Canadian Finance Blog presents The new breed of financial bloggers: Young, frugal and vocal, and says, “I’ve discovered a lot of young bloggers who do care about personal finance. Young bloggers can fill a void in financial education for young people.”

Tom from Stupid Cents presents What Is Term Life Insurance?, and says, “Life insurance is important for everyone but it can be expensive. That is where term life insurance can be the most helpful.”

Philip from PT Money: Personal Finance presents How to Pick a College that Suits You, and says, “Financial and other considerations when deciding on a college.”

That’s it. If you enjoyed this little journey through silver, please take a moment to subscribe to Live Real, Now.

Making the Sale: How to Alienate Your Customers

Business

Have you ever walked into a store only to be instantly surrounded by salespeople trying to sell you whatever their corporate office has decided is the most important thing for them to sell this week?

I remember walking into a big blue electronics store to buy a TV. The beautiful corner-unit entertainment center that perfectly matches my living room will fit–at most–a 32″ screen. Unfortunately, any questions I asked were answered with an attempted upsell to a big screen. I don’t want a fancy TV. I don’t have room for it. It doesn’t fit my needs.

Why do the salespeople persist in strong-arming me into something I can’t use?

Later, I’ll be visiting a couple of potential customers. I know from talking to them that they are expecting a hard sell and a push to sign a contract today.

I don’t do that. I can’t do that.

My goal for these meetings is to find out what these people want, and–more important–what they need. How can I know what they need before I have a chance to sit down and ask them? Even bringing a proposal to the meeting would show that I cared less about them than I do about their checkbooks.

Here’s my checklist of items to bring:

Notebook
Pen
Spare pen
Business card
My winning personality

That’s it.

I can accomplish more with “How can I help you succeed?” than I can with “You really need to buy this from me, today.”

If the high-pressure sales-weasels at the big blue electronics store had been taught that lesson, I may have gone home with a high-end (though smaller) TV, rather than going home to buy online.

Have you ever had a sales-weasel try to convince you that you want something you don’t need or need something you don’t want?

Sammy’s Story, Part 3

Finance

If you haven’t been following along with Sammy’s story, please take a few minutes to do so here and here.

After Sammy gave me the sketches of his landscaping plan for my mother-in-law’s yard, we sat down to work out a proposal. Keep in mind that he’s never run a business and I’ve never run a landscaping business, so it was a bit of a learning experience for both of us.

We finally came up with a proposal for $1200, which included laying a plastic border around the yard, mulching the border, removing some trees and stumps, sanding and painting a swing and barbecue pit, and hard-raking the yard. He asked if $400 of that could be applied to the car he bought from us. I said yes, which was a mistake.

Sammy’s plan was to hire guys from the Salvation Army and at-risk kids, giving them a chance to improve their situations. As it turns out, a significant percentage of those folks don’t really want to work to improve their situations. The guys from the Salvation Army were all vetted by one of the counselors, but still only worked out about half of the time. The kids quit wanting to work when they found out it involved…work.

That was an expensive lesson that caused a bit of a cost overrun. If the crew that finished the job would have started it, we’d have been done weeks ago. What should have taken 3-4 days ended up taking a month. Not a 40-hour per week month, but it was still a month.

As we came closer to our garage sale, Sammy had the great idea to tackle the front yard, too. He wanted to make it pretty as an advertisement for the people coming to the sale. That inflated the cost.

We used the stacks of bricks that came with the house for the border instead of the plastic roll. Another price boost, since it involved digging deeper and laying freaking bricks.

The plan was for us to pay $800 out-of-pocket for the work, plus $3-400 in tools and equipment to help launch the business, plus materials. We ended up paying a bit under $3000 for everything. Between the labor problems and an expanding project, the price got a bit higher than either of us had anticipated.

At least the yard looks nice.

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