Live Real, Now

The no-pants guide to spending, saving, and thriving in the real world.

Search Results for: how-much-should-you-tip/shaving-for-real/4-ways-we-keep-wasting-money

Why Jodie Sweetin’s Latest Divorce Should Make You Start an Emergency Fund

Celebrities, Gossip

Jodie Sweetin, American actress; cropped versi...
Jodie Sweetin, American actress; cropped version of :Image:JodieSWEETin.jpg Taken March 7, 2007 at Rutgers University with Bethany S Murphy. Original file history Image:JodieSWEETin.jpg 00:12, 8 March 2007 . . Bethanyshondark (Talk (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There’s lots of people talking about former Full House star Jodie Sweetin these days. Recent news reports are telling us that this 31-year-old mother of two is now on her way to filing for her third divorce. Yep, that’s right. Divorce #3. Sweetin got married in 2012 to Morty Coyle, and reports say that she is already on her way to filing the legal documents necessary to ask for a separation, which she claims is due to irreconcilable differences.

It was in 2008 when Sweetin filed for divorce from husband number two, Cody Herpin. She blamed the breakup on an already rocky marriage, as well as extreme financial hardships. Sweetin’s first marriage to Shaun Holguin, who she married in 2002, ended when she entered a treatment center for her longtime drug abuse.

Divorce

Because the life of a celebrity is more often than not on display for the whole world to see, there tends to be a belief that famous people get divorced more often than us other ordinary everyday folks. Although this isn’t true, when the news is telling us about a celebrity who’s getting ready to file for their third divorce and they’re only in their early thirties, it tends to make people start thinking! Thinking about what they would do if they ended up being in a similar situation.

Emergency Fund

Although everyone of course intends to stay married forever once they exchange those sacred vows, reality tells as that of least half of all marriages are going to end in some type of separation or divorce. This is the reason why the vast majority of people who plan on getting married one day don’t even bother to plan for what they would do in case of a divorce. They simply don’t think that divorce is something that will happen to them, just everyone else.

Although Sweetin surely didn’t believe that she would have three failed marriages by the time she was 31, her failed marriage situation is helping other people by letting them understand how important it is to have in emergency fund in case such a situation comes up. An emergency fund is going to allow for a lot more freedom of choices if the instance of divorce does happen to come up.

Good to Know

Money struggles have been an issue in all three of Sweetin’s marriages, which is still the number one reason for divorce in America. It’s not hard to start an emergency fund and is something every newly married person should do asap. Well, waiting until they first return from their honeymoon might be a good idea.

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

Lamar Odom: The Cost of Addiction

Gossip

Rumours swirl around Lamar Odom and Khloe Kardashian that their marriage is in trouble due to the basketball star’s addiction to recreational drugs. The couple has not been spotted together since June, and Kardashian has been photographed recently not wearing her wedding ring. On Sunday, August 25, TMZ reported that Odom had been missing for 72 hours after a dispute with Kardashian that some say was a failed intervention.

Los Angeles Hotel

On Monday, August 26, ESPN reported that Odom’s agent, Jeff Schwartz, claimed that Odom was in a Los Angeles hotel and that friends were attempting to get him help for a drug problem that the agent declined to explain further. The agent also said that Kardashian knew Odom’s whereabouts. Kardashian herself tweeted that she was unhappy with the news reports about her family, but failed to elaborate on whether the reports were true or false. ( http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/9601746/agent-disputes-report-saying-lamar-odom-missing)

History of Drug Probems

In 2001, Odom violated NBA drug policies twice in eight months, apologizing at a press conference after the second offense. Odom claimed he did not have a drug problem and was only guilty of smoking marijuana. Odom often speaks of losing his mother to colon cancer at the age of 12 and his father’s heroin addiction, eventually moving in with his grandmother. In 2006, Odom’s son, Jayden, died of sudden infant death syndrome. In 2011, a cousin who Odom was close to died of gunshot wounds in New York, and just two days after the cousin’s funeral, Odom was involved in a car accident that resulted in the death of a teenager. Odom’s chauffer driven SUV collided with a motorcycle, causing the bike to go out of control and strike a 15-year old pedestrian who died of head injuries the next day. (http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/02/sports/la-sp-lamar-odom-accident-20110803). Odom took a 10-day leave of absence from the Dallas Mavericks, claiming his father was ill right after the incident.

Clash over Partying

Odom Shooting
Odom Shooting (Photo credit: compujeramey)

According to insiders, Odom and Kardashian have often clashed over his partying, but that she had kept his addictions secret from her family. According to many who have known Odom well, when things are difficult for him, he likes to get away and hide, which is what some say he did when he took leave from the Mavericks and just recently when he disappeared for a few days. (http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20728355,00.html) Insiders are reporting that Kardashian is contemplating divorce, which will be costly for Odom as there is a strong infidelity clause in the couple’s prenuptial agreement, and there are rumors that Odom has been unfaithful.

High Cost of Addiction

Most of the rumors surrounding the Kardashian Odom marriage are related to the fact that two women have come forward claiming affairs with Odom while he was married to Kardashian, and not due to his drug use. However, the fact that there is a strong fidelity clause in the prenuptial agreement indicates that Kardashian may be unwilling to ignore his dalliances. If it is proven that Odom committed adultry and the couple divorces, Kardashian retains the Tarzana mansion the couple share, $500,000 for every year they were married, two vehicles, shopping money and spousal support. However, many reports continue that infidelity is not the problem in the marriage, but Odom’s continued use of drugs. Odom checked into a San Diego rehab in 2012, but left after only three weeks, and insiders claim that Odom’s recent disappearance was related to an intervention, staged by Kardashian, to encourage him to return to rehab.

Regardless of whether the marriage ends due to infidelity or drug use, it appears that addiction may be a costly proposition for Odom due to the clause in his prenuptial agreement.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Net Worth, April 2016

Finance

Net Worth

Last year wasn’t a good year for my net worth.  It came with a $7000 drop.

Q1 2016, however, was a great quarter.

In December, we had $13,271 in credit card debt.   At the time I took this screenshot, it was down to $3836.43.    As of this moment, it’s down to $2640.91.   If things go as expected this week, I should wake up on Friday to a paid-off credit card.  I had to raid some of our savings accounts to make it happen, but it’s happening.    Some of it was a tax refund, some of it was the fact that my mortgage payment went away in December.

That’s seven years of hard work, almost to the day.   Seven years ago, I was researching bankruptcy, and stumbled across Dave Ramsey.    Seven years ago, we were drowning in debt.

Next week, we’re free.   No more debt, hanging over our heads.   We’re free to take vacations.   We’re free to finally save for college, when my son is 16, and stand a chance of being able to pay for it for him.   We’re free to do…whatever we want to do.   Our monthly nut after the debt is paid–only in fall/winter/spring when my wife is working–is roughly 1/3 of our take-home pay.

That’s how hard we’ve cut to make sure we can pay our bills and make debt die.  We do have some things that would be considered extravagant.   We’re not savages.   But my car is 10 years old.  My wife’s is 7.   My motorcycles are 35 and 30; one of them was purchased before we cared about our debt.

Back to the net worth….

The biggest change came from our property values, which sucks.  That was $36,000 of the difference, which comes with the painful tax bump to go with it.   A large chunk of the savings increase was the money we set aside every month to cover the property tax bill, and that will go away next month.

Still, $641,000 dollars is a long way from nothing.   I’m pretty happy.

Decluttering the House – April 30 Day Project Update

Life

My 30 Day Project for April is to declutter my entire house.   That’s every room, every dresser, every drawer. We’ve got 12 years of jointly accumulated clutter.

Our progress so far has been wonderful.   The main level of our house is almost done.

In our daughters’ room, we put in bunk beds and pulled out a dresser.   With the crib, changing table, and toddler bed removed, they actually have room to play on the floor.  Their closet has been emptied and repurposed as scrapbooking and blanket storage.  Cost: $140 for the bunk beds.

Our son’s room has had a dresser, a desk, and a bed replaced with a loft bed.   Even with the 6 foot tall monstrosity of a bed, his room looks so much bigger.    We still have to clean out his closet, which is mostly artifacts of a business we no longer have, leftovers from when his bedroom was our office.  Cost: $260 for the loft bed.

Our room was depressing. Never dirty, but oh-so-full.   The closet was jam-packed.  The top shelf was full of towels and sheets.   The closet rod couldn’t fit another shirt.   There was a modular shelving system on the floor of the closet–full.  We had three full dressers.   The headboard has 5 foot tall cabinets, half of which were full of makeup and jewelry, the other half with books.   Now, there is 1 empty dresser.   It belonged to my great-grandmother, so it’s going to the shop to be refinished, instead of the garage sale to be sold.   Another dresser has spare room in it.   There’s no need to rearrange the cabinets to get to anything.    The closet is less than half full and there is almost nothing on the floor of the closet.   Gear for my side-line business is stored out of sight and out of the way.  This is so much more relaxing.

We’ve tackled the kitchen, except for 1 cabinet, which is mostly cookbooks and booze.   That will be fun to clean out.

Our front closet was worthless.   It was so full we put hooks on the outside of the door to hang our coats.   We pulled out a dozen coats we never wear.   At least 20 pairs of shoes, some belonging to roommates gone 1o years.   We can actually use the closet now. The shoes and boots all have homes.  Our coats all fit…inside.

We have 1 closet and 1 cabinet left to address on the main level.   There are also 3 small rooms in the basement that need to be gutted–the laundry room, the family room, and a room that has been designated for storage and the litter box.    The last one will be the hardest.    It’s full of remnants of hobbies past and failed ventures.   I’m expecting some fights, flowing every possible direction.

In the process, we’ve filled our dining room with stuff for our garage sale…twice.   It’s all getting priced and boxed as we go through it.   We thrown away anything we won’t be able to sell.   We’ve done all of this with the mutual understanding that nothing is coming back in the house.  After the sale, it will be donated or sold on Craigslist, but it won’t become a part of our lives again.   We are successfully purging so much.    The “skinny clothes” are gone.   When the time comes, they’ll be replaced.  In the meantime, they can be put to better use on someone else.   Hobbies that never took, games that are never played, it’s all going.    We are getting down to the things that are actually used and useful.

It’s interesting to note that the process is getting easier as the month goes by.     My Mother-in-Law is a hoarder.    Those habits get passed down, but what was originally a source of stress has turned into a pleasant chore.

The most wonderful discovery of all?  It turns out we don’t need a better storage system, we just need less stuff.

Update:  This post has been included in the Money Hacks Carnival.

It’s My Fault So Stop Me Now

Finance

One of my biggest problems with maintaining a goal is follow-through.    Three weeks or six months into pursuing a goal, it becomes incredibly easy to rationalize setbacks.    If my back hurts, it’s easy to skip some sit-ups.  If a custom knife maker offers me a good deal, it’s easy to drop a significant part of my discretionary budget on a really nice knife.   The rationalizations come pouring in when I see a good deal on Amazon.   “I need to read that book” or  “I’ve been waiting for the move forever.”  The excuses don’t matter.  As long as they are coming in, I will eventually cave to my inner impulse demon.   How do I avoid that?

I try to make myself accountable to as many people as possible. At the beginning of the year, I posted my 30 Day Projects here, for the world to see.    I post updates on a regular basis.   Admitting my failure with the sit-ups was surprisingly difficult.   I made myself accountable and fell short.  That’s hard.  Thankfully, none of you came around with a sjambok to make me regret my slip-up.   When I was doing push-ups, my wife was more than willing to let me know when I slipped into bad form to try to squeeze out a few more before I collapsed.   I count on that.

I count on my wife to help me stay on the right path.  Eliminating our debt is easily the longest goal either of us have ever set for ourselves.   Mutual support and mutual accountability are our main methods to maintain that goal.   It is, after all, a marathon, not a sprint.   When I want to buy more cookware, she reminds me that we already have something to serve the purpose.    When she wants to buy the kids new jammies, I remind her that they have more than can fit in their dressers already.    Neither of us are afraid to tell the other to return bad purchases to the store if it’s not in our budget.  When we go shopping, we go through everything in the cart before we get to the checkout, to decide if we really need everything we picked up.   We support each other.

If I couldn’t make myself accountable to my wife, my family, my friends, and–last, but certainly not least–the three people reading this, I would fold in the face of my marshaled rationalizations and leave my goals in the oft-regretted gutter.   Thanks for that.

How do you keep yourself on track?

Update:  This post has been included in the Money Hackers Carnival.