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Do 1 Thing

: Image by Sailing “Footprints: Real to Reel” (Ronn ashore) via Flickr

I’m lazy.

Really, I am. When I get home from work, I want nothing more than to plop down on the couch, dial up a movie and ignore the world for a few hours. I need some downtime to relax.

While I am keeping the couch from flying away, my wife gets home, makes dinner, does the dishes, changes the cat litter and maybe vacuums the floor. Once dinner is cooking, she usually throws in a load of laundry. Three kids is a great way to guarantee a lot of laundry needs to get washed.

I have just two things to say about that:

It makes me feel really lazy.
I love you, honey!

I’ve never considered it a problem because I work my butt off on the weekend. My wife isn’t happy with the arrangement because I tend to do next to nothing during the week. I think it’s a good balance. I’m productive on the weekend, she’s productive during the week. Unfortunately, my habitual laziness has caused a bit of tension. We’ve had a few “discussions” about that balance. It’s obviously not working.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been trying something new. When I get home from work I’ve been doing just 1 thing. I do one thing per day. One day, I fold laundry, another day I do the dishes. Some days, I pick a room to organize. It’s never very much, but it’s always something that needs to be done and, possibly most important, it looks like I’m doing more so my wife feels less abandoned to the housework. I’m not actually doing more, but it gets spread out over the week, so it looks like more. Slowly, surely, all of the work is getting done.

It’s not a perfect solution, but it seems to be working. More is getting done, my wife feels like I’m helping out more and I get more time on the weekends to pursue whatever I feel like pursuing. It’s a win for each of us.

How do you balance relaxation and a shared workload?

Getting Out of Debt: The Prime Rule

Finance

The American Dream has been perverted. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness has been cruelly warped to mean

Wipe our Debt (Photo credit: Images_of_Money)

“Toys, free stuff provided at the expense of others, and the ability to buy and do anything I want without regard for the consequences.” To fund this horrible new dream, the people who can’t convince a government program to finance it for them often turn to credit. Credit is the art of putting your future into hock for something that you probably don’t need or want and that won’t work by the time you are finished making payments.

Ick. I’ve chosen not to live my life that way. Every day, more people are waking from the consumerism fog and deciding to reel their lifestyles back in and take control of their lives. They take a look at the world around them, compare it to their check register, and realize that it’s just not sustainable. You can’t survive on credit forever. Eventually, you will realize that there isn’t enough money to continue to buy things today on tomorrow’s paycheck.

What’s the first thing you should do when you decide that a “normal” life—a life in debt—isn’t the way you are going to live your life?

Well, when you find yourself standing in a grave, stop digging. You can’t dig yourself out of a hole and you can’t borrow your way out of debt. If you want to get out of debt, you need to stop using more debt. Period.

It may seem impossible, and the people around you may try to convince you that you are crazy. It is not impossible, just time-consuming. Short of finding an insane amount of money hiding under your front step or a winning lottery ticket blowing across the sidewalk, there are no shortcuts to getting out of debt. It’s just a matter of making the payments and not using more credit.

As far as the haters, screw ‘em. They are brainwashed into thinking their unsustainable and insane lifestyle is not only normal, but necessary. You don’t get life advice in a padded room, and you don’t plan your finances with a debt-addict.

Getting out of debt is a simple process, but that doesn’t make it easy. It only has two real steps: stop using debt, and keep making the payments.

What motivates me financially?

Finance, Parenting

This post was originally written for a blog swap run by the Yakezie personal finance blog network to answer the question “What motivates you to be financially responsible?“

This may not be the most original motivation, but I am financially motivated by my family. Before I had kids, I didn’t care much about money or “stuff”. My goal was to sell everything I owned and backpack Europe. Yeah, it’s a bit cliché, but that’s the way it is. I was also considering trying to live out of saddlebags while touring the country 1000 CCs at a time.

Now, I’ve got so many other considerations. Four, to be exact. A wife and three kids certainly change your perspective. If it doesn’t, you’ve got flaws that I can’t help you with.

When my family started, it was a huge wake-up call. Suddenly, I had responsibilities (cue scary music). Overnight, I had things to care about that didn’t involve a party, or instant gratification, or, well, me. Merlin the Stork floated down, waved a wand and Poof! I was a grown-up. This may not sound like much of a shock, but my wife and I had baby #1 when we were 20. Adulthood was still pretty new to us, and suddenly we’re parents?

As a grown-up, with three precious little monsters dependent on me for absolutely everything, I had to start worrying about their security. This was more than just keeping them physically safe. I’ve had to manage their emotional health, their physical needs, and their entertainment. They rely on me (and my wife!) for everything. How could I live with myself if I couldn’t put food on the table and a roof over their heads? Winter boots? Clothes without holes? Visits to the doctor? Have you ever noticed how much kids cost, even without considering the Japanese fad games and Barbie dreamhouses? Having a kid is like cutting a hole in your wallet and holding it over a blender nestled comfortably in a roaring fire fueled by napalm.

Then, after I’ve got them clothed, fed, sheltered, and entertained, I have to teach them how to be real people. I’m of the opinion that children in their natural state are little more than wild animals. Generally cuter, but that’s about it. It’s a parent’s job to train that ravenous little beast into an acceptable, successful person. Part of that consists of teaching the little brats how to start paying for their own clothes, food, shelter, and entertainment, and how to manage that without becoming a drain on society. Productivity and success can be defined a thousand different ways, but none of them include letting other people pay your way or borrowing money you have no intention or means of repaying. Ultimately, being an adult–being a successful part of society–involves recognizing your responsibilities and living up to them.

Caring for, providing for, and teaching my children the things I know provides me with an irreplaceable opportunity to watch them grow and learn, while giving me a chance to steer that growth. It is, without a doubt, the best, most satisfying, and most difficult thing I have ever done. The pleasure I get from raising my kids reinforces my desire to become the best person I can be.

Really, I just want to be the guy my kids think I am.

Selling Your Car

Finance

: English: Jalopy car in Joshua Tree National Park in Hidden Valley Campground (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When it’s time to replace your car, most people focus on the new car, instead of the old, but that is ignoring real money. Your old car–unless it has disintegrated–still has value. Sometimes, it’s just time to ask yourself, “When should I sell my car?”

When you’re looking to sell your car (like with We Will Buy Your Car), you generally have several options:

Tow & crush. If your car has been wrecked, doesn’t run, or is just old and beat up, you may be stuck with calling a junkyard and accepting $50 for them to pick up your car and crush it for scrap.
Trade it in. This is probably the least hassle, but–other than #1–doesn’t pay well. Dealerships are willing to pay something under what they will get at a wholesale auction, which is quite a bit less than the blue book value.
Sell it yourself. Now you’re thinking, “He’s going to buy my car! Oh, bother.” It can be a pain, but it’s also the best way to get a decent price for your wheels.

When you sell your car, there are a few things to keep in mind, much like when you sell something on Craigslist.

Don’t be alone. There are bad people in the world, but they don’t like witnesses. Bad things are much less likely to happen if you have company.
Know your price. Specifically, know three price: your dream price, the price that would make you happy, and the absolute lowest price you are willing to accept. Make sure you figure these numbers out ahead of time. Know what you are comfortable with before it comes time to close the deal.
Check IDs. The buyer is going to want to test-drive your car. That’s fine, but you want to make sure you know who is driving off in your car. “Officer, Sumdood took my car. He was wearing jeans.” That won’t get your car back.
Clean it up. Get the car detailed before you show it to a potential buyer. A sparkling-clean car will almost always bring in a few hundred extra dollars. It’s well worth the expense.

Following this plan should make the sale go as smoothly as possible and bring you the most possible money.

Readers, what have you done to dispose of an old car?

This is a sponsored post written to provide some insight into the world of used car retail.

I was recently given an advanced reader copy of Small Message, Big Impact by Terri L. Sjodin. It’s a book on crafting an effective and persuasive elevator speech.

An elevator speech is, according the the author, “a brief presentation introducing a product, service, philosophy or an idea. The name suggests the notion that the message should be delivered in the time span of an elevator ride, up to about 3 minutes. Its general purpose is to intrigue and inspire a listener to want to hear more of the presenter’s complete proposition in the near future.” It’s a 3-minute speech you give to intrigue someone enough that they will let you give a real presentation.

A lot of people–probably most–use their 3 minutes of unexpected access as an “information dump”. They pour as much data as possible into their audience. According to Sjodin(and I agree!), and elevator speech needs to be primarily persuasive, not informative. You need to include enough information to back up your persuasive arguments, but too much information is at least as bad, if not worse, than too little.

An elevator speech is either a sales pitch or a waste of time. You are selling the right to give more detailed information at a later time. The elevator pitch is not about making the sale. It’s about advancing the ball toward the eventual sale.

Who needs an elevator pitch? You do. Everybody sells. Even if you don’t have a product, a service, or a business, you have yourself. Can you pitch your boss on why you deserve a raise or a promotion?

The author walks you through creating an elevator speech that takes advantage of Monroe’s Motivated Sequence to advance your goal, whatever that is. She’ll teach you how to grab your audience’s attention and make them recognize a need for change. You’ll offer a solution, help them see the super-ninja-awesome future you’re offering, and give them a clear call to action. All in 3 to 5 minutes. Small Message, Big Impact will also teach you to provide a clear progression through those steps, making it easy for your target to say yes.

You’ll learn the basic outline of an elevator speech, including how to grab your target’s interest, build a persuasive case, and establish credibility when you’ve been surprised with a few moments of access. The three pieces of any successful presentation, from an elevator speech to a full-day presentation are

Case. If you can’t make your case, nothing else matters.
Creativity. You won’t win by being the same as everyone else. The same product, the same service, the same buzzwords won’t differentiate yourself from the competition.
Delivery. Stumbling, stammering, and talking to the wall will make the the best product and the most creative presentation sound like crap, every time. You need to build your presentation and practice it, so you come across and smooth an knowledgeable.

One of the best ways to sound credible, which will assist your delivery like nothing else, is to use an authentic voice. Be sincere and sound it. Believe in the material and yourself. Know the material–inside and out–and practice it until you can deliver it smoothly, even if that means enlisting a friend for speech practice.

Of the books I’ve reviewed, I think this is my favorite. If you need to design an elevator speech or improve the one you’ve been using, you should read this book. Even if you don’t care about an elevator speech, the book provides a decent education on persuasive selling that easily carries over to the written word.

How would you(or do you) use an elevator speech?

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Carnivals I’ve Rocked