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Credit Peril
When my mother-in-law died, we went through all of her accounts and paid off anything she owed.
The Discover card she’d carried since the 80s–a card that had my wife listed as an authorized user–had a balance of about $700. We paid that off with the money in her savings account. They cashed out the accumulated points as gift cards and closed the account.
A few months ago, we decided it was time to buy an SUV, to fit our family’s needs. We financed it, to give us a chance to take advantage of a killer deal while waiting for the state to process the title transfer on an inherited car we have since sold.
Getting good terms was never a worry. Both of us had scores bordering on 800. Since our plan was to pay off the entire loan within a few months, we asked for whatever term came with the lowest interest rate.
Then the credit department came back and said that my wife’s credit was poor. I chalked it up to a temporary blip caused by closing the oldest account on her credit report and financed without her. No big deal.
Since we decided to rent our my mother-in-law’s house, we’ve discussed picking up more rental properties. That’s a post for another time, but last week, we went to get pre-approved for a mortgage. During the process, the mortgage officer asked me if my wife had any outstanding debt that could be ignored if we financed without her.
Weird.
A few days ago, we got the credit check letter from the bank. Her credit score? 668.
What the heck?
I immediately pulled her free annual credit report from annualcreditreport.com, which is something I usually do 2-3 times per year, but had neglected for 2012.
There are currently two negatives on her report.
One is a 30 day late payment on a store card in 2007. That’s not a 120 point hit.
The other is an $8 charge-off to Discover. As an authorized user. On an account that was paid.
Crap.
We called Discover to get them to correct the reporting and got told they don’t have it listed as a charge-off. They did agree to send a letter to us saying that, but said they couldn’t fix anything with the credit bureaus.
Once we get that letter, it’s dispute time.
Net Worth Update – September 2014
It’s time for my irregular-but-usually-quarterly net worth update. It’s boring, but I like to keep track of how we’re doing. Frankly, I was a bit worried when I started this because we’ve been overspending this summer and Linda was off work for the season.
But, all in all, we didn’t do too bad.
Some highlights:
- Both of our properties lost around $3000 in value. I’m not worried, because we are keeping them both for the long haul. The rental is basically on auto-pilot, so that’s free money every month.
- We sold a boat that appraised for much less I had estimated in the last few updates. I had it listed for $5000, but it was worth $2000.
- I do have a credit card balance at the moment, but that goes away as soon as my expense check clears the bank, which will be in a day or two.
- We’re in the home stretch with the mortgage. There is $11,407 left to go, and we’ve paid down $9105 in the last year. By this time next year, I want that gone, gone, gone.
I can’t say I’m upset with our progress. We’ve paid down $6000 in debt in 2014, including 3 months with 1 income. We aren’t maxing our retirement accounts, yet, but I’d like to be completely debt free before I do that. It’s bad math, but having all of my debt gone will give me such a warm fuzzy feeling, I can’t not do it.
My immediate goal is to hit a $600,000 net worth by my next update in January. I’m only about $7000 off.
Time to hit the casino. Err, I mean, time to up my 401k contribution from 5% to 7%.
Can EverQuest Next Compete with World of Warcraft?
Legions of MMORPGs have graced the internet to do battle against Blizzard’s World of Warcraft, yet no challenger has bested
Blizzard’s massively multiplayer online juggernaut. Huge marketing campaigns and years of development by the makers of games like Star Wars: The Old Republic and Rift have left players less than satisfied, with an initial big burst of player excitement and eventual failure.
Every software developer that creates an MMO that tries to take a slice of Blizzard’s pie invariably ends up as a “free to play” model. The latest MMORPG slated to try and take a shot at fighting Blizzard’s dominance is EverQuest Next. The developers are looking to lure players to EverQuest from a variety of other games such as EVE Online and Warcraft, but the design of the game seems to straddle a few different genres.
As with other game releases, the developers at Sony Online Entertainment have tried to suggest that their game will be “new” and “different.” It’s not difficult to understand why skepticism is high. Every game that has seen release in the past few years has had developers boast the same and has crashed and burned just a month or so after the release.
Players of EverQuest Next will find a game focus that includes some familiar fantasy elements of an MMO game (like elves), but developers have sought to step away from the traditional, linear questing experience and offer some world-building opportunities for players (much like EVE Online). One of the interesting features expected of the game is the ability for players to impact permanent change upon the landscape.
For example, during wartime a player might decide to build a wall somewhere, and he or she can accomplish this and actually have that wall erected as a permanent feature in the game world. Similarly, when players fight one another or monsters, a spell or explosion that creates a hole in the world will remain permanently. One of the developers likened this feature to the idea of putting Minecraft into an MMORPG.
Although absolutely everything in the world can’t be destroyed (certain structures will be permanent), this opportunity to build, create, and destroy represents a jump forward from the same opportunities players have had in games like EVE Online. World of Warcraft has occasionally offered players the opportunity to change the landscape, but not on a regular basis. Such changes have generally been implemented after a reset with all the realms taken offline, after which players would log in and see the changes.
However, the lack of appreciable impact on the environment hasn’t stopped players from flocking to World of Warcraft for nearly a decade, and EverQuest Next will need to bring an amazing player experience to lure away current players as well as retain them. The ebb and flow of Warcraft’s player base often coincides with the new release of another MMORPG, but after a month or so the new game’s servers are ghost towns. It won’t take long to see whether EverQuest Next can compete with World of Warcraft.
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Magical Thinking
A few weeks ago, on my way to work, while merging onto the highway, a soccer mommy in an SUV decided that she was going to accelerate to fill the opening I was going to use. Not before I got there, which would have left her in the right, if still a jerk, but as I was moving into the lane.
The entire reasoning was that she could be rude and dangerous under the assumption that I would be more civilized and back down, allowing her to indulge her little fantasy about how the world works. Luckily I saw her speed up, and had time to move out of the way. Physics very nearly taught her an expensive lesson.
This is similar to the people who think they’ll be safe because “nothing has happened before” or think “He won’t hurt me because I;m a good person” when confronted with a mugger.
This is magical thinking. Basing assumptions of other people’s actions on nothing more than your personal hopes and biases. The truth is, your halo does not provide a shield. Your luck at dodging criminals while strolling through bad neighborhoods does not circumvent statistical likelihood and your jerkface attempt to run me into a guard rail had better be backed by the stones to deal with a wreck.
Magical thinking, wishful thinking, and baseless hope are not rational methods of running your life. Criminals hunt for victims who wrap themselves in a smug, yet naïve, superiority. Murphy’s Law is waiting for someone arrogant enough to think that the laws of physics don’t apply when you’re commuting. The only rational means of predicting the behavior of others is to look at the signals they are actually producing.
Someone tentatively trying to squeeze into an opening in traffic is far more likely to submit to your passive aggression than the guy who merges with a turn signal and the gas pedal.
Someone in the park after hours in a hoody is more likely to hurt you than the guy in running shorts.
The guy lurking in the shadows of the parking ramp, refusing to make eye contact is a more likely mugger than the suit trying to find his Lexus.
A million years of evolution have given us an incredible ability to detect danger. A few hundred years of relative peace at the end of a few thousand years of relative civilization have not erased that ability, it has just convinced us to ignore our instincts under the mistaken assumption that all predators live in the jungle.
Fear has survival value. Don’t allow your rational brain to override your lizard brain completely. Let your fear keep you safe.
