Is this a Case of Bait and Switch?

RRRRGGGG – I just logged into Emigrant Direct’s on-line banking to see if I had earned any interest since opening the account in February. Much to my surprise I discovered the interest rate on my savings account had dropped from when I had opened the account. When I opened the account the interest rate for a savings account was 3.6%. When choosing an on-line bank for my car savings the deciding factor to open up an account at Emigrant Direct was the interest rate as their services were nearly identical to their competition.

I decided to check out their competition and see if they had decreased interest on savings accounts too. This would prove to me that it was a market effect due to the economy and not just Emigrant Direct lowering interest rates. I log onto Bank Rate and wouldn’t you know, none of Emigrant Direct’s competitors had lowered interest rates. HSBC Direct was still at 3.55% and ING was still at 3.4%, both higher than Emigrant Direct’s current rate.

I’m not a happy camper. L I go to bank rate’s calculators to determine the interest I’ll be loosing by having a lower rates and in the long term having a lower interest rate is only the difference of about 3 months to meet my car savings goal with Emigrant Direct rather than ING.

I guess I’m staying with Emigrant Direct since I don’t want to be opening and closing savings accounts every month to chase after the best interest rates.

Everyone’s in Debt? Really?

Last Wednesday I rode back from the Hockey Game with two co-workers who I used to work in the same department with until I was transferred to Valdosta (I’ll be back working in the same department with them once I move back to Atlanta in April). One, we’ll call Baby Daddy*, is in a comparable position as I am but a few years older, the other, we’ll call Cyclist is a few decades older and is two positions higher than Baby Daddy and myself.

* Just to clarify – I named him Baby Daddy because his wife just gave birth two months ago to a beautiful baby boy. Not because he’s some deadbeat or anything.

So the three of us are riding back together, gossiping about work stuff and catching me up on all the happenings I’ve been missing while working out of town. Somehow we got away from the work gossip and on to the topic of how compared to a lot of people we were all better off – and we weren’t talking about just financially. Cyclist was talking about having an amazing wife, Baby Daddy was talking about the new baby and being a first time Daddy. Eventually we worked our way around to finances – we agreed we were lucky to have good jobs, a stable company, opportunities for advancement, and a good 401k plan. Then Baby Daddy asked if we’d ever seen CNBC’s the Millionaire Inside. Of course I have – I’m really into financial stuff, but Cyclist had not, since he doesn’t have cable so Baby Daddy explained the show to Cyclist – “People who are seriously in debt come on the show and experts try to help them change and become financially successful”. Baby Daddy talked about how seeing these people who are millions of dollars in debt makes him feel better about his lack of substantial savings. We all start going on and on about how horrible it must be to be that far in debt and I talked about how I have a really hard time relating to how you can get to that point of debt problems (in the millions people) and not realize there’s a problem and make a change. Cyclist agreed with me and added that even if you get into a thousand dollars of debt you’ve got to realize there’s a problem and do something to fix it. “So neither one of you is in debt?” Baby Daddy wanted to know. We both said no, I have no debt and Cyclist has none and even has his house paid off. Baby Daddy couldn’t believe this, and said we must be the only two people in the country who’s not in debt. This made me start thinking about if debt was the norm rather than the exception.

I further started thinking about this after a comment my mom made to me. On Saturday we were walking at the park and she was talking about her money woes and how she just can’t seem to make it all work. I love my mama and was sympathetic to her plight but seriously it’s the choices she makes for examples she has a $200 cable bill but claims she can’t find anything on TV to watch – but I digress the post isn’t about her money choices. At the end of her complaints she shrugged her shoulders and said “I guess everyone’s in debt”.

Baby Daddy and my Mom both think everyone’s in debt. Is everyone in debt, are Cyclist and I the only ones not in debt?

I know we hear statistics all of them about the average savings is negative and how the average non-mortgage debt per household is about $14,500 . But does that really reflect the typical lifestyle in America or is this just a perception that helps to promote more debt? I started thinking about what the median debt and savings could be. With an average you’ve got extreme lows and extreme highs, but the median would tell you what most people are doing. I just can’t imagine that more than half of the population is in debt (other than mortgages). I mean how are these people going to retire, how are the current retires living if not off of savings, what’s going to happen to this economy if the majority of people are in debt? It could be my perspective, and its not like people tell you they are in debt but if I quickly count up in my friends circle the couples or individuals (those who are not married) who I think have savings even if its not substantial but at least they are in the black, and that’s about 12 married couples/single people compared to about 3 couples/people that I’m fairly certain do not have any savings. Hmmm…at least in my friend group I’d say that the majority of American’s are not in debt, but then again my little survey was not scientific in the least.

What do you think, do think the majority of Americans are in debt?

Monday's Money Funny --- Snow Day to Save Gas

One of the regular features on my blog is "Monday's Money Funny" which are humorous (at least to me) articles/jokes/just about anything that I've discovered over the weekend when I catch up on all my on line reading that spark a need for knowledge. For example last week's was on Spending Mis-Deposited Money.

Typically the Monday Money funny will be something that I’ve just run across in passing other times I get inspired to look for a specific topic and this Monday I was inspired to look for the topic because this past Saturday in Georgia it snowed. I think it’s snowed twice this year, I don’t think its snowed in Georgia twice in the last two years not including this year, so as you can expect Georgians are not very prepared to deal with this type of weather.

Not expecting the snow, my brother and I had pre-registered for a 10k on Saturday – just for fun and to support the cause (no not the marathon – it was about 20 miles short of the marathon we’re running in less than 2 weeks). Anyway we were all set to run on Saturday until we wake up and discover its pouring snow, I mean it looked like a blizzard outside. Wind blowing, horribly cold – basically miserable but being the stubborn people we are, we decided to toughed it out and run it anyway. Let me tell you that was probably one of the dumbest moves I’ve made. Have you ever seen the cartoon version of 101 Dalmatians and remember the scene when the cross the river, they are all trying to huddle for warmth and one of the little guys calls out and says “Papa my ears and froze and my nose is froze, and my tail is froze”. Well let me tell ya – that’s what running this race was like.

At the end as I’m shivering, wet, freezing, and can’t feel a single muscle in my body because of the cold I start wondering why the heck I didn’t just forfeit the entry fee. And now as I am suffering a cold today from being out in the snow Saturday I start thinking about the cost of snow, especially in Georgia – a state ill prepared for snow.

With that in mind, I was hoping to find an article about the cost of snow in Georgia – the ice trucks, the missed school, the missed work, the stock up on food all of that associated costs for today’s Monday Money Funny. After scouring the web I found no such article (maybe you all will have better luck than I did). But I did run across several rather interesting articles including the one I found so interesting I couldn’t resist using and that’s about Governor Perdue canceling school for two days as “snow days” to compensate for the huge gas price increase. If I remember correctly this was right after the Hurricane that destroyed New Orleans – so it’s about 2 and a half years old, and I think I remember gas getting up close to $5/gallon. I feel this article deserves to be a Monday Money Funny because its rather humorous to me to see how Perdue forgot the forest for the trees – just like some people are cheap but not frugal because they forget about the forest.

The article is posted at Think Progress. Below are the highlights:

“There is no snow in Georgia, but Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue (R) has called for schools statewide to take today and tomorrow as “early snow days.” Perdue proudly announced his decision as part of his call for citizens to save more fuel. According to his office, closing schools will save 225,000 gallons of diesel fuel each day. […]

Perdue’s decision to close schools was announced after schools had let out last week, setting off panic amongst parents who had to hastily find (and pay for) two days’ of child care for their children. […]

However, such savings could be more than eaten up for parents who have to pay for two extra days of day care because of the school closings.”

This article didn’t lead me to research how to save money on Snow days as I was anticipating, but it did help me to do some research on how to save gas. Here’s a few interesting articles:

Wiki How's How to Save Money on Gas

Bank Rate's Top 15 Ways to Save Money on Gas

Also I included a link to Seb @ PinchingCopper post in my weekend round up, where he recently posted about how to save money on gas.

Well that's it for this Monday. Stay tuned for next week's Monday's Money Funny. Also if you run across any Money Funnies please email them to me at future.millionaire.blog@gmail.com and if I use them I will give you credit and link to your blog.

The Weekend Round Up

After joining the PFBloggers Network my game plan was every Saturday to post a Round Up highlighting my favorite post from the week...well as you can see since today's Sunday and not Saturday I missed my first mark. So it appears I'm off to a great start, although I was worried that my misspelling of Savy made a rocky start to the blogging world but I think I'm doing okay despite my lack of grammer/spelling savvy-ness.

Below are some of the highlights from this week in the PFBloggers World:

Ben @ Trees Full of Money answered my question about the radio commercials that say “Hi, I’m Todd Davis, and my Social Security # is 457-55-5462" with the post LifeLock®: A Review of Todd Davis’ Controversial Service

Jonathon @ Master Your Card provided Everything you wanted to know about Fico Scores* - and let me tell you there's a ton to know.

After learning everything about FICO scores mom@ Wide Open Wallet explains How I check my credit score anytime I want... for free!

I really enjoyed the humor in Kevin @ No Debt Plan's post Dumb Money: The Lottery because Mr. Be-Mine always jokes about how his retirement plan is the lottery only some how he doesn't think it will work since he doesn't invest in the lottery. (Don't worry he really has a pension since he works for Uncle Sam and fully funds his 403b each year.)

JB @ Get Rich or Die Trying shares my rant about Car Insurance with his post Auto Insurance Revolution.

After driving back to Valdosta today from Atlanta I very much appreciated Seb @ PinchingCopper's post How to drastically improve your gas mileage now I just have to figure out how to stop driving like a maniac :)

Don't forget to check out all the other blogs in the network. I've conveniently listed them all in the left hand column for your use.

Carnival of Savings Savy by a Future Millionaire

To kick off the Second Comment Contest I thought I'd share with you all some of my favorite posts.

Please feel free to add your two cents to any of these - especially since every time you comment you're entered to win.

Are Salaries No Longer Taboo to Talk About?
Extreme Savings -- What Personal Finance Choices Do you Make?

Saving for a New Car
Future Millionaire is Coming back to the ATL!!! ---- The Money Side to Moving
Income vs. Goals in a Relationship ---- Food For Thought
Judging The Jones’ Money Moves
Secrets of a Self-Made Millionaire
How Much to Spend to Buy a Car
8 Smart Money Moves for 2008 includes Rent, Don't Buy

Alright – Blog Stockers – Here’s your Second Chance.

As I’ve mentioned before, one of the biggest reasons I started this blog is because I enjoy the feedback from readers. In an effort to encourage more commenting I’m holding a second comment contest. The second contest will run from Friday, March 7^th until Friday, March 28^th.

The way it works is any comments posted between March 7^th and March 28^th on any blog entry will be eligible to win a financial goodie. The more comments the more chances to win. At the end of the contest I will randomly draw one winner from all of the comments posted. Check out the Winner and process from the last contest.

I’ve decided for this contest to give away a second copy of one of my favorite books, The Millionaire Next Door, if/when I do a third contest it will be a different financial goodie – feel free to chime in with suggestions.

Happy commenting and make sure to check back after March 28^th to see who won, especially if the winner happens to be you.

I love the Perks of Working for My Company

One of the perks I get by working for my company is that subcontractors are always "wining and dining" us trying to gain the opportunity to bid our work.

Let me preface this with the fact that I've always been a very firm believer in treating the company's money like it was your own - so if you wouldn't buy a $100 steak with your money don't do it with the company's money. The "wine and dines" I feel are slightly different, they want you to enjoy your self and the purpose of the event is to well "wine and dine you" so take advantage of the opportunity to go a little outside your norm, but don't take advantage of the situtaion. (I realize I used advantage twice, but I think you know what I mean). In fact Frugal Zeitgeist recently posted about this topic.

With that said, the reason I love these "wine and dines" is two part. The first is its usually some place or some activity that I wouldn't ordinarily go to and the second reason is I get to enjoy luxuries I don't often afford myself.

Tonight was no exception. Our sub had reserved a box at the Thrashers Hockey Game and arranged for an amazing buffet and open bar. I never would have done something like this if it weren't a work event. On my subway ride home from the game I started thinking about the cost to an individual if they wanted to have a similar experience so here it goes --- Master Card style:

Hockey Ticket: $275 tickets
"Gourmet Dinner" Hockey Style: $60
Alcoholic Beverages served in your seat: $50

An evening with your closet friends from work: Priceless


Yeah there's no way I'd normally spend almost $400 to attend a Hockey Game -- I'd much rather watch it at home a heck of a lot cheaper. But I'm very grateful to the sub that provided this opportunity as it was an amazing time (even if the home team lost).


PS - As a side note and follow up to my post yesterday "Are Salaries No Longer Taboo to Talk About?" one of the main topics of conversation at the hockey game tonight was the shock of being asked this question. No one could believe a dollar figure for salary was asked plus a ton of people are really surprised Mr. Other VP answered with an actual dollar figure. Maybe my overreaction to the question being asked was biased by the culture of the company I work for - at my company you just don't talk about those things at all.

Are Salaries No Longer Taboo to Talk About?

Last night I along with 3 co-workers had the pleasure of going to my alma-mater to present a guest lecture in a construction seminar class. The presentation was on safety in the construction industry and highlighted one of our projects. Since our company had the opportunity to be in front a large audience of mostly seniors (about 70 of them), we took the liberty of using the last five minutes of the class to give a plug for our company by sharing the three career paths within the construction industry using our company as the example. Following the career paths highlights we opened up the floor for Q&A on the entire presentation.

We had a very lively and thought provoking Q&A regarding safety until a student in the 6^th row raised his hand and asked “Where’s the money?” At first I thought this was about the money to pay for safety equipment and explained that the money for safety is the responsibility of every company and it would be irresponsible not to ensure safety because of money. Then proceeded to list examples where by providing a safe working environment for construction workers productivity actually increased. The student then said “No, in the career paths, where’s the money at?”

I couldn’t believe he asked this question, especially since the people in the room who heard him ask that question are the decision makers in the company (the ones who decide who to hire and who to fire) – not exactly the kind of impression you want to make when you’re going to be looking for a job soon.

But since he asked the question, I responded in the most honest way I could with all paths are similar with regards to compensation, some have certain perks over the other but for the most part if all balances out. The money is in the path that makes you the most happy so you can be the most successful. If you hate what you do, chances are you’re going to struggle to go above and beyond which is the source for monetary rewards.

But just wait – that’s not what blew me away and made me wonder if salary information is no longer taboo. A different student then chimed in with “So what is the going rate for an entry level job at your company?” In my head I’m going HUH…you want me to name a figure?

Out loud I respond with “umm…our company pays very competitive salaries.”

Another student piped up with “How competitive, give us a dollar amount…”

It could be my conservative nature, but never have I asked others about their salary or shared (other than indirectly on this blog) my salary. When asked a to name a number I’m thinking inside my head – are you freakin’ serious?

Well one of the VP’s of our company, jumps in and says “ you were part of the college recruiting event we held this past year, what was the dollar figure used in the offer letters, it was $50,000, right?”

In my head, I’m thinking, how do you want me to answer this?

I mumble “yes around that, some a little more some a little less it all depended on previous experience and location due to cost of living”.

I’m still blown away that this conversation even occurred. I’m also blown away that this VP (not Mr. VP, a different Vice President - one that I’ve never had as a boss or boss’s boss) actually named a dollar figure. Am I being too conservative, when is it okay to talk openly about salary? Do you think I overreacted to the fact this question was asked?

Monday Money Funny - Spending Mis-Deposited Money

One of the regular features on my blog is "Monday's Money Funny" which are humorous (at least to me) articles/jokes/just about anything that I've discovered over the weekend when I catch up on all my on line reading that spark a need for knowledge. For example last week's was on Why People Believe Weird Things about Money and a very interesting article from the LA Times.

This week, I ran across too very similar articles, one from the Chicago Sun-Times and the other from the Boston Globe. Both are articles about men who used money accidentally deposited into the their bank accounts and are now charged with the crime of using this money.

Highlights from the Chicago Sun-Times Article:
"A man was charged with withdrawing $2 million from an account after a bank confused him with a man who has the same name. Benjamin Lovell was arraigned Tuesday on grand larceny charges. The 48-year-old salesman said he tried to tell officials at Commerce Bank in December that he did not have a $5 million account. He says he was told it was his and he could withdraw the money [...]"

Highlights from the Boston Globe Article:
"A La Vista man was charged with felony theft after he spent $80,000 his bank deposited by mistake in his account.
George J. Costa, 45, is charged with theft of lost or mislaid property. It is a crime to take money that's been "delivered under a mistake. More than $106,000 was deposited into Costa's account between August 2006 and February after a Pinnacle Bank employee mixed up account numbers, according to the Nebraska State Patrol. [...]"

Now, I realize that both of these men, most likely new that this money was not theirs to spend, but what if it had only been an extra $200 deposited, do you think they would have realized it was not their money?

I ask this because I know so many people who don't keep track of their financial papers (recipets, CC statements, etc) or balance their check book. Honestly, would you know if an extra $200 had been deposited in your accounts?

This promted me to do a little research, if you're like Albert Einstein and struggle balancing your check book I found a how to guide for you at ehow (personally I don't balance mine on paper either, I use an excel document to balance my checkbook - so much easier and less work).

Also for those of you who are struggling to figure out what to save and what to shred as far as your financial paper I found a good chart at bankrate.com that tells you how long to keep your documents. And when you're ready to get ride of your no longer needed financial documents, make sure to use a shredder. Kevin over at No Debt Plan has an interesting post about shredding documents.

This year I finally got tired of all the paper I keep and decided to embark on a paperless filing system. I scan every document that comes in, save it on my hard drive in a password protected winzip file, with a back up on a USB drive. So far its worked wonderfully I can shred pretty much all of my documents and since I save everything with the name of the institutes, a description, and a date I can easily access it all.

Well that's it for this Monday. Stay tuned for next week's Monday's Money Funny. Also if you run across any Money Funnies please email them to me at future.millionaire.blog@gmail.com and if I use them I will give you credit and link to your blog.

Its Offical - Future Millionaire has a new Apartment!

As promised here the update on My Apartment Search:

On Saturday, after receiving the email from the APM at the Apartment Complex Fashionista and I want to live in, I went over to check out the two apartments she had on special.

Neither one was perfect, they both were in the building we had originally veto'ed since it was next to Subway Tracks, but I was willing to consider since we liked the area and the complex.

After arriving there, I discovered that the subway train would be on the oposite side of the building from where both apartments were located. Standing outside of Apartment #2 I heard the subway coming and stepped back into Apartment #2 to see if you could hear the train and heard nothing. Hear No Evil Train, See No Evil Train, therefore I won't speak of an Evil Train. So that negated our original concerns about the subway being so close to this building.

Continuing on with the tour of the apartments:
Apartment #1 was on the second floor and the "courtyard" view was of the side wall of the parking deck with a vine growing up it. One floor below the the living room window was a picnic table and grill. But at least this was on the second floor and not the ground like the one we'd previous looked out. I still wasn't too thrilled about the lack of light and the noise from people at the grill. So onto Apartment #2.
Apartment #2 was on the top floor with a courtyard view of the tennis courts which are located on top of the parking garage - not crazy about the noise from the Tennis Courts but I figure that's farther away, blocked by some trees, so I'm more willing to consider it. Since Apartment #2 is on the top floor it had slightly higher ceilings, which made it feel much larger (I know there will be some heating and electric bill issues but its all about choices), plus since it was on the top floor and not blocked by the parking deck a lot more sun light came in, again making it feel larger. Over all I was really starting to like this unit. The one other thing to check out was the parking and access issue that was Fashionista's big concern. There is no covered parking on this level since the tennis courts are there, but you can park one level below and take the stairs which were about 20 feet from the front door of Apartment #2, or you can take the elevator which was about 50 feet from the front door.

I was still a little leery of this deal since it seemed so out of the blue, but had a long talk with the APM and felt comfortable and could see where a bird in the hand (us taking the apartment today) would be worth it to Apartment Management Company.

After the tour and the talk, I ducked out for a minute and call Fashionista to report, she agreeded that we probably couldn't get any better and that we liked the area, we liked the complex, and the apartment sounded great, even if there were a few compromises to make. We agreed that we should take the apartment today. I filled out our paper work and left a deposit. we just have to wait on approval of our application and we're good to move in on April 16th!

PS. The picture at the top is the floor plan of the unit we're going to be leasing.