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Expected Budget Changes from Moving

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I’ve talked about the benefits to us moving in general, but what are the real budget changes we’re expecting once we move?  I know the first few months will be all over the map on how much we spend because we’ll still be settling in, fixing things in a new house, etc.  But I have a pretty good idea of how much extra we’ll be saving.  This isn’t all of our budget, but the items I think will be changing.  The rest, like how much we spend on clothes or groceries might change a little, but not really drastically.    Our income isn’t changing significantly (I’m getting $2000 less per year – about $150/mth), and Dad’s is staying exactly the same.

Overall, we’ll be spending a little less in food and clothing purchases because of Pittsburgh/Allegheny county sales tax (0% clothes and basic food vs the 6% on clothes and 2.55% on food in VA).  We’ll also theoretically be paying less in income taxes,  VA has a 6% on Federal AGI tax, but PA taxes ~3% of all income (very few deductions), and 0.5-1% local income tax – depending on where we live.  We shelter a lot of income from the feds (and therefore VA), and it won’t be sheltered from PA income tax, so I don’t know how the raw numbers will work out. I don’t *think* we have enough sheltered to make up the 3% difference, but we might.

Bills that will go up:

VA PA Difference
Auto insurance 75 110 -35

Bills that will go down:

VA PA Difference
Mortgage (including property taxes & insurance) 2700 1700 1000
Daycare 1300 500 800

Just among those three things, we will be able to save an extra $1765 per month beyond what we’re saving now.

Definitely looking forward to seeing how all the expenses play out.  We are also likely to save more in fuel as I’m planning on taking the bus to work on a regular basis (and I get a free bus pass as a perk of employment, but I have to pay for a parking pass).  That’s a decision that hasn’t been made yet though, so we’ll see how it plays out.

We’re also going to have at least one month with no mortgage – just as part of the buying and selling process (and we’re living with my mom during that time).

Update July 21: I just found out that I’m also getting an $80 “communication allowance” per month to pay for cell and Internet service.  That’s about 90% of our entire family cell phone bill – an “extra” $80 per month 🙂

Have you ever made a significant move to lower your expenses?

We Have Too Much Stuff!

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As we start to pack our life into tiny boxes for moving, I’m starting to realize how much “stuff” we actually have. And how much of it wasn’t being used much (if at all). Some stuff we have to keep for a prescribed period of time (like old tax returns), other stuff, we just need to get rid of. Moving is as good of an excuse as any. I’m more concerned that I don’t have time to seriously go through the stuff and separate between keep and donate before it needs to end up in a box for moving.

I still have a huge monster suitcase that my parents gave me when I graduated high school – that I’ve used maybe 3 times in the last 20 years – and at least the last time, I wish I hadn’t brought such a large one with me. I haven’t carried anything larger than my medium sized one for the last 8 years – and that was for 3 weeks of work clothes! It’s listed on freecycle, but no bites yet 🙂

I already have a rather large pile of things that are going to donation. The charity does pickups and they’re coming by today to take that away. Then we start a new set of boxes for donation, because I’m sure there will be more!

There is the pile of things that I would like to sell before moving, but it might have to wait until after we’ve moved: like our exercise bike and treadmill. No bites on the bike on craigslist, and the treadmill has stuff sitting on it so it hasn’t even gone up on craigslist yet.

Finally, there is the “trash” pile. As much as I hate throwing things out, there are just some things that aren’t worth donating or even giving away.

The Realtor came by last night to sign the listing paperwork, and we went over what should and shouldn’t get packed. All the stuff we really don’t use that often, like tchotchkes, that would be easy for us to pack up, are the things he wants us to leave unpacked for the stager to use. We’ll just have a *lot* of extra packing to do between going under contract and closing 🙁

Why is it that moving spurs you to get rid of things that haven’t bothered you for the last 5 years?

We’re Moving!

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I got a job offer in Pittsburgh yesterday.  It’s conditional on me passing a background check, which I don’t see as an issue, so really, I have an offer. I’ve verbally agreed to it this morning to start the background check process.

It’s a *very* good offer too – $2k less/year than I make here in DC, but with *much* better benefits and a lower cost of living area.  I’m basically getting a 20-30% raise given the cost of living difference.  There’s only a small stipend available for moving expenses ($1,500) – not near enough to cover what it’ll cost, but it’s something – and I can deduct the rest on my taxes.

There is a tax-deferred plan with an 8% contribution and it vests in 3 years.  I don’t have to contribute a dime (although I plan to). Health insurance will cost us about $200 less per month than it is under Dad’s plan, which we’re currently under.

Dad has already talked to his boss and his boss’ boss about it, and he may continue to work at his current job, just remotely – coming down to DC once every few months or so.  They are OK with it (they like him – and there is some precedent), but they have to check with higher-ups to confirm that it’s OK within the company. That’d continue to get us his DC-level salary and he’d be able to vest in his 403(b).

I’d start mid-August, so there’s time to get everything ready, and maybe even sell the house before I start.  I haven’t told my boss yet – but he’s on vacation for the next two weeks.  If I tell him when he returns, that will be two-week’s notice.  “Hi, how was vacation? – here’s my resignation”. More notice than the 24 hours he gave us on the company sale/acquisition.

Now to turn my efforts to getting the house ready and put together for sale!

$200 Grocery Challenge Results

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With today being the last day of June, how did we do on our grocery challenge to spend less than $200 this month?  Not so great, but better than most months: $246.61  We had a few things come up that we weren’t expecting, but I think we did well.  We had to buy more scoopable cat litter after our radioactive cat was no longer radioactive and we had to toss out what we had.  Costco also had a sale on rice and flour – both of which we needed, so a bulk purchase was in order.   ~$250 is better than our normal $300-$350 though!  We also fed my mom for a weekend while she was here as well.

On the plus side, we only ate out of the house on our car trips to and from Pittsburgh (reimbursed), and ordered pizza in only twice in the month – bringing our eating out final to $54.34.  *Much* better than our normal $250-$300 of eating out.  We did buy some wine, but it was limited to only drinking on the weekends, and was mostly Aldi’s house brand (at about $32 for the month)

Except for the $2000 plane tickets that I needed to front the money for (and have since been reimbursed), we spent about $2500 less this month than we normally do.  Now, a good bit of “normal” month is/was debt payment, so that’s some of the difference (about $1500 of that), but the rest is us not spending money.  Good practice for the future since I know what our new take-home pay is: about $2000 less per month!

Missing the Buzz

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Now that my student loans are paid off and we’re not making any extra payments this month, I find that I’m missing the little buzz of excitement I get when I make an extra payment and watch the line of total debt drop closer to zero.  We’re still paying on the car, and I can watch that amount owed drop, but since we’re in a holding pattern, that little buzz just isn’t there.

I enjoy watching our other accounts grow, but it’s not quite the same “stick it to them” feeling that came with making an extra payment.  I also look at our accounts way more than a sane person should.  I don’t touch them or buy/sell, but I look at the little “portfolio balance” chart in Personal Capital a bit too much.

I have a new goal in completing our emergency fund, but for some reason, it’s just not as exciting.  I’d love to set some more short term goals as far as savings go – like continuing to spend very little on groceries or getting our savings rate closer to 50%. But with life at a cross-roads, I don’t know what a reasonable goal is at this point.  Moving will seriously impact our savings rate as we spend money on things like deposits, down payments, and fixing up the house for sale.  We’re trying to avoid buying groceries right now – especially freezer stock up items – in case we do move.  Just the bare minimums to get us through the week – which both helps keep the grocery bill low, and increases it since we’re not buying in bulk.

One thing I am excited about is the possibility to buy a smaller house with a (much) smaller mortgage, and hopefully saving more.  We don’t know what our new salaries might be though – just what we’ve asked for, so we might not save as much as we’re expecting.  But, it lets us look for a house with a different set of priorities in mind rather than just “how big of a house can we afford”.

If you’ve finished paying off your debt, what do you do to stay excited about saving?

eBay Selling Spree

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Total items out of the house: 194/365

I’ve gone on a mini eBay selling spree in the last few weeks.  I sold two Apple TVs (we had 3 – and we really only need one now), and my old Mac Pro.  It went for $270 – not bad for an 8 year old system.  I netted $536 and some change in the last two weeks.

I’ve also listed some of our living room furniture on craigslist and sold it pretty quickly.  I have pictures of the treadmill and other toys of Daughter Person’s to put up on craigslist, I just haven’t gotten them up yet.

If I do accept the position in Pittsburgh, we’ll definitely be getting rid of more things.  I may use the move as a “clean slate” and only pull things out of boxes when I want to use them, then donate the rest after a year.  Need to clear that plan through Dad first though 🙂

Reasons we have a large-ish emergency fund

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This month, the annual checkup of our two kitties revealed that one has hyperthyroidism.  They’re both a bit older (~14), but they are indoor only cats, otherwise healthy and expected to live another 5-6 years.  Bloodwork revealed early hyperthyroidism in Bootsie, our black and white cat.  Just the diagnosis for her was $178 (in addition to the “normal” vet visit which we had saved for all year long and was already in the budget).  Then we needed to decide what to do.

Untreated, it is fatal.  It can be “cured” (98% success rate) with a one time injection of I-131 radio isotope (Iodine), or it can be managed with 2 times daily doses of medicine.  Realistically, we know we’re not going to remember to give her pills twice a day, and many times, we leave for long weekends, and we’d have to find someone willing to come by the house to dose her up while we’re gone.  So, that left the one time “radio cat” treatment.  It’s not cheap, but it has some distinct advantages over the medicine – other than not having to dose her twice a day, we would only have to have her thyroid levels tested once per year after the treatment, whereas with the pills, we’d have to have her tested every quarter to make sure the dose was still correct (at $178 a pop!).

We got the estimated costs for the medicine (we don’t have pet insurance), and doing the math, the $1400 radio cat treatment would end up being cheaper if she lives 4 more years – and there’s a really good chance of that if the treatment is successful.  It also means that we have to come up with about $1800 “now”.  The $1400 is for the full treatment, we also had to do a few more diagnostic tests with the vet before hand, and a one month and 3 month followup with the vet to make sure she’s “cured”.

She’ll be at the treatment facility for at least a week, because she’ll literally be a radioactive cat for a bit, and we have to follow special precautions once she does come home for 2-3 weeks, but it’ll be easier than giving her a pill twice a day!

If we only had $1000 in our emergency fund, we’d still have to come up with $800 in the budget quickly, but with the $3000 we had left in the emergency fund after taking some to pay off the student loan, we’re doing OK.  I’m not even going to “refill” the emergency fund until August – after the student loan is paid off.  We live in a high cost of living area, and I always felt that $1000 wasn’t enough for an emergency fund – now I’m glad we had it.

Spring Cleaning

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Total items out of the house: 187/365

And I only counted the large bin of diapering stuff I gave to to my friend as 3 things (diapers, diaper bag, and wipes).

I sold several smaller items on e-bay this past week, mostly more expensive clothing that Daughter Person had inherited or shoes that she never wore.  We also traded her velcro diapers for snap ones (the velcro was falling off at night), and I sold the velcro ones on ebay for $10/diaper.  These were all the pink ones that weren’t appropriate for my friend’s boy.  For diapers that needed repairing (and I was upfront about that in the description), that’s pretty good. I started the bidding at $25 for all 7 of them, and it went up to $70.  We only bought 6 diapers to replace them.  We’re doing a bit more diaper laundry, but since she’s only wearing them at night, it’s not too bad.

The Lupus Foundation is coming today to take the three large boxes of stuff off my front porch.  It’s all Daughter Person’s 24mth stuff (and 2T stuff that’s too small), some of my shirts I never wore all winter, and some of Dad’s shirts.  I also had her go through her toys and pick a few things that she was willing to donate.  She picked about 5 things – 2 of which I knew were her favorites (she likes to share) and I took them out of the box and hid incase they’re asked for in the future.  I also added a few things to the box that I hadn’t seen her play with in a while.

I freecycled her plastic slide and a few storage bins that I had cleaned out.  All largish items that weren’t worth much, but they’re out of the house.

We have a treadmill and exercise bike, and I think I’m going to get rid of the treadmill, but I’m going to wait until the end of the year when people are looking for them instead of now when craigslist has a glut of them from failed New Year’s Resolutions.  Dad’s undecided on the exercise bike.  I prefer to walk outside anyway – and I’ve been doing P90x3 – which doesn’t need a treadmill 🙂

I still see lots of things around the house that I want to get rid of, most of which I think will fetch something on Craigslist or eBay.  It’s quite freeing to get rid of things!

Rediscovering the Public Library

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I grew up going to the public library in our town – I was (and still am) a voracious reader.  I’m pretty sure my parents were thrilled when I could drive myself there (it wasn’t exactly close or convenient).  I had read through all the interesting scifi/fantasy books available at the library, and just sort of stopped going – preferring to get books from B&N and then Amazon.  I can count on one finger the number of times I went to the school library in college.

When I got my Kindle (the 2nd generation edition), I couldn’t go to the library to get Kindle books, so I didn’t bother.  Just in the last year or so, as we’re trying to save money have I been going back to the library.  Daughter Person made her first trip there late last year – she loves picking out new books to read before bed.

Our public library system has over 20 locations, with two pretty close to us.  The closest one to us also houses the library operations center, and it’s one of the larger libraries in the system, so it has a good selection.  I can also request a hold online, and if the book isn’t at my library, I can have it sent to my local library for no charge.  They also support inter-library loan should I wish to take advantage of it. I also have access to the public libraries (and their online resources) in the greater DC Metro region – all of which are excellent library systems.

In addition to books, the library has DVDs, music CDs and books on tape/CD to lend patrons.  I haven’t gotten to spend much time browsing the main library section lately as I’ve had Daughter Person with me, and adult books are just as interesting to her as the picture books in the children’s section.

Our library offers an amazing array of online resources.  I can checkout Kindle books, Audible books, PDFs, ePub books (among others).  It gives me access to research databases (EBSCO) as well, which I use on occasion.

I just learned this week that our library offers Mango Languages as well – for free!.  If the language you want to learn isn’t available through Duolingo, I suggest seeing if your library subscribes to Mango Languages – there seem to be hundreds of languages available.

Now, instead of going straight to Amazon, I check the library’s web page first, and if the book is available, I’ll put it on hold.  I get an e-mail telling me when the book is ready, and I go download it from Amazon.  Unfortunately, it can be a long wait for popular books.  If the library doesn’t have it on Kindle or I need to read it quickly, only then will I purchase it.  I’ll even sometimes check out a printed book for myself.

Do you frequent your public library?

Spring Cleaning

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Now that spring is nominally here, I’ve put aside all of the “winter” clothes that I didn’t wear this winter.  They’ll go to Goodwill (or the Lupus Foundation) as soon as I get around to it.  I’ve not gone through Daughter Person’s clothes from this winter yet as she’s still wearing most of them.  We’re expecting another snow storm this week, and then I hope spring is coming and I can go through her stuff and put it in the donation bin. I’ve already put aside things that she’s obviously grown out of, but haven’t taken them to donate yet.  Once those things are out of the house, then they’ll get added to the count for this year.

I’ve taken pictures of a few of our living room furniture pieces to list on craigslist, but I haven’t gotten them listed yet.  I’m also retiring an ancient Mac Pro (1,1) in favor of a Plex server on a slightly newer system.  I’m not sure that anyone will buy it from me as it’s an 8 year old system (and can only sort of run Mavericks – the 10.9.2 update broke it 🙁 ).  But someone might want it for parts, it’s some pretty beefy hardware.