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Beekindpleez
Member
07-18-2006
| Tuesday, February 10, 2009 - 8:04 pm
Serate...wow! That is unbelievable. It's so pretty there, too. If I had any sense, I'd get me and mine outta California. lol
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Serate
Member
08-21-2001
| Tuesday, February 10, 2009 - 8:17 pm
We do get snow Bee, but for me that's a must - gotta live somewhere where we get some decent - not obscene - snow a couple times a year. I like my seasons. And if I had to do w/o one season it would be summer. I like the other 3 the best.
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Beekindpleez
Member
07-18-2006
| Tuesday, February 10, 2009 - 10:53 pm
Oh, a bit of snow is okay...as long as there's a nice ocean nearby so I can get my sunset fix. LOL
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Urgrace
Member
08-19-2000
| Wednesday, February 11, 2009 - 7:39 am
What do they call a house that sits right on the property line? We have some new neighborhoods here where the house sits on the line so that the yard is larger between them and the next house that sits on the line. It is in a lower priced housing bracket. There are many, many people moving into Texas due to the lower cost of building and buying prices. I know the costs are going to start skyrocketing if they haven't already.
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Dipo
Member
04-23-2002
| Wednesday, February 11, 2009 - 10:04 am
Ugrace we call those zero lot line properties and they are usually a PUD (Planned Unit Development).
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Christy358
Member
07-10-2007
| Wednesday, February 11, 2009 - 11:08 pm
I do not believe in snow. I think it is a made up thing. How can frozen stuff fall from the sky? Water barely does.
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Happymom
Member
01-20-2003
| Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 10:37 am
lol!
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Denecee
Member
09-05-2002
| Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 10:49 am
Serate, your house is beautiful! It's way more expensive over here in Oregon than that but I'm not leaving my job for nothing right now!
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Urgrace
Member
08-19-2000
| Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 11:55 am
Christy, you are so intuitive. I don't know where any precipitation comes from, but I'm thinking we only get it from Africa when the hurricanes drag it across the Atlantic. Dipo, thanks for the answer to my question.
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Serate
Member
08-21-2001
| Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 1:25 pm
Denecee I only WISH it was my house! *L* We paid about 1/3 of that for our house, which is still a pretty decent house for us. I was just showing what $300K - $400K could by where I live. Our house would probably appraise for at least $300K in some of the areas where hubby could transfer, which means we wouldn't be able to afford it, even with $10K premium pay that is given for working in some cities.
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Denecee
Member
09-05-2002
| Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 2:58 pm
Oh, I missed that and I even had my coffee!
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Monday, February 23, 2009 - 1:25 pm
I haven't been saving big on a regular basis lately, but I have been making regular contribuitions to the jar, we all have. We stick all change (except for a handful of quarters for Darren) into the jar each day, plus whatever I find around the house. One of the bigger things I've been doing for the past month though is dropping in $2 a day. If I can keep that up, I'll consider it good! Since I cash my paychecks and use it to pay bills, the last couple of checks, I've also thrown in whatever I have left over. So, last week when I got my check, I had $15 left from the check before and it went into my fund. Right now I have about $60 left which may or may not go into the bottle, but it's time to order Caleb's year book and Kota needs the rest of her softball uniform and I'm not sure I'll get my next check before I need to take care of those. I do have four big, black bags of cans I need to take over and recycle and that money is going into the savings fund as well. These days we really can't take $100 out of each paycheck to save, but I'm hoping the smaller savings will add up.
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Happymom
Member
01-20-2003
| Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - 11:26 am
Good job with the saving! Do you have plans for your fund if you don't have to pay for yearbook etc. out of it? I've been doing really well with not spending. I am sticking to just the bare essentials at the store, and even then, I've found we can do without some things I used to consider essentials. It seems those bare essentials are getting more expensive all the time. We did have a little extra money recently that I was able to use to pay some extra on bills. (Well, it's not really extra, hubby probably worked more OT than usual.) That always feels so good to me. I hate debt especially if it involves interest. (except for the mortgage, but, I'd really rather not have that either) I hate it a lot and I get such a natural high from saving money. We are spending more these days, I went back to school. However, it should pay off in a year or so by a big increase to our income...just in time for the younger two to go to college...sigh...we'll never get ahead. But I guess that is ok, I don't really care about getting ahead so much as not feeling behind. I don't care about stuff (physical things) too much or even taking trips. It would be really nice to get to a place where I didn't have to worry about money though. Someday...
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - 12:33 pm
Happymom, last year at this time I had some specific goals for our savings/funds, but this year I really don't. Our retirement accounts taken a beating in the last year, Darren's not getting much ot (though you can't tell that right now,) he's not getting a raise this year, and I work for one of the social service depts that's facing a major budget cut. And then the price of everything going up this year and things coming up last year that really ate into our savings...we're not worried yet, but we are concerned. So, no specific goals with the funds other than trying to save as much as we can just in case something comes up. On the conservative side, I'd like to have at least $1,000 saved by the end of the year, but I won't be truly comfortable about it unless there's $3,000. With the lower amount, if a car broke down or a major appliance broke, we wouldn't have to worry, with more saved, we'd have a little breathing room if something truly horrible happened, ya know? You went back to school? Congratulations!!! Darren went back last year, he didn't have to but it'll help him advance in his company and they pay for most of it. To my way of thinking it makes a lot of financial sense because down the road it will pay off.
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Happymom
Member
01-20-2003
| Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - 3:27 pm
Thanks! I'm not sure congrats are in order though! I am overwhelmed and really don't have time for school or homework but the semester started before I could get stuff taken care of around here. So, even though hubby is pitching in with stuff here, I don't think he much likes it, nor do the kids (oh they are fine with dad pitching in more, but they don't want to do more work...they're kids!), but, I think the kids needed to do more anyway...actually now that I am writing this, he needed to do more too, so, I don't actually feel as bad about it now. He is all for me going to school and earning more money down the line. We have Bank of America and that program where they round up all our atm purchases and stick that into our savings. I noticed about $180 in there, so, it does add up. I have to pay down debt with it though. Someday I hope I'll get to the point where we can have a fund for emergencies like you have War. Right now, unfortunately, if car repairs etc come up and if we don't have the money in our checking acct, we have to charge it. Luckily I can usually pay that stuff off before interest is due. Our electric bill was way too high last month. Our bedroom is in our remodeled garage, so, we had been using a space heater at night. We have gone the last several nights without it and been ok. I turn my electric blanket on for just a few mins. when I first climb into bed. Anyway, I hope to see some savings on that bill. Our bill from the city went down $28 for the last 2 mos! I have been doing less laundry. Also, we aren't watering outside. With one kid at college, I guess we're really saving some money in water and sewer! (Although the cost of college is not offset by that savings in water. But I am just going to feel happy about the savings, any savings!) Oh, and I got my tire fixed today for free! I saw $12.75 on the receipt but he told me no charge!
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - 10:43 pm
That's pretty much the driving force behind trying to save as much as possible Hypermom. After the last year our savings went down. We were pretty lucky the car repairs came at a time Darren had worked quite a bit of OT and not on a mortgage check. Right now we're just hoping if anything breaks, it happens at a good time and that so doesn't make me comfy. I won't feel comfy til we have some kind of cushion. My electric bill was small this month, $84 something. Maybe. I'm not so sure what it is now. I got that bill about 2 weeks ago. Saturday I got a disconnect notice for $200 something. I called yesterday, couldn't get ahold of a real person, but had a computer that reviewed my account...it was really odd. It told me I owed over $186 for December, $79 for Jan and $7 for Feb. LOL, I know there's a mistake on their end, $7 for Feb??? Not to mention there's no way they'd let me go 3 months without paying (besides the fact I know damn well I paid Dec and Jan, it's on the bank statement) and that the first bill I was looking at had the Jan payment of $79 listed as being paid whatever day it was paid on. I actually forgot to call them today, but will first thing in the morning to get it straightened out. ETA: Meant to mention that Darren has some similar complaints about college. Between work, kids, home, and school he's running on nothing. His biggest complaint is that during his time home he's always busy with school work and he misses a lot of kid stuff. We found out today, that like last year, half Kota's games will be on Monday nights which is when he's in class. He hates to miss so much with the kids and they're not real happy about it. We keep telling them its only for a couple years (which seems like forever for kids) and how worth it it'll be when he could be making a bit more money and maybe a promotion to a job that doesn't require the 60 hour work weeks for long periods of time. He runs track with Caleb's team when he can and helps with Kota's when he can and spends one on one time with each of them, but it's still less than it was before he started school.
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Beekindpleez
Member
07-18-2006
| Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - 10:48 pm
War...I had a really strange electric bill situation like yours. My last bill was for $648, then the current bill was for $68. DH had purchased a new heater gizmo, so I blamed the $648 on that and made him send it back. Then, when that next one came, I realized something was totally off. Like they doubled it up, or something. Normally my electric bill is about $300.
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - 11:14 pm
Have you called about it yet, Bee? Does seem strange for it to go up that much. I'm more curious than anything about it (though do want to take care of it before they shut it off, lol.) I know damn well, so does my bank statement, that I paid Dec and Jan and I'm not behind and I certainly know it's more than $7 for Feb! Oh, we did have some good news on the uniform front. They're going for red socks, belt, and undershirt and white pants. Same colors as last year. Only thing is that her white pants from last year are dirt/grass stained, so I'll pick her up one pair at Walmart, think I paid 8 or 9 bucks last year for them. We'll use the other pair for backups. And then of course there's never good news without bad, lol, we've been debating rather she needs a new bat or not. I thought hers was too short for her, Darren said no. Then he said it was too short and I said nah, it's fine. Her coach today said, yep too short, she'll either need a new one or can use one of the team bats. I'm ok with her using the team bat, but the problem with that is that when she practices at home or goes to the batting cages she'll be practicing with one that's too short.
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Beekindpleez
Member
07-18-2006
| Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - 11:29 pm
War...I haven't called yet. I was going to wait and get one more to see if it just works itself out. I've just got too much other c.r.a.p. to deal with right now. But it was a weird thing. Same months as yours. I think I'll get my February bill tomorrow, so I'll know more then. Hope you find a good bat.
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Wednesday, February 25, 2009 - 12:02 am
How odd both of us have similar problems at the same time, Bee. I think we're going to wait a bit on the bat...closer to opening day the sporting goods store will have sales so we might get lucky. I'll probably put the can money towards it (was really hoping to save that, but ah well.) For now she's going to use the team bat and I know we can borrow one at the batting cages, though I'm not sure if they have softball bats. To tell the truth I don't know the difference between softball and baseball bats but I do know they will check the girls bats to make sure they are softball bats when the season starts.
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Happymom
Member
01-20-2003
| Wednesday, February 25, 2009 - 10:41 am
We have a store in the area that has all used but good quality sports clothes and equipment. Maybe there is a store like that near you War. Every once in awhile PG&E doubles up the gas or the electric portion of our bills too. It always catches me off guard because I worry they didn't get a payment. Sometimes I think they do it because we haven't put our card out and no one is home when they come to read. (They only need to see the meters every 6 mos. to verify. The other mos., we do it ourselves. We have to turn the dials on the little plastic card and put it in the window. We can't leave our gates unlocked because of the dog.)
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Wednesday, February 25, 2009 - 11:03 am
We don't have a used sporting goods store, unfortunately. I thought about second hand stores, but we checked all those in August looking for Caleb a guitar and I really don't remember seeing bats. I'm about to head off to the grocery store in a bit, as predicted I'm running low on fresh fruits and veggies. Luckily Vons is still having some major sales (lots of dollar this and dollar thats) and I just got their sales ad yesterday and they have some good coupons (box of cereal .99, free 2 liter bottle of soda, $10 off $50.) I don't need $50 of groceries, but my aunt still has some shopping money and I noticed a few things she needed so between the two of us, I might spend that much.
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Monday, March 02, 2009 - 1:54 pm
I forgot to come back and post last week about the electric bill...it was just a glitch. My bill was $84 for Feb and we're all caught up. They had it fixed in no time. So, good news/bad news as always with finances these days. Bad...Darren's company had suspended the matching 401k funds for what was supposed to be a temp basis. Friday they had a meeting and told them they'd get the matching funds for the 3 months they'd been suspended, but that was it, they're cancelling the matching funds all together. Totally sucks, that was a big incentive to save as much as possible out of his checks, but still better than him not having a job. On good news...my mortgage. Last month I recieved a notice that our loan had been sold and we'd have a new mortgage company. My biggest concern at the time was, great where do we send the payment this month?? I got that figured out and today got the first bill for the new company. My payments actually gone down $90 a month! I have no idea why, I read the statement several times and still can't figure it out. It does show what the old payment was and what the new payment is though. I'll have to call tomorrow and see why that is. Also in the mail today, Darren's car registration which is due in May. Since the mortgage is down $90 and his registration is $78 I'm going to jump ahead and pay it this month. Mine will be coming next week (also due in May) and it's quite a bit more, so not having to worry about his along with mine will help some. Sigh...and not in the mail today, my paycheck. Should have been here Saturday.
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Happymom
Member
01-20-2003
| Friday, March 20, 2009 - 7:53 am
War, did you ever get your paycheck? Our state is in such a mess. Did you ever figure out why your mortgage was less? Is it a fixed rate? I'm so glad to hear your electric bill is better! We had a whopper of a bill. It is the darn space heaters. You'd think my husband who bought them would be aware, he is an electrician! The electric portion alone was $391! That was for Jan. I was so mad. So not only did we waste money on the cost of those heaters, but we had the huge bill. Why the heck did we spend all the money on the firewood if he was just going to buy those space heaters for the girls' rooms! I swear he just doesn't get our financial situation. (I've been sick and he's decided to feed everyone with restaurant food a few times! aargg! Once, I can see. We just can't afford this. Sorry for ranting. Marriage is so freakin' hard sometimes!) For Feb., it was down to $104. I've been making sure the girls unplug those heaters every morning. But I am actually going to take them out of their rooms. They'll be fine. Our bedroom is in the remodeled garage and the space heater was the only source of heat. But when my husband was out of town for 2 nights in Feb, I tried it w/o the heater and was fine. So we haven't had it on. I'm so glad we didn't have to have a fight about it. It helps that we had a thermometer out there so I could prove that it didn't get that cold. So, I am saving money by not going to the Dr. even though I thought I had strep throat. I know I don't though. Still sick but I'm glad I waited it out. I am feeling some better. I watched a thing on On Demand about that Duggar family with the 18 kids. It was about them being frugal. They save a lot of money on laundry detergent of all things. But they also have lots of people around to help make it. They showed the math. (and the math on lots of shoes purchased at the thrift store for $1 per pair.) It was interesting to see how much money they save. They do spend $3000 per mo on groceries.
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Wargod
Moderator
07-16-2001
| Friday, March 20, 2009 - 10:44 am
Yeah, Happy, I finally got my check, but each time I'm due one it's taking longer and longer to get. IHSS is one of the programs the governor has slashed and I know there's going to be pay cuts and hour cuts, but won't know for a bit how it's going to effect me. I'm one of the lucky ones either way, we don't depend on my paycheck or need it to survive. I use it to pay utilities and whatevers left for groceries, so if I lose some or all of it, it's gonna hurt and we'll have to tighten up even more, but we won't do without the neccessities ya know? Oh and yeah. It was due to go down (the mortgage.) I never did call, but Darren looked at me like I was nuts when I mentioned it to him cuz it's written in our mortgage papers. It'll drop twice, this was the first time and he thought the next was 12-18 months away. Happymom, be careful with that illness! I took Dakota to the dr last week with a sinus infection, throat infection (wasn't strep,) and fluid in her ears. She finished off the meds this past Sunday and Monday night spiked another high fever. Took her to the dr Tuesday and dr thought it was the virus going around cuz everything looked good except minor throat irritation. Yesterday we went back for a follow up and she was still complaining about her throat. Nurse said strep was going around and did a rapid strep test, it came back positive. So it is going around! Ack ack $391!! I think I'd have fallen down opening that up. Our last gas bill was $123, much better than the $178 the month before. It should be even lower this month, we've hardly used the heaters. Electric bill was still pretty low this time too, but that won't last much longer with summer around the corner. I just noticed Kota needs new shirts yesterday and I'm proud to say the first thing to pop into my head was D.D.'s Discounts. That's where we did such a great job with the clothes after Christmas. So on Darren's next check (this one went to mortgage) we'll head over there for t-shirts at least and might go ahead and buy some summer clothes.
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