For most of my life, I’ve been convinced that happiness depends upon your own independence. Financial independence, yes. But emotional independence too – the strength to stand alone on something, to not rely on others for your sense of purpose. I’ve always lived that way. I’ve moved to new cities with a pretty slim bank account because I knew it was the right place for me. I’ve struck it out alone, and been proud of it, even when I had zero friends and stayed home reading every Saturday night. But eventually I know I will want to give up a portion of that independence – for a really cute Guy. :)
My ING-Account is still nick-named just “Business School Savings,” but that’s just to preserve the illusion of self-respect. I'm saving for grad school expenses. But I’m really more excited about saving for the frou-frou white dress. I want Vera. I want the sit-down dinner. And naturally, in my independent way, I want to finance it myself. My parents gave me the financial support to graduate from a great undergraduate institution without any student loans. I simply won’t allow them to pay for cake for three hundred of my friends too.
According to the wedding budget calculator, I will need upwards of $10-20K dollars to have the wedding I’m dreaming of. Right now it’s sitting at $0 because it tends to be the last priority. (I mean, I don’t exactly have a ring.) But I need to save anyway if I’m serious about this goal. So, I’m starting small and my new goal, now that the Dog Fund is over, is to filter away at least $100 a month.
Showing posts with label priorities. Show all posts
Showing posts with label priorities. Show all posts
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
How do you set a budget when you *technically* have no income?
So, I know I need to set a new, realistic budget for when I'm in school. A lot of things will be different. The main one = no income.
So how do you set a budget when you don’t have any money coming in? A lot of financial aid and federal loans will cover a good deal of the straight tuition part of my expenses. But then I expect I will also have one big lump of funds from loans I take out. I will still need a budget so I prevent myself from burning through all of my loan money too quickly, but I know it’s going to look and feel a lot differently than my current financial planning. A couple of the different dynamics to note:
One, I won’t be amassing savings – so I will need to stop all automatic deductions for my current accounts and maintain only my cash-value life insurance and my Roth from my loan money.
Two, very limited capital - there is a limited amount of loans I can take out, as restricted by the “Student Budget” that Stanford has calculated. I won’t be able to take out any more money than they have determined it costs. For me, that total is $53,000 for each year, of which, $28,000 has to be devoted to school costs and $25,000 is for everything else. I literally can’t spend beyond $25,000 each year, or I will have to dip into my paltry savings or incur – gasp – credit card debt.
Three, invisible expenses - there are a lot of “mandatory” items that are not included in that student budget – like, flights for all of the job interviews and all of the special study trips that you HAVE to take advantage of – otherwise, why go to school full-time?
Four, extreme temptation- I think it is going to be hard to stay in the mode of reducing expenses or keeping expenses low, because business school is this very finite period of time when you are going to be surrounded by the most amazing set of people and experiences yet. Who wants to think about keeping to the bare necessities as the backdrop for THAT? Any tips?
So how do you set a budget when you don’t have any money coming in? A lot of financial aid and federal loans will cover a good deal of the straight tuition part of my expenses. But then I expect I will also have one big lump of funds from loans I take out. I will still need a budget so I prevent myself from burning through all of my loan money too quickly, but I know it’s going to look and feel a lot differently than my current financial planning. A couple of the different dynamics to note:
One, I won’t be amassing savings – so I will need to stop all automatic deductions for my current accounts and maintain only my cash-value life insurance and my Roth from my loan money.
Two, very limited capital - there is a limited amount of loans I can take out, as restricted by the “Student Budget” that Stanford has calculated. I won’t be able to take out any more money than they have determined it costs. For me, that total is $53,000 for each year, of which, $28,000 has to be devoted to school costs and $25,000 is for everything else. I literally can’t spend beyond $25,000 each year, or I will have to dip into my paltry savings or incur – gasp – credit card debt.
Three, invisible expenses - there are a lot of “mandatory” items that are not included in that student budget – like, flights for all of the job interviews and all of the special study trips that you HAVE to take advantage of – otherwise, why go to school full-time?
Four, extreme temptation- I think it is going to be hard to stay in the mode of reducing expenses or keeping expenses low, because business school is this very finite period of time when you are going to be surrounded by the most amazing set of people and experiences yet. Who wants to think about keeping to the bare necessities as the backdrop for THAT? Any tips?
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
United Way Charitable Giving
This year I’m begrudgingly accepting the coordinator position for my company’s United Way campaign, and this morning was the rally. So this means I’ll be leading a giving campaign for 200+ people. The giving levels are pretty good, actually. As an incentive, they give you a free vacation day if you give at one of two levels:
The Love-Share Level – Give .7% of you income. For me this would be about $20 bucks deducted from each paycheck, or $40 a month. I think this might be a little out of my reach, right now.
The Goal-Share Level – Give 12% more than you gave last year, and also at least .5% of your income. Which for me, would be $12 out of my paycheck or $24 bucks a month.
This is certainly more doable. But I like the flexibility to give to other things throughout the year – my coworkers cancer research walk, the Alzheimer’s fund around Christmas in memory of my grandmother. More money to the Obama campaign in the next month, for sure. I don’t like having to say no to giving down the road. So I decided I would give $8 per paycheck, or $16 a month, for a total of around $200. And in the end, this is actually double what I gave last year, so I still feel good about increasing my giving levels as my income grows.
The Love-Share Level – Give .7% of you income. For me this would be about $20 bucks deducted from each paycheck, or $40 a month. I think this might be a little out of my reach, right now.
The Goal-Share Level – Give 12% more than you gave last year, and also at least .5% of your income. Which for me, would be $12 out of my paycheck or $24 bucks a month.
This is certainly more doable. But I like the flexibility to give to other things throughout the year – my coworkers cancer research walk, the Alzheimer’s fund around Christmas in memory of my grandmother. More money to the Obama campaign in the next month, for sure. I don’t like having to say no to giving down the road. So I decided I would give $8 per paycheck, or $16 a month, for a total of around $200. And in the end, this is actually double what I gave last year, so I still feel good about increasing my giving levels as my income grows.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
The Quarter-Life Thing
Warning, this is going to be a bit of a random rant. So, where I currently work, I’m pretty much the youngest one in the office. The rest of my peers are all married with kids. Which I can deal with, I’m adaptable! But in our lunchtime conversations they pretty much squash all romanticism one could ever have about the future. They complain about their spouses, about their kids, about their lack of freedom, and basically sound miserable eighty percent of the time, and bored to tears the other twenty percent. I exaggerate slightly. But, really. They have basically stripped me of any desire to daydream. Now I know that being married’s not all that great, and having kids is the worst idea ever.
So my quarter life is not all “what do I do with my life? What’s my purpose?” My quarter-life is delaying all of THAT as long as possible. Maybe that’s why I’ve let that wedding fund hang out there at 0% for so long. For now, I just want to move to a fun city with the Guy and have adventures and travel and eat at nice restaurants and entertain in our cute boho condo and play hip music that really belongs in an ipod commercial.
Sorry not more substantive, but that’s what’s on my mind this week. While I might envy their financial stability, sometimes it’s just pretty damn nice to be young in the world. (And probably why I already spent $60 of my $100 clothing budget on lingerie. Oops.) So, I’m going to Chicago for a long weekend and it’s going to be fabulous. Starting Friday at 9 AM, I will be in high heels the entire weekend, playing and exploring in the city, heading to a posh wedding, staying out late, having lots of drinks, and meeting new people. Yes. Good.
So my quarter life is not all “what do I do with my life? What’s my purpose?” My quarter-life is delaying all of THAT as long as possible. Maybe that’s why I’ve let that wedding fund hang out there at 0% for so long. For now, I just want to move to a fun city with the Guy and have adventures and travel and eat at nice restaurants and entertain in our cute boho condo and play hip music that really belongs in an ipod commercial.
Sorry not more substantive, but that’s what’s on my mind this week. While I might envy their financial stability, sometimes it’s just pretty damn nice to be young in the world. (And probably why I already spent $60 of my $100 clothing budget on lingerie. Oops.) So, I’m going to Chicago for a long weekend and it’s going to be fabulous. Starting Friday at 9 AM, I will be in high heels the entire weekend, playing and exploring in the city, heading to a posh wedding, staying out late, having lots of drinks, and meeting new people. Yes. Good.
Monday, February 4, 2008
Questions to Ask Yourself
Over the weekend, I came across the show The Millionaire Inside, and started watching "debt confessions" on late-night TV... in my near slumber-stupor, the moderator of the program seemed unreasonably harsh. They kept posing these impossible questions: "What is more important to you - your home or your business? What is more important to you - changing jobs to something you love or getting married?" Insane!
Glad I'm not at the point where I need to be answering such questions. However, it does raise the all important question of choices and priorities in my own financial life. It's nice to phrase this as a tradeoff. Too often I make choices by assuming that I have to do something, because it's part of me. For instance, I'm not going to stop all of my weekend social activity to save money, because I'm in my early twenties. It would be foolish for me to be a hermit until I have reached 100% of my financial goals, because then I'll be in my early forties... and it's less fun to dance on the bar then.
However, I can start posing the priorities/choices question: what is more important to me now? Having 3 more drinks? Or being able to pay off $30 more of my credit card? Taking cabs all over town? Or being a little closer to having my emergency fund whole? Or even questions among questions: going out to a concert or being able to eat out once more this month? I think I'm going to focus on making better choices within my priorities (being social, but practicing some good cost avoidance while I'm out there!)
Glad I'm not at the point where I need to be answering such questions. However, it does raise the all important question of choices and priorities in my own financial life. It's nice to phrase this as a tradeoff. Too often I make choices by assuming that I have to do something, because it's part of me. For instance, I'm not going to stop all of my weekend social activity to save money, because I'm in my early twenties. It would be foolish for me to be a hermit until I have reached 100% of my financial goals, because then I'll be in my early forties... and it's less fun to dance on the bar then.
However, I can start posing the priorities/choices question: what is more important to me now? Having 3 more drinks? Or being able to pay off $30 more of my credit card? Taking cabs all over town? Or being a little closer to having my emergency fund whole? Or even questions among questions: going out to a concert or being able to eat out once more this month? I think I'm going to focus on making better choices within my priorities (being social, but practicing some good cost avoidance while I'm out there!)
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