Vacation is over...

My unplanned vacation is over, and I am back to work. When the "bad check" crisis hit last Monday, I took an unplanned vacation for the three days before Thanksgiving to resolve the issue. Well, it took practically the entire time to get it resolved. If you want to read a lengthy post about the details click HERE. My tenant's son said he was going to pay December's rent in advance so I "wouldn't have anything to worry about." He also said he would pay it this past Friday (11/23), but as you probably already guessed, I haven't seen the money yet. I am sure next month will be another battle. My tenant is now telling me she is going to move out after the "Holidays," which I took to mean in January. I don't know if it will happen or not, but at least I am getting a possible heads up. I received an unsolicited call this past weekend asking if the apartment was available for rent. When I mentioned it might be in January they said that was perfect... So if they do move out, I may have someone ready to move in right away. I got the marital home listed for sale. If you are interested in seeing the property, or are just curious you can click HERE. My realtor said she may have an interested party already, so I am hoping to hear some good news from her soon. Regrettably, I am back to work. My boss isn't here today, so it seems pretty quiet in the office. Even though my vacation was unplanned, and except for the money crisis, it was for the most part, very enjoyable. Now that I am back, I wish my vacation was longer! It snowed again here Thursday evening, and neighbor kids were making a snowman in the shared yard in front of Sweetie's place, but they didn't get to finish it... So there were a couple of large "snow balls" in the yard for the weekend. My family is planning a Holiday gathering and gift exchange, so I have to create a wish list. I am having a tough time coming up with a list of things I would like to have. Actually my real "wish list" is quite lengthy, but most of the items don't fit within the monetary limit set for the gift exchange! If you had to create a list of things you wanted under $50... What would you ask for? Later Lou

Whammie...

Well the loan company never called me back, so a little while ago, I called them. I asked them "Big Bucks or Whammie?", and they said.. "What?"

After a brief explanation of the old game show "Press Your Luck" (not really, but it makes a better story), I was told that the representative I spoke with yesterday had just stepped out to go to lunch, but if I gave them my SSN they would look up the loan for me. After a brief pause, I got the response, "Yeah, this just came in...!! Oh Sorry, you didn't qualify for the loan." Yeah, right, they had it probably most of the morning, just didn't want to call me and give me the bad news. (sigh)

I asked if I could qualify for a lesser amount, but was quickly told "No," because my credit score was below the minimum value for giving out a loan. I tried to once again express to the representative that most of the bad stuff on my credit was due to "Ex", whom I haven't been married to for seven years, didn't refinance debt "awarded" to her in the divorce settlement. I said that they should look only at the items that were new since our separation, and not the things that I was listed as a co-borrower on before my separation, and they would see that I have paid all of my stuff on time. I tried to argue that the bad credit score wasn't all my fault, and there should be someone alive to review my history other than a computer rating system, but I was told "Sorry, there is nothing we can do."

So basically the 30 minutes I spent on the phone giving my entire financial history was completely in vain, as all they did was pull my credit score, say "No", and move on. (sigh)

So, I guess I am going to either need a lot of baked sale items, or one really, really unique item I can sell on eBay? Any one have a rare old comic book, postage stamp, coin, or other collectible that I could buy cheap? I promise to not return it. :-)

Later Lou

Press my luck...

I spent most of yesterday talking to everyone I knew well enough to ask, how to go about getting "Big Bucks and No Whammies." The results were not great, but they have a little potential:

• Find a loan company that will grant me a loan. A co-worker suggested a company that I called last night. I spent about 30 minutes on the phone giving them my entire life's financial history. The representative told me I would get a call this morning, and I have been waiting all morning for that call... It hasn't happened yet, which leads me to believe from past experience that no news is definitely not good news.
• Ask the head guy at our office, who has a little money, to give me a personal loan. The issue with this is he is my boss's boss. I am saving this suggestion for next to last resort.
• Ask "Sweetie" to get a loan in her name and I make the payments to her in advance. This option sounds good, except that "Sweetie" doesn't want to have anything to do with this house because it involved "Ex", and because she feels that my luck is really bad, and that things aren't going to go as planned, and she will end up having to make the payments. This option is last resort.
• Ask my one of my uncles whom I have hardly spoken to for years, to loan me the money. I wasn't a good kid growing up, so there is a little bit of bad blood there. And to top off the situation, my brother had a similar situation a few years ago, and when he asked to borrow a few bucks, they told him they wouldn't help him. And he was the good kid growing up, so this one is beyond the last resort.
• Hope that money falls out of the sky, or that some lucky lottery winner decides to read my blog and show me pity and send me a small portion of his/her winnings. Yeah, I am dreaming, but I figure it's better than having a crime against my imagination - Right Limpy?
• I could petition the government for a grant... or I could sell them a few of my hammers... I understand they were buying a few for a couple grand each a few years ago. Nah, they would probably arrest me, or worse yet, make me work for them.

OK, so I am rambling... but it's what I do.... I am trying really, really hard to be patient for the phone call from the loan company. But it's only 15 minutes until the morning is over, and they did say they would let me know in the morning... Unless their office is in California, or Hawaii, then maybe I have a little more time...

Later Lou

Good News...??

This weekend I talked with a Realtor and I met with a contractor about the marital home.

Real quick update for new readers:

I separated from "Ex" in January 2000, and divorced in Dec 2001. She got to keep practically everything including the marital home. She lived there with her new husband and my kids until Sept 2006, after she bought herself a new $170,000 home on the outskirts of the school district - good for her. She put the marital home up for sale.

I lived in rental apartments for 7 years until I was able to buy the duplex building I have been living in for the past 3 years. I closed on the duplex in May 2007, and in July I rented out the second apartment.

In June 2007 the "Ex" had not yet sold the marital home, and decided that she no longer wanted to pay the two mortgages on the old marital home, and since I had all this money to buy my property that she would stop making payments on the mortgages. In the seven years of our separation she never refinanced the mortgages, so they were still in my name, and when she stopped paying on them, my credit rating took a nose dive. To stop the credit score "bleeding" I had her sign the property's title back over to me, and I paid the back mortgage payments, and have continued paying the mortgages and utilities since then.

Now back to the present:

My tenant has not been a reliable, on-time rent payer, so I don't have the rent money to offset the new expenses and I have had to use my credit cards more than I would like in order to survive. I have stopped the downward spiral of the credit rating, but in it's place I now have a downward spiral of available money.

So, I have decided to try to get rid of the marital home. This past week I contacted a Realtor who is supposed to be really good at moving properties, even in my real estate depressed area. The Realtor reviewed the property and told me that it could definitaly sell, but that I had to do some repairs to the place to make it appealling to potential buyers. Before this, I had already had a few people look at the place and give me estimates. Just to be sure they were good estimates, I had a new contractor come out this weekend and give me another quote.

The property needs about $10,000 worth of work to make it "sell-worthy". The Realtor said that with those repairs it could be listed for an amount that if it sold at that amount I would would be able to recoup the repair money, and still make a profit. The really good news is that I could accept an offer much lower than the listing price, and still break even or make a few bucks. The Realtor is pretty confident that the property could move pretty easily with the right advertising at the right places. So if the Realtor is right, I could be rid of the drain on my income and get a little extra money to pay off all my credit card debt, and finally get my head above the debt level.

There is only one road block to this whole scenario... coming up with the $10,000 to do the repairs. I only have roughly $6,500 in available credit, and my savings have been pillaged to purchase my duplex back in May. I am roughly about $4,500 short, and I don't know how to get the remaining amount.

I have already tried my local bank, my immediate family and other mortgage/loan places. No one is willing to loan an amount that small to someone who has the credit rating I have. As a matter of fact, one of my credit card companies recently reduced my "available credit" from $2,000 to $0 because of the dip in my credit rating... Yeah, thanks "Ex" for bailing on the mortgages in May, you were very thoughtful! (yeah, right!)

Anyway, I may have to take Tysgirl up on her offer to start a phone sex company... Or maybe I could have a bake sale?

Later Lou

No Money...

I currently have $0.85 in my checking account... Woo Hoo!! I am wealthy!

I am not really bad at managing my money, it's just that I don't have very much of it to manage... I make a good income, however I don't get to keep any of it. I pay taxes, child support, health insurance, and loans all of which are taken out of my paycheck before I even get it. So, that leaves me to "take home" less than 40% of what I earn. With the remaining amount I pay my car payment, car insurance, 3 mortgages, 3 sets of utility bills, credit card balances and if I am really lucky, I get a couple of bucks for groceries, and gas for the car... phew...

I need a new source of income... Anyone want to hire a used software engineer? Not that I am limiting my abilities to software engineering, because I can learn a new skill.... possibly.

OK I am done whining. There are a lot people with a lot worse problems and situations than me. So, I am going to go back to work, and wait patiently for my 40% at the end of the month.

Later Lou

New Dollar Coins

Yesterday as I was heading out to lunch a fellow coworker stopped me to say "Hello". He noticed I had a small handful of the new Presidential Golden Dollars in my hand, which I was going to use to pay for lunch. He hadn't seen them yet, so I showed him the coins. If you haven't gotten one of these new dollar coins, you should stop to your local evil bank and ask for them. The government is going to mint four different $1 coins each year for the next 11+ years. Each coin will have a different president on the front, called the "obverse", of the coin, and all of them will have the Statue of Liberty on the back, or the "reverse". They are a golden color, and even though they aren't real gold, they are cool to look at. This year they have already released coins with George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson. Anyway, back to the story... We started to talk about the minting errors he had heard about the new $1 coins. As with all coins there are tons of errors (remember it's the government who makes them) to discuss, but he focused on the new edge lettering. On the edge of these new coins the mint inscribed the words: "In God We Trust", "E Plurbis Unum", and the year of the coin's mintage ("2007"), and the mint mark (usually a "P" or a "D"). They did this to give more room for the presidential portrait, and to make the coin more unique.

One of the most well known errors on the coins is the missing wording on the edge of the coin. At first some people who got the coins thought this was intentional to remove the "In God We Trust" from the coins with all of the political "hay" about religion and government, but this isn't the case. Instead it was a minting error that created some coins without the writing, and they are now being called "Godless coins". Some of the Washington "Godless" coins have sold on eBay for $600, but most sell for around $40-50. The Adams "Godless" coins are rarer and are commanding an higher price. Of course there are a few people trying to cash in on this error by filing off the edge writing and trying to sell the fake "Godless" coins as authentic errors. My friend said that he heard of another error related to the edge writing. He said that the mint intended for the writing to be read correctly when the coin was face up, but some of the coins have the writing face down. I hadn't heard that, and I thought he was pulling my leg, so I kinda dismissed him with a wave, and went off to lunch. Well today, pulled out a handful of my $1 presidential coins and I looked at the edge writing. Of the 20 coins I examined, 8 of them had the writing face up, and 12 had the writing face down. If it's an error, I have a whole bunch of them! Which of course makes it unlikely that the error is worth anything. I did a quick Internet search and found that it is in fact not an error! The mint never intended to control the direction of the edge text. The machine they use to inscribe the edge does not check the direction of the coin before it inscribes, so there is roughly a 50/50 chance of the text being face up or face down.

So if someone stops you on the way to lunch and tries to tell you that $1 coin with the text the "opposite" way is worth money, don't be fooled and wave him (or her) off and continue on to lunch. Later Lou

Sigh...

Bank Update:

To the bank's credit, they didn't charge me the overdraft fees, as they said they wouldn't. However, I still have a negative balance because an automatic bill payment came out of my account yesterday, and that WILL give me an overdraft charge... So all in all, I lost $105 to the bank in fees this month... (sigh)

Cavalier Update:

Tuesday after "Two's" scout meeting we got the new battery installed. After we brought the car back to the "Ex's" place, and he was backing up in the parking spot, I heard an usual noise from the car. I asked "Two" if he checked the transmission fluid when he was going over the car, and he said he did. He assured me it was checked properly, and had enough fluid in it.

I told him that the transmission sounded bad when he backed up and that he should try a test the next day to see if it was just a noise or a more serious problem. I suggested he drive to the end of "Ex's" drive way, and put the care in reverse and backup the length of the driveway. The driveway has a very slight downward slope, so has he reversed it would be a very slight up hill, just enough to put a little pressure on the transmission.

So this past Wednesday when he got home from school, he did the test. The car didn't pass. It only backed up the driveway about 90% of the way, and then gave out. The car no longer goes in reverse. The optimist in me says, "I am glad we found out now instead of when you were out driving around." The pessimist in me says, "How are we going to come up with the money necessary to fix the transmission?"

"Two" was very upset because the transmission work will cost pretty close to his entire purchase price of the car, and of course he doesn't have the cash now. It will take him about 2½ months to save up the money for the repair.

I am going to take the car to a local transmission shop, and get a proper estimate. The estimate the mechanic gave me over the phone without seeing the car is around $700 for a used transmission or $1,050 to rebuild the existing one. I am hoping that he will give me a better estimate when he sees it. (sigh)

Parking update:

I forgot to move the trash cans I was using as a parking space barrier to the curb. So Thursday morning when the trash collectors came I expected they wouldn't empty the cans... I was wrong, they did... They just emptied them, turned them over, and put them back where I had the barrier setup... SOOOO... I haven't opened up the drive way in front of my garage to see if the neighbor will return... I think after this weekend I will remove the barrier and put the trash cans away... It looks bad with the cans sitting out in the driveway. (sigh)

Bowling update:

We officially sucked as a bowling team last night. Ok, that's just me expressing my extreme displeasure at not winning any games last night. We don't suck completely, just a little bit. The team we played last night was just better than us. Last week however we did win 2 games and total points, so we moved into second place. After this week's loss, I am thinking we will be at the bottom of the list again! (sigh).

Sweetie update:

At the end of the post "Weekend Work...", I said the following:

I am not sure exactly where we "are". We didn't really make up, but we didn't really say we would stay apart... We are somewhere in between.

Well... We are still talking to one another, and planning events and outings together. This upcoming weekend, "Sweetie" mentioned she would like to do something outside like go on a hike or something. Personally I am happy for the opportunity to spend time with her, as I really enjoy being with her, but at the same time I don't want to feel I am forcing her to be with me by my continuing to "chase" her when she has told me she wants to "move on." Maybe this weekend we can have a heart to heart and either decide to try to make a real go of it, or do an actual separation. (sigh) Tenant Update: I still haven't asked my tenants for the October rent... yeah, yeah, yeah... I know I need to be more stern, but I really hate being the "bad guy", or the "mean landlord" and demanding the rent. (sigh) New News: As I was typing this post, my brother just called and told me we finally got a bill for the funeral home. I haven't written about it, but a few months ago, my mother past away. The funeral director was seemingly in no hurry to get his money, and didn't send out the bill for quite some time. Anyway, the bill is for $6,000, and after we use whatever money my Mom had saved, which isn't much, we (my brother, my two sisters and I) have to share the remaining cost. Supposedly my mom had enough money to cover at least half of it so that means I am going to have to come up with about $750. (sigh) Later Lou

I hate banks...

I hate banks... Not the simple piggy banks, or the mattress banks, I mean the buildings with tellers, a safe, and security guards. Yeah, I know they are necessary. Yeah, my brother works for one of those evil places, and he is even a bank officer. I just can't stand it when they take my money, and tell me it's my fault! (ok... it was a little bit my fault... ) I overdrafted my account, and since I check my account online all the time, I noticed my mistake right away, before the overdraft was "officially" posted to my account and they charged me for it. I transfered enough money from one account at the same bank to the one that I had overdrafted, so it wouldn't be negative any longer. So even though I did the transfer on Tuesday, the bank didn't post the transfer until Wednesday... Any other time they post transfers on the same day, almost instantanously... I mean the money is still in their "safe", just being moved from one account to another, so it's not like they have to wait for the check to clear right? Well because they posted the transfer the following day, I got charged 2 over draft fees which were $35 each!... When I transfered the money I didn't transfer enough to cover the unexpected $70 withdrawal from my account, so my account overdrafted again. Today, I looked at my account again, and saw it was overdrafted again and flipped! I have three more expected transactions posted to come out of my account today, and if I didn't do something, they were going to charge me three more $35 dollar fees! For those without a calculator handy, that's $105 dollars, or a two day total of $175 in fees! So in an effort to prevent the additional $105 dollars in fees, I broke my piggy bank and wrapped up $58 worth of coins. I then went to my credit union and withdrew all the money I had in my savings there (which was only $80), and ran to the bank to cover the overdraft. The teller confirmed that if I made the cash deposit today I would avoid all $105 fees. The account balance won't be updated until tomorrow, so I won't know if I was successful at avoiding the fees until then. Even so, I am preparing myself to see some overdraft fees posted on my account tomorrow, because I just know banks are evil and take your money. It always seems they withdraw their money BEFORE they deposit yours, and then tell you "Sorry, you overdafted, and we had to charge those fees to cover our costs." To be fair, since my brother does work at a bank, I know banks aren't really evil, and they don't intentionally adjust their accounting rules so they always win (at least I hope so), but it sure seems like it some times. I mean this whole problem wouldn't have occured if they would have processed the transfer of funds before they processed the witdrawals from my account. I wouldn't have had a single overdraft, and I would be very happy... Instead due to an accounting policy, the bank is $70 richer, and I am very UNhappy! I suppose there are a couple of solutions to prevent this from ever happening again... 1) I could keep more money in the account and never let the balance get that low... 2) I could apply for overdraft protection... or 3) I could just use my piggy bank and pay all of my bills with coins and not use the bank... Yeah, I like that one! Later Lou

Luck

I have heard it said by other people, "If I didn't have bad luck, I would have no luck at all". Well that pretty much sums up most of my life. I mean, I have some great things in my life; a woman that I adore, and love, kids that I couldn't live without, friends that keep me sane, and good health to enjoy everything. However, day to day, things happen that keep me from feeling I am on top of the world... Maybe that's by design so I don't get a swelled head... Thanks God for keeping me in line! :-) Seriously though let me give you a brief run down of the last few weeks. Before you read this, let me tell you that this is a average week for me, some times things are worse, other times they are better. BTW: Most of my bad luck seems to follow directly after some good luck. I got my income tax refund recently, but due to a screw up on 2002 taxes (I claimed the same kids as my Ex), I have to repay around $1,300.00 to Uncle Sam. I found (actually my girlfriend did) a great new apartment for me that has much more room, and a garage for about the same monthly expenses as my current place. However, it doesn't have any appliances. So with the new appliances, and the deposit for the place, the rest of the income tax is now gone. I had wanted to get a bigger TV for my living room, not a 60" or anything, just a nice 30"... Oh well, maybe next year I started to move, and my new car (2002 Ford Focus wagon), started making this horrendous noise. This noise seemed to come from everywhere, and only when the car was moving. The noise sounded like a really bad ass set of studded winter tires, and since I had just got new tires I had thought the sound was them... That was until it got louder and louder... I took the car to my dealership, since the car is still new and under warrenty... They don't service that car even though I bought it from them with an exented warrenty on top of it... So they sent my car out, and gave me a rental for free. Now I have no car to move into my new apt. with. Sigh... After a week my car is finally fixed. It had a bad wheel bearing, and it took 7 days to repair it. Great warrenty huh? The dealership called me at 5:20PM to pick up my car and return the rental. They close at 6:00PM. I head the the dealership and when I am almost there (I can see the place) a pickup truck stops abruptly in front of me. I stop quickly also, and immediately look in my rearview mirror to see if anyone is coming up behind me... Well there was... It was another pickup truck, however he didn't seem to notice that we had stopped in front of him, so he didn't slow down (or so that I could tell), so he plowed into the back of the rental car which is within feet of being returned. The rental, and I, were pushed into the pickup in front of us, and so on until there were a total of five (5) vehicles collided together.

The good news is no one was seriously hurt, and I escaped with only bruised ribs from the seat belt, which I am glad I was wearing. I also got my car back, and the insurance of the person who hit the rental is paying for the rental car. Is that good or bad luck? You decided. And to top of this last week, I have misplaced (lost) my PDA. I had a Compaq iPaq H3870 PocketPC that I used all the time, and I took everywhere with me... Including to the laundry, which is where I think I left it. After multiple calls there, and a visit there, it's still missing. I have checked both apartments (remember I am moving), and I can't find it. So there goes not only the money I spent on the PDA, but a piece of my life that I use all the time. I have the money to replace it, but there goes my TV again! Good or bad luck? This past weekend, the car I just got out of the shop has now got the "Check Engine" light lit on the dashboard. I called the dealership and they said to bring it in, but it will take a few days because they have to "send it out" again... Which means a rental, and who knows what else? Needless to say I am a little afraid of taking my car in again... Wouldn't you? So I look back and see that I have recovered well from most of the bad things in life recently, but if I didn't have those bad things, I can't help but think of how much nicer my life would be now. I would have much more money in the bank, I wouldn't have sore ribs, and I wouldn't have the worry about whether my new car is going to breakdown, I would be completely moved into my new apartment, and maybe I would be happier at work! Nah! That would really be pushing it! :-)