Author Archive for Jimmy

First and foremost, let me aplogize for the ten-day delay in posting – I honestly feel terrible about that. It’s the same lame excuse every other M.I.A. blogger tends to come up with, but let me just tell you – things have been pretty hectic around here lately.

I won’t bore you with every single detail, but I do have a bit of news that I feel obligated to share with you. I’ve spent the last week negotiating the sale of MoneyRemix. Yes, you read that correctly – after spending countless hours pouring over thousands of lines of HTML and personal finance news articles and despite the strong encouragement from friends and family, I may be offloading MoneyRemix in the coming days.

The sale was actually supposed to have been completed by now, but there is a holdup with the funding and now that I’ve had a week to sit and think about letting go of a project that I put so much effort in, I think I’m having second thoughts about the sale. Of course I don’t intend to go back on my word to the buyer, but let’s just say that if the funding doesn’t work out, I’m not going to be terribly upset.

Again, I apologize for my lack of communication. As soon as there are any noteworthy developments, you’ll be among the first to know. As always, your comments are sincerely appreciated.

I just wanted to take a minute to wish everyone a happy and safe 4th of July. Make sure to lather on that sunscreen and run like hell when you light those firecrackers!

I’m back home, in Virginia Beach, taking a much needed vacation and spending some time with friends and family who I only get to see once or twice a year. The 4th of July and the week of Christmas are the two times each year that I can completely forget about finances and the stresses of work, so you better belive I’m outside, making the most of it!

Anyhow, I’ll be back to the grind on Tuesday the 8th. Until then, I hope you have a fabulous 4th!

One of the most common excuses I hear from people who have difficulty saving money is that they simply don’t make enough to put any aside. By the time they pay the mortgage, the car loan, childcare, insurance, etc, there just isn’t any money left to put into savings. I actually used that same excuse until I discovered the unbelievable power of “snowflaking” six or seven months ago. It took me a few months to really get the snowflaking concept going, but now that I’ve been at it, I’m able to reduce my debt by $560/month…after all the bills are paid!

What is snowflaking?

Before I answer that question directly, think about the term “snowflake” for a second. What comes to mind? If you’re thinking about small, insignificant pieces of ice that melt the second they touch the ground, you’re not too far off from the norm, but you are missing something important. Snowflakes accumulate rapidly and when they do, they form a much larger and more significant entity – a snowball.

In terms of personal finance, snowflakes are extra bits of money you have left over after you’re bills are paid and any extra money you can squeeze out of your budget over time. The beauty of snowflaking is that you can literally start out with an amount as small as a few dollars each month. Over time, the minimum payments on your debts will be reduced and the money that you save on the lower payments would be considered additional snowflakes. The point of snowflaking is to accumulate enough snowflakes to eventually create a debt snowball that completely steam rolls your debt into oblivion.

How I applied the snowflaking system

Step 1: Getting the initial $300/month snowflake
When I was first beginning the snowflake system, I discovered that after the minimums on my monthly bills were paid and I cut back on any extraneous spending, I had an extra $300/month that I could start with. I have a difficult time writing large checks to repay debt, so I decided to split that into four, weekly payments of $75 which makes the pill a little easier to swallow.

Step 2: I found another $80/month snowflake
I only had to repeat step 1 a couple times before I paid my Best Buy credit card off in full which freed up another $80/month. Instead of blowing that money on eating out or purchasing clothes that I didn’t really need, I turned it into a snowflake and applied it to my debt snowball, which now stood at $380/month.

Step 3: I found yet another $80/month snowflake
At this point, I was pretty stoked about saving and repaying on my debt to the tune of nearly $400/month. I began doing some calculations and realized that I could have all of my credit cards paid off in a pretty reasonable amount of time if I just stuck with the program. Never one to be content, I decided that I could do even better, so I managed to cut another $80/month out of my budget (I nixed my gym and NetFlix memberships) which I turned into another snowflake.

Step 4: I received a raise and created a $100/month snowflake
A couple of months ago, I received a raise at work and easily created another $100/month snowflake from it. I could have gone all out and added another $50 to it, but I decided to also increase my Roth IRA contribution which was a little puny.

Snowflakes are beautiful things

All said and done, after only a few months of snowflaking, I went from saving $0/month to saving $560/month. Not in my wildest dreams did I ever think I’d have the ability to save that much money every month.

Although I’m currently using the snowflaking process to pay off my credit cards, the beautiful thing is that once I’m done repaying them, I can apply the snowflaking concept to my investments and retirement savings. Instead of making a weekly payment to Discover Card, I plan on maxing out my Roth IRA with weekly contributions and increasing my 401K contribution.

Your experience with snowflaking

Needless to say, I’m a HUGE proponent of snowflaking and I honestly feel that it’s the one method of saving that has been vital to my significant debt reduction over the last year. If any of you are currently in the process of snowflaking your debt away or accumulating additional savings using the snowflake method, please share your tips, tricks, and success stories – I’d love to hear them!

Image by: J. Star

“Personal Finance: The Week in Review” is a weekly series of posts highlighting my favorite personal finance articles from around the blogosphere.

It’s hard to believe that the 4th of July is right around the corner – this year is already half-way over! Wasn’t it New Year’s Eve just a few weeks ago? It is absolutely amazing how fast time flies sometimes.

I’m actually leaving for vacation to Virginia Beach (my hometown) on Wednesday, July 2 for five days of seafood dinners, swimming, and suntans. Don’t fret though, I already have posts scheduled to publish while I’m away and I’ll be checking in periodically to respond to all comments. (Not-so-subtle hint – I really appreciate comments from you all )

I should also mention that I would absolutely LOVE to get your feedback on MoneyRemix if you have a few minutes to spare. If there’s a particular topic you’d be interested in reading about, let me know and I’ll add it to the queue.

Oh, and don’t forget, If you haven’t already subscribed, you can receive instant notification of new posts from MoneyRemix by subscribing to the feed or by subscribing through email.

With that said, please enjoy this week’s “Personal Finance: The Week in Review”!

• Five Cent Nickel: Three Things You Should Know About Political Donations
  Political donations are governed slightly differently than charitable ones.

• Moolanomy: Test Drive Your Home Ownership Experience
  A terrific idea if you’re contemplating the purchase of a home but aren’t quite sure if you’re ready to take the financial plunge yet

• Millionaire Money Habits: Money and Happiness
  Can money buy happiness? That’s a subjective question that only you can answer.

• Consumerism Commentary: Are You Expecting an Inheritance?
  If you’re relying on an inheritance to build your nest egg, you may want to give that strategy a second thought.

• brip blap: how to be a location independent family, part 1
  Like the thought of being able to pick up your stuff and move without a care in the world? This article’s for you.

• Frugal Dad: How We Spent Our Economic Stimulus Check
  This was one of my favorite blog posts I’ve read in quite some time and I can totally relate to the “natural high” from paying off debt.

• Get Rich Slowly: My Mid-Year Financial Checkup: I Am Spending Too Much on Food
  J.D. came to same realization that I probably would if I actually sat down and crunched the numbers like he did.

• Money Ning: Setup Google Alerts to Get Coupons and Deals
  Money Ning provides some excellent tips for getting the most out of Google Alerts.

Interested in reading more from my favorite personal finance blogs? Head on over to my list of Must Read Personal Finance Blogs.

Last week, I purchased a docking station for my laptop on ebay and it arrived yesterday afternoon, in extremely poor condition. Before I even opened the severely mangled box, I was already trying to recall the company’s return policy.

After inspecting the contents of the box, I wasn’t terribly happy with the significant wear I saw on the components, but I decided to plug everything in and test the functionality anyway. To my surprise, despite the broken keyboard/mouse receiver, everything worked pretty well although I continued testing it thoroughly the rest of the night.

Irrespective of the fact that the product actually worked, I felt hat I had been duped into purchasing something I otherwise wouldn’t have. The ebay auction stated that the item was “new in an open box”, however it had clearly been used, extensively, and in my opinion, that’s false advertising.

With that thought in mind, I decided to write an email to the seller informing him of my dissatisfaction and requesting a partial refund. Below is the email I sent: Continued