Personal Finance Weekend Discussion and Victory Thread for the week of August 10, 2018 |
- Weekend Discussion and Victory Thread for the week of August 10, 2018
- PA: Apple support will not directly call you to let you know your Apple ID has been hacked!
- Are using financial apps like Mint safe?
- Little Cousin spent over $5000 in game marketplace without his parents knowledge nor authorization
- Paying $2200/month for healthcare, 70M 50F. Good income, but no money left at end of month. We are healthy but this it's killing us!!
- Time to leave Wells Fargo? Such a pain.
- $975 water bill
- Just got out of 2 high interest car loans within a week. You can do this!
- I have been living with my mother for the last 15 years and she just suddenly died with no will.
- Just made $3k at summer internship and I’m looking to invest $2k
- I am broke right now. I don't see any way
- I made a mistake and now accidentally overcontributed/converted to roth ira, please help
- I found out I am underpaid. My annual review, including compensation, is this month. Advice?
- Was sent to collections agency over tuition
- Quoted insurance job to replace floor was approved, now being asked to lower bid
- My retired mother is being forced to pay hospital bills for my late father.
- Kicked out at 18 by abusive parents
- Re-Post;; 22yr old stuck at home, what do? No cash.
- Wife was just promoted but at bottom of pay scale
- Pay an extra $150 a month on my home loan principal or put it into a Vanguard S&P 500 Index fund every month?
- Pros & Cons of a Credit Union vs alternate options
- Everyday changes in habit that saves money
- Are there benefits to contributing your maximum contribution to Roth IRA and 529 all in one shot versus contributing over the span of the year?
- Is moving funds from crypto to investing apps worth?
| Weekend Discussion and Victory Thread for the week of August 10, 2018 Posted: 10 Aug 2018 02:06 PM PDT If you need help, please check the PF Wiki to see if your question might be answered there.This thread is for personal finance discussions, questions, and sharing your success stories:
A big thank you to the many PFers who take time to answer other people's questions! For past threads, please search the Weekly Archive. [link] [comments]  |
| PA: Apple support will not directly call you to let you know your Apple ID has been hacked! Posted: 10 Aug 2018 05:26 PM PDT Sorry if this is the wrong sub.... My wife has been called 4 times today by "Apple Support" to try and get remoted into her computer. It is a total scam! Please be careful and mindful when strangers call or email you. [link] [comments]  |
| Are using financial apps like Mint safe? Posted: 10 Aug 2018 03:32 AM PDT A coworker recently told me about how he uses an app called Mint where it logged into his banking accounts and budgets all of his expenses for him. I downloaded it but I am hesitant to just give my banking info to random apps. I'm really young and still pretty naive when it comes to saving and budgeting but I want to having something that will help me keep track of all my spending. What do you suggest? (Edit) Wow, I didn't think this post would explode like this. Idk if I will be able to read every comment but I really do appreciate all this feedback! Budgeting is hard when you're young and dyslexic. [link] [comments]  |
| Little Cousin spent over $5000 in game marketplace without his parents knowledge nor authorization Posted: 10 Aug 2018 04:48 PM PDT Apparently over the past 4 months my cousin has been spending his parents money out of their debit/checking account on game trading on stuff like TF2 trading websites and the sort (kinda like that csgo gambling thing that happened a while back) and now they're broke. They called up the bank yesterday to investigate but they didn't know that he was the one who did it until this morning. We don't know what to do. Please, any and all advice will be appreciated. We just want to know if we're completely screwed or if there is some hope in getting the money back. Edit: Edit 2: We were able to get a case with Paypal and told them the situation and they said they would refund us the money between 10-15 days. Special TY for /u/TinyBagel05. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 10 Aug 2018 04:27 PM PDT Throwaway acount for privacy. Location: Oregon. Husband is retired for about 10 yrs now with government pension (PERS), I was a SAHM and don't work now and don't plan to. Only child is out of the house now, 21 yrs old independent and studying but still on our health insurance. My husband always took care of finances, and I am originally from another country and have no clue about these things and never worked in the USA. But talking to similar aged friends now, they tell me how little they pay for healthcare. Some even just $2200 a year (what we pay monthly!). My husband says we pay so much because we don't qualify for cheaper plans that are subsidized by the government and because we are in a group plan through his former employer that has very generous benefits. I am 50, 20yrs younger than husband, and don't qualify for Medicare yet. Last year I looked at our finances and I saw we paid just a bit more than $1800/month for healthcare. In December 2017 we got a letter from PERS saying they were raising (renewing) our premium to $2200/month. Apparently there was nothing we could do, husband said, but continue paying. The plan didn't change; just the price. $400 a month more, which is insane!!! Someone told me to call a hospital and ask about an individual healthcare plan and I did call one of the biggest hospitals in town (Kaiser). But they said they don't have a person I can talk to on the phone or in the office to see some plans, but that I can look on the internet for a third party provider. They declined to name one, so I have no idea where to turn for such provider. We have to penny pinch every month to break even now, although we have what I would consider a good income. Here is our breakdown:
We have no debts, no cable, no luxuries, our used car is paid for. We buy clothing from thrift stores. Mortgage is about $700/month but we pay an extra $300/month, so we will pay off the house within the next 11 yrs vs. 18 remaining years on the mortgage. Our utilities are about $60/month, rather low. Food budget is about $800 - we hardly eat meat, but cannot afford organic either. We never eat out and don't indulge in cigarettes, soda or wine, not even bottled water. On the phone with Kaiser I was told we can change plans every November if we don't have any extraordinary event happening like moving during the year (we don't). But what can we even change it to?? What can we do to pay less for health insurance? In our budget, I find this category (healthcare) to be the most challenging, and I hope this is where we can tweak something so we can have more money left at the end of the month. I feel so stupid... we are all healthy, but paying so much money is killing us. Please help me/us with some suggestions in regards to healthcare costs. [link] [comments]  |
| Time to leave Wells Fargo? Such a pain. Posted: 10 Aug 2018 09:04 AM PDT I've been a Wells Fargo bank customer for over 15 years. My wife switched over when we got married about 10 years ago. Generally, it's fine, no major problems for us with banking services over this time. Currently have 2 checking accounts and a savings account with WF. After the first (and expanding) scandal of opening fake accounts on behalf of customers, my wife and I considered switching banks. I called WF and hadn't had any fake accounts opened, and when I started the process of considering other banks, it just started to feel like too much of a pain to switch everything (direct deposits, automatic payments, etc). I also thought to myself, "Well, this is such a big F up, there's no way something like this could happen again and they'll over compensate." So, we kept our money there. Now, with the new foreclosure scandal, it's feeling like time to change. Increasingly difficult to justify staying with WF. So, looking for advice, where should I look for new banking services, what are best features of daily banking, any recommendations, and any advice on how to switch everything efficiently (making sure I don't miss anything like automatic mortgage payments, etc)? EDIT: I love the internet. Awesome advice here. Key takeaways: (1) it's time to leave WF and I need to stop being lazy about it; (2) transition the move to be safe; and, (3) online or credit unions are the way to go. Thanks, all. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 10 Aug 2018 08:09 AM PDT Hi guys! I hope this is an appropriate sub for this. My basic question is, how does one dispute or pay utility bills that are outrageous? Yesterday we got our water bill and our normally $35 water bill was a little over $975 (using a little over 181,000 gallons of water for the month. We checked everywhere and have not located a leak. The only thing we can figure is that there is a massive underground leak or that the water company totally screwed up. We are going to check the meter when we get home today from work to see if it's spinning when the water is off in the house. My boyfriend called them today to ask wtf is going on and they said they'd send someone out Tuesday and that was it. Now, that's a loooong time if our water truly is leaking like that. I'm displeased about this because obviously I don't want to pay more money for something that we don't even know for sure what's going on. If this is a leak that we were obviously unaware of, is there a way to dispute or handle a utility bill like this? Thanks in advance! Update: so my boyfriend just got home and read the meter. It isn't moving at all with everything off in the house. It's sitting at 4 units where they stated 242 units. So we're pretty sure at this point that somewhere along the way the meter reading was messed up. He called the water company back and they made a note and will verify Tuesday. Thank you so much for all the help everyone! [link] [comments]  |
| Just got out of 2 high interest car loans within a week. You can do this! Posted: 10 Aug 2018 07:14 PM PDT A few years ago, my wife and I were in a pickle. We had a 2000 Buick with a busted AC, and our credit was clogging the septic tank. After I finally landed a decent job and had been working for a few months, and June arrived in the southern US, we decided to see what we could get. We ended up trading the Buick in on a 3-year-old Ford Fusion with low miles. We got hit with 20% interest, which I knew was crazy high, but I felt we didn't have much choice. We've been paying those $460 payments for over 4 years now, plus the other high interest car we bought new 2 years ago at 15% with a payment over $500. We've been tracking our credit with Credit Karma (yes, I know it's not always accurate, but it shows the general track of the score). A few weeks back, we saw that my wife's score had jumped up over 700 (from the low 500s a couple of years back). After doing some preliminary research about cars and rebates etc., we decided to see if we could get a preapproval for a new car loan. I said, "If we can get a rate that's half of the 20%, it'll be worth it." Logged onto USAA, plugged in the info, and got approved for under 4%. Went that afternoon and got a new car with a payment of $379 with no money down. (Finance manager screwed up on the paperwork and we weren't able to put the money down. Long story, maybe I'll save that for another post.) That's almost $100 less than the old payment, and on a NEW car. Today, I thought it might be worth checking into a refinance for the other car, and when I did it, I got the rate down to 4.7% instead of the 15% we had before. This also brought that payment down to $330. Now, we'll have a few hundred dollars more to throw at the principals of the loans. TL;DR - Traded from a 20% loan to less than 4%, and refinanced a 15% loan into a less-than-5% loan, saving us hundreds per month and thousands over the loan life. [link] [comments]  |
| I have been living with my mother for the last 15 years and she just suddenly died with no will. Posted: 10 Aug 2018 10:07 AM PDT As I stated above, my mom just died, I have been living with her for the last 15 years, but she left no will. I have two brothers who are looking to me to take care of everything and so I have started looking into the probate process. So far I have come up with this information:
Here's my questions. After looking at her finances, wow did she leave a lot of debt. Currently, I have found about 62k in credit card debt and about 40k in mortgage debt but also that she has about 85k in equity in her house. Will the mortgage be considered a debt/liabilty that I can assume (take over paying the mortgage and continue living in the house), or am I likely to have to sell the house to use the equity and satisfy the non-mortgage parts of her debt? Also, could the administrator (myself) of the estate, petition the court to protect the property against creditors on behalf of the child resident (also myself), because requiring its sale would leave the child (me again) homeless? Unfortunately for me, it seems mom left me with a bit of a mess and some insight would help. Thanks all! [link] [comments]  |
| Just made $3k at summer internship and I’m looking to invest $2k Posted: 10 Aug 2018 03:29 PM PDT I am a college student who just completed a 13 week internship at an insurance company and I am looking to invest at least $2k of my earnings. This being my first time investing, I am looking for a safe investment that does not necessarily grow exponentially, but will steadily grow over time. I will likely not need to touch this money for a long time. If there are any solid websites out there or if anyone has some solid first time investor advice it would be greatly appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| I am broke right now. I don't see any way Posted: 10 Aug 2018 02:13 AM PDT I run a small company in Delhi, India. I have a debt of around Rs. 200000 and bank loans amounting to Rs. 3500000. The borrowers call me daily and because of that, I am unable to focus on my work.I constantly avoid calls as I don't have any answer to give anyone. What is the procedure of bankruptcy? Can I go to jail for this? I am 26 and possess a sound skill set in IT field. [link] [comments]  |
| I made a mistake and now accidentally overcontributed/converted to roth ira, please help Posted: 10 Aug 2018 08:02 PM PDT i was doing my yearly backdoor roth IRA conversion from $5500 today and noticed there was a balance of $0.28 in my vanguard traditional IRA after i made the conversion. It said it had converted -5499.72 from the traditional to the roth IRA. I had put in to convert the $0.28 balance over to the roth IRA and now it appears that I have now contributed $5500.28 to my roth IRA for the year which is going to cause issues when filing taxes. Two questions, what was this $0.28 from? The funds were transferred from my brokerage account to traditional IRA yesterday and I converted to the roth IRA as soon as I possibly could today so i'm not sure where that extra money came from. What should I do about the $0.28 from my roth IRA? Should I just leave it there and fill out the extra tax forms? Withdraw $0.28 and take the penalty? Is this reversible generally? Should I convert back to traditional IRA and then withdraw there? Would love any advice. [link] [comments]  |
| I found out I am underpaid. My annual review, including compensation, is this month. Advice? Posted: 10 Aug 2018 03:37 PM PDT I started with this company in August of last year, fresh out of college from a good university, and they offered me 54k per year. I found out today that one of my coworkers who was hired in March of this year, also fresh out of college, is making 60k, and another coworker hired straight out of college last month is making 65k. All of us have the same job and title, and the same major coming out of university. I feel like I have done a great job, and my reviews from my bosses and clients have been nothing but stellar, and it sucks to find out I am making less than the new guys. I am scheduled to have my annual review with my boss later this month, and that is supposed to include compensation changes. I have no idea how to approach this conversation, especially if the salary he offers is less than the new guys. Any advice for approaching the conversation? [link] [comments]  |
| Was sent to collections agency over tuition Posted: 10 Aug 2018 06:03 PM PDT I took out a subsidized loan of $3,000 in Fall 2017 and I wasn't supposed to pay it back until after I graduate but I performed terribly that semester for medical reasons so my school told me to pay the loan off immediately. I took Spring semester off to take care of myself and then I got a letter from collections in June saying I had to pay $4000. I had sent a tuition refund form in the beginning in January and assumed that it was successful since they weren't sending me any letters to remind me to pay my bill. I didn't check my student account until I got the letter from collections. I resubmitted the tuition refund form, it went through successfully and I got my bill waived. But now it's on my credit report. Is there anything I could do about this? [link] [comments]  |
| Quoted insurance job to replace floor was approved, now being asked to lower bid Posted: 10 Aug 2018 06:00 PM PDT Hello, I hope this is an appropriate sub for this l, if not please let me know where I should go. Context, I'm a carpenter who was called in to take a look at a tile floor that needs replacing since a dishwasher leaked. Rip it all out and replace it. As I'm measuring things out he tells me of another quote he had from a different company that I thought was insanely high and was apparently rejected by his insurance company. So I gave him a quote I thought seemed reasonable and he tells me he'll get in touch if the insurance company approves it or not. Fast forward a couple weeks and I get an email from his insurance company saying it's approved and asked for my GST/business number so they can send the guy a cheque for the work. I call the guy to go over all this and he tells me that he had another quote from a 3rd contractor who will do it for half of what I quoted and if I could now lower my price. I said I'd get back to him. Seems to me he just wants to pocket a bunch of the insurance money and pay as little as possible to whoever does the work. And I'm pretty sure the insurance company doesn't know about this 3rd contractor he mentions. Should I bother lowering my price after my original quote was apporved? Is what he's doing legal? I haven't dealt with insurance claims before with my job. [link] [comments]  |
| My retired mother is being forced to pay hospital bills for my late father. Posted: 09 Aug 2018 09:42 PM PDT So to give a little context to this, my father passed away in October of 2012. Before his passing he had a brain operation, and had been paying off the bills until he passed. In Hawaii, the partner of the deceased must take over these expenses and pay them. My mother who was already retired at the time, has almost no income at all except for around 2k a month for her SS. That being said, the hospital still demands over 53k and have been threatening to take legal action against her and possibly take a warrant out for her. My mother is alone, living in a 1 1/2 bedroom apartment, paying 1k in rent and the rest of her income on surviving. She does not have the means to pay for this and they're asking for 400-500 a month to pay off the bills, which she can not afford. Her credit cards are maxed and her credit is shot. She lost her husband, has no job and is being forced to pay these bills. If there's any advice it would be greatly appreciated, I do not want my mother to live the rest of her life like this. [link] [comments]  |
| Kicked out at 18 by abusive parents Posted: 10 Aug 2018 06:04 AM PDT I'm posting on behalf of my boyfriend, who I am extremely worried about. His family is very abusive and they have forced him to give them every paycheck he has gotten all summer as "living expenses". His parents kicked him out of the house because he left the sink dirty, and only gave him 200$ to start over. He is moving to live with his cousin, where rent is 200$ a month for him. He needs to find a new job, because his current job will now be hours away. His cell service will be shut off and his cousins apartment has no WiFi. He has no car and we've been discussing how to get him out of this tough spot. I'm honestly at a loss for words and he has to move out tonight. Any advice on how to make it out of this situation, how to budget to be able to afford food and basic living expenses off of 200$ until he gets his next job and paycheck? I'm a college student with no income, or I would try to help him myself. [link] [comments]  |
| Re-Post;; 22yr old stuck at home, what do? No cash. Posted: 10 Aug 2018 02:57 PM PDT Hey all, like title says I'm 22yrs old and stuck at home. I never have anything to do and I'm willing to learn a trade, but I don't have months to figure something out. I take care of my grandmother full time and drive my girlfriend (that lives with me) to work and from work since we can't afford a 2nd car. She makes decent money working with special needs kids as an IA (instructional assistant) and I do Lyft in my free time making around 300-400 on weekends if I have time. Especially recently I haven't been able to work as much as I like because of my grandmother constantly being at risk of falling. From what I know, I'm not able to earn any income from at home care because she makes too much income herself and she would have to pay me out of pocket. My family and I have always been lower middle class, but I want to break out of that bracket, I have no mentors or figures to really look up to, so I'm not sure who to ask for what advice. TL;DR // I need to figure out a way to make money at home because I take care of my grandmother full time. [link] [comments]  |
| Wife was just promoted but at bottom of pay scale Posted: 10 Aug 2018 10:55 AM PDT She got a promotion recently, but she sent me her compensation overview and I noticed that while her pay scale is from 21-31 per hour, she is only making 21.50. I asked her about it, but she seems to think that you always start at the bottom of the pay scale after a promotion and work your way up. But with my job, being at the bottom of the pay scale means your arent performing well. From what she says, she always receives good feedback from her boss and others, so could this be a red flag that she is under paid, or nothing to worry about? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 10 Aug 2018 05:10 PM PDT I bought a house 6 years ago for 225K and made just the normal payment for 5 years, but last year I decided to start pay $150 extra a month on the principal. Some amplifying info is that my home loan interest rate is pretty low at 3.375%. I have begun to think it might be more useful in the long run to put the $150 into a Vanguard S&P 500 Index fund that I already have set up. I also already contribute about $900 a month to my Thrift Savings Plan which is a government worker retirement fund. I've seen this sub give a lot of good advice in the past so just want some help putting me in the right direction. Thank you for any help in my decision. [link] [comments]  |
| Pros & Cons of a Credit Union vs alternate options Posted: 10 Aug 2018 06:39 PM PDT As the title states, what are the pros and cons of banking at a Credit Union compared to not? Is it smart to open accounts at both? I currently bank at Chase solely because my dad told me to (I'm 18 years old), but does he know what he's talking about? Let's just say he's no longer in the picture or else I'd be asking him for advice, and why he was so confident in me depending on Chase Bank to handle my money. [link] [comments]  |
| Everyday changes in habit that saves money Posted: 10 Aug 2018 06:32 PM PDT I've seen and read at multiple places that changes to your everyday habits helps you cut costs and save better. These are not some major life changing habits, but just everyday habits. Two items people have recommended and I've started doing recently are 1. Stopped buying and drinking coffee from shops(especially hipster ones). Switched it to maybe one coffee from shops every other day. Coffee from shops costs anywhere from $2 to $4 per cup easily. 2. Limited eating out to two to three times in a week. What other habits or changes to habit do people recommend? Note - I do not have a goal like buying house or some expensive car or something along those lines. Just interested about saving. Also don't want to restrict myself too much to the extent of living life of a saint. I want to enjoy nicer things in life without breaking bank. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 10 Aug 2018 02:19 PM PDT Don't judge me. I had no one in my family who has ever prepared for their financial future, so I'm learning as I go haha [link] [comments]  |
| Is moving funds from crypto to investing apps worth? Posted: 10 Aug 2018 05:57 PM PDT Is it worth it taking cash out of cryptocurrency to put into an investing app like Stash or Acorns? I have some money left from when crypto was big, granted it is not a lot at all but its something. I am looking to start putting money into an investing app, I have tried trading on apps like Robinhood but I would rather have it 'automated'. For Context: I am currently a college student and I do not need to worry about loans or anything like that. The only money i "make" is from what I budget out of the cash I get to live. It tends to be around 100$ per month. [link] [comments]  |
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