Personal Finance Weekday Help Thread for the week of October 08, 2018 |
- Weekday Help Thread for the week of October 08, 2018
- If you can't get your emergency fund to grow because of emergencies that keep coming up, you're still doing a good job.
- My wife and I met a financial adviser for the first time ever and he asked, "Do you like cards?"
- The importance of an emergency fund
- My mom just died. What do I do?
- I want to move from a high COL area to a low COL area but will take a hit to my pay. How do I figure if it's worth it?
- My in laws gave out the credit card number to a random "your PC is infected" pop up.
- My mom asked me to cosign a loan for her?
- Is it possible to pay off someone else's student loans with a one time payment?
- Car loan is ruining my life(Repo'd)
- I’m self employed, 34 and have NOTHING set up for retirement. Somebody punch me in the face with their best 1 - 2 with where to start.
- Fun Fact: Wells Fargo limits your online credit card bill payment to $5K... unless you use a Wells Fargo bank acct (or phone the transaction in).
- How Viable Are Tiny Houses?
- Education Savings Account over age 30
- $5,000 for 10 minutes in the ER
- Payment for deletion
- As an average person in the US, how can you proactively protect yourself from economic downturns?
- Are Credit Unions a wise banking option? Can I use any CU or is there a "rating" or some such thing that I need to resort to?
- Paycheck to paycheck
- Parent has terminal illness and a lot of debt. What should I do?
- My grandparent passed and left my father an inheritance.
- Can I file a Diminished Value Claim years after an accident?
- Husband being let go from his job. Help!
- Lease fell through, almost died?, might end up being homeless
- How normal is this to you?
- My mother just received a threatening voicemail from a lawyer about a supposed claim against me.
| Weekday Help Thread for the week of October 08, 2018 Posted: 08 Oct 2018 06:08 AM PDT If you need help, please check the PF Wiki to see if your question might be answered there.While we never remove posts just because a question is answered in the wiki, this thread is a low-key place to ask any question no matter how "moronic" you think it might be. Make a top-level comment if you want to ask a question! Also, please don't downvote "moronic" questions! If you have not received your answer within 24 hours, you can feel free to start a discussion. A big thank you to the many PFers who take time to answer other people's questions! For past help threads, please search the Weekly Archive. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 08:28 AM PDT Over the summer I made a steadfast commitment to getting my 3 month emergency fund built, which is only about 15k. I'm saving $750 a month, which is exactly 15% of my family's post-tax income. In the 3 months since I made that change, I've had $1.8k in car repairs, $600 in vet bills, and $250 to cover a friend who got towed from our guest parking (our fault). Needless to say, the needle hasn't moved as I wanted it to, and I have to keep reassuring myself that, had I not made this commitment, I'd be in real trouble covering these costs. The end goal will come eventually. EDIT: Just to clarify - this is a two person budget! [link] [comments]  |
| My wife and I met a financial adviser for the first time ever and he asked, "Do you like cards?" Posted: 08 Oct 2018 06:50 PM PDT And I said, "Yes" and he handed me a deck and said, "Left to right, most important to least important, don't let either of you see the other's until you're done." This is mine and This is her's. I bought my wife roses the next day and thought this was a great thing for the FA to do for their clients. [link] [comments]  |
| The importance of an emergency fund Posted: 08 Oct 2018 09:06 AM PDT I've seen others post similar things before, but the last two weeks the importance of having an e fund really sunk in. In the course of two weeks my house was struck by lightning, I fell through the ceiling of my garage (trying to replace the garage door opener that got fried) and my dog had an unexpected health issue pop up. Even though I got nailed with over $1000 worth of extra bills all at once, I am completely fine and still have plenty of money for normal bills gas and groceries [link] [comments]  |
| My mom just died. What do I do? Posted: 08 Oct 2018 12:12 PM PDT My mom died overnight very unexpectedly. I'm only twenty-two, and her closest kin. I'm in charge of everything now, but I have no idea what I'm supposed to do. I know she kept all her important papers in her safe in her trunk, but I don't know what to do with any of it. I know she had debts, but am I responsible for them? The coroner said it could take 3 months to get back her death certificate. Do I call credit card companies? Her bank? Do I contact her insurance guy? Any advice is greatly appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 06:37 PM PDT So basically I live in a major west coast city city, and make $45k/yr. That's basically peanuts here. I pay $950 plus utilities for a small 1 bedroom apartment. Basic necessities eat the majority of my paycheck and I save almost nothing. I want to move to the midwest. I'm guessing I'll be able to get a comparable job making $35-40k/yr but my rent will only be $500/mo or perhaps even less for a similar sized apartment based on prices I see online. I don't know how to quantify exactly how much cheaper other expenses will be. I know gas is almost half the price in the midwest as it is where I am, that's a huge one. I figure just in rent I'll be saving myself something like $5k/year and worst-case scenario be bringing in $7k less net income per year. I'm hoping this will put me in a better financial situation to actually save towards something in the future. [link] [comments]  |
| My in laws gave out the credit card number to a random "your PC is infected" pop up. Posted: 08 Oct 2018 04:13 PM PDT Hopefully this is the right spot to ask this question. I overheard my wife talking to her mother about a pop up on her computer. Long story short, they had hundreds of "errors" and "Microsoft" sold them some software. Basically, $800 was charged on their card. I asked several times to make sure that this was their credit card and not their bank card. I told them to call the card company immediately and dispute the charges. What else should they do? [link] [comments]  |
| My mom asked me to cosign a loan for her? Posted: 08 Oct 2018 01:28 PM PDT My mom asked me out of the blue today to cosign a loan for her to get a new car she needs badly. I don't want to because I know if I say no she will guilt trip me. Also I've done research into what happens to a cosigner and basically gathered if she is late or fails to pay I responsible for the money owed. I owe quite a few medical bills, student loans, and I have to pay the department of revenue because my old boss at work f'ed up. I legit cannot afford for her to miss a single payment. How can I explain to her I don't want/can't do this for her? Edit: Plot twist she said it was ok for me not to do it even though she usually guilt trips me with these sorts of things. Thank you to everyone who commented it helped a lot! [link] [comments]  |
| Is it possible to pay off someone else's student loans with a one time payment? Posted: 08 Oct 2018 08:43 AM PDT I recently came into a very large inheritance that I did not know was coming my way. I was lucky enough to make it through college without needing to take out any loans, but my best friend was not so fortunate. He is now struggling with student debt like most of our generation. I have the ability to pay off the entirety of his debt with one go without crippling myself. He has no idea this is even a possibility, I would never bring it up with him until I had a plan that made sense, but since I have no idea how student loans work I figured I would need to do research first. Thank you for your help! Edit: Thank you to everyone who commented, I've been given a lot to think about and also a crash course in lending! It seems that without a doubt the best way to proceed would be to give the money as a gift (or direct loan payment) without ever expecting to see a Nickelback (heh). Thank you all for looking out for my friendship and sharing your wisdom. [link] [comments]  |
| Car loan is ruining my life(Repo'd) Posted: 08 Oct 2018 05:23 PM PDT I'm 25 years old and in February of 2018, I made a huge mistake in thinking I could handle the payments on a 2017 Toyota Corolla for 5 years. I managed to receive a loan for the car at 3% APR, putting me at 250 a month on my car, worth 16k, for 5 yrs. In May of this year, my job where I'd worked for 6 years randomly went out of business leaving me, someone with no degree or skill of any kind, to pay 1k monthly for expenses. I managed to find a job at a deli for 10 bucks an hour,full-time and it is barely enough to pay for anything. All of my money goes towards my car, rent, food, phone and insurance. My car was repo'd today cause I was 3 payments behind and part of me wants that shit to be gone forever, but I know it will be sold at auction and I'll end up having to pay for a car I don't own, so I have to find a way to get it back, I guess. Was off today. Walked out of my house, pulled my keys out and checked the lot for my car. Gone. Is there any way to get rid of this car without owing an outrageous sum of money? Just feels like 5 years of my life are being eaten away for a dumb mistake. May as well be in jail [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 03:54 PM PDT I spoke with my bank and they suggested a sep ira and I'm probably going to do that. The tax help with that now would be appreciated. But I've heard from a couple different sources that active brokers are a thing of the past and that index funds which are not actively managed perform just as well with no/less fees. I'm a little anxiety torn about biting this first bullet because I want more money overall to spend but also because I don't feel as informed as I wish I was. Edit: I am married and we will have mortgage paid off in about 12 years. Wife doesn't work while we raise kids for the next few years. Stashing money is never easy for me as I've always been self employed and I never know what next month's income will be. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 03:16 PM PDT Today I learned that Wells Fargo has a $5K limit on online credit card bill payments; this is INSANE as I have a $25K or so credit line. I know this is a first world problem but just in case some of you are considering getting a WF credit card, here's a vote as to why you shouldn't bother for large purchases. - I'm not asking WF to pay someone else; I've just racked up a some big bills this month and am trying to pay Wells Fargo back from my Citibank checking acct. - It's like they are encouraging me to bank with them. Didn't they have problems with overzealously encouraging "bank accts" to be opened? That's why the "reestablished" themselves in 2018, right? - I've never had this issue (paying a credit card bill with another bank) with AMEX, Citibank, USBANK, or BofA. WF is unique here with this limitation. - I'm lucky I found this issue instead of letting the automatic system pay my bill normally. Clearly, they wouldn't have debited my checking acct sufficiently and I would have racked up interest. That would have sucked. - In the end, I had to spend 15min resolving the issue and making a "manual" payment via phone as neither phone CSR I contacted had ever heard of this issue before. I had to share my acct/routing details again since of course, they cannot use the info already on file. This is a total BS issue to deal with in 2018. UPDATE: I did get a prompt email response when I sent them a nastygram about why this is BS: Online payments made from a non-Wells Fargo account to an active credit We are not able to increase this limit. I apologize for any inconvenience. Please note that we do have other options available to make payments to * Visit a Wells Fargo branch Wells Fargo Card Services ...They also cut & paste default instructions on how to setup automatic online payments... which is exactly what i had already setup and in any case wouldn't have helped in this situation. Conclusion: WF is a clueless company. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 04:58 PM PDT When I think about how much of my current house I actually use, it's really just my bathroom, my bedroom, my kitchen, and the living room. I don't need extra bedrooms or a crazy amount of space. Just enough for an entertainment center and a couch. This has gotten me interested in tiny houses. Talk me out of this nonsense (or talk me into it). If I'm ever able to score a Good Neighbor Next Door house near-ish Miami, I'd like to eventually rent it out, and minimize my living expenses. [link] [comments]  |
| Education Savings Account over age 30 Posted: 08 Oct 2018 08:10 PM PDT I have a Coverdell Education Savings Account that was not used when I was in school and I wasn't aware that the funds have to be distributed when the owner (me) turns 30 - and now I'm past that point. I have no one in my family young enough to transfer it to, so my options are to transfer the funds to another account or redeem the funds. I'm going to have to pay taxes on it at this point. Which would be the better option? Are they basically the same, tax wise, or is one clearly better? I wish I could use it to pay off student loans without taxes, but doesn't look like that's a choice. (Turns out my parents had forgotten about this when I was in school, which is why I didn't use it instead of taking out loans) Appreciate any advice! [link] [comments]  |
| $5,000 for 10 minutes in the ER Posted: 08 Oct 2018 11:42 AM PDT In August of last year my dad took me to the ER because the skin in my hand stated to blister and peel off. They sat me down for ten minutes looked at my hand and sent me home with some anti itch cream. I move out of my dads place not to long after that and about a month ago he sent me a letter saying my hospital had gone to collections. They are charging me 5000 dollars! I had no medical insurance at the time but the nurses had told me at the time the hospital would cover it so I didn't even think of it after I moved I tried to look for some sort of paperwork from the hospital but literally threw everything away when I moved. There's absolutely no way I can afford a 5000 bill but I also don't want to mess up my credit. Is there anything I should be doing to get my bill out of collections? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 06:13 PM PDT I have outstanding debt from April 2013 which has been sold to a debt collector. When i reached out they stated they do not offer anything in writing or anything with their letterhead stating they will remove the debt from my credit report. I have the money to pay them off my question is will it even help my credit score if i pay them in full with one lump sum? [link] [comments]  |
| As an average person in the US, how can you proactively protect yourself from economic downturns? Posted: 08 Oct 2018 09:51 AM PDT So I've read a fair amount of doomsaying over the past few months regarding a potential recession coming due to some combination of wage growth, underemployment undercutting good unemployment numbers, labor pool limits, rising bond prices leading to inflation, rising household debt, stagnating housing market, State government reserves, Fed rate increases, tariffs, lower overtime hours in manufacturing, skyrocketing inventories in advance of trade issues, and so on. Regardless of whether you agree with the pessimists or not, for the sake of this thread lets assume that it's a realistic and plausible possibility. As a regular person with a wife and kids, two medium salary jobs, a growing but small 401k, a home with maybe 10% equity, a modest emergency fund, and two cars with just a smidge of negative equity; is there anything I should be doing in preparation to limit the effects of a recession on my family? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 06:45 PM PDT So I'm thinking about opening a CU account. There are a few in my area but I don't know where to start. Does it ultimately matter? I guess the biggest thing I'm concerned about is deposit safety. I'm guessing all such institutions are FDIC insured, or should I check that up specifically? I'm sort of at a loss here; I've only ever used Wells Fargo and after all the scandal, I really don't want to store my money in there. But with a large corporation, you sort of knew what you were getting into, whereas here I'm very nervous. Any things I should look out for? Just a little help on how to get started would be appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 06:41 PM PDT Living paycheck to paycheck. What fun. I've done all the budgeting I can, I can see where I'm at. I've made all the cuts and I'm just paying the essentials. I'm working full time and it covers my bills, but that's it. I have debt that I'm paying off and I know it's no one's fault but my own for being in debt. What I'm seeking is advice on how to stay motivated when you know you're just making the bare minimum. I just feels like I'm alive to pay bills. That's my existence. I do love the work I'm doing currently (Vet receptionist) and I'm spending my free time trying to learn a new skill (coding) in hopes of it becoming a possible career path. It's my mental health I'm concerned about. Getting up every day to bust my ass at my job only to just cover my bills deflates my motivation. Does anyone else feel this way? Any thoughts on how to stay motivated while paying off debts? Thanks in advance for even taking the time to read this. [link] [comments]  |
| Parent has terminal illness and a lot of debt. What should I do? Posted: 08 Oct 2018 05:21 PM PDT One of my parents was recently diagnosed a terminal illness and has lost the capacity to make decisions (both in action and mental capacity). We are trying to organize finances, but we are concerned about the amount of debt and the debt:assets ratio. Assets:
Liabilities:
My concern is that perhaps her liabilities are very close, or higher than her Assets. When she passes away, will her retirement account be used to pay off her debts? What is the best thing to do regarding her debts? Edit: Thank you for your posts. Here is some additional info:
[link] [comments]  |
| My grandparent passed and left my father an inheritance. Posted: 08 Oct 2018 07:44 PM PDT My grandmother passed recently and left my father and uncle a sizable inheritance. I don't know what she specified in her will. Grandchildren and spouses received nothing, everything was split between her sons. My father would like to give me a portion of his inheritance. Can he do that, and if he can what is the best way to do that? Would I have to pay taxes on it? It would seem odd for him to just write me a large check when I make peanuts annually and tax time is approaching. Thank you for any insight. [link] [comments]  |
| Can I file a Diminished Value Claim years after an accident? Posted: 08 Oct 2018 07:12 PM PDT I was rear ended a couple years ago and only just found out about these claims. Did I miss my chance? [link] [comments]  |
| Husband being let go from his job. Help! Posted: 08 Oct 2018 02:10 PM PDT Ok, so my husband found out today that he is being let go from his position with his last day being Friday. There will be no severance but he will be eligible for unemployment. However, my husband is the primary earner in our family and our financial situation will quickly become desperate. My salary and his projected unemployment will not cover the monthly expenses. I have a small emergency fund, about one month. Used to be three months but we had very high medical bills over the course of the past year for my son. Anyway, we are both still reeling. Obviously he's going to start applying to jobs tonight, but it there anything else we can or should do right now? Thanks. [link] [comments]  |
| Lease fell through, almost died?, might end up being homeless Posted: 08 Oct 2018 08:51 PM PDT Sorry for the throwaway account I'm not good at asking for help. Around two months ago, I moved into a townhouse with someone I met through a friend. He was in school at a nice university I hope to be attending soon. We got along very well and was very excited to have someone to split the bills with. The area wasn't the nicest, but for 1225 + 50 a month, and only having to pay for the gas bill, it was a two bedroom setup that was a steal. After we moved everything in it became obvious that we were bait and switched into a not as nice unit and my roommate was very upset at this(It had outdated appliances, writing on the doors and walls, stairs had some nails in them) . I figured it wasn't that bad and for the price we could talk it out with the landlord and make the best out of it. After a week or so of the landlords not contributing any help to the situation, my roommate contacted the city to evaluate our rights. Unfortunately things to a turn for the worse... my roommate, let's call him Jon, walked out on a test for school because he couldn't handle the stress of our living conditions. I tried the best I could to calm him down and be a friend in anyway I could think of. I've had to walk out on a test before as well and I know the feelings that follow. The days that followed were tense, but we tried to calculate our moves for the best possible outcome. However the shit hit the fan HARD. After waking up and starting my pre-work process, I put a few chicken breast and sweet potatoes in the oven while I went to assemble my outfit for the day. The oven ran for about 55 minutes (Sweet potatoes take some time), pumping gas and carbon monoxide all throughout the home. I started to get extremely dizzy and hazy before our carbon monoxide alarm started blaring. I immediately turned the oven off and called my roommate freaking out, he instructed that I open all of the windows and that he would be home for school in a few minutes. After arriving he called 911, and even after airing the home out for thirty minutes, the fire department were able to get bad readings of carbon monoxide in the closets upstairs. After a day or so our local gas company came to inspect the house and found that the oven was not hooked up properly (would not light), furnace was in terrible condition(would constantly leak gas), and the only vents in the house were plugged with insulation. The opinion of the gas company was that even if nothing happened, I would have most likely been exposed to potentially lethal amounts of carbon monoxide come winter time. Hearing of the result of the inspection, my roommate just left, moving in with one of his classmates. We kept in contact, but had a meeting with the landlord and decided that we would write up severance paperwork that only got us our security deposit back. Noted that I was not at this meeting, but he wants me to sign the paperwork because "he just wants to be done with the situation". He is out, he has somewhere to live. I'm not getting any of my rent back, moving cost, or anything I've put into the home (furniture, networking supplies), let alone a significant amount of time to find somewhere else to live. Taking some time to think about it I brought up the idea that we should get an attorney because I thought it was very unfair that my life was put at risk, and I get back only $612 of my side of the deposit (1225 /2). He became very upset and brought up that his situation has been bad and just wants to be out, and that when the lease is closed that I could pursue further action. He also has the police report, and the report from the gas company and I doubt he would give them up. We are meeting tomorrow to see the severance paperwork and I'm shaking because I have no idea what to do. All of my family live in a state 900 miles away, I don't think my friends would let me stay with them, and I've lost all of my emergency fund after a really bad car accident. I'm thinking my only move would be to avoid signing paperwork and find legal help, even though my roommate is continuously putting pressure on me to sign. I'm sorry for the long story, I was homeless when I was 14 and the thought of being there again at 19 is putting me in tears. I have no idea how to go about this, and any guidance from someone who has been in my situation would be very helpful. TL:DR Moved in with roommate, bad environment, I get carbon monoxide poisoning, he leaves and wants me to sign the paperwork to close the lease while I get little to nothing back out of it [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Oct 2018 08:46 PM PDT I have a feeling its a bit more difficult for me to relate to people because of my financial troubles. Not really sure if that many people go through the same thing. Heres just a few things: -I dont pay subscriptions for any entertainment services I cant really afford netflix, I just deal with free cable instead. No hulu, no spotify and no monthly non-necessary subscriptions. If anything, free trials is what I use. I mean come on, its free. -I refuse most invitations with friends because I cant really afford to go (thus, probably why I dont have many friends) Daily trip to the coffee place? No, cant afford that. A trip to the mall? Watch me buy nothing because I'm trying to save up for my next phone bill instead of buying a new cool pair of shoes. I may buy a $10 meal after starving for so long at the mall, but I'm going to feel extremely guilty about it afterwards. -The data I pay for my phone bill restricts what I can do online, therefore free wifi is a godsend. The data I pay for isnt even that good, I mean come on its cheap. I can Snapchat people of my age, but because it takes a lot of my crappy data I don't like to use it. Pretty sure it makes me even less able to communicate with other people my generation. Anyway, that why I am ever so greatful for free wifi hotspots around my campus, and other places like McDonalds. Thats all I got. I'm aware people can have it worse, but does anyody else in a similar boat? Id really like to know because the further I've attended my Uni the more I feel like I can't find anyone else with any similar issues. Makes me feel so different and like Im not supposed to be there. [link] [comments]  |
| My mother just received a threatening voicemail from a lawyer about a supposed claim against me. Posted: 08 Oct 2018 08:37 PM PDT My mother received a call earlier today asking for me, she notified them that I don't live there anymore and they said they would call back and leave a voicemail so she could play it for me when I come by. The voicemail said they were calling about a certain claim number, and they needed to verify my home and employer address for service of process. Guy said to call back immediately to discuss this with the firm and this was my only opportunity. He didn't leave the name of the firm. I google the number and apparently other people have been called from this number with threats of lawsuits. The call ended with, "You have officially been notified." Is this legit or a scam? Should I be concerned? Should I call them back? I do have a few things in collections, could this be connected to that? Thank you for your time. [link] [comments]  |
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