The Payday Surprise!

As many of you know, the secret to my success lies in my (hard earned) ability to budget and stick to that budget. 

A wise man (or woman who knows) once said, the secret to budgeting is to overestimate your expenses and underestimate your income. Basically, that’s what I do.

Since my paycheque is based on an hourly wage, the number of working days within that payperiod, with a commission based on something out of my control, and you have a crap shoot as to what my paycheque will be.

I have an add on spreadsheet that I have tacked onto my timesheet spreadsheet that estimates my paycheque based on what I put into that timesheet spreadsheet. I call this my “can I make rent” spreadsheet. 

To estimate what taxes will be taken off, I have found that you can average about 24% of your gross will be taken off for taxes. 

What I have done with this spreadsheet is take 25% off for taxes. This way I think that my paycheque will be less than it actually is. 

I base my overall budget for the upcoming paycheque on a safe, lower number than what I might get. Why? 

This way, if I can make my budget balance (even if a bit tight) on a lower estimated income, then I have a happy moment when I open that paycheque envelope and find a slightly larger amount. 

I also avoid the shock and horror to find out that the actual number is less than I had estimated. Then I have to scramble to find a way to cut back and balance the budget, but in a negative way. 

The other way, I have the happy joyous feeling of “what will I do with this extra money?” (giggle-giggle). That, my friends, is the payday surprise!

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive and keep moving forward!

Can Still Run To The Hills!

Since I am one to look ahead, particularly to my Christmas Break, I have been eyeing up the online registration page for my favourite mountain campground.

You see, my company shuts down between Christmas and New Year’s, so that gives me about a week break. Sitting around a parking lot in the dead of winter for a week is not an appetizing thought.

So, out of frustration, and  to plead my case to be allowed to sneak in the back way (I promise that I’ll be in my trailer, making no noise and pretend that I don’t exist) and use up an out of the way spot.

It turns out that this year, they won’t take reservations, but just go on a first come-first served basis. The usage is low at this time of year, so the risk is low that I will be turned away.

I do like to book ahead, though and make sure that I have a spot, particularly for something so important as my Christmas break.

As always, no matter what, I will be okay, I will survive, and I will thrive, regardless of whatever gets tossed my way. (And yes, I will be running to the hills this Christmas.)

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!

The Foot That Wouldn’t Step

So, wind the clock back to the weekend before last . . . (Canadian) thanksgiving weekend to be exact, more specifically 4:30 am on Tuesday morning.

I was packing up and pretty much the last thing that I do is to bring Wanda’s front foot up. You know this is what the “dolly-wheel” is on older, smaller and lighter trailers.

This foot is supposed to take the weight of the trailer, in cases of smaller trailers where it is possible to push it around by hand, this foot is a wheel. (Wanda is “big boned” so nobody is pushing her around by hand.)

Most of the older Dolly-Wheel or Front Foot are wound up and down by hand, not Wanda, hers is electric. Therein lied the problem.

I clicked the switch, and nothing. I tried it a few times, even in reverse and nothing. This was odd, because it worked fine going down but going up, it wouldn’t.

I didn’t have time for this so I pulled out the “just in case” manual crank and cranked that foot up by hand and off I went to work.

The week before last, I really didn’t have the energy to investigate this problem after work, so it became a Saturday project.

The first thing I thought that it could be was a fuse so I looked at my fuse box. Nope, not only was there no fuse blown, but no fuse allocated for the front foot.

   

I opened up the head of that foot and tried to see if there was voltage going to it, using my trusty Multi-Meter. My first guess was a switch, nope, no voltage anywhere.

So, next I traced the wiring harness back from the front foot to see where it led, and look what I found . . . .

   

That is an inline fuse, the bane of many a mechanic. This little device is designed to put a fuse in the middle of the wiring harness, so that you have the safety of a fuse, but it could be located anywhere!

   

Yep, the problem was just a blown fuse.

   

For those of you who may not know, the fuse on the right is blown and the one on the left is a good (not blown) fuse.

So, all it took was to replace the fuse and the foot worked fine.

   

You may be wondering why anyone would put an inline fuse out here when there is a nice and central fuse box?

The answer lies in how these RV’s are made, they are build with off the shelf components in a factory.

As in the people who made Wanda bought that front foot assembly from someone who just makes those front feet.

To make it safe they put that inline fuse in their harness which is to connect up to the battery. This way it is safe just as it is, no matter what trailer you install this front foot assembly onto.

So, if you face something similar, never forget to look for that inline fuse.

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!

Bashed By Budget, But Bouncing Back!

So, with me being me, after setting my goals for the foreseeable future, I revamped my budgets to make sure that I could meet them . . . my budget laughed at me (figuratively). 

I had wanted to pay my Visa off by November 7, that’s doable. Then put at least $1500.00 into my now depleted Mid-Term Savings by November 22 (also doable).

So far, so good.

Then when I looked at the fact that I was missing a paycheque that magical one between November 22 and December 7, I was in trouble.

You see, the Wanda Paydown Plan starts (come Hell or high water) on December 7 and I just can’t push that date back any further, nor will I. 

Even if I start the plan on time, who knows if I will actually make the November 7, 2017 date to pay the Wanda Loan off.

Why? You see, my original plan (which is unworkable) was to put $1500.00 per payday into savings. I just can’t do that, and exist. 

If I wasn’t paying the regular Wanda Payments, I could do that. 

So, as it is, I trudge on ahead with my revised plan in hand and see what will happen with this Wanda Loan. 

The one thing I do know is that I will have a healthy Oops Fund, and paid off credit cards. So that is something, even though I will have less than a hundred bucks in my Long-Term Savings Account, and likely won’t for a year yet.

Regardless, I have a plan, and am working it, even if I keep revising it . . . improving it, rather.

As always: keep your head up, your attitude positive and keep moving forward!

Don’t Be Afraid to Change Your Mind

There really is nothing more stupid than doing the wrong thing just to save face. 

I can’t imagine being in a frame of mind where I do something that I know is wrong, just so I won’t look bad, indecisive, or whatever.

I live in an RV, I sleep on roadsides or in big-box store parking lots . . . I gave up caring what people think about me or my lifestyle a long time ago.

What I am talking about is the fact that I have tweaked my plan, yet again. I don’t see this as a problem as one of my philosophies is that life is always in a state of revision.

We should always be looking at what we are doing and asking “How can I do this better?”  or “Should I really be doing this?” 

This is not from a mindset of lack of confidence or always thinking that I am screwing up or making a mistake, but rather from one of always looking to do better, to always improve.

So, when I revise my plan, I see this as a strength and a positive thing, not a weakness. 

I am not sure if I mentioned this, but I had planned to have my RV Dealership install a couple of solar panels on the roof of Wanda. 

The idea was to try to rely more on solar than on Jenny for my power and thus save money over the long term.

I also had the thought that this would make me ready to park Wanda on that piece of land that I plan to buy and pioneer and transform it into a home worthy of others. 

I had thought that the solar technology had improved to the point that this was viable, whilst this may be the case, the cost of installing them are still quite prohibitive to this venture at this juncture. 

I was talking with a friend this weekend about my plans to pay down Wanda by saving up the cash and making a lump sum payment and mentioned the solar plans to him.

He offered up wise words of sober second thought; I saw his logic.

The reason that I was talking to him because the couple of times I tried to talk to my bank about other options, all I got were “Microsoft Answers.” 

(As in their answers were: accurate, correct but not helpful at all.)

This friend spent some time in the financial sector so knew about loans, compound interest and so on, better than me. 

Apart from telling me to give my head a shake with regards to the solar panel idea, he had a few words to say about the Wanda Savings Plan. 

He advised me to put the cash that I was planning on saving right on the loan and not put it into savings. 

This would reduce the amount of interest I am charged and therefore shorten the length of time that it will take to pay the loan off.

Exactly how much shorter it will take is up for debate, so we shall all see what actually transpires. 

So, here is the plan, as it stands now. First I will pay off my Low-Interest card.

Then, the cash that I had intended to splurge on solar panels, I will use to top up my mid-term savings up to $1500.00 and put $1000.00 into my Long-Term Savings account.

This will give me a bit of a Contingency fund as I then put my targeted $1400.00 per payday directly onto the Wanda Loan. 

I will leave the regular, bi-weekly payments of $122.38 unaltered and just let them go on like clockwork. 

So, without further fuss, here is my new fiscal plan going forward:

   

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive and keep moving forward!

Self-Made Frustrations

As I begin this next phase in my journey, the homeward stretch to total debt freedom, I grow agitated with the process and just want it over with. 

I find my thinking shifting to what to do and life beyond this, of finally owning some land and yes, starting that science foundation (if even an incubator form of it). 

(www.terran.foundation) if you’re curious.

I know that even to begin such planning, is a year away. I still need to be a good boy, keep doing what I am doing and finish what I started: totally eliminating my debts.

Only then, can fun-time really begin, because then I will be socking cash away to actually start my dreams. 

As it is now, even the cash that I am putting into savings, is not mine, not really, it belongs to the bank.

I need to calm down and re-learn a lesson I keep learning again and again: dream for the future but deal with the crash back to reality. 

The weather is getting colder, I still have 12 months and over 3 weeks until Total Debt Freedom Day. As such, I still have much work to do.

Yet, it would be fair that I have accomplished a lot and grown as a person during this journey. I just need to hunker down, and keep on keeping on. 

This is perhaps the hardest thing to do, to keep on when you are so close to your goal, yet it seems so far away. 

I write this to encourage others in a similar situation, to let them know that you are not alone, others feel this, and yes, just keep going.

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive and keep moving forward!

Ahead by $2.98!

Okay, so today was a Wanda Payment day. This means (because I notice these things), that as of 12:01 this morning the outstanding balance for the loan dropped.

So, I checked in this morning and found out exactly what that outstanding balance was. I had recorded what the outstanding balance was as of the day before.

This means that through my Wanda Payment Estimator Spreadsheet I could calculate exactly how much that balance actually dropped. 

It dropped $42.98 instead of the guestimate of $40.00 the bank had told me not long ago. Why does this matter?

Well, this matters because it is factored in to each payment going forward. So, that means that all of those $2.98 adds up and chips away even faster at the outstanding balance.

This is good news, as it looks like that it will be a stretch to even manage to put $1400.00 per payday aside instead of my target of $1500.00 per payday aside.

If this holds up it looked like I was going to miss target of Total Debt Freedom Day of Nov 7, 2017. With this little nudge, it is looking possible again. 

It is important to note that this number will fluctuate over time, and anything this far out is a wild (if somewhat educated) guess, but I need a target to shoot for.

It has been suggested that I up those Wanda payments to take a larger bite out of the principle, and pay less interest. 

For now, I like having more control over my money. If I increase those payments, I have to assume that the bank will not let me lower them down again. 

This way, I will still have low payments if I find myself suddenly “actively encouraged to seek other employment opportunities.”

This way, the money that I have (will) saved up to pay off Wanda will be my financial cushion, if need be. Once I give money to the bank, they don’t like to give it back . . . funny that. 

So, as far as Total Debt Freedom Day is concerned, as long as it happens sometime before the end of 2017, I’ll be fine with that, and consider it a win.

I will still be me, however, and do everything in my power to make the day and pay Wanda off on that day. 

After that, I will look to manage and handle the many media interviews and yes, setup the speaking tour across the country . . . and book deal naturally . . . 

As always: Keep your head up, your attitude positive, and keep moving forward!