Budgets and Plans

I started this post back in March.  I need to update it again.
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Let's take a look at my financial freedom/semi-retire early plan again.  I admit it, I am a total scaredy-cat when it comes to quitting my stable, good-paying job.  I'm going to be updating my spreadsheets into my 60's if I don't get up some courage to just jump.  Or die at my desk.  That alone should make me want to quit.  What am I afraid of?  Running out of money and being too old or ill do make any more.  So, with that in mind.  Here is my current plan.

I have re-adjusted my minimum budget and removed health insurance.  My previous plan was to get insurance through Medicaid because that is what the ACA site told me I would qualified for.  Now, in Arizona, they have changed the requirements and any able-bodied person will need to work or volunteer 20 hours a week in order to qualify.  That is fine but if I am working part time, then I am just going to use that money to buy my own insurance.  When I looked up available plans, the cost was between $300 and $600/m.  I did not look up plans through the ACA exchange because the site won't let me see plans without putting in a lot of personal information and I don't need to do that now.  Maybe I will qualify for a subsidy but I am going to assume that I won't and just go with the highest price of $600 as my goal.  I can pay for that with a part time job, or selling on Ebay, or maybe some sort of small home business.

Back to the budget.  This is the minimum that I would need to survive. I know people will have comments.  Gas prices I can't control, only how much I drive.  I was spending a little over $400/m on food but I was buying a lot of junk food and eating a lot too.  I changed my diet, reduced my portions, and my bill has been closer to $50/week so I know it is attainable.  Maintenance is too low.  Car and home maintenance could be expensive.  Also, dog costs.  One vet bill will blow the whole budget.

So, what will I do about that?  Here is my income plan:

Rental 1- $1,050
Rental 2- $700

Subtract property management, taxes, insurance, maintenance.  Let's call my net profit $1,100 for both.  Since my rental income is not stable, as you know from previous posts, I am saving an additional amount, I call it the freedom fund.  I figured out how much I would need starting back in July of last year until I am 59 1/2 and can take money from my 401K.  That is 161 months or 13 years and 5 months.  I am adding $2K each month to my fund and subtracting $700 each month from the total needed since I'm getting older.  Where the two columns meet is where my freedom point is.  May 2020.  48 years old.  You might notice that my freedom fund did not start at $0.  I put $52,000 from the sale of my home into the fund to start, then I came up with this plan later.

Income:
Rentals: $1,100/m
Freedom Fund: $700/m
Total= $1,800/m

Budget: (-$700)
Health insurance: (-$600) part time job or business

Hooray for wiggle room and hopefully enough to get me through a rental income drought. 
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Now it is almost June.  12 more months until I've saved up enough for this plan.  A few expenses have gone up.  My cell phone plan went from $15 to $20.  I put my mother's car in my name.  The registration is $60 and the insurance is more although I plan to go back to liability coverage only once I move out to my property.  My portion of the inheritance will go to savings for rental house maintenance and making my tiny house and property livable.  But the house has to be sold first.

This week has not been as fun as I had hoped.  Working from home comes with its own set of challenges.  Mostly I don't like being isolated from my coworkers even though I only have one regular coworker in the office.  Maybe I just don't like that she is on vacation and everyone is asking me for answers that I don't know.  I would also need my computer and two large screens for my home office because working on a small laptop is frustrating.  Next week I will be back in the office.  The following week, my coworker will be traveling and I will be working from home again but she will still be working so I shouldn't get the questions that I can't answer.  The week after that, my sister will visit and we will sort through the contents of the house.  Then the week after that I'm traveling to our corporate office for a few days.  That pretty much takes care of June. I hope it is a productive month.

Electric Questions

It was and dark foggy morning.  Despite leaving early for work, the extra traffic from the eerie fog added another 10 minutes to my trip.  I got through the door with 2 minutes to spare.  Luckily, the big boss who kept track of those sort of things, has retired.  My boss isn't as concerned although if he needs me for some reason then he starts getting antsy...

We have a website that directs calls to my desk and lately I've been getting calls for some electric company in the UK.  It's actually their emergency line so I get frantic people demanding I do something to turn their lights back on immediately.  The second time it happened the fellow was going on and on and I wasn't sure what he was talking about because our company makes electrical contacts so questions about electricity aren't totally abnormal.  I finally said,"What is your question?" and he said,"It's all dark here, what are you going to do to get the lights back on?".  So then I realized that I couldn't help him.  I got another call today and I was really tempted to say, "Sorry, Sir, you've reached the colonies.  I'm afraid you're plum out of luck" but I didn't.

Today was payday but I want to wait until I get my rent money before I pay my Christmas credit card bill.  After that I can shuffle money around and make my extra mortgage payment.  I've been trying not to spend a lot of money this month.  With gas prices at $1.83/gallon, it is certainly helping my budget.  I did a foster-dog switch.  The rottie puppy went to another couple and I picked up a Lhasa Apso and puppies.  She is super sweet and so quiet.  Not at all like the hyper-active rat terrier-min pin that I had last time.

My groomer friend is going to stop by on Friday to give her a haircut.  I'm so glad she makes house calls.  Otherwise we would have to wait at least 4 weeks when the babies start eating solid food.

Borrowing From Myself

Wowza.  This is an expensive month.  Monday morning I got a call from the auto shop.  Turns out running over the rake didn't do any damage even though it sounded horrible.  The problem was the thermostat and hose connection so all of the antifreeze leaked out.  While they were checking for damage under the car, they noticed that a motor mount was broken.  Grand total: $700, $400 of that was labor.  So, now I have the $500 vet bill and the $700 car bill, right before Christmas.

Now, I could take $100 out of the maintenance and dog budget until I pay myself back or I could skip a month of extra mortgage payments.  I think I will wait until January to decide.  Next month is a big step because my extra payment will put me in the 40's!  So exciting!

I made it to my 4 day weekend so I will try not to dwell on the fact that I owe myself $1200 and just enjoy my long weekend.  Tomorrow I will spend time with my parents, then I don't have any plans except rat-proofing my mobile home and trying to return as many kittens as possible.  They keep randomly sneezing and  really want then to be well so I can return them for adoption.  The first thing I want to do, though, is sleep in, at least until the dogs tell me they are hungry.

Mortgage Update for November 2014

Woo-Hoo!  It's my favorite day of the month.  Mortgage update day!  This month I put an extra $1,100 towards the principal which brings the grand total of my mortgage down to $50,947.  So close to the 40's!  Just one more month.  $1,100 is less than I was previously paying because I took $400 to pay my savings account back for buying the car.  Next month I should be back to putting $1,500 towards the mortgage if I don't go too crazy with buying Christmas gifts.

My mortgage should be paid off in 2 years and 11 months, or faster if I don't have more expensive emergencies or buy big ticket items.  And, for some more good news, I got a 4% raise this year!  That's around $100 a month after taxes and subtracting the increased charge for health insurance.  If I put that extra $100 towards my mortgage, I could take another 2 months or so off of my timeline.

Tomorrow I'm taking a half day to go have Thanksgiving lunch at the nursing home with my dad.  Unfortunately, he fell this morning and broke his arm.  I don't know if he will be able to enjoy his lunch or not.  On Friday I hope to go out to my property to finish rat proofing the place, after I have a leisurely morning at home, of course.  Those are my big plans for my vacation time and I am perfectly fine with that.

No More Spending for November

I'm not spending any more money this month...well, except for the HVAC guy to come out and shut down the swamp cooler and start up the furnace.  That's $79 but after that, no more spending unless it is for Christmas gifts for other people because that money comes from a different budget category and gas for the car.  Buying trim for the kitchen and potting soil for the garden will just have to wait.  I have plenty of other things to work on like cleaning and organizing which never seem to go away.

Only 2 more days of work this week!  I am very ready for another weekend.  I am dropping my foster chihuahua off at an all day adoption event and then going out to my property to clean.  I haven't decided if I will take my truck or attempt to drive my new low-to-the-ground car.  It would be good to know if it can make it up the dirt road.

In other news, the foster kittens in my bathroom would like me to build them a cardboard box castle to play in.  4 kittens are doing well but one kitten is still sick.  It is very sad to see.  The mama chihuahua/min-pin in my other bathroom is very strict and makes her babies cry often because they sometimes crawl too close to the food dish.  I asked the vet for some doggy-valium but she is still nursing her pups so she can't have any yet.  I told a co-worker that I was going to "take the dog out" and he thought I meant I was going to get rid of it like I'm the doggy mafia or something.  Um, no, I just meant I was going to take her out of the bathroom for walks and time away from her puppies.  Geez.  

Dog Cargo

Rough weekend.  It started on Friday when I came home to find the dogs had pulled out the plastic liner on my bed cover.  It was hanging out on the floor and I needed to cut it but I decided to give the dogs their evening treat first because they were running around excitedly and I didn't want to poke them with the scissors.  Next thing I know, my big dog is trying to jump on the bed, then he yelps and when I turn around he is limping.  I think he probably slipped on the plastic and twisted his leg or he did the splits while trying to get on the bed.  He limped outside and I was hoping that it was just a sprain.  He came back in and seemed to be ok.  Later that night, I helped him get on the bed.  Early the next morning, he tried to get up and yelped.  He managed to get outside.  I went back to bed and woke up an hour and a half later and he was still outside.  I tried to help him up but he was in a lot of pain and all sorts of terrible scenarios started going through my mind.  Broken hip, strained back, torn ligament, etc... I called the vet and they say they can get me in as an emergency case which means an extra fee and more waiting.  A few minutes later, she calls back and says they have had a cancellation so I can have a regular appointment.  Now the hard part, getting my 75 pound dog in to the car.  I tried putting his front feet up on the bumper but he yelped so that was out.  Next I managed to heave his whole body up and in the back of my PT Cruiser.  I must say the dog cargo space certainly came in handy.  We got to to the vet and I slid my dog to the ground.  He could walk but he yelped when stepping up the curb.

Anyway, lots of tests and x-rays were ordered and I went home but first did some grocery shopping while I was out.  The fall fruit selection was very boring, by the way.  I am sad that watermelon season is over.  Later I went back to collect my drugged-up dog.  The good news is that he didn't break anything.  The bad news is that he has an enlarged spleen and we won't know what that means until the blood test results come back.  My dog got anti-inflammatories, muscle relaxants, and pain killers.  I think I could use some of those myself after lifting him in to the car.

Today he is feeling much better and even jumped on the bed tonight.  This little trip to the vet only cost me $550.  I had decided that is was going to cost $600 so I wasn't surprised at the bill.  Of course, this made me think about my goals to semi-retire early.  I must be able to afford my lifestyle which includes the care and maintenance of 3 dogs.  The good news is that my future budget includes $700/m for my basic bills and $700/m for both projects and, if needed, unexpected trips to the vet.  Hopefully, I won't be needing too many of those.

Finally Done With The Taxes

I finally submitted my taxes. I am a horrible procrastinator when it comes to taxes. I used TaxAct but I couldn't keep track of all of the fees. I thought I prepaid but I ended up paying $20 to file, or to have a back up copy on file, or...I don't even know. All I know is that they have been filed and if all goes well I will have $1,000 for my emergency fund.

Spending Spree

I have noticed my spending habits slowly increasing over the past few weeks. A few extra things at the grocery store, 6 songs from Amazon, an online book (did you know you can buy Kindle books and read them on Amazon's Kindle Cloud Reader so you don't have to own a Kindle?), a baby gift and housewarming gift for friends, a new collar for my dog. I managed to avoid eating out this week but it was tempting.

And then today I asked my friend to watch my dog while I ran over to the thrift store to look for some new bed coverings (the dogs wear them out so fast). While I was there I did a whirlwind look through the shirts because I am soooo tired of my wardrobe. I grabbed a dozen shirts and didn't even try them on. The total for shirts and linens was $65. More than I had planned to spend. I am going to wash them tomorrow and hopefully I made some good purchases. I'm excited. New clothes always make going to work a little bit easier.

I better keep an eye on my spending or else I will start spending it as fast as I make it. I'm even tempted to **gasp** join Netflix. Maybe I should spend more time fixing things around here instead of watching movies. The weather will cool off soon so I won't have the "it's too hot" excuse to use much longer. Time to put some effort in my to-do list.

No Money, No Spending

The day started off well. I got up early, fed the dogs, picked up the yard, washed the rug and bedspread, swept the floor, all before 8. I had time for a nap and the dogs were quiet so I took a snooze until the phone rang. After that I got ready, ate breakfast and attempted to load 3 dogs in the car. One dog ran off and I spent a few minutes tracking him down. I still managed to get to the pet store early and was the first one to set up.

After more people arrived I ran off to Home Depot to see if they had any evaporative coolers in stock. They did not but while I was there someone returned one so I gleefully wheeled it to the self-checkout. I carefully fed my 3 HD gift cards in to the machine and I owed $20 in the end. I reached for my wallet and...it wasn't there. Darn, left it in the car. I told them I would be right back and went to my car where I suddenly realised that my wallet was not there, it was at home. I had to go back to the store and get them to retrieve my gift cards out of the machine and then sadly went back to the pet store.

Without a wallet I couldn't buy dog treats or special food that I was planning to buy for my cocker spaniel. It sure would have been nice to have that cooler. Next Friday has a 20 % chance of rain and my cooler and AC are arriving this week so I guess I will just wait. Once it starts raining I am sure HD will have coolers in stock again.

On a good note, my little yorkie mix got adopted today. I am sad to see him go but hopefully he will get a lot of attention as an only dog. I'm going to take my little Toto to work on Monday so that I don't miss my foster dog so much. I only need one more dog adopted to reach my manageable pack size of 7. At least I have another corner of my bed back for the moment.

What's Next?

It's kinda small but I think you can still read it. My next step is to save for these categories. They are just a few items that I want before I attempt to change jobs or whatever I plan to do next. It will take me 2 1/2 years to save up the money at the rate of $2,000 a month.


2 1/2 years sounds awful at the moment so I am trying not to think about it. Some of these are more fun than others like dental is not fun but travel is fun. The building is not really a 'need' but it is a big 'want' so if I can hang on to my job for long enough then I can have my building. If not then I have to be happy with my old mobile home and should probably spend more than $4,000 on fixing it up.

I put RV fix up for $2k because there are a lot of things that need to be fixed but after that I can sell it and I am hoping I get $5k for it which would definitely help my project funds.

The other big unknown is whether my house will be rented continually or will sit vacant again. The current tenants signed a 1 year lease but after that, who knows. I can't really quit my job and live off the rental income quite yet.

While I am continuing to work and save for these things I am hoping to be able to use the extra 5 days vacation time next year to make some nice 3 day weekends at least once a month. This year, I only have 5 days left until December but maybe I could use some half days. That way I can leave at noon, go buy supplies for whatever project I am working on and get a head start on the weekend. That makes me feel better. I mean, money is nice and all but if I don't have time to enjoy myself, I am still gong to be miserable.

4 Days Until the Weekend

I made it through another Monday. The boss was there and was in a good mood so that was good. I didn't bring my little dog to work because I needed to stop by the grocery store on the way home so my office was quiet. I also spent some time today thinking about the future. I re-worked my budget and decided that I could get by on $710 with a few dogs. A "few dogs" means less than I have right now which is 9. I think 4 or 5 dogs would be ok. That would be my 2 plus 2 or 3 fosters. I am trying to resist getting any more until I get down to a lesser number. Still, it is hard to see them get put down at the pound, especially the ones that I would have gotten if I had room.

I was going to write more about my future plans and budget but that will have to wait until later since I forgot to email myself the picture of my spreadsheet. Basically it came down to $710 per month minus $691 from the rent which left me $19 short per month. It wouldn't take long to save up enough to cover $19 a month. Then I made categories for the important stuff like medical, dental, travel, etc... Well, I should write about it tomorrow when I have my visual aid. If I'm not too tired. I was going to go to bed early tonight but it's after 10 already. Good night!

Skipped A Day

I usually don't skip a day without a post but when I tried to log in yesterday it said Blogger.com was down for maintenance. Since I was really tired and had no idea when it would be up again I decided to just go to bed.

It was a long, hard day. Work was exceptionally frustrating and I actually emailed my boss and told him I wanted to quit. He emailed back and said that I shouldn't so I stayed. While I was thinking of quitting I also looked at my budget and compared it to my incoming rent and decided that I would be around $180 a month short if I wanted to keep doing this dog fostering. Too bad. I was looking forward to having lots of free time. But free time with no money is no fun either.

I finally asked my property management company if my house was really rented. They said yes but the people aren't moving in until May 17th. That means I will only get a 1/2 month rent on the 25th which happens to be my next payday. So, I am waiting and waiting again. The 25th is only 12 days away. That isn't long at all.

One Or The Other

This is my newest dog. I posted her picture before but now she is more relaxed. I've had her for about 2 weeks and I have resisted the urge to go get more. I want to get some of my big dogs adopted before I get new ones. Right now at 7 dogs I have the right balance of dogs for my small space.

I completely forgot about paying the dentist until I just reread yesterday's post. It is one of those dentists who has two offices so maybe they were at the other office today. Hey, if they forget about me then it was free, right? I suppose they would probably mail me a bill the old fashioned way.

I was looking at my bank account today and wondering if I took all the money out of savings and checking, would it be enough to pay off the mortgage? The answer was no. After I get my paycheck next week I could have $4,000 for the mortgage. Only problem is that the mortgage is $4,500. The money in my bank account is not extra money. It is money for insurance, registration, property tax on the property that I live on, stuff like that that accumulates every month until it is due. If I stole it for the mortgage I would have to pay myself back. That is too risky since I couldn't get rid of the whole mortgage yet.

I was going to put some money towards the Home Depot card and some towards the mortgage but now I think I will concentrate on the mortgage. It is more fun to get it paid off. The credit card is no interest until August anyway. And if I did lose my job it would be much better to have the mortgage gone so that I wouldn't have to try to come up with $800 a month to pay it. For the credit card I would only have to pay $50 or so.

So, I won't be able to pay off the mortgage this month but perhaps, if no other emergencies come up, I can borrow from my other reserves and make the mortgage GO AWAY next month! That would be great to do it in May since that is my birthday month. I'm going to think about it some more but it sure is starting to sound good. Of course if the house gets rented I can pay off the credit card too. I mean, I am still hopeful that the house gets rented very very soon so I can get back on track and not have to do any creative shuffling to pay the bills.

Going To The Dentist

I was dreading the dentist today especially since I remembered that I cancelled my dental insurance. I seem to remember that the cost was going up and I decided last year that I probably wouldn't be working at this job much longer (this was when I was still planning to pay off the rental mortgage by December) so I opted out of vision and dental. Now it is six months later and I am still working and still have over $6,000 in debt before I can start thinking about my next step.

When I got to the dentist they told me they needed to do xrays because they only did that fancy xray last year, what do you call it? The one where it takes a continuous picture of all of your teeth. Anyway, I asked how much it would cost and they said $62. I asked how much the cleaning would be and they said $100. I thought that was ok although unplanned and then I remembered that my new insurance is a health savings account. Not only that but my company contributes to it. I think I get $250 a quarter or something like that.

I managed to escape without any cavities or other problems although they were concerned about one back tooth. Kind of looked like a crack on the xray. They just told me to watch for any sensitivity and come back if it was hurting. It was time to pay and I had my HSA debit card which they gladly accepted. But then their computers were down and it was 5pm so they took down the number and said they would run it tomorrow. Good thing because I didn't know the PIN. I came home and found the PIN and I know they will be calling for it tomorrow.

So, my trip to the dentist didn't take any money out of my extra cash fund. That means I should still have $500 budgeted for the Home Depot card, $500 from my tax refund to go to the mortgage, and $636 for...hmmm...the HD card or the mortgage or...my fence project! Ok, I should probably just put it towards the credit card instead of spending more money at Home Depot. It is tempting though.

Stopping The Cash Leak

It was a nice quiet day at work today. I started to clean off my desk but then I didn't want it to look TOO clean. The people who were testing out my puppy decided to keep him so I didn't have to go pick him up after work. I am glad because I am not in the mood for more potty training. I got to go straight home again and decided to try to take all 6 dogs for a walk at the same time. This was not as enjoyable as taking only 3 but I actually survived it and only lost one dog when I dropped his leash. He ran off and then came back by the time the rest of us made it home. Naughty dog.

Tomorrow I think I will get another load of water. Might as well keep filling up my tanks if the house isn't rented. It is hard to be patient but if I get a good renter eventually then it will be worth the wait.

Oh and I finally added up my expenses for January, February, and March. No wonder I don't have the money to pay off my Home Depot card. I went over budget by $500 each month!!! That means I am $1,500 short. Some of that was the extra electric bill from running 4 space heaters. Some was from buying extra things that I didn't really need but I was at the store so much for my rental house I just grabbed a few things because it was convenient. Some was from eating out and buying more convenience food because I didn't have time to cook. It all added up to a lot of money. Now that I am not shopping for my rental house I should be able to stop the spending. If I want to pay off that credit card and finish off the mortgage I am going to have to get back to staying within my budget. I only have $636 extra a month to go towards the mortgage and credit card. I can't be spending that on donuts and cookies and expect to still meet my goals. If I keep doing that it will take until December to finish the mortgage and that is just too long.

Bounce Back

So, it wasn't a mid-week dog return, it was a beginning of the week dog return. I think it was only 9 o'clock when I was told the people wanted to return one of the dogs. It seems she got a hold of the husband's wallet and chewed it up along with the contents. Then she chewed up the dog bed and was spreading the stuffing around. I don't think they were as ready for a crazy puppy as they thought. She went home with me and they are keeping the second one until Wednesday to see if they can handle one puppy at a time. I kept trying to encourage them to look at dogs who were a little older so that they wouldn't have so many issues to deal with but puppies are just soooo cute...until they chew your wallet.

I took a few minutes to put my towels and sheets away. They had been on a bookshelf in the living room but the puppy who got returned likes to pull them off the shelf and shred them. I hope nothing is destroyed when I come home from work tomorrow. If I had a better fence she could be outside. I am really looking forward to building that fence. First though I have to pay off the credit card ($2,000), pay off the mortgage ($4,500) and probably buy a water tap from the water company ($2,000) so I can haul my own water. Maybe I'll get that fence next Fall.

Little Bits Of Progress

I would just like to say that doing my taxes online on a tiny netbook is horrible. Next year I have got to have a better set up. My old desktop was much better. Nice big screen and plenty of room to work.

I was able to find my old stock info and I just need to double check my calculations. And so ends my 10 year stock experiment. What a miserable 10 years for stocks or at least the stocks I picked. Good news is that I won't be paying any taxes on capital gains because, well, the negatives cancelled out the positives. And I don't even know what to do with GM. I would have had to pay in order to sell it and I didn't need the losses anyway because I don't have any gains to offset.

In the afternoon I went to the rental house and finally finished putting the closet doors back on and taking my tools back home. It is all ready to rent now...except there is one closet door with a blue mark on it. If I remember I will bring some paint and a brush to see if I can touch it up.

It rained gently all day and was quite cold. It looks like I collected 50 gallons in both water tanks. The dogs tracked muddy footprints all over the floor. I cleaned it up once and it looked the same 2 hours later. The second time I just swept. I'll clean again when the ground is dry. No use wasting all those paper towels.

And Happy Birthday to my mom! I hope you had a wonderful birthday.

Another Late Night

Oh no, I've managed to stay up too late and the morning is going to come way too soon. Nothing much to report. The tiling is working it's way down the hallway. The puppies are getting big and I am spending way too much time cleaning up after them. The big Animal Fair is this weekend and plans are changing and re-changing. I am taking 3 dogs I think. I made it through another day of work without quitting which is good because someone has to pay for the tile work. I got a Home Depot Credit card and charged my big purchases on it because they have a no interest for 6 months deal. I didn't want to use up all of my cash reserves and it's a good thing I didn't because this project is costing around twice as much as I expected. I've never paid the minimum payment on a credit card but I did today. I need to pay off my mortgage before August or else I will have to pay off the credit card first. I'll make that plan when the house is rented again. Right now the cash outlet valve is still wide open.

The Ever-Expanding Home Repair Budget

I seem to be really bad at home repair estimates. For one thing, it didn't dawn on me at the beginning that the house would need paint. 20 gallons and 3 days of work and I have a freshly painted house. I also have to pay for it. Each 5 gallon bucket of paint was $100. Sprayer rental $130. Drop cloths, tape, brushes, and other miscellaneous stuff, $200. Labor $460. That's a large chunk of my budget.

Next is carpet removal which means another day of labor plus fees to haul the carpet to the dump. I'll try offering it free on craig's list and see if anyone wants to use it as weed suppression in their garden or whatever else people use old carpet for.

As you can see in the picture, the front door opens right in to the living room and the kitchen area and dining area are both in the same room. That's good if you like to watch TV while you cook.

At least it smells better now. Before it smelled like some sort of fragrance trying to cover stale smoke. Now it smells like paint although the garage still smells like trash because that's where the trash is. I sorted out the recycling and hauled away 3 bags of trash to the dumpster behind my work. The trash can is still full and the plastic from painting is waiting for it's turn in the can. I am looking forward to trash day (Friday).

Home Depot called with their carpet quote. $980 for 4 bedrooms of carpet installed. I guess I'm going to do it. That leaves very little for the living room, kitchen, dining, and master bathroom. I think I can afford the vinyl but will have to let my handyman go. I have run out of money for labor. They say that the vinyl installation is easy. I read as many reviews as I could find and most of them say it is easy and looks great. I want to try it on the master bath this weekend and if all goes well maybe I will take a day or two off work next week and work on it myself. I seem to be stuck in a no-win situation. I don't have money to hire someone, the longer it is vacant the more money I lose, if I take time off work I use up my vacation days and I might do a bad job and need to hire a professional anyway. But I am hopeful that I will be able to do it myself. I'll keep my handyman's number just in case.

Not There Yet

Ugh...another annoying day at work. It was annoying enough to make me think about quitting today. I could take all of the money in my bank account and almost pay off the mortgage. Then I could put the flooring and other rental house improvements on a Home Depot charge card and get no interest for 6 months. Assuming my rental house gets rented in March, I could survive for 6 months and then I would be in big trouble when it was time to pay that credit card! You might have guessed that I did not quit today.

Tomorrow I get the wonderful chore of sorting someone else's trash. My tenants filled both cans to overflowing. The big problem with that is one of those cans is for recycled items only and I will get fined if it is full of trash so I get to sort it out. Trash day is early Friday morning so I definitely want to get those cans out to the curb for pick up so I can use those cans for my own trash and recycling.

The Home Depot installation services guy stopped by to measure my house. I never heard back from him. From the in-store estimate that I got a few weeks ago, I am hoping that carpeting the 4 bedrooms only costs $800. That's what I have in my budget. I hope I hear from him tomorrow.