The job search is still on! Here’s a few things I’ve been itching to do, but am putting off until I have employment (and paychecks!):

1) Get a Bank of America Savings Account with Keep The Change. I already have a checking account with them, but their savings accounts require either a fee or a $25 a month automatic transfer from your checking. I’m not comfortable committing to that transfer until I have gainful employment. However, the whole point of it is to take advantage of the tasty Keep the Change deal. After some good money accumulates in there (between the Keep the Change and the automatic transfers), I’ll move the money over to my Emigrant account to get even better returns.

2) Apply for a card with a 0% interest rate on balance transfers for one year, roll my debt onto it, and pay it as fast as possible. Pretty self explanatory. There’s two reasons I’m waiting on this: first of all, to be able to fill out the “Employer” section on the credit application will make me feel a lot better, and probably improve my chances of getting the card approved at a large enough credit limit. Also, I want to make sure that I’ll have enough money coming in to pay off the balance before the 0% rate expires.

3) Buy some DevaCurl products. Ok, first of all, this is my little treat for getting a job. Secondly, this might save me some money in the long run, according to English Major. Most of all, I want to see if I can’t just find some better products for my curls!

4) Take my car to the mechanic. Alright, I’ll admit it: I’m driving around with the “check engine” light on. But the mechanics didn’t find anything wrong with it when I had it inspected, and I haven’t had the money to fix it, if there is something wrong. If I want to keep whatever job I get, I’ll need to keep my ride in ship-shape… er… car-shape?

5) Get this blog a domain. It’s only $10 a year. And I think the poor girl (get it? “Poorer Than You” – “poor girl?” Hahaha, I’m so easily amused) deserves to start spreading her wings a bit.

While the biggest buzz for a Harry Potter book comes on release day, the second biggest has got to be when they announce said release day – and the name of the book. You can’t escape the announcement – the final book will be Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and the release is slated for July 21st of this year.

I’ve been a fan of the series for the past seven years – the books still deliver, as far as I’m concerned, although I was sorely disappointed in the fourth movie (I think it was too confusing and disjointed for non-readers). However, with this becoming one of the world’s greatest franchises, are we paying too much?

The assertion that we are was made on the discussion page for the new book.

R. Dennis says:

I can’t believe how much it is!! That is even more than an adult hardback.

You would think someone from her background would have more feelings for people without a lot of money…

Yes, I know no one pays full price but it is still riduculous.

With the pre-order currently listed at $18.89, down from the List Price of $34.99, is this book too expensive? Keep in mind that the book is probably about 700 pages.

I received an email from my Chase account tonight, letting me know that a new statement had been posted to my account – the 2006 Year in Review Statement.

Huh.

I’m pleasantly surprised by the thing. It’s a great breakdown of my spending habits on my credit card over the year. There’s a chart, with the following categories broken down by month: Travel and Entertainment, Restaurant, Automotive, Merchandise, Services, and Miscellaneous.

There’s a pie chart for all the categories below that, which showed the breakdown as:
0.67% Miscellaneous
3.86% Restaurants
8.86% Automotive
23.21% Services
30.34% Merchandise
33.06% Travel and Entertainment

And there’s a bar graph of the monthly spending patterns at the bottom. The following pages show all the items, sorted by category. My only issue with the whole thing is that they grouped my grocery purchases into “Merchandise,” which is not where I would have thought to look for them.

The other problem is that I don’t use my credit card for everything. Since July, I’ve had a debit card which I put most of my gas and grocery purchases on. I could, on my own, recalculate everything to include those purchases as well, but frankly, I’m not likely to do that.

But, I will make predictions for the 2007 statement:

10.00% Miscellaneous – I bumped this up to make the numbers work
5.00% Restaurants – a nice round number
25.00% Automotive – this will go up now that I have my own car
10.00% Services – this will go down, simply because the things placed in this category are things I’m not as likely to buy this year
30.00% Merchandise – since groceries are included, I don’t anticipate much change
20.00% Travel and Entertainment – this will go down due to a new-found frugality

Golbguru over at The Tao of Making Money put forth the following question for the upcoming Festival of Under 30 Finances:

Assume you are an average 25 year old with $25,000 debt (on account of your student loan) You have been given a lump sum $10,000 and the following four choices:

1. Invest it for your retirement funds.
2. Save/invest it for your future home.
3. Save/invest it towards your child’s/children’s future college education.
4. Pay part of your student loan debt.

You can pick only one of the above choices towards which you should use the entire $10,000. Which one will you pick? ..and Why? Assume that the rate of return on the three investments choices is the same and the student loan charges you an interest rate that is equal to this rate of return. Would your answer be any different if the amount was $25,000 instead of $10,000? Again, you can pick only one of the choices.

Well, first of all, I’d stomp on the floor and start whining “Who says I can only do one of those things?” After my tantrum subsided, I’d give my answer:

Invest for retirement. There’s no day like today, so this would be my very first choice for the money. Sock it away. Also, I believe that you really shouldn’t put your children’s education before your own retirement. Like Suze Orman pointed out – there are plenty of loans and scholarships for college, but there are none for retirement. It’s the same for a house: you can get a mortgage on your home, but not on your retirement. I don’t really have a solid excuse for choosing this over the student loans (assuming the interest rate is equal to the rate of return) – at that point, it’s just a personal choice.

So, would it change at $25,000? I believe so. I would pay off the student loans completely, and take the extra “income” each month from not having to pay them, and start dividing that money up into savings for retirement AND a house. Haha, I beat your little “you can only choose one!” system, didn’t I?

I had a fairly aggravating conversation with a friend of mine last night. My friends are nice people, but not a one of them has a clue about money. Of course, this all started because of our sweet, dear college – it usually does.

My friend’s problem was that the school had switched from paper billing to online billing, and so his parents never got the latest bill, so the school put a hold on his account (not letting him register for next quarter’s classes) until he paid the $500 he owed them.

I can see where you would be upset. After all, not being able to register for classes the second they open registration can cause major problems (I myself once got screwed over by the registration system, big time). But, in the end, it’s all his own fault.

The school sent plenty of emails and paper mailing to both us and our parents, detailing the new system. It was his responsibility to log onto the new online bill system and set up his parents’ emails so that they would get their email copies of the bills. And, this system was set up in June of 2005, so don’t ask me how he’s just finding out about it now – it’s been this way for all but his freshman year.

I can see why the school would make the switch. I personally enjoy the fact that they’re saving tons of paper with the new system, rather than sending out a paper bill to each of the 10,000+ students 6-8 times a year. But I can also see that someone saw this as an opportunity to not only save some money for the school, but also make some. How much more in late fees can they collect off the irresponsible students who never bother to set up the emails for their parents? I kinda like this, as well – let the irresponsible kids pay more, so my tuition rates don’t go up as much. It’s a win for those of us who are on top of our money!

Of course, that’s where the conversation lead. I had always had the particular feeling that this friend had no idea about his money – at least, not as far as the school was concerned. Of course, his parents pay all the bills that come, but I knew that he had to have some student loans of his own in there. And when I asked? He had no idea.

*sigh*

People, you have to PAY those when you graduate. With interest! You should be checking them, at least a few times a year, know exactly how much you owe, and watch out for scholarships you can apply for to lessen the load. It’s not that hard.

The problem is that money, especially debt, freaks out most everyone I know – and this is not limited to my age group, but it’s especially prevalent. The idea is “I won’t think about it, and I definitely won’t talk about it, and I’ll just deal with it when I graduate.” Right… that sounds fun. Post-graduation job search and move aren’t stressful enough for you? You have to add in a brand spanking new slap-in-the-face of a 5 or 6 digit debt? What is this… Xtreme Graduating(tm)?

No wait, it gets worse. So I start in on my spiel, which is basically Ramit’s 5 Steps to Getting Rich, plus some other things to just help him build credit. I would have just sent him some links, but he stubbornly refused to go near a personal finance blog (huh?), so I had to do the whole thing myself. Each step was like wrestling with porcupine, I swear.

Here are some key quips:

Friend: I take control of my finances
Stephanie: got any investments? an emergency fund?
Friend: ok….
Friend: maybe not
Friend: but if I invested in anything I’d lose all my money
Stephanie: WRONG
Friend: I don’t have the capital to start investing
Stephanie: WRONG
Friend: I got bills to pay
Stephanie: *sigh*

And later on…

Stephanie: do you have a credit card?
Stephanie: There’s the first thing you can fix
Friend: um
Friend: no
Stephanie: ok, credit cards usually = bad, right?
Friend: no credit for me
Stephanie: why?
Friend: cause I like to actually pay for things

Of course, I went on to explain that there are good ways to use a credit card, and that you really need to, at our age, to start a credit history and boost your score. Still, this “stubborn ignorance” and defensive need to find excuses for not looking after your financial future bewilders me. We like to spend money just as much, if not more, than any other age group. Why wouldn’t we want to find ways to maximize our money?

Some days, I just don’t get it.