Oct 29, 2014

The "Reset" button

I spoke of purging and cleaning the wardrobe, room, hanging up the curtains etc last week, I went through the process during the weekend and it was a nightmare. Every time I cleaned I am shock at the sheer amount of stuff I have, how much space they are taking up, how much effort they require to be cleaned regularly. This serves as a reminder every single time that I need to downsize, and stop bringing things home!

While I was cleaning, the picture became clear again: there's always something I don't wear in the closet, yet I can't bear to donate them. This alone is making the closet burst and finding clothes a difficult task. I found 2 long coats bought at the charity sale last year which were WAY TOO BIG for my built, the size made me look like a homeless person (the horror), I thought about getting them altered but the cost will definitely be higher than what I bought them for! So they are still sitting in the closet now, until I figure a way to make them wearable.

I put aside some unwanted clothing and sold them for $10 together with some old papers. I also picked up another $10 from the pavement the other day. Yay!

With that in mind, I probably will not go to the charity sale this weekend. If I do, it'll be helping my mom to carry her stuff, and I'll not spend a penny on any clothes. A lesson should be learned here: NEVER, ever buy clothes that don't fit (a bit small or a bit big), don't harbor the thought of I'd fit into them *someday*, I won't.

I've been doing some small reading ion ETFs and stocks, I really need to get my dough, albeit small, to start rolling. The question is where, and how. I was told it will be a lengthy journey for anyone who wants to learn about investment, hopefully I will get it right. My goal before the end of the year is to open an investment account and put in funds for some dividend-paying stocks and maybe a bit of ETFs / funds. 

The weekend getaway in November came at HK$200 below the expected amount, another thing to be happy about! I paid for it promptly but it'll technically be a November spend. On a health-related note, I need to get on with the jog this weekend to give November a healthy start.  I also have started thinking about the vacation plans for next year (2 trips), it'll be a financial strain for me (given my late start in budgeting) but thinking that for the next 2 years I won't be able to take any long leave from work, it'll be OK. Now all that's left to do is to tighten the belt and how to make it work, stick to it.

Here's to a good start for everyone in November!

Oct 24, 2014

Drained.

The past two weeks various family troubles plagued me. I've spent time and energy to work things out but sometimes it's not me, it's them (the relatives) that were not being reasonable. They made me mad and upset and I had to find people to talk to, and you can't really talk about family troubles with anyone out there. Right now things have gotten to a very thorny, tricky and hanging-on-a-thread juncture, and I'm not sure where it'll head to. The worst case scenario is we won't be seeing some of these relatives during festive times, or that we'll pretend not to see each other. While THAT is odd, I guess we'll all get used to it at some point. 

It is the most critical of times that reveal who that person really is, and it is exactly that right now. I get to see who some of them really are and I"m not pleased at them, nor will I compromise to their unreasonable demands just for the sake of family harmony. It's hard to be a good and helpful relative, and I will stop doing that from now on. All I got in return was backstabbing and ungrateful words. Even though I've discussed this with my friends lately, I still feel the need to properly write these things off my chest and start the day clear. So the rant will end here. *RANT MODE OVER*

Aside from dealing with family issues, I've hardly make any progress on October goals. I plan to do the room cleaning tomorrow, purging the wardrobe and see what needs to be donated / rid of, digging all the winter apparel out, and putting the summer stuff away, hanging up the curtains, etc. November we'll see a weekend getaway, a charity sale (I won't buy but I may go along with my mom to help her with carrying stuff, let's see). A haircut would be great because I feel sluggish and badly in need of a trim - having a haircut when you want to start from afresh / cut away with old past, is psychologically helpful. I'm hoping to get on my feet to complete the said goals, tweak my budget and such, work harder on the side-hustle front.

It's a bit early to say that but I truly hope November will be a good month! 

Oct 19, 2014

Change of seasons and preparations

It's been a good 12 days since my last check-in. I finally got a small tax refund :) it's a small amount (about US$30 odd dollars) but nevertheless it's nice to have a refund after all. 

The past 12 days had been hectic and frankly the protest news had got me mentally fatigued and I wasn't in the mood to do anything really. I'll catch up with the blog posts I missed and the comments to make. Nowadays I prefer the TV off, it annoys me and upsets me when my mom switches it on. I can't remain calm when I watch the news, and I feel very sorry for the cops who are literally fighting a battle each and every day/night. I care (about what's going on, but every time I watch the news I got upset and terrified by what's going on. Those people are really nuts, and I can't stand to live in such a place anymore. When I have the money, I'll leave. One more reason to save $!

The temperatures have dropped a bit and it was definitely getting cooler. I've made a to-do list to prep for winter and there is just so much to do. Bear in mind that we don't have snow here so it might not be "cold" by each person's standard. Without further ado, here's the list:

1) Reshuffle wardrobe and put the winter pile at the front, summer pile to the back

2) Dig out the winter shoes, booties and tights (for some reason my tights always go "missing" in the mornings, or the wrong ones keep popping up)

3) Purge old clothes, winter coat and donate

4) Clean room with bleach once again (repeat every 3 months)

5) Hang up the curtains in room

6) Stock up on shampoo

Regarding item (3), I had a younger cousin who I gave my old/purged clothes to for the past few years, she's always taken it for "granted" and was reluctant to come to a train station near my home, the pile was heavy each time. She insisted that I meet her up at the train station near HER home, and she was also the one who had a student discount on train fare, and I don't! I got fed up by her attitude and laziness, it seemed to me that she doesn't really "care" for the free clothes, mind you some of them are brand new. I would call her up and asked her to pick up the clothes on a holiday weekend and she would reply reluctantly and keep telling me she's busy (hello she's a student). I don't want to go through this nuisance and suck up her attitude. I would rather bin the pile or donate it, it takes less time and less effort and at least I don't have to deal with her bat-shit. There has been lots of family troubles going on which bothered me personally lately. 

I have a coat in mind which I'll trash it because it got a bit small for me now, and the buttons keep falling off after I stitched them back for a few times during the past several years. Maybe I"ll take it with me next time I travel, and bin it upon return to shed some of the luggage weight. I always do that with the torn and worn undergarments. I've also set my eyes on a few nice coats but I don't think I'll get them (not at full price anyway), there's just too much in my wardrobe already! I'll go through the coats one by one and see which one can stay / go, then we'll see if there's a chance for some new additions.

The current blanket I'm using is not enough for winter and I should really just get a nice warm duvet/quilt but a nice one filled with down will be really, really expensive. Plus there's the storage issue and I"m not sure if I can use it during summer too, will sleep on this and come back to it later? It won't fit in my current budget anytime soon...hmm...

Budget-wise, an overspent have been recorded(!!!). I think I've done pretty good so far up to mid October, spending less than half of the amount for food (up to today) and I did not make unnecessary trips to the supermarket. But I screwed up majorly in the clothes and beauty section. Remember the GAP gym bottoms I mentioned last time? They were not budgeted but it was a 30% off total. The real blow came when I ordered a mini tote with 25% off in an FF sale! Then I snagged 3 shorts on clearance, because when is a better time to buy summer items for next year? Now! I should put a stop to the spending on clothes.

The beauty department was where the major overspent appeared. I came across the rarely-in-stock cotton puffs and stocked up majorly, then I got a nice coffret by paying less than half (thanks to cash coupons). The cotton puffs I'll use up eventually but the coffret is NOT a "need" but a "want" obviously. Then there's the shampoo stock-up. I made an order last minute because the house is running out of shampoo and the order (which has a nice surprise 10% off) will bring 9-10 bottles of them for all of us in the house. That shall last for about a year or more. I'm very pleased with the deal, but I need to budget for this time and again.

Our office will see a colleague departing who is really close with me. This week and the next will be full of social lunch occasions, we're talking about 5-6 of those with different parties but the same colleague!! GAHHH, there's really no way to get away with it but to chip in and pay for her share. So I'll do so. I've re-purposed an item which will be gifted to her, which I'm very proud of, lol. Last week I treated two of my relatives to dinner and it was a good one, albeit it's came around a bit more than I budgeted for - but I'll gladly pay for the time spent together any day.

Next month we'll see a weekend getaway trip with a bunch of friends, and the long overdue haircut shall also happen next month, my hair resembles a stack of dry hay as of late. I hope I can make a bit more from the side-hustles next month, as October has been a bit sluggish in that area. A formal budget review shall come next month too, as the current one is a pilot one made in July which needs some adjustment and tweaking.

Hope everyone has had a good month so far!

Oct 7, 2014

Stocking up on essentials

Yesterday I had lunch out with a former colleague who is also a friend of mine (despite she's retired at her 50s), we talked a lot about the strikes going on in the city, and our family members who hold different views. I told her I'm sourly disappointed with the people around me who seemed to be in support of the strikes, now I don't think it's wrong to voice out opinions, but a fine line has to be drawn when it comes to the consequences. The collateral damage incurred in the "supposedly innocent" strikes here we're talking about are: bus drivers, minibus drivers and taxi drivers driven out of work because the major roads are blocked, routes are cut (until god knows when), no surprise to believe that some are told to take days off. We're also dealing with shopkeepers and merchants who have to close their stores due to the riots and possible chaos of the strikes, the insurance companies DO NOT insure / reimburse damages due to political riots / instability. We're also talking about numerous working adults who had to "fight their way" (me included) when commuting to work each day, students who cannot attend schools because of the chaos and lack of transport. A resident of the strike area complained that he has to walk 2 hours to a nearby place where he can get there in a little bit more than 30 mins. I told my mom to stock up on some fresh food in case the trucks aren't coming in on time to replenish the supermarket stores...I've been so turned off by these people causing all the troubles.

Then we went to a grocery store and I happened to see the cotton puffs I plow through monthly is back in stock. PJ being PJ, jumped at the opportunity and stocked some - well, a lot - boxes up. I gave 1 box to the colleague. They'll be enough to run for entire year without the need to replenish, this quantity will cover both my mom's and my usage.

Then I headed to a "beauty samples spree" after work, paid NOTHING but got a handful of tubes, jars and sachets, gotta love beauty memberships, YAY! Also had a bowl of my favorite noodles and it was a hearty meal. I deliberately went home a bit later than the usual peak hours to avoid the rush hour crowd and traffic, and it was way easier to manage than returning home straight away. 

For the whole life insurance thing, I decided to sleep on it a bit, still on the fence. Term life insurance is an option but one that I'd like to forget - term life insurance here insures up to age 75 only, which is nothing but a gamble whether I'll die before 75 or after 75. If it's the latter, nobody will be able to get a cent out of the payments. One could say that the money I put away monthly for whole life insurance might do better if put into a mutual fund or something, I don't know if it's true (yet), and I'm too new to the field of investing. Speaking of which, I have a plan to get into investment next year...we'll see. My former colleague suggested I buy some gold because its prices are dropping, but I'll have to rent a safe deposit box at the bank and pay rent for it (!), plus it's not like they have tons of safe deposit boxes at the banks for rent, so one has to queue for god knows how long.

I'll probably have a trim at the hair sometime this month - it's looking awful in photos since August. The shampoo stockpile is running out so there will be a chance that I'll do an online order for shampoos in November. My online liquid soap order arrived yesterday and it was splendid. I'm also hoping to get a few hyper-pigmentation spots on the face removed come winter when I sweat less and see the light less.

About a week ago I've sent documents to the Tax people and am waiting to hear from them. Stupid me, I forgot to fill in some information 3 years ago and hence they did not factor that the retirement contribution I paid when calculating my taxes back then. The good thing is that the person on the other hand of the phone said they could do a re-assessment to see if there'll be tax dollars returned to me. :-)

Oct 5, 2014

Life insurance - dilemma AGAIN

One of my October goals is to have some of the insurance stuff sorted out - I met up with the agent with SO last week, I have asked the agent to show me the different options for a Life Insurance plan for moi. He had made 4 different payment plans, the insured amount + insured age + terms being the same for all plans. The plan was, of course, not for me (I'm not a beneficiary but my parents will be).

I did the math at home, the shorter the payment cycle is, the smaller the overall amount I need to pay in total. The 4 different payment plans can be paid monthly or yearly, in essence the math is:

(1) $113,860 per year x 5 years = $569,300 i.e. $9,488 per month.

(2) $59,680 per year x 10 years = $598,600 i.e. $4,973 per month.

(3) $41,660 per year x 15 years = $624,900 i.e. $3,471 per month.

(4) $34,720 per year x 20 years = $694,400 i.e. $2,893 per month.

................That's a tough math! But what in life isn't?

Option (1): As much as I want to pick this, there's hardly any money left for savings per month after all my expenses are deducted, and we're talking about 5 whole years without savings (!!!). This is out of the question I think?

Option (2): It's thinkable, it'll leave me a bit of wiggle room for savings (down by half than I plan to save per month), but shall I decide to buy a house, it also means the down payment sum will be smaller/slower than I want it to be.

Option (3): Not so much different than (2) above, but even more wiggle room for savings. Not the most ideal but thinkable.

Option (4): This one is easiest to manage, if I can stick to my budget each month, I'll still be able to achieve the minimal savings goal set per year, albeit I have to keep telling myself I"m walking a tight rope. Here we are talking about 20 years of payment so things will become easier when I get raises across years. BUT, I don't like the thought of owing something and paying something for 20 years (except mortgage)!!!!!! Also, bear in mind that the difference of the total sum between Option (4) and Option (2) is > 98,000!

If you know PJ, PJ is the sort of person that if she wants something done, she wants it to be done quick, neat and efficiently (cost, energy, effort).

In 5-7 years time, I plan to buy a house and get mortgage. I don't have exact figures or plans yet but I know I want to do that, better as soon as possible. I also would like to add that anyone of my age should easily have at least 300k net worth and I'm falling far behind.

Have you faced such dilemmas? How and what did you end up deciding?

Losing patience with the city strikes

At the supermarket checkout, I got 2 small bottles of shampoo (for my family) for HK$9.9 each. They're not big bottles but enough to last 20-30 washes I guess, that's not so bad but looking back, it might not be the best value for money. Not sure. 

(Note to self: Don't buy any stuff that's not listed on the to-buy-and-needed-necessity list.)

On Friday I saw there's a cute set of figurines from a fast food chain that includes Batman, Wonder Woman, the Joker, Superman, Cat Woman. I asked my colleague who patronize that fast food chain to help me get the set and I'll pay him. Then 3 hours later I thought, I don't need anymore junk or clutter at my home. I am not going to get any value from the figurines apart some tiny joy (upon getting it) which will subside to nothing a week later. The figurines will be as cute as looking at them on printed papers. So, I told my colleague he doesn't need to get it anymore. Money saved!

Lately I've been thinking of keeping a sleep log book, in an effort to make moi get enough hours of rest per day. Does anyone do that and how did it come around?

The various strikes that's been going on in the city has driven me nuts. Not only did I have to walk to the nearest train station whenever I go out, I have to walk back home from there. I do the former frequently on weekends but I"m not happy that I have to do this on my commute to work in the morning. 

Plus the train journeys are costing me MORE than my usual commute, although the cents and odd dollars can be absorbed in my budget, it's not something I want to continue, nor is this disturbance to my sense of ease/peace (when going out) can be further tolerated. Don't forget that I sweat much more and clothes have to be washed once I got home - here's to the rising laundry-related costs. Yes I may be walking more than usual but let's not forget the roads are busy roads with cars, so more fumes and dust during the walk. Imagine walking home so slowly and painfully on a stomach in paralysis (some sushi I had last night), lugging a tote full of stuff, sweating profusely. It's dire, it's pathetic.

Note to self: Have less and less raw fish because stomach paralysis due to unclean food is not. worth. it.

I don't mind sweating a bit more when becoming frugal, I was doing exact that all along, until now. It's not frugal by any measure. What can I say, the strike and its strikers should be damned!!!

Oct 2, 2014

Flappy arms and October goals

[edited at 22:35 to add point (7) in the goals recap section]

Did a bit of half-jog and half-walk today, it was really hot outside. I have came to notice in mirrors that my upper arms look a bit "flappy". I've come to pick up signs of ageing here and there even in my age: first lines, bloated face (read: dreadful), now the "flappy" arms. My arms could use some help from the rowing machine at the gym, am figuring where to get into a gym near my home now. The one that I can access is rather far away: 2 hours of commute + commute costs. The plus side is I can get in for free. On a side note, I will google some exercises that can help with toning the upper arms as well.

Tomorrow I will be meeting up with my insurance agent as well, so hopefully something will be sorted out this month. For the magazine subscription, I feel quite certain that I won't be renewing it this year because it'll take some time before I go through the unread backlog, plus I don't need more clutter on my desk. I"m looking at re-purposing things as well, I have 2 scented candles which I don't want anymore, am thinking of giving it to a friend who will be moving to her new house next month. It shall make a great housewarming gift. 

This month I'll be mainly looking at driving down food costs (minimize eating out, no shopping for yogurt, relying on oatmeal for breakfast at work). I'm waiting for the weather to cool down so jogging/walking becomes more tolerable, ideally 6x per month, each time I will do at least 3 miles. I enjoy walking a lot (maybe too much) so when the weather becomes nicer it won't be a problem.

To recap:

1) Get some of the insurance matters sorted out;

2) Hit the trail/park 6x, 3 miles each time (already did once today);

3) Look at the gym options near my home;

4) Have more meals at home;

5) Finish reading 1-2 issues of the magazine backlog;

6) Review my budget at the end of the month to see if it needs tweaking. I'm wondering if I should draw up a different budget for each month of the year? Months like parents' birthday will see extra costs spent on meals, grannies birthday/festivals will see extra dollars going to the meal chip-in and pocket money for grannies, haircut during various times of the year, etc. The list could go on and on. Would love to know your thoughts / ways of managing this!

7) Money from side-hustle slowed down a bit since mid September, really need to get the ball rolling again! Need to get in touch with the company in mid or late October. Will test the person I know who work there to find out whether the company is busy at the moment first.

Oct 1, 2014

Lucky Day!

Had a friend coming from UK this week and I took her and her friend out today. Due to the strikes in the city, we decided to venture to the islands. There was two kinds of ferry - the regular and the express, the express is double the price. Didn't take that long for us to decide which one we're taking since the express one won't come until half an hour later (too much wait time). When we returned to the city, there was a large queue for the express one. The regular one would come 45 minutes away so it'll be a long wait (plus we were all tired, sweaty), so we took the express!! Money to buy time. 

We bought bottled drinks, and a snack on a skewer for a light lunch on the island. No qualms on that since I had to eat lunch anyway, and there's no bloody way I'll chug along a bottle of water when I'm doing walking from my home to the pier (blame the bloody strike!) We had seafood dinner and my friend generously paid for me.

I mentioned previously I want to get jogging bottoms for winter season, well today is my lucky day. I waved my friend goodbye and then I passed by GAP. Vaguely remembering that I read someone mentioned that GAP makes decent gym attire, I entered the store. I tried on a pair of capris legging on sale. Then I remembered that GAP had those little lucky draw boxes they put at the entrance, where you can draw a card from the box and see what discount they give you for the purchase (even free purchase/item!). So I asked the SA at the fitting room whether she knows if the discount card applies to sale items, she said yes!! I went out and back into the store with a card drawn (30% off any purchase!), today is really my lucky day don't you think? :-)

Back I went to the gym attire area and gleaned to see if there's any styles that I'd also like to get, then I found the all black, long leggings that comes with a concealed zip pocket for keys at the back of the waist. Nice. I calculated the price before checking out and there were no nasty surprises (the discount applies to sale + regular items). I got 2 pairs of gym bottoms for HK$403, one capris and one long pants, not bad at all! A pair from Nike would have costed $350 after discount. Without the GAP discount card, I wouldn't be thinking of getting a second pair. Everybody likes a pleasant little surprise - be it 10%, 15%, 20%, 25%, 30% off. And it doesn't hurt for the store to create a moment of suspense and excitement by giving away little discount cards in a sealed box for random draws. If you have nothing in mind before entering the store, then that could be a potential danger of spending. The discount cards are good for the whole week so one can always go home and sleep on it. I'm thinking that if it's true as they say (one free purchase/item per day in the lucky box I guess?), then it wouldn't harm to draw a card there whenever I go past the store, if I happen to draw that lucky card to win a free purchase, I will go home and sleep on the things I can get with the card.

I wouldn't say both the jog pants are perfect (ideally should come with drawstrings at the waist, more light-reflective patches for style, color-versatile) but I figured that for a starter, getting the right gear (read: not professional athlete) is important. More important is to know that I'm no professional athlete so unless I"m really an avid gymnastics fan, I'll probably do well in basic offerings from mainstream brands. I've done a bit of research lately on gym attire and some of them (Lululemon) could get really expensive (more so than Nike and Adidas!). I'm new to picking and wearing gym gear so I'll need a bit of time to experiment and later figure out what kind of designs/functions I need. So even though I haven't budgeted them in for October I'm happy to say that these would last for a while.

Mid Week Update

Last Friday and the past two days of this week went by in a whiz. I was pressed tight at work and my migraines + nausea came out rather mercilessly. I felt shit last week to a point that my boss asked if I'm feeling unwell (well, clearly I was). Coupled with that was the crisis going on in the city right now - strikes everywhere so buses are cut. 

Now to give you a clearer picture, I don't live near a train station. So, for the past two days I've been WALKING to the nearest train station (sweated profusely may I add), take the train and go to work; take the train from work to the train station nearest to my home, and WALKED back to my place. Never had I seen SO MANY people on the street walking about, because the buses and the stuff are cut due to strikes. This additional time and effort in my daily commute for the past two days also come with a few cents higher in commute costs than usual. A few cents shouldn't be the cause of concern, but I'd rather not have that (plus the extra leg walk! This is lose-lose situation). 

Due to the strikes going on about the city, I had a panic moment on Monday on my way home. I thought "what if the strikes went on and the supermarkets weren't re-stocked properly?"And so off I went buying a few spring rolls from a noodle shop and mush them into the freezer. Yesterday I thought today and tomorrow will be a public holiday so I might eat one or two meals at home, so off I went to the supermarket and got some asparagus (not on sale, bummed) and peppered ham (on clearance price but not so much cheaper...). The ham will expire (tomorrow) before I can cook them all but I plan to stash them into the freezer for later use. Thus these spur-of-the-moment purchases bumped up my food spending (see last paragraph). 

Lesson to learn here: ALWAYS, ALWAYS have ready to cook/eat food in the stockpile. Be it dehydrated or frozen food, add in some quick-to-cook pasta or noodles and voila! This morning I cooked the asparagus with the ham and the ready-made pasta. To be honest the flavored pasta packets suck in flavor but they'll have to do. At least I don't have to panic at the thought of having no food!

At work, there had been a particular guy who just came to the office (but is not new to working in the department), he was being an @$$ to people who work around him, myself included. That affected me, but I wasn't the key to the solving of the problem either so there's not much I can do on my level. 

The tax notices came in on Saturday and I had a shock (a good one). I had been putting money away every week for "tax payments" and it looks like I'd be dipping into 5% of it. The remaining funds would be tucked away towards the savings pile or the "travel" fund (I don't have one set up). Thoughts??

I just calculated my finances for September, realizing I overspent in the beauty and clothes category. The food category was overspent but bear in mind that it covered my parents' birthday dinner. I'll budget for this come next year. I had stopped buying yogurt altogether, so that was quite a (key) change. Really need to work hard on trimming the beauty and clothes budget. In previous post I mentioned that I want to get a few serious jogging bottoms for the winter season. I did not end up getting any in September (indecision, indecision), please see the upcoming post for an update on this. I put aside and maybe dismissed the thought of renewing my magazine subscription as well, so that's money saved (for now)!