Debt Free Kid

My kid turned eight years old a couple of weeks ago. I booked him an amazing party at the local laser tag place for under $400. He invited eleven friends, and they all showed up! He got a lot of Lego, which he was thrilled with. I got him a new two-wheel bike, because his old one was getting too small. I also bought him new soccer cleats and shin guards, but I would have bought them regardless of his birthday. It was an expensive weekend! Spending on my kid now has its own category in my spreadsheet. I track all the expenses in their own categories (daycare/camps; sports; RESP; life insurance - something I would not purchase now but I bought the policy when I was less informed, and it is universal life, so I keep paying for it - only $24 a month; misc - includes birthday party and more frivolous expenses like tiny shopping sprees). I add up all the amounts and apply it against the amount of child support I get each month. If there are any funds leftover they go into his savings accou...

My blogger friend Grace  struck a chord with me today when she posted about being the "go-to" person in the family, especially when it comes to money. Currently I am financially responsible for only myself and my son. However if something bad happens and I can no longer work and earn, it will force his dad to become more responsible with his own time and money, if possible. So in an indirect way I am the go-to parent, even though at this point in time no one is actually asking me for money. I get bills that the dad doesn't: Daycare - which is subsidized but there is a monthly bill to pay plus I have to meet with the social worker twice a year to insure continuation in the program Dental and prescriptions - which I have benefits to cover but I have to pay the bill before I can get reimbursed. School - always seems to be nickle and diming me for fundraisers, PLUS I have to come up with a lunch the kid will actually eat, which I try to keep cheap and healthy ...

Well I finally opened an ING savings account, and it took me a few months, but I finally remembered to send a cheque in to get things rolling. The good part is that I got a $25 referral bonus (and I can't remember whose Orange Key I used to get it) and the bad part is that the account is still not linked to my other online bank account. I guess I have to send them another cheque, marked VOID. What a pain. I'll get around to it eventually. So now I have two Savings progress bars, one for my old account, and one for my new. ING just started offering a chequing account so I opened one today. I am going have my government incentive cheques (GST, HST, PST) deposited there so that I won't be tempted to spend them. I am also going to send VOID cheques to the companies I use for RESP savings and life insurance to have both withdrawn from the ING account. The focus of this shift to ING is Bean, and keeping "his" finances separate from the others (rent, food, househo...

A couple of weeks ago I decided to pilfer my TFSA in 2010, and apply the $1130 or so to my $3500 credit card balance. I want this card paid OFF, ASAP. I know I'll be losing out on compound interest but I think I'm making the right decision. I will continue to snowflake back into it with each paycheque, but I probably won't get it back up to $1000 by the end of 2010. That's ok, because I desperately want to have the CC and LOC paid off in 2011. I have my 2010 budget spreadsheet all ready to go, with all the modifications I could think of based on spending in 2009. Reaching the final column of the 2009 spreadsheet has been a relief, and a real achievement, because I made through the entire year tracking my expenses and debt payments. Here's a bit of a postmortem: After-tax income, including pay, child tax credit, child support, GST rebates, and gifts and miscellaneous sales $35 841 Rent and Food $11 496 Debt re-payments, including interest charges $8209 Car, including...

I finalized all the tracking for my January spending, and I'm pleased to report that I am right on target. I way overspent in a couple of categories, but made up for it with spending shortfalls in other categories. Here's a brief: Rent $0 (paid first and last in December) Food/House (budgeted $200) $150.68 Apt./Car insurance $96 (on target) Car gas/oil (budgeted $70) $152.31 - way over, due to an oil change and two trips to the big city (an extra 600 kms) Phone (budgeted $90) $121.05 - way over, because I wasn't watching my daytime minutes over the xmas holidays RESP (budgeted $40) $39.20 (on target) Life insurance (budgeted $49) $48.73 (on target) Misc. spending (budgeted $100) $310.10 (sickeningly over budget, but the Kiva loan is in there) Line of credit (budgeted $500) $500 Credit card (budgeted $100) $48.57 - under budget, but I used $47 to top up my RRSP account Emergency Fund TFSA (budgeted $800 from rent not spent) $1000 - proudly over budget! Total spent...

I have been waiting what seems like weeks and weeks for my expense claim reimbursement to come in from the health insurance company my employer chose to do business with. I checked my account online yesterday and found out that I am being reimbursed for less than half of what I claimed. Two reasons: 1) Rather than having a $50 family deductible (which is what I was told would happen) they have decided to have a $25 per person deductible. Since Bean's prescriptions for 2008 just went over the $25 mark, we are not getting the full refund for his most recent prescription. 2) They have been reimbursing my chiropractic appointments as naturopathic appointments, because my chiropractor is also my naturopath, however she has two separate files for my appointments and has clearly been issuing receipts for my chiropractic file. The insurance people neglected to notice/did not care and put it all towards naturopathy, which has a way lower allotment than chiropractic. They told me that I went...

My budget is in place (in Excel anyways) and so far it looks pretty good. I'm saving an average of $350 in rent and bills thanks to the smart decision to move to the apartment. I have also canceled my internet cable (hello to the kind person who is currently supplying the wireless network, when I find out who you are I will make you some banana bread), which saves me another $35 a month. My Emergency Fund is almost complete and I have made arrangements to "pay myself first" by deducting 10% of my gross pay each month and transferring it to an ING-type account. The transfer is made only once a month because, well, have I ever mentioned that I get paid only once a month? Yeah. I have my $20 a week set aside for personal spending, and 20% of that goes to my version of titheing: $2 to my self-help group and another $2 to the offering plate at the UU church. I aim to be able to offer more to each once my savings account is established and I can skim a percentage from that acco...