Evolving Personal Finance » Archive
Favorite Posts, Mentions, and Top Comments Week of 10November2013
As you can see from the late post today, we’re still very busy with work! I’ve worked full days Saturday and Sunday in addition to evenings during the week… Ugh. But Kyle deep-cleaned the entire kitchen while I was at work on Saturday, which was wonderful to come home to. (I don’t might light cleaning but I hate deep cleaning – gross.) We did see Gravity yesterday ($25! I remember when…). My work was going terribly so I knocked off at 7 PM and we went to a 10 PM showing. We were practically the only ones in the theater. The visuals were great, of course, and we had a wonderful conversation on the inaccuracies later. 🙂 Sorry for not leaving many comments around the blogosphere this week. There were plenty of … Read entire article »
Filed under: weekly update
When Plans Change
I have a personal update for you today! It’s about how our protracted time to graduation has affected our plans, careers, and finances. I though we had some timelines and plans down, and then they were shot to heck, and now the picture is re-coming into focus. Grad School I’ve mentioned in my weekly wrap-ups here that for the past several weeks Kyle has been working around the clock on writing his dissertation. We were hoping that … Read entire article »
Filed under: career, cars, goals, marriage, personal, savings, spending, transitions
Who Is the Accountability Partner for What?
I had an interesting conversation with a couple of my FPU students a couple weeks ago. I was telling them about how much I like Republic Wireless and they asked if I am planning to upgrade my phone when they release the new one. I said that Kyle has been pushing me to upgrade but that I didn’t see the need – to me upgrading a functional smartphone after only one year of use seems … Read entire article »
Filed under: lifestyle creep, marriage, spending
Favorite Posts, Mentions, and Top Comments Week of 3November2013
What can I say about this week? It was grueling, as most of my weeks have been recently. I’m really working at an unsustainable pace, but I only need to sustain it through the beginning of December. 🙂 I did have kind of a funny one-car incident on Saturday. Kyle was working at church from 12:30 PM through the service, which starts at 4:00 PM. He dropped me off at work in the morning and we thought he might be able to steal away for a few minutes to pick me up close to 4:00 PM, but it didn’t seem like it would work out because there was also a football game starting at 4:00 PM and we thought the campus might be difficult to drive in and out of quickly. … Read entire article »
Filed under: weekly update
Accepting Money for a Favor
This week, one of my colleagues asked me if I would edit a document he’s working on – and he offered to pay me to do it. I said that I would help with the edits but turned down the payment offer twice and we left the money issue unresolved. I’m still not sure what to do. I feel a little strange accepting money from a friend for what I consider to be a favor. I … Read entire article »
Filed under: income
Would You Take a Break from Working?
As Kyle is drawing closer to graduating, he’s facing a job transition. His advisor has offered for him to stay in his current lab as a temporary measure until he finds a postdoctoral position at another university. Academic labs seem fairly flexible in when personnel come and go so between a flexible end date in his current lab and a flexible start date in his next lab, Kyle could choose to go basically immediately from … Read entire article »
Filed under: career
HuffPoLive Segment on Boomerang Kids Paying Rent
Today I participated in a HuffPost Live segment with Erin from Broke Millennial that was inspired by her great post on why parents should charge their boomerang kids rent. Erin asked me to join her as someone who paid a rent-equivalent while I lived with my parents post-college. So for those of you who are curious about my and Erin’s faces/voices, the segment is embedded below. It was supposed to be 20-25 minutes but was cut to about 10 – can you tell I didn’t get all my talking points in? 😉 About a year ago I wrote two posts of my own about boomerang kids, based on my experience as one: Boomerang Kids, Listen Up: It’s Not All about You How to Be an Exemplary Boomerang Kid Thanks so much for asking me … Read entire article »
Favorite Posts, Mentions, and Top Comments Week of 27October2013
More of the same this week, so nothing new to report! Work is coming out of our ears. I’m probably going to be working quite a lot through the first week in December, and who knows when Kyle will let off the gas on writing and editing his dissertation. Posts I Liked Debt Blag advocates for getting to know your SO financially during the dating period instead of post-engagement. Michelle from Making Sense of Cents has certain luxuries … Read entire article »
Filed under: weekly update
Will You Ever Reduce Your Retirement Contribution Rate?
November 4th, 2013 | 23 Comments
When I think about the retirement savings trajectory of a typical American, I imagine that his rate of saving for retirement increases basically monotonically throughout his life. In his 20s and 30s he doesn’t save anything; in his 40s he wises up and starts putting money away; in his 50s he panics and saves as much as he can given the lifestyle he’s become accustomed to; by the time he’s about to retire he’s putting … Read entire article »
Filed under: choices, retirement, savings