Andy Hough

September Expenses – $1561.90

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Here is a breakdown of my expenses for September.

Household

$28.74
Entertainment

$84.19

Transportation

 $169.73

Food

$130.19
Van Payment $1000
Debt $5.00
Phone

$26.81
Health

$117.24

Total

 $1561.90

My expenses were down a bit from August.  I made three extra payments on my van or my expenses would have been way down.  If you take away the van payments, my expenses would have been only $561.90. My goal was to keep my expenses other than the van payments below $1000 so I’m very happy with September’s total expenses.  I’m finally starting to see the savings from living in a van. It was one of those rare months where there were no unexpected expenses and no semi-annual/quarterly expenses.  I’ll be hard pressed to keep my expenses as low this month.

Transportation was where I had the most savings.  I went from spending over $500 in gas in August, to spending $169.73 on gas in September. It would be nice if I could keep my gas expense that low again this month.

I doubt I’ll be able to make 3 extra payments on my van again.  I’m hoping I will be able to make at least one extra. All my other expenses will probably be about the same.

 

My Plan to Get What I Want

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Monday I posted about a couple of things I wanted to accomplish and stated that I would post them as SMART goals today. For those who aren’t familiar with the term, SMART goals are goals that are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely.

One of my goals is to write a book. I will have one non-fiction book written and published to Amazon by October 31, 2012. To do this I will simply write one hour a day, five days a week. I have already done a lot of research on the topic I’m writing and have an outline. The book will only be 20-30 pages because that is all it needs to be. I’ve also researched publishing a book on Kindle and have published a book to Amazon for someone else. This goal should be easily attainable if I just put in the time.

My other goal is to lose weight and get in shape. I will lose five pounds by October 31, 2012. To do this I will quit drinking soda, track my calories daily with MyFitnessPal.com, and work out/run at least three times a week. I will also refrain from eating chips, cookies, and candy for the month of October. I’ve tried quitting soda a few times, but this time I think it will actually work because the last few times I’ve had soda it has severely upset my stomach. The pleasure I get from drinking soda is no longer worth the after effects. Since I go to the gym everyday to shower, it won’t be a problem to exercise three times a week. I’m already doing that. I might increase my running outdoors since I actually enjoy that and this is a good time of year to run outdoors.

I also plan to change my eating to mostly low carb/slow carb. Living in the van makes that difficult since I can’t really cook, but I still think it is doable. This part of my plan isn’t too specific yet. Just giving up the junk food and soda should be enough to reach this goal, though.

Next week I promise my post will be less self-absorbed and more helpful to the readers. What do you think of my plan to achieve these goals? Are they SMART? Do I need to change anything?

Snowflake Giveaway Project

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I have joined with several other bloggers to host a snowflake giveaway. You have the chance to win 1 of 10 prizes of PayPal cash or Amazon gift card. The Snowflake Giveaway Project hopes to encourage blog readers to find ways to snowflake to help them reach their financial goal as quickly as possible, while also keeping them motivated to move toward the financial goals they have set. The giveaway will run from September 26 – October 5. Use the widget below to enter.

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If you are a blogger and would like to participate in future giveaways, click here.

What I Want

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On my birthday, my mom asked me what I want and I couldn’t think of anything. Since then I’ve been thinking about what I want. The only thing I can think of is a tablet computer. But that isn’t something I want very much and I think if I put off buying a tablet for a couple months I’ll either find a really good deal or decide I don’t even want a tablet. When it comes to material goods there isn’t much I want.

“Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.”
— Socrates

Although I am content, there are a couple things I want. One thing is to lose weight and get in better shape. The other is to write a book. Both of these things are achievable. I will turn these wants into SMART goals and post the details on Friday.

Getting Your Free Credit Report and Credit Score

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A couple weeks ago I decided to check my credit report and credit score. It had been over a year since I had checked it and since a lot had happened since then I wanted to make sure that there were still no blemishes on my credit report and that I still had a good credit score.

I went to annualcreditreport.com to check my credit report. That is the official free site for checking your credit report from all three credit bureaus. It is supposed to be easy to check your credit report online, but I’ve had trouble doing so in the past. One reason is because I had my identity stolen several years ago and had a 90 day freeze put on my credit. At least one of the credit bureaus took several years to lift the freeze. The other reason is because I have a hard time passing the identity test. I’ve lived in so many places that I have trouble remembering them all.

This time I was able to pass the identity test. I was a little worried since two of the answers were none of the above, but it seems like that is the most common answer. Since you can access your credit report free once a year, it is advised to just check one report every three months so you can see your credit report more often. This is a good plan, but since I was so surprised that I was able to access one of my credit reports I wanted to see if could access the other two as well.

I was able to access all three credit reports. I was happy to find that I had no negative information on any of my credit reports. The only potential worry was that one of the credit bureaus showed my student loan as a line of credit which makes it look like I’m using nearly all of my available credit. I pay my credit cards off every month so I actually have plenty of available credit. Since I don’t plan on applying for any loans or credit cards I’m not going to worry about the available credit issue right now.

Next I wanted to get my credit score. When you are accessing your credit report the credit bureaus will offer to sell you your credit score also. I’m guessing the credit bureaus probably make a lot of money off of people accessing their free credit report. I didn’t want to pay for my credit score so I went to CreditSesame.com. They offer a free credit score from Experian. In exchange for the free score they will try to sell you credit cards or other financial products. I was pleasantly surprised to find that my credit score is 776. The last time I had checked it was in the 730s. Although, I don’t plan on applying for credit in the near future it is still helpful to have a good credit score.

I’ll have to wait a year to check my credit report again, but I can check my credit score every month. If there are any major changes in my credit score then I’ll know something is up with my credit report.

Have you checked your credit report and/or credit score lately?