Financial stuff

This is actually my experience trying to get insurance on the Healthcare.gov website.  The site isn’t working correctly for me and I still haven’t been able to sign up for insurance.  It took a week before I could even get to the application page.  Since finally getting to the application page I’ve had repeated problems trying to complete the application and enroll in a plan.  First, the site kept saying I hadn’t completed my application even though I had filled out everything.  I had to fill out the application several times before it actually registered as completed.  Then I was finally able to shop for a plan, but when I went to actually enroll in the plan the website froze up on me and sent me to page with an error message in Spanish.  Now, I can’t seem to get past the dental plan option.  Even though I keep declining the dental coverage the site won’t register my choice and I can’t move on to the review of my policy. The website is a humongous fail.

Despite the shortcomings of the website I have been able to learn a little bit from the site about my options for health insurance in 2014.  Based on last year’s income I would be eligible for a $244 a month subsidy for health insurance.  At that subsidy level I could get some health insurance plans for free. Since I think my 2013 income will be a little higher than my 2012 income I chose to reduce the subsidy to $200 a month.  This level of subsidy allows me to get a health plan for as low as $15 a month.  That would be for a bronze plan.  This plan is actually quite a bit better than my current health plan since it has an out of pocket maximum of $6300 compared to $13,000 for my current plan.  If I weren’t eligible for  a subsidy I would have to pay about $215 a month for the cheapest health plan.  That is a lot more than the $65 a month I’m currently paying.  Since the new plan would be a major improvement the price is probably reasonable, but I would prefer to have a choice. Catastrophic health care plans are no longer available to me.

It looks like the Affordable Care Act will benefit me in the coming year since my health insurance premium will drop from $65 a month to $15 a month for better health insurance.  That doesn’t mean much if I can’t actually enroll in a plan.  I do see that the plan I selected is offered by Blue Cross and it appears that I can sign up for it directly on the Blue Cross website.  If the healthcare.gov site isn’t fixed soon then I will look into that option.

Has anyone actually been able to enroll in a health insurance plan at Healthcare.gov?

Sleeping in my car during my recent hike along the Katy Trail kept me from spending hundreds of dollars on hotel rooms.  A Ford Focus hatchback is better than some cars for sleeping, but it is far from ideal.  Even with the back seats folded down there isn’t a big enough sleeping area to lay completely stretched out.  Maybe you could stretch out if your were five feet tall, but for most people the area is going to be too small.  Another problem is that the back seats do not lay down completely flat which creates a big hump in the middle of the sleeping area and also makes the sleeping area slanted rather than level.

My solution to these problems was rather simple.  I went to a home improvement store and had them cut me a piece of plywood to fit the sleeping area.  I got the wood cut so that extends a few inches past the back seats and thus lengthens my sleeping area.  With the piece of wood down in the sleeping area you can no longer feel the hump.  To make the sleeping area level I took a couple of the scrap pieces that were cut off my piece of plywood and stacked them under the lower end of the sleeping area.  After adding a mattress pad and my camping pad I have a reasonably comfortable bed in the back of my car.  The cost was only $9 and change since I already had the camping pad and sleeping pad and they can be used for other purposes. I have to lay diagonally to be able to stretch out which is no big deal.

In order to have some privacy I have static cling limo tint on the back windows and put a sun visor in the windshield.  The tint looks terrible, but it works well for my purposes.  I also have a piece of plastic that I hang behind the front seats for additional privacy.  This system has worked well for me so far and nobody has ever bothered me while I’m sleeping.  I’m probably going to sleep in my car again when I go to the Financial Blogger’s Conference.  I will drive away from the downtown area though so I’ll be less likely to be noticed and/or bothered.

Have you ever slept in your car to save money?  Would you?

I read a forum post the other day in which the original poster shared all of his jobs and then others continued the thread with lists of their jobs. I found the thread interesting and decided I would share all of my jobs on this blog. I’ve probably had about 100 jobs and I don’t think I can remember them all. I will start with my first 10 jobs and post the rest of my jobs in later posts. I will use a broad definition of job for this series of post. I’m trying to post the jobs chronologically but there is some overlap between jobs and I can’t always remember exactly when I had a particular job.

Job 1 – Mowing lawns, yard work, etc. My brother and I would mow lawns and occasionally do other yard work around our neighborhood. I think we got $8-$10 for a lawn and we had to split that so it wasn’t much money. The lawn mower and gas was provided free by our parents so at least our expenses were low.

Job 2- Trap Machine Loader. I worked for a local trap shooting range when they would have their big annual trap and skeet shooting tournament. I sat in a little bunker in front of the shooters and loaded clay targets on the trap shooting machine. The machine shot out the targets very quickly and I was always worried about getting my hand hit by the machine. That never happened, but as I think back it is surprising that they let me work there when I was 14 years old. That probably doesn’t happen now. I can’t remember what this job paid. I think it was a flat rate per day and it seemed like a lot of money to me at the time although I’m sure it wasn’t much.

Job 3 – Dishwasher. This was my first real job. It paid minimum wage. I got this job when I was 15 years old. Not because I wanted to, but because my mom made me get a job. She didn’t think a 15 year old should be sitting around the house all summer. I disagreed. I was fired after two weeks. My mother’s attempt to instill a work ethic in me did not work.

Job 4 – Cleaner/Janitor. I worked with my best friend cleaning buildings at a church camp during the summer and the first few weekends of fall. I worked two summers at this job. This job paid minimum wage. I got to work with my best friend and we worked unsupervised so I really liked this job.

Job 5 – Picker/Packer. I worked at a warehouse picking lawn mower parts from the shelves and then packing the order to be shipped. I think this job also paid minimum wage. I was going to work both this job and the cleaning job during the summer, but got laid off from this job right before summer started. I was disappointed because I was looking forward to making sooo much money. This company went out of business the next year so I guess they really couldn’t afford to keep me over the summer.

Job 6 – Amusement Park Worker. I worked this job the summer before I started college and the first few weekends after I started college. The pay was minimum wage or slightly above it. The job did come with the fringe benefit of free amusement park admission which I did like and I managed to get some roller coaster rides in on my days off. I worked in the carnival games department. The games weren’t rigged, they were just incredibly hard to win. The main drawback of this job was that there was a 45 minute loop of songs that played continuously and it was the same songs the entire time. I was really sick of every song in that loop by the time the job ended.

Job 7 – Mcdonalds. It was probably inevitable that I would work at Mcdonalds at some point. This was my first job after dropping out of college. I hated it and quit after one night. My mom was not happy.

Job 8 – Grocery Store stocker. I got this job a few days after quitting at McDs. I liked this job a lot better. I had my own section of the store that I was responsible for stocking the shelves and pricing the products. This was a long time ago when you actually had to put the prices on the product because most stores didn’t have bar code scanners. I also helped out bagging groceries and cleaning. This wasn’t a bad job, but once again the pay wasn’t much and I didn’t see how I would ever be able to save enough money to go back to college so I made a big change.

Job 9 – U.S. Army. I didn’t really want to join the Army, but I didn’t see any other way out of where I was at. The plan was to serve in the Army for a couple of years and then have the military pay for my college when I got out. This plan was a miserable failure. I never even made it to basic training. I was not physically or mentally equipped to handle the army. After two and a half months I was kicked out for failing to meet the physical standards.

Job 10 – Movie theater Concessions. After the army I returned to the grocery store job for a few months. When my mom moved to Kansas City, I quit the grocery store job and moved too. I worked a few shifts at the amusement park I had previously worked at, but they had already hired for all their full-time positions. It was a month or so before I got this job and I was somewhat depressed from my previous failures so I was very happy to get this job. It paid minimum wage which I think was $3.35 an hour at that time. It came with the fringe benefits of free popcorn and soda while working and free movies on my days off. I’ve always loved the movies so this was like a dream job for me. The theater was located in the mall and I lived within walking distance of the mall plus two other theaters located near the mall. I spent a lot time at the movies and the mall and really enjoyed that summer. I liked this job, but once again the pay was a problem. Even living at home and not having to pay rent I didn’t make enough to save money to pay for college.

That gets me to age 19 and I don’t think I’ve missed any jobs yet. Can you remember all of your jobs?

It will actually be a few days until I have maxed out my IRA for the 2013 year since I have to wait for my deposit to clear. The money is on the way though so I’m counting the IRA as maxed out now. I also made the maximum IRA contributions for 2012 with the bulk of those contributions being made this year since you have until April 15th of the following year to make IRA contributions for the current year. This is the first time I’ve ever maxed out my IRA two years in a row. I’ve actually only made the maximum IRA contribution once before and that was when the maximum was only $2,000. The max contribution now is $5500 for taxpayers under 50. I wish I would have been maxing out my IRA in years past, but most years I didn’t have the income to do that. It is better late than never.

I actually have both a traditional IRA and a Roth IRA. Even though I have two IRAs the maximum contribution is still only $5500. I put the bulk of my contribution into the traditional IRA. My theory is that it is better to efile and take the tax break now than gamble on it still being around later.

Now that I have maxed out my IRA I am thinking about opening a solo 401k to put away even more money. Before I do that though I am going to build up my cash savings. I would like to have more of my savings held outside of retirement accounts so that I can access it quickly and without penalty if needed.