Are Outlets Worth It?

The problem I see with outlets is that they are too far away. I end up buying more than I plan because I don't know when I will make it back. We used to regularly go to the Osh Kosh Outlet for clothes for our boys. This time, we went for my daughter with one goal in mind, long sleeve dresses in size 12 months.

Well, there were no long sleeve dresses in size 12 months or 9 months. Apparently, they don't sell any or I should have shopped in November. Of course, other sales were possible but if I bought the dresses I probably would have skipped the other items.

Leaving the Osh Kosh store, I thought it would not be a wasted trip because there was probably another children's clothes store. On the way to The Children's Place, I saw a shoe store. I did purchase a pair of shoes but I didn't give the store more money buying the 2nd pair of shoes for half price. In reality, I would have saved $10 for each pair of shoes, so I saved my extra $20 by not buying a 2nd pair, which I really did not need.

Next, skipping The Children's Place because I forgot, I went into the Kitchen Store and then the toy store. By the time I got back to the car I realized that I skipped the other clothes store. The store was still open but I decided to skip it. Again I thought I would have skipped the Kitchen Store and the toy store if I went to the children's store, probably not, right.

This is an example of a simple shopping trip going into disarray. I had two thoughts before going to the outlets. 1)Dresses for my daughter and 2) take out cash so we could limit our spending. End result we used the charge rather then cash and we bought several extra items.

Outlets are a place to get good deals but how many good deals should you get at a time? Answer, just what you need. I would argue that yes, I did want shoes, I did want kitchen items and I did want birthday gifts for my son. When we buy things we do not intend to purchase is where we get into trouble. So while needing or just really wanting these things, they were not items that I needed that day.

I do enjoy impulse buying. My solution is to stay out of the stores when possible.

Anyone care to share their needs vs. wants stories or their outlet experiences?

My $2,000 Cat

If you went to a pet store to buy a cat you would probably pass by the cat that cost $2,000. Advance 4 years, you already have adopted the cat and the cat gets sick. Now what? You take the cat to the veterinary. My almost four year old cat starting getting sick in the house multiple times. A visit to the vet turned out that she was now dehydrated from getting sick. In addition, she was no longer getting fluids and in a few days would need IVs and hospitalization. Now my inexpensive cat was in need of tests and hospitalization.

This is an example of the need for an emergency fund that would have been very hard to plan for in advance. First visit on 6/20/07, the cat had an exam, blood tests, hydration and x rays.($273.05) Second visit on 6/21/07, the cat just rec. hydration. ($15.38) Next visit (6/22-6/26/07), the cat stayed for hospitalization. ($880.61) Then the cat needed to be transported on 6/25/07 to another place for an ultrasound to rule out any problems. ($285 -cost of test, we transported the cat)

My sister recommended capping the expenses at a certain amount. The cap in my head was $2,000. But how do you explain to your children that for the price of blank we were not able to save the cat. What if it happens again, has the cat already reached its medical limit or would it be $2,000 for another occurrence?

I can say that if we knew up front how much the cost would be it would have been better. Next time x rays are suggested, I would probably skip the x rays and just opt for an ultrasound.

Our cat has survived its ordeal. We are grateful our cat is okay and thankful that it did not bankrupt us to get there.

Do you have any experiences where the unexpected costs got out of hand very quickly?

Upromise Withdrawals

I really have to thank No Credit Needed for his info regarding Upromise Accounts. I have not seen anyone actually get any money to pay for college from the Upromise Accounts so I have not been to focused on using this loyalty program. As mentioned by No Credit Needed, you can obtain a check from Upromise rather then putting the money into a 529 Account.

Great news! Here is the link for a withdrawal request of at least $200. http://www.upromise.com/pdfs/fund_withdrawal_request.pdf

Debt Free

Debt free. No. But in some people's minds we are because we don't carry a credit card balance and we don't have a car payment. In addition, we don't have a cable bill. But we do have two tuition bills and we belong to a pool each summer. So how do we do it living on one income?

I believe that we as a family tend to spend what we make so we need to lock the money away and make it work for us. Prior to stopping working, I started investing in 529 plans and a Roth IRA for myself. I wanted to save money while we had two incomes.

In May 05, we leased and purchased two new cars. At this point, both cars are paid off, the lease and the financed car. We did a snowball payment to pay down both debts. Now we are paying down the mortgage the same way. I continue to need encouragement in this endeavor because I hear negative things about paying off my mortgage. The comments don't make a lot of sense to me because 1) it can't be that much of a tax break having a mortgage and 2) I would like to own more than just one brick of my house.

My Financial Plan Part I
1. Cut out cable? Not really, we never had it in the first place.
2. Buy lottery tickets? No, that did not seem to be a good option if we were trying to save money.
3. Invest more? Nope. Not that either.
4. We looked at all our debt and decided to do a debt paydown or a debt snowball.We had three main debts.
A) leased minivan
B) financed minivan
C) mortgage on our home.

I. Each month we applied extra payments to our leased minivan until it was paid off.

II. When the lease was paid off, we took the extra payment, the leased minivan payment and the financed minivan payment and paid off the financed minivan.

III. Next we applied the extra payment, the leased minivan payment and the financed minivan payment to our mortgage.

Part 4 was not the hard part. The hard part was getting the money together for the extra payment.

Carnival of Debt Reduction #122

Debt Free Revolution hosted this week's Carnival of Debt Reduction .

Utilities under $300

I just saw an interesting older post at Boston Gal's Open Wallet.
She had a spreadsheet where she was trying to keep her utilities under $300 per month.
That is not a bad goal.

Wordless Wednesday -January 9, 2008