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2015 Wrap-up and 2016 Goals

2015 was a pretty good year in a lot of ways for our household. Here’s a brief summary of the year’s financial picture, as well as our December numbers. Let’s begin with a quick over all summary.

In 2015 our savings/investments went up $155,976. Not too bad, but not great since most of that was just us putting in new money. You can see from the graph that there was a big dip, followed by a recovery, then a flat to downward trend that helped keep that growth slow. However, I still think we are on track to hit our FI number in mid-2017, if stocks can manage to grow just a little bit.

Instead of doing a full budget breakdown for December, I’ll note that we did well. Our finance picture was pretty boring, which I’ll take any time. Some anomalies not seen in previous months are noted below.

Yearly HOA = $815 Yep, HOA dues. But I think they do a great job with their festivals that they host for Spring, Easter, 4^th of July, Fall, Halloween, and Winter. We also get a lot of use out of the pools during the summer.

Extra gift/entertainment = $450 – Miscellaneous gifts, and costs associated with holiday hosting of family.

Car registration = $79.50 – Yep, cars cost more than gas each month. Shocker…

Groceries = $509 – Some extra was put in the ‘entertainment’ category to account for Christmas and New Year’s feasts. Most of the alcohol for those events was covered in November.

Overall we spent $7148.11. Without daycare and mortgage that is $3419.77.

To wrap up our 2015 expenses for our first full year of tracking – we are looking at a FIRE estimate of $58,800/year – which comes out to about 8 grand more than we expected at the beginning of the year… What caused this jump? Well, we replaced the AC for $7k, a broken shower door for $1.3k, garage door for $440, AC drain repair $440, and I think that might have been it. That is roughly $9k in home repairs, and yes, some we could have gone the DIY route, but not the big hitter of the AC. We do have some buffers built in to account for these repairs in the future but it does have us thinking about renting, or even possibly building so we could get a good 7-10 years “problem free”. Gah!! There will be more to come on these choices later.

How does this break down as to where the money goes? On average we spend $644/month on groceries and $173/month on pets. Pet costs will likely go down, as we had expensive medical bills for Harley, and adoption costs for our lovely greyhound, Lola. Although, Quinn, our second dog is 15, so it could be pricey this year depending on her health. Miscellaneous shopping was $204/month, and House miscellaneous was $1120 – definitely bad due to the AC. In total, we spent $113,025 this year (includes 12,000) for allowances.

More resting. Greyhounds "rest" a lot... — More resting. Greyhounds “rest” a lot…

We did not reach our goal of saving $150k this year, but we did save $135k or 90% of our goal in 401ks, 529s and personal investment accounts. Not too shabby. This is actually the first year I didn’t max out my 401k. I got close, but since those accounts are already “big enough” for what we need in “real” retirement, we focused on our pre-retirement gap savings. We both took full advantage of the employer match and again got close to maxing out those accounts, but at this point, that’s not where our savings is focused. That gives us a savings rate from our take-home portion of 47.8% and that’s pretty darn close to the 50% we aimed for. This is just $4000 shy of savings Mrs SSC’s entire take home salary, so overall, I’m pretty excited about that. This year, we will try again for the elusive $150,000 savings goal!!!

For kicks, I thought I would look at where we are in terms of FI goals. Taking after Eat the Financial Elephant I’ve plotted our savings in terms of the 25-times rule. So you can see that now we are at about 17.5 times our yearly needs, and by early 2018 we should be at 25 times. This projection assumes investment growth of 4% and that we save at the same rate we did in 2015. As you may know, we may enact our Lifestyle Change prior to reaching the 25x number, due to an increase in quality of life.

How could our quality of life increase you ask? Time, lots more time… Currently, between the commute and 9/80 work hours, I get to see the kids briefly in the morning as I get them ready for daycare and then for about an hr in the evening when I get home. That sucks. With Mrs. SSC being unhappy in her current position for a myriad of reasons, we’re actively pursuing other opportunities for her. While it would make sense for me to stay at my job until mid-2017 when my work/pension 401k vests, I realized that I’m fully vested in the larger of those accounts, so the amount left on the table would be pretty minimal in exchange for an increase in happiness. The Frugalwoods just had a great guest post on that exact subject, which I’d recommend clicking over and reading. It provides great perspective on achieving happiness on your way to your FI number, but I don’t want to spoil it.

That was our year and December wrap up along with our 2016 goal. Our plan isn’t too exciting other than stay the course and keep doing what we’ve been doing. We’ve analyzed what the effect would be on reaching FI if we went ultra frugal and cut more stuff out of the budget, and we’ve decided the increase would be so minimal, that it wouldn’t be worth it currently. So, until something dramatic happens, we’ll just keep plugging away at saving, and trying to find something more fulfilling for Mrs. SSC.

By Mr SSC
Posted on January 6, 2016January 6, 2016
28 Comments on 2015 Wrap-up and 2016 Goals

How is your risk tolerance affecting your FI date?

Recently, we’ve been discussing our Fully Funded Lifestyle Change (FFLC) date and we’ve going back and forth about what is the earliest date this could start. See, it started when I bought a retirement countdown clock. I had to set it to a date in the future, then set today’s date, and voila! You have a countdown to retirement. I decided to settle on July 13, 2018, as my last day in the office. How did I pick that date and more importantly, how has it changed from 2010? Let me explain.

It's been updated since this pic and is now under 600 days! — It’s been updated since this pic and is now under 600 days!

I’d heard Mrs. SSC talking for years that we can retire at 45. She had it all planned out in our “investment and retirement planning” excel sheet she would share with our friends when they would ask her advice on retirement planning. Then they would exclaim, “Wait, you’re retiring at 45?!” Well, that would be the year 2022, so clearly things have improved. How were we able to move up the date so dramatically? Well, since then, we’ve tracked budgets better, saved more, and refined our excel sheet to match reality. But, the single biggest thing we have done is assess and account for our risk tolerance. That’s right, risk tolerance alone has accounted for dropping almost 4 years off of our original FFLC date, and just this weekend, we potentially shaved another year off.

See, originally, we’d accounted for a 10% cushion so we could deal with any economic maelstrom that might occur. We also didn’t account for ANY side income, or Social Security, or our pensions (meager as they may be). We just looked at that as buffer money, in case it all goes pear shaped economically. We wanted to be able to take care of ourselves even if Social Security died, our companies failed and pensions didn’t exist (thanks for that lesson Enron), or any other myriad of calamities.

All these buffers and assumptions just added more money and time to our savings and FFLC date. Then I remembered a post by Mr. Maroon (they’re no longer active or I’d add a link, but they were a great source of inspiration for us) in which he described how he had shaved off 3-4 years from their planned FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) date, just by sitting down and doing a more detailed analysis of their budget and assumptions. The biggest thing they adjusted was their risk tolerance. This got Mrs. SSC and I to re-examine our own assumptions, and BAM! Overnight, we went from “retiring” at 45 to targeting 42! Woohoo! That got us to 2019 which is still 4 years away though and it’s still a fairly conservative estimate, because we don’t like to count our chickens before they hatch.

We use a mix of spreadsheets and online calculators to help us feel better about our FFLC situation. This isn’t saying we trust any of them blindly, but if we get agreement from multiple sources that our assumptions are fair, and our strategy could work most of the time, then it helps us feel more comfortable about all the assumptions we’re making when they are so far out in the future.

One of our fave’s is cFIREsim because you can put in your best assumptions and it runs your scenario against all historical data. For those that haven’t heard of it, cFIREsim is a crowdsourced FIRE simulator that works pretty well with letting you simulate and adjust your expected retirement lifestyle scenario. You can input as much detail or as little as you want and it gives you a sense of how your portfolio and withdrawal plan would fare. We targeted ~95% as our success rate, but it’s mainly because that is the number Mrs. SSC is comfortable with. This chart below shows a sample of one of their outputs run aainst various historical periods based on your inputs.

A version of our scenarios run against different historical periods

This past weekend, I was reading a link Mrs. SSC sent me that took me to the MMM forum with a good discussion about “choosing a success rate with cFiresim calculations”. It was pretty interesting reading, and eye opening in that most of the people on the site were targeting 80% chance of success. Some even as low as 50%, to which I say, No thank-you, I don’t like to gamble that much. They make some great points about what a 90% success rate means, and what an 80% success rate means, and how that relates to your comfort level. It’s a great discussion and I highly recommend bouncing over there and checking it out, because they explain it WAY better than I can. Don’t worry, I’ll wait. (twiddling thumbs, looking at ceiling, whistling…) Good, you’re back! For those who didn’t go there yet, I’ll try to sum it up below.

In essence, having a success rate of 90% is saying that you’re expecting the future to be as bad as the worst 10% of historical periods. Even through all of those bad times, you should have success for 90% of those occurrences.

After reading that, we re-ran our numbers looking for a 90% success rate, and adjusted it to account for some of our retirement benefits and social security, and holy cow, we’re looking at the end of 2017!! Yeah, that’s moved up our FI date another 2 whole years! Granted, the stars would have to align, and all of that for us to achieve FFLC in 2017, but it’s a new best case scenario. See the chart below for various assumptions made with the amount investment being the only change. We typically go for 4% withdrawal and set a max spend of $90k/yr and min spend of $50k/yr. for our scenario.

Another thing we took into account is if we have any side income. Most likely, we’ll be working in some manner, and it’s amazing how even a little money like $5k/yr can dramatically change your chances of success. These assumptions using the $1.1 million starting also assumes a paid off house, and the higher invested scenarios are dependent on how the market does. The $1.1 million is assuming the same savings as now and 4% growth in the market. I did say we like to be conservative in our assumptions….

More scenarios based on side income variability

The biggest change for us, is that our comfort level with our FFLC plan has dramatically increased, and our risk tolerance towards enacting this Lifestyle Change has dramatically decreased. By tracking our spending- our real spending with the lifestyle we want to maintain in our FFLC, and keeping the discussion about this plan in the forefront, it isn’t some oddball unconventional dream anymore. We’ve given a face to it and realized, it’s TOTALLY achievable. We have also realized that we’re both going to have a side income of some sort, and if it’s enough to cover expenses so that we don’t have to tap into our investments immediately, then we can watch those investments grow and grow. We’ve quit looking at this Lifestyle Change as “retirement”, because for us, that’s what it has become. Focusing on getting to FI so we can have the freedom to do what we want to do, liver where we want to live, and have more time to spend with family.

After all of these realizations, we accepted that 2018 is now our most likely scenario, and it could be as early as 2017 when we hit FI. I adjusted my clock to Aug. 3, 2017 which is just under 600 days from now, as our new target and the point at which if we wanted to we can start our FFLC. I just find it amazing how knowing your numbers, adjusting assumptions, and reassessing your tolerance for risk can dramatically impact your FI date. To which I say, “Go! Go! Quit reading, get your spreadsheet out and see if you can shave any time off. Why are you still reading this and not “spreadsheeting”? Go! Now! GO! For your own sake!”

What is the biggest factor affecting your FIRE date?

Have you had any big leaps forward in your date, just by adjusting assumptions or risk tolerance?

Detailed Grocery Review: October 2015

We realized in September that our grocery bill had gotten a bit higher than we wanted. While we don’t do a detailed review/tracking of groceries each month we figured we would do one for October. This would allow us to see what the big spends were on, and if there was anything we could do to reign it in, or if this was the new standard. We also realized that we have 2 other months that we did this detailed tracking so we have some other months to compare it with. It’s amazing to see some things change dramatically and some items remain status quo. For instance, our $40/month yogurt tab does not seem to be going down because we all still eat a lot of yogurt.
I think the biggest thing we do to keep our grocery budgets low is make a list before we go to the store. We found when we go to any store without a list, we overbuy, and spending goes up. During the week, we add things to the list, and then we stick to the list. We usually make our big grocery trip on the weekend, and then sometimes mid-week for things like bananas or milk, but not staple items. We also are mindful of sales, but we don’t buy something if it isn’t something we usually purchase. Meat is usually low priced, but we almost exclusively buy red meat and pork when it’s on sale. Otherwise, it gets really expensive really quickly.

Most categories stayed in the same trend as our previous Oct 2014 analysis, and our January 2015 analysis. Some things seem high because we stock up due to being low/out of something, and some things seem anomalously low because we stocked up the month prior. Protein bars are the perfect example, with $33 spent last Oct. (stocking up due to sale), $0 spent in January (we were already stocked up) and $8 spent this month – average spend if you buy month to month and there isn’t a sale or reason to stock up.

Mrs. SSC loves using excel for tracking!

The big drop I noticed is coffee. I started buying green coffee beans off of Amazon and I just use a Whirly-Pop popcorn popper to roast the beans. Whereas before we were spending ~$8-$10/lb, now it is under $6/lb. We still buy some pre-ground coffee, but it’s only $2-$3/lb so it isn’t a big hitter on the budget.

The other 3 biggest things that jumped out to me immediately, were desserts/adult snacks, frozen prepared meals, and drink mix and juice. Last time the drink mix got high, I just started making tea with teabags, and you can see the difference in January 2015 is pretty big. Almost a $25/month savings which adds up to about $300/year. It falls into the paying for convenience category though. I drink about 1-2 pitchers (~1 gallon) of tea/lemonade or what not each day, and the kids like lemonade, so we give them watered down versions of whatever is made up. It still adds up over a month, so we’ll probably watch that.

Alcohol was higher this month. We did a Pumpkin beer tasting when the in-laws came in for a visit. This is usually only about $9 to make a sampler 6 pack of your own, but the selection was poor, so Mrs. SSC opted for 4 six packs at ~$8-$9 each. We also had the same tasting at a pumpkin carving hangout with some friends of ours since we had more than enough. As you can see usually alcohol is low on the bill. Frozen prepared meals are another thing that fluctuates as we get some frozen meals and other things that are easy for the kids. Weekends, we make a lot of food from scratch, and we save left overs for them when we make dinner, but not every night can be nice like that, so back to paying for convenience. The healthier options in those categories aren’t the cheapest either, so it’s a trade-off. When we enact our Lifestyle Change, there will probably be not much in this category as we’ll have time to get to do more cooking again.

Desserts/Adult snacks were pretty high this month as well. Between the layoff situation, and heightened anxiety, we realized we’re both comfort eaters to some degree. I know I eat more chips than I should, but chips and salsa or guacamole is just SO delicious! Mrs. SSC loves ice cream, and since Blue Bell was out of the stores due to listeria issues (they’re back, but limited flavors) Mrs. SSC found gelato as the only other same quality ice cream substitute but it’s kind of spendy.

Beyond that, cheese was a big drop, not because we had a lot, but we’re just not eating as much lately. We’re doing more baking, so baking supplies, eggs, and the like were a little higher. Surprisingly, “meat” was down. I guess we’ve been a lot better about getting meat on sale and that is reflected here. Mrs. SSC does the grocery shopping almost exclusively now, and I’ll watch the kids. It’s way easier this way for both of us. However, Mrs. SSC knows nothing about meat, except chicken and fish, as that is the only type of meat she eats. So… she will buy what she sees is on sale. It’s a bit of a gamble on my part though, so like on cooking shows, I get to see what’s in the mystery basket each week, and figure out how to cook whatever she bought. It’s been good in that I am learning lots of different cooking techniques that make cheaper cuts of meat tender and delicious and it also breaks me out of my culinary ruts. So I count that as a win on a lot of levels.

Let me know if you have tips or tricks you use to keep your grocery budget in check.

“Our Next Life” Series – The SSC’s

We’re continuing the “Our Next Life Challenge” put out there by one of our favorite bloggers, our next life. The following is my take on it, and even a picture of me!

As you may have been following, we recently went through a drawn-out lay-off situation with Mrs. SSC. It was a blessing in disguise really, because while she didn’t get laid off, it really forced us to examine what would happen if she were let go. The short answer, is that our quality of life would most likely improve and we would end up a little better because of it. Schedules would get less hectic, we could focus more on family time, have more freedom, and less stress to get to better enjoy our downtime.

In short, that’s what we are looking for with “our next life”, is a more relaxed, less hurried pace of life that will allow us more time to spend with the kids and ourselves.

We’ve come to the realization that we aren’t seeking the typical Financial Independence Early Retirement (FIRE) situation, but rather a Fully Funded Lifestyle Change (FFLC). We feel it’s a distinction for us because Mrs. SSC really wants to teach, and while I would be happy not to work, if I came across a small Oil & Gas company, I’d definitely hit them up for some consulting and part time work. So, while we’re aiming for the FI part, we don’t really see it as early retirement, because we plan to be fairly busy with other projects, we just won’t have to depend on any income they may/may not provide. We see it as having the opportunity to pursue what we are passionate about – regardless of the paycheck, and to always have the freedom to put our family first.

Location:

Currently, we live in the great metropolis of Houston. While we love our neighborhood and immediate area, we would not want to retire here because we need four seasons, mountains to hike, and a smaller town that has a community feel to it. We’re currently looking at the Roanoke, VA area because it has a lot of amenities and a lot of small communities around it, while being nestled into the Appalachian Mountains. We haven’t ruled out North Carolina, or Eastern Tennessee, however the greater Roanoke area is close to some good colleges and universities that could fit Mrs. SSC’s teaching goal quite well. But, that could all change if she gets an offer to teach somewhere else that we hadn’t thought of yet.

Timing:

We’re looking at no earlier than Mid-year 2017. Unless we win the lottery, but I doubt the occasional $1-$2 ticket is going to make that happen, and yes, we will occasionally buy a lottery ticket. GASP!! Since we’re not counting on winning that, our financial models have us looking at 2017 for a few reasons. Mainly, I get fully vested with my company “retirement” plan then. It’s their version of a pension, so I’m not going to leave that on the table. I also have a golden handcuff bonus that hits mid-summer 2017, so I’m not leaving that either. Most likely it will be 2018, but if Mrs. SSC gets a good teaching job before then, and we can live off of that income, let our investments grow more, then we may pull the trigger on our Lifestyle Change in 2017.

What will we do:

We have no worries that our time will get filled up with activities. Beyond getting to have more home cooked from scratch style meals, just having free time to hang out with the kids will be awesome.

Mr. SSC: I like to play the banjo and guitar, and will spend a lot more time playing music. I also want to finally spend more time learning the dobro. Gardening is another way I plan to spend my time. Exercise. Something else I have to force into my schedule now to keep off the “office lbs” but can do for fun when I have free time. Blogging. Yep, I’ll spend some more time keeping posts coming out and updating you guys with how we’re doing. Volunteer/Part time work. I don’t know which of these will happen, but between the kids sports/activities, our local community or possibly church, I plan on doing some work with a few of these to keep socially active. Fishing, how could I have forgotten fishing? I like kayaking and fishing and plan to spend a lot of the time on the water doing one or both. Woodworking. I want to build a wood strip canoe, and maybe a wood strip kayak as well, along with other projects as they come along.

Mrs. SSC: Teaching. She will most likely have a teaching gig of some sort to keep her occupied. Photography is another hobby of hers that she doesn’t get to spend as much time with as she would like. Painting is something she enjoys but hasn’t had the time to enjoy recently. Reading. She longs for the days she can be “that girl” sitting somewhere for a few hours with a book/kindle in hand without a care in the world.

Travel:

We plan to travel during the summers or the kid’s school breaks. We want to take at least a month and road trip each summer across the US or maybe even Canada. We’ll just knock around camping and seeing the country. We also want to see a baseball game at every major park, and we can start knocking some more of those off of our list again. International travel is something we want to do, spending a few weeks or so in another country with the kids. I think it would be great cultural experience for everyone and a fun way to spend part of the summers. We’d like to live abroad at some point, but it will have to wait until Mrs. SSC’s parents are gone and the kids are out of the house. Camping and hiking whenever we have free time. With the Appalachians at our door, we are positioned well to be in the woods a lot.

I’m sure we will probably end up with a schedule where we will mix up time for kids, music, gardening, blogging, napping, exercise, and more once we get our rhythm established and get the pace of our lives turned down from 11 to a more respectable 3-4 level.

That’s what we see as “our next life”, at least as it is looking this month. It changes, but the overall goal is the same – more freedom, less stress, and enjoying life.

September 2015 Budget Update

I can’t believe September has come and gone. It seems like only 6 months ago we were finding out Mrs. SSC may get laid off this week. We’re still waiting to find out, as they are dragging it out thru the later part of this week, maybe even into next week. Huge eyeroll… I think lack of efficiency may be a key factor in needing to have so many layoffs to begin with, but since I’m no corporate analyst, I’ll just leave that alone.

Um, it's a pie chart.... — Um, it’s a pie chart….

September positives, daycare was down last month, even though it all evens out since we’re just paying “per week”. Also, health, gifts, entertainment, pets, and cash were all lower than usual. Mrs. SSC even crocheted a pair of Minion hats for a set of twins, whose birthday party our oldest was invited to. That saved us from buying any birthday presents, so YEAH for small wins!

September Negatives include utilities, which were slightly higher, probably due to that 3 weeks of 100+ degree weather in early September. Car repair/gas/tolls came in a little higher than previous months, no clue why there, maybe more toll usage? I’ll monitor that closer for next month. Groceries, though… BUST! Not sure why this jumped up so much, but we will be doing a grocery curtailing this month and monitor purchases and receipts to get it reigned in. We would analyze September’s receipts, but we don’t always keep every receipt. Looking at overall purchases from credit card statements, there doesn’t seem to be anything out of whack, so we will monitor and report back for October! SO exciting, you probably are giddy with anticipation! 🙂

Well, except for waiting for the sword of Damocles to fall later this week, there haven’t been too many changes in the SSC household. We have made multiple budget and savings scenarios, and lifestyle changes regarding this upcoming layoff cycle and we will report all that out to you as soon as we know something. I have to say, as stressful as it has been lately, it has been pretty darn encouraging to review all of our income, savings, FFLC timelines and more and realize that we are still sitting in a pretty good position. It does alleviate some stressful aspects of this situation. However, the anticipation and dragging out of this announcement and decision is just ridiculous though. Talk about adding more undo stress to an already stressful time. Aye yi yi!!

Hope everyone has a great week!

By Mr SSC
Posted on October 6, 2015October 6, 2015
22 Comments on September 2015 Budget Update

Is an $8 tomato worth it?

Recently the topic of a fall garden has come up around the SSC household. With the high temps starting to stay at/below 90 during the day, and night temps around 75 (time for a fire!) it got me thinking we should plant some stuff for the cooler weather. We keep talking about wanting to garden and grow more stuff as part of our Lifestyle Change, but we don’t do too much of that now. I figure now is the best time to get with it so we can iron out any bumps and what not before we go big with a garden. However, our success rate with getting anything edible from any plant isn’t exactly stellar. Is it due to our ungodly hot climate, our lack of green thumb, or possibly lack of diligence with taking care of the garden due to our schedule? I’m all for the fall garden, and have even agreed to scale it back a bit, but I’m having trouble getting Mrs. SSC on board due to our usual gardening adventures fails.

Our first “big garden” attempt down here was nothing short of a disaster. We’d decided to do a raised bed, with a garden system that made a 6’x6’ box separated into 4 squares. We then put our usual peppers in 2 squares, some squash in another square, and something else in the 4^th square. The fact I can’t remember what it was should be a clue as to how successful it turned out. We were doing well with the garden even though it was as far away from the house as it could possibly be in our backyard. Then we went on vacation. Ever mindful, I set up a timer and watering system so it would get water while we were gone. I hooked up the sprinkler, ran it out to the garden, and even adjusted the flow and coverage of the sprinkler so as to be efficient. I was SO proud of myself.

When we returned home the scene looked like it was out of a plant horror movie. Some plants were dead – straight up dead, while the other plants looked droopy, wilted, and brown. Not dried up lack of water brown, but a weird brown, like a “death” brown. I thought I may have overwatered, but that couldn’t be the case. I checked the sprinkler and timer and they looked good too. Then I stepped into the spray of water and was scalded from my knee down to my flip flop covered foot!

Gah!!! Idiotic me didn’t think about how hot the water would get while it was sitting in ~50’ of garden hose stretched out across the yard, in the sun, ALL DAY, in the middle of Houston summer. Yep, I had managed to kill the garden with repeated scaldings over the course of a week. Side note – if you want to get rid of a certain patch of grass or weeds and don’t want to use chemicals this seems to be an effective method, as even the weeds were dead… We haven’t tried keeping anything alive since beyond our two pepper plants and the occasional tomato plants or herbs.

This guy's about 6' tall and flowering again! — This guy’s about 6′ tall and flowering again!

This year I got one tomato before the heat cranked up and I calculated it cost me around $8. I’ve kept that plant alive and I’m hoping for a fall crop now that it’s cooler and it’s starting to flower again.

She's a sad tomato... — She’s a sad tomato…

However, the other one got decimated by some kind of bug. I went to water it and all of its leaves were gone. There were just little leafless nubs all over it. I brought it inside to try and resuscitate it, to no avail. Our pepper plants are still cranking out peppers though, and we do have a pineapple we started from a cutting earlier this summer that’s looking quite nice.

Now that it’s cooler, I proposed the Fall Garden! However, I want to only put up 2 squares, so it’s half the size. Also, I would put it on our back porch so it’s right next to the hose and in our daily view so we won’t forget about it. Plus, the kids seem like they could get excited about it. Our oldest transplanted a bean plant he started in daycare, and it got over 6’ tall and made a decent amount of beans. He really enjoyed that.

I was thinking of planting some cauliflower, but maybe they get too big for that small of an area. Maybe plant some root vegetables like turnips, carrots, or something along those lines, and maybe something leafy like Collard Greens or Bok Choy. I even proposed to fund it from the allowance, but was reminded my allowance is a bit tight currently, Oops…

I think our gardening fails are mainly due to our busy schedule, not being diligent with the garden, and having the plants out of sight. The high summer heat doesn’t help either, but I don’t want to make too many excuses. With the weather getting nicer, we’ve been spending more time out back, so we should be able to manage it way better. I really think the kids would like gardening too since our oldest liked seeing the bean plant get big and make beans he could eat. I think it’s worth giving it a shot and hoping they want to get more involved.

What are your thoughts? Should we start a fall garden? Thoughts on what we should try to grow – any advice is welcomed. Do you want to hear about more gardening fails? I have plenty!

By Mr SSC
Posted on September 17, 2015September 17, 2015
10 Comments on Is an $8 tomato worth it?

Layoffs – 3 weeks and counting…

Storm on the horizon... — Storm on the horizon…

Well, we’re drawing closer to the date, and the outlook is getting grim. We will find out what the verdict is by Oct 5^th, but morale has dropped significantly around Mrs. SSC’s office, and our house. Initially, the spin from management had been that there would be available jobs to apply for in Business Units, and therefore some hope was instilled in the troops. When job postings came out last week, and everyone began combing them for positions that they could apply for, it became very evident that the amount of actual jobs posted, versus the amount everyone was led to believe would be available was dramatically different. There were about 8 Houston jobs available, and 12 or so overseas jobs, if you want to move to the armpit of “enter country name here”. For those jobs, the compound life, horrid commute (an hour plus each way, but at least you’d have a driver) and longer work schedule make Houston seem like Shangri La! Also, most of those positions are already spoken for and aren’t an option for our family for many reasons.

On the positive side – yes there are lots of positives, we are in a better position than most of our friends who are in the same situation, and may or may not have a spouse with a second income. We’re also not leveraged heavily in our house, cars, credit cards, or lifestyle, so we can continue on and figure out what the heck to do from here, fairly unscathed. I can switch my work schedule to a 6:30 am – 4 pm sort of schedule and get home in time to have dinner with the kids. Plus, I get to see them for an extra hour each day. That also means I will probably have an easier commute in the morning, and well, my afternoon commute will probably stay the same, as a LOT of people leave the office around 3:30pm and later in our fair metropolis. I’ve actually found that my commute is lighter and quicker leaving at 5:30 pm on the rare days that has happened.

The biggest toll here is more emotional than anything. Mrs. SSC has been having a hard time getting okay with the fact she will most likely be let go. She understands it’s not her or her performance as a worker, it’s just a wrong place, wrong time scenario. She’s the newest and least senior person on her team, and when compared to her peer groups in the same job, they have more seniority in that position. Coming to accept that has been trying. Also, losing the sense of worth that is innately tied into working. She has been struggling with the fact she will feel like she’s not contributing if she gets laid off. We talk about these things and I tell her that I’m perfectly fine with her getting laid off. I understand the emotional toll, but she’ll be contributing in way more ways than a paycheck. Plus, it’s not as if this job is really making her feel happy, or giving her any satisfaction right now anyway. It’s like a catch 22 – losing the paycheck will hurt a little, but keeping the paycheck for a job that’s not very satisfying is almost like a lose too, especially when we discuss the positives for our family life that will change.

How will this all relate to our Fully Funded Lifestyle Change date? Well, we’re not too sure at the moment. We had recently changed it dramatically, even if it meant it was a Mostly Funded Lifestyle Change, but there’s no point in putting all that out there until after Oct.’s layoff deadline. So stay tuned for that, haha! We did decide that this life event has us re-evaluating what is important to us and what our priorities are. We’ve realized that we’re not driven by material items, but rather how we can spend more quality time with the kids and ourselves as a family. Not that we haven’t realized that before, but it sure has driven that point home. The sooner we can make our Lifestyle change, the better.

Until then, everyone have a Happy Monday and a good week ahead!

July 2015 Update

July was a rather boring mundane month, and after all the unexpected costs in June, I’ll take it! Boring is good on some levels, especially when it relates to out of pocket spending. For the most part, we’re on track with our predicted FFLC budget, and on an upside, July was our third cheapest month of spending this year. This has been good for us keeping a more detailed look at the finances to be able to see how accurate our predictions are for our FFLC number. Based on the year’s spending to date, it looks like our yearly budget is running right around $54k. This is inline with what we’re thinking so our target date remains unchanged. That may change in 8 weeks, but for now, we’ll just move forward as if things are good all around. Now to discuss some budget numbers!

As far as specifics go, the pet’s column is a little high again due to taking Lola to the vet for a baseline checkup and get her flea/tick preventer and heartworm meds. We should be good for staying away from the vet for a while now, but you never know. Groceries were a bit higher than usual, but that’s probably due to the Mother-in-law being at the house for about 3 weeks. Mrs. SSC had some allergies flare up and then turn into bronchitis, so the medical bumped up a bit. She’s fine, but had a continuous cough for almost a month… Due to the ridiculous heat, yes I know it is summer in the Gulf South, our utilities are higher as well, and that’s just keeping the house around 78… Blech…

Numbers, numbers, everywhere... — Numbers, numbers, everywhere…

On the plus side, it looks like the car repair/gas/toll is down from what is typical, woohoo for that! Phone/internet/tv is down due to the plan switching, although do I have a gripe with the new guys. I’ll save that for later though.

Thank goodness for an easy no surprises month. Whew! It was a welcome relief after June’s outflow of cash. I hope your spending has stayed reigned in and your month went as well as ours!

Layoffs are Looming! Would you be ready?

So it’s no secret that the oil industry is going through a typical cyclical downturn. Blame it on what you want, but that’s just the nature of the industry.

It’s also no secret that companies have been laying people off left and right. We’ve been fortunate enough to not have to deal with this yet, however, our time has come. Mrs. SSC’s company has been making waves about “re-org’s”, consolidation of departments and the like since February, and it had been rumored there would be layoffs, but it hasn’t been official until the last few weeks. They recently found out that there will be 12-15% staff reductions all across the board, with larger cuts most likely in Mrs. SSC’s group. No one is safe. Being true to their nature as a huge bloated bureaucracy, they plan on releasing little info and dragging the process out into October. Yippee!!
Alternatively, back in March my company announced that we can “keep on, keeping on” indefinitely with oil around $50-$60 a barrel. We did some minor reorganization, stopped our hiring campaign, and put raises on hold. They still paid out bonuses though, which was nice, and my move was well timed, so I already got a nice raise just by moving, so it isn’t too bad.

This week will mark the kickoff of the layoff cycle with a release of some info, possibly blank org charts, websites to see how you will be affected, and the like. Yep, everyone gets to essentially re-apply for their job and compete with others that may also apply for their job. Joy! Being a large company though, some people have gotten more information quicker than others. For instance, on a recent fishing trip a friend of mine told that he knows his boss’s job and likely his job is gone, as his group is going from 21 to 11 people. He’s kind of freaking out, because he’s a sole bread winner for his family, and no-one is currently hiring. However, he has a pretty good savings account, and he and his family live fairly well below their means. While he is worried, he isn’t super worried because they carry almost no debt, just the mortgage, they have a good savings account and emergency fund, and they have an amazing support group available from their church should things get really, really, bad. Another friend of ours who works with Mrs. SSC, recently had his wife get laid off from a different oil and gas company. Since he is now the sole bread winner and also works with Mrs. SSC he is more than a little worried about what could be coming. Again, they live pretty well below their means, and manage to save a decent amount. His job still covers their bills, and they can still save some along with that. So, while they are worried, they are not as worried as some other friends of ours, but no-one wants to be out of work, and have to start tapping into emergency funds and savings while scrounging for a job.

In my new company, I’ve only come across 2 people who mention that they save money outside of their work retirement plans. Two people… One of them is a new hire, and he follows the model of “pay yourself first” and then live off what’s left over. For instance one week, we were going out to lunch (I know, I know) and I invited him and he said he was going to be pretty broke the next 2 weeks because of a miscalculation with transferring funds to a Vanguard account. Apparently, he’d set it up to make a “monthly” transfer and it hit his account twice. Instead of dipping into his savings or other funds, he just shrugged his shoulders and said, “Nope, can’t afford it for the next 2 weeks.” Commendable, because I would’ve just used “other money” and then “rewarded” myself on saving twice as much as I’d planned. Sidenote – I still have bad financial ideas sometimes. The other person has “outside of work” retirement accounts, and a fund for a retirement home rather, a house to live in in retirement already and they’re only in their early 30’s. The rest of the people from our work group looked at us like we had tentacles growing out of our heads when they heard us talking about Vanguard funds, retirement savings, expense ratios, and the like. One person said, “Why are you talking about retirement, that’s like forever away!”

That leads to conversations of other people we know that are not in the same boat. Specifically, a couple that makes two oil industry salaries and are freaking out about layoffs, because they still live paycheck to paycheck with little to no savings, much less emergency fund savings. Yes, you did read that correctly. This couple, in their 30’s with children, still gets occasional help out from their parents with bills and vacations. They like extravagant vacations, and they take them as often as possible. In between vacations, their spending habits aren’t reigned in well either, because that’s just the lifestyle they are used to. They know they should be saving more, or any really, but between little things here and there, and kid functions, and birthday parties, and groceries, they just don’t manage their funds well. They are really worried, because with a layoff from just one of them, their house of cards could easily crash down. They’re taking the ostrich head in the sand, fingers crossed approach and hoping for the best.

This attitude and lifestyle of spend, spend, spend rings true with more colleagues of ours than you might think, hell it’s probably not much different in your industry either. For the occasional person that may be thinking about retirement early, or retirement at all, everyone else is thinking about more ways to spend their paychecks. It’s just mind boggling to me that people don’t save more. I have to say though, if I was still single and hadn’t met Mrs. SSC, I’d think I was doing alright maxing out my 401k, and having my debts paid down. If I was diligent enough to actually have them paid down, which is doubtful. Even then, I would probably still be only a few paychecks away from disaster. It was living with Mrs. SSC that got me to realize how to break that spend, spend, spend cycle and start focusing on investing, saving money, and paying off debt.

As the weeks move on, things will be pretty stressful around here. Maybe we’ll luck out and Mrs. SSC will get to retain a spot on the payroll. Maybe she’ll get laid off, and get to figure out what to do next? I know we’ve already figured out exactly how it will affect our FFLC date, and our savings though. Since this post has already gotten so long, I’ll go into that in detail next week with part two of this crazy adventure! Yeah, layoffs!!

Source: Macrotrends, Inc.

By Mr SSC
Posted on July 28, 2015
29 Comments on Layoffs are Looming! Would you be ready?

Kaboom, went the budget!! June 2015 Update

Man, was this a rough month for the budget in the SSC household. As I’d teased last month, we were expecting a few overages due to the A/C repairs, new tires, new greyhound adoption and the like, but I wasn’t expecting the hits to keep rolling. Fortunately, there haven’t been any breakdowns, repairs, or otherwise costly expenses that have cropped up yet this month, and we’re almost a third of the way through it. A quick glance at the bar chart shows June (appropriately orange) topping the charts in almost every category except the stable ones like mortgage, car note, and home utilities. How did this all happen and where did the money go you wonder? Since we don’t have the usual “numbers” chart for this month (it will return in the July update and you can peruse it then) I’ll just tell you.

Phone, tv, internet got hit with a $65/month increase due to 2 years’ worth of discounts finally running out. I called ATT, asking about any other ways to reduce our bill, and besides getting a 3 month $40 discount applied to our account, it was just lip service. I shopped around and 2 days later have our service switched and added bonus, NFL Sunday package is included for free this year! I count that as a win, since I’ll probably have to pony up for that one from my discretionary funds if we continue it in the future. Increased daycare costs – no clue. I’m guessing it’s a combo of short month in May, little longer month in June, and the difference was made up in June. Groceries were okay, trending a little higher than usual, but we’ve been on a “grocery spend watch” just to see if we can keep it steady.

Home repairs… Oh, home repairs…. Besides the A/C drip line getting clogged up (~$450), we also got 2 solar screens made for the bathroom windows (~$140) and it is now cool as can be in there, and not sauna like every day. We also had our wall mount A/C controller go out, so there was some added cost there. When we looked at replacing it with the same unit, we realized we could try the Nest for a little less (~$250). So far it’s been working great! The garage door springs also broke in this month, and that was another $440 to get them replaced. The car needed new tires, so I went a middle of the road option for that, but it was still ~$650 we didn’t want to spend.

The kids had their birthdays this past week, and we had a party. No, no, not some thousand dollar extravaganza with entertainers, balloon animals, and bounce houses. Oh wait, there was a bounce house, but upside, it was paid for over a year ago, and overall, not that pricey. Essentially we just had friends over and did snacks, drinks, and appetizer sort of food, beyond the cake and ice cream.

I designed and decorated James’ cake, and Mrs. SSC did Marie’s.

James wanted a construction cake, so I built this one.

With the food and extra drinks, juice boxes and gifts (For our kids not those give away bags for the party, I just don’t get those) it was still ~$200 or so for entertaining.

The bigger kicker of the month was our shower in the master bathroom. The metal for the hinge on the door fatigued and split. When this happened the pin that rests on this tubular metal hinge now sat about ½” lower and started hanging up on the lower part of the door. Imagine any door you use dropping a half inch and you get the idea. After hours of scouring the internet and talking to 4 different shower companies, we found out that they don’t make replacement parts for the style of enclosure we had. Seriously, what a racket! None, no parts. They have to be connected to the mob somehow, but no, they just expect you to replace the WHOLE thing if something like a tubular hinge fatigues and splits. So, after getting 3 quotes all within $50 of each other, we got our shower replaced to the tune of $1350….. Ridiculous! Now you understand where the comment about fixing all the “custom everything” on the Living Big Sky show came from, as it was playing the night after we’d ordered our standard shower door replacement. Ugh…

Finally, we got the newest member of the family our new greyhound, Coffee!! Kidding, we went with Lola instead of her racing name “Rusteze”. She’s been great, but the adoption fee of $250 and the $200 vet checkup/heartworm and tick/flea medicine and some other costs added up to just over $500.

So to recap, we’re about $3600 over budget this month. Fingers crossed that we don’t have the same string of spending in the next few months, but I see it trending back downward again.

How was your month?

Did you get any crazy unexpected bills,repairs, or new pets that threw your budget for a loop?