Wednesday Website #5: Craigslist.org

This post might be obvious to some, but it definitely is worth mentioning.When it came time to furnish our apartment, we immediately went to Craigslist.org. You can find excellent pieces of furniture for very little money, if you can figure out when the most items will hit the market in your locale. For example, if you live in a city with a large university, check Craigslist frequently between the months of May and September and you'll be rewarded with people moving out, people moving in, and lots of furniture being posted.

We live in a large city, which helps provide a steady flow of Craigslist items. If you know what you are looking for, and you check frequently, you can score awesome deals. The picture above is our living room, and all of the furniture is from Craigslist or IKEA.

Here's the breakdown:

Couch - $150

Price included delivery and help getting it into the apartment. This couch is a clean dark grey material, and is as big as a twin bed if you remove the back cushions. It's great for guests to stay on, or for taking a nap (trust me - it's ridiculously comfortable and makes you never want to get up!).

Chairs - $50 each

I had been eying these cream colored TULLSTA chairs from IKEA for months. I didn't want to pay the $99 price the store asks for brand new chairs, so I kept an eye out on Craigslist. It took several months, during which I saw it in red, black, or a single cream chair, but eventually I found someone selling several of these. I snapped them up instantly! There is only a couple small smudges on the material, but they are barely noticeable. I can either try steam cleaning them, or just get a washable slipcover.

Bookcase - $40 for two

We had been in need of bookcases for about a year. Our books were sitting in white plastic milk crates since we moved here, and they were in need of a new home. I kept an eye out for nice wooden bookcases, and was rewarded with these foldable bookcases. They happen to be the same ones that Sherry and John have over at YoungHouseLove.com (although they were much more adventurous than I am and ended up painting it green). The other is located in our office/guest room, which for now is nice, but a much less inspired space.

The coffee table is the LACK coffee table from IKEA, which was about $20-$25 new. I got that because we have matching LACK side tables in the bedroom, and I liked the both the style and the potential to use them in the same room.

Curtains are from the Christmas Tree Shop (an amazing line of stores that is unfortunately only found in the Northeast). I wanted blue-grey silk curtains with a nice sheen, but could not talk myself into spending a ton on real silk. So instead I found them in faux silk at Christmas Tree Shop in Connecticut, and put them in my suitcase on my way back to Arizona! At about $15/two panels, they are much, much more affordable.

We also put the curtains in our dining room. (adjoins the living room at the point from where the pictures were taken) We have a wall with an ugly wood veneer built in cabinet, and cannot remove it since we are renting. Since I couldn't stand to look at it every single day, I had the idea to hang curtains on either side of the stainless steel shelves and cover the cabinet, while still allowing access to drawers. The other side of the metal shelving is where we store things like brooms and mop buckets, since we don't have room anywhere else in the apartment.

In this picture, the table is from Craigslist, while the metal shelves are from IKEA (about $80 for the set, but very durable - and it was the one piece of furniture my fiance really wanted in the apartment). The table cost $50 for a table and four chairs. I loved the lines on the back of the chairs, and so I'm hoping to make time in the next year to stain or paint it a darker wood color.

So there you have it. For less than $400 we added furniture and fabric to our living/dining room area and created a comfortable, inviting space. I must say, I'm addicted to Craigslist! (we got our new mattress and desk from Craigslist as well)

 

Side note: sorry about the poor picture quality and the weird lighting. I was using an unfamiliar camera but wanted to get the pictures taken!

Wednesday Websites #4: Retirement Accounts

Since this is National Save for Retirement Week, today's websites will feature online companies that allow you to create and maintain retirement savings accounts.

despair.com

Before I launch into a list of links, I'll give a quick background of the different types of accounts. I'll go into each in more detail later this week, but for now, lets say there are two major types of retirement accounts.

The first is the 401k. This is a tax advantaged account that is generally an 'employer-sponsored' plan. That means, when you leave one job for another, you have to transfer your 401k account to your new employer. Many employers also offer matching contributions, say for 3% of salary. Employer contributions are free money - make sure you are taking advantage of it!

The second type of account is the IRA, or Individual Retirement Account. Like it's name implies, this account is tied to you, not your employer. You can change jobs every week if you'd like, but you don't have to change your account information for an IRA. You do not get employer matching for this type of account.

There are limits as to how much money you can put in each account during the year, since they are "tax advantaged" accounts. That means that there are tax benefits associated with saving for retirement.

If you choose the 'traditional' IRA or 401k, you put money in pre-tax, and are only taxed when you make withdrawals in retirement. This type of account is good if you think your tax bracket is higher now than it will be when you retire. It also serves to decrease your current taxable income, so you will pay fewer taxes in the present.

If you choose the "Roth" IRA or 401k, your money is put in after taxes have already been taken out, but you never have to pay tax on the gains that investment makes. So if you manage to turn $10,000 into $100,000 by the time you retire, you will have been taxed on the original $10,000 at your current tax rate, but you will not be taxed on the $90,000 your money earned. This type of account is best if you think your tax rate now is lower than what it will be when you retire. So if you are starting out at an entry level job in one of the lower tax brackets, this may be the best account for you currently.

You can also have both. I currently do - I put money into both a Roth IRA and Roth 401k, but my employer's contribution gets directed to a Traditional 401k.

Now that you get the basic idea of what types of accounts there are, here is a listing of websites that allow you to create and fund your own account.

Etrade
ING Direct
Fidelity
Bank of America
Scottrade

Note: You should check out the list of potential fees before opening any account. Some of these sites will charge an annual fee, but not charge for trades, while others will charge for trading but not have an annual fee. You need to determine how you will most likely handle your money, and pick the one that suits your personal investment style.

Wednesday Website #3: Gift Cards at a Discount

On Monday we featured a way to save on your digital music habits. This week's Wednesday Website is a great way to save money at stores you already know you're going to shop at, or to save money on gifts for birthdays or holidays.The following websites feature gift cards at a discount - 10%, 15%, or more.

 Plastic Jungle: Probably the most popular of the gift card recycling websites, Plastic Jungle has a cute, user friendly interface and a slew of merchants to choose from. You can find almost any store you need - Home Depot, Lowe's, Macy's, Sears, Best Buy, Victoria's Secret, Old Navy, TJ Maxx, JC Penney, you name it. They also offer some pretty awesome discounts. As I write this, they are offering a $25 Godiva gift card for only $17.50. That's a great way to save some serious cash on your Christmas shopping! Even better, if you are feeling philanthropic, you can choose to donate 100% of the amount on your card to a classroom in need.

GiftCards.com: This website is a little less fashionable/user-friendly, but it does have spots where it outshines Plastic Jungle. They too have discounted gift cards for common merchants, though the selection is a little more limited. On the up side, they have an option to create customizable VISA gift cards. You can choose your amount, upload a photo, and have it sent to the person in a personalized card. This is great if you can't figure out what someone wants as a gift, but want a little more security than giving out cash.

Wednesday Website #2: Mint.com

Here it is: the number one website for keeping track of your money - and best of all, it's free!

I discovered Mint about a year ago, and it has made my life so much easier. The basic premise of the site is aggregation of your accounts. You enter your online login information for your banking, loans, or other financial accounts, and then Mint combines them all into one easy to use tool. This is not a paid endorsement, I didn't get any freebies (other than the use of their site, which is always free) - it just has worked wonders for me.

There are a few areas where Mint is very very helpful. I find numbers 4 and 5 below to be the most helpful.

1: Categorizing your spending.
Mint automatically categorizes all transactions in your transaction history into different categories. For example, a credit card charge at (insert grocery store name here) will automatically be categorized as groceries, or food and dining. A trip to Shell will be categorized as gas. When these are categorized, you can view your expenses as part of a whole - do you spend 1% or 10% of your money on gas?

2: Tracking your spending over time.
Mint also allows you to compare your spending from month to month or year to year. You can see where your expenses have changed.

3: Compare your spending to others.
By anonymizing your data and others on the site, you can compare your spending habits to other people in your city, region, or nation-wide. If you see that you're spending $500 more per year on auto insurance than the average person, you can take action to try and find cheaper rates.

4: Simple, easy budgeting.
The best feature on Mint is the budget tool. Remember that plan you came up with in Step 3? Well here is where you make it nearly automatic and incredibly easy. Enter your budgeted amounts into Mint's categories (groceries, gas, insurance, etc) and then relax.

That categorizing aspect I mentioned above? It comes into play here. When you buy groceries, it will automatically deduct that amount from your budgeted amount. You can see how much you have left, in relation to how much time is left in the month. You also have the option to roll over budgets from month to month, so if you spend $400 out of $500 one month, you get an extra $100 to spend the next. Or, conversely, if you overspend one month, it can deduct it from the next month's budget.

5: Alerts
The last really helpful feature Mint offers is the ability to set alerts. You can have these alerts sent in an email or as a text message. You can set alerts to tell you when you have a low balance, when you exceed your budget, when bills are do, or a whole host of other important things. That way, if you exceed your 'shopping' budget for the month, you can get an email to remind yourself not to spend anymore until the next month.

Wednesday Websites #1: Credit Karma

Last weekend I wrote about credit reports.

But there is another thing that companies use when determining your financial acumen - the credit score. If your credit report is like your credit report card, then your credit score is like your GPA. The credit score is a proprietary number calculated by one of several credit bureaus. They take all of the information covered in your credit report - payment history, amount of outstanding debt, etc - and boil it down into one number that is supposed to predict your credit worthiness.There are several credit scores, but the most common is the FICO (Fair Isaac Corporation) score.

Your income is not considered at all in your credit report or your credit score. You could be making a million dollars a year, but if you are borrowing 2 million dollars and having trouble paying it back, you could still have a very low credit score. Your score simply describes your likelihood of paying back your debt responsibly.

Although you are entitled to one free credit report annually from each of the three credit bureaus, you are not entitled to free credit scores. You can purchase them as an add-on to your credit reports at annualcreditreport.com, or you can purchase them individually. Since each score purchase runs $7-$12, that can add up very quickly.

But luckily there is an awesome website that allows you to get your credit score for "free"! At CreditKarma.com you can obtain your credit score as frequently as you want, and it will not cost you a dime. They pay the $7-$12 fee for you by posting related ads around the site.

Once you are on Credit Karma's website, please explore! It is chock full of helpful information, and literally breaks your credit score into sections and gives you a grade on each so you can see what parts of your credit activity you need to improve. These sections include:

-- Credit utilization
-- Percentage of on-time payments
-- Average age of open credit lines
-- Total accounts (number and type)
-- Hard credit inquiries
(When you apply for credit, they make a 'hard inquiry', which affects your score. If you check your own credit, it is a 'soft inquiry' and does not affect your score)

The other amazing part of the site is the Credit Score Simulator. Here, you can input potential changes to your credit activity, such as closing a credit card, increasing a credit limit, or making a late payment, and you can see how it will potentially affect your credit score. From my experience it is fairly accurate too! When I increased one of my credit limits by $2000, it showed that my credit score would increase by two points. So I called up my credit card company, asked them to increase my limit by that amount, and sure enough, my score went up two points!

This is a really useful tool to help you wrap your head around the complexities that make up a credit score. Check it out!

Wednesday Websites

Wednesday Websites #1: CreditKarma.com
Wednesday Websites #2: Mint.com
Wednesday Websites #3: PlasticJungle.com