you reminded me of a good laugh we had when purging my mom's house to sell it. mom had a reputation among us for forgetting where she hid Christmas presents and we would inevitably end up getting something OBVIOUSLY meant for Christmas in an Easter basket or as an 'extra' birthday gift. by the time mom sells and moves into assisted living all of us were ranging from our 40's to near 60's so no need to be hiding anymore YET we find, under a pile of long unused linens holiday socks wrapped and ready to be put in one of our childhood stockings. we also had a laugh over how many old cool-whip containers she had washed and squirreled away in the cabinets.
if your mom has any tendancies to hide stuff away make sure to shake any books/open any VHS or DVD holders, check pockets of any clothing to be tossed. photo frames are also hideaway spots for documents and money with some older adults so pull the photos out and see what lurks beneath.
I'm never going to buy another mechanical pencil or lead for as long as I live. I've found handfuls of pencils and packs of lead in probably 40 different random boxes over the last week.
as for pens and pencils and leads and erasers-at the end of every school year I would have my kids empty their backpacks and unload the supplies they brought home. it is like a walk down memory lane when you go to grab a pen, pencil or eraser here-you can estimate how old one is by the decor (lots of disney and video game themed).
My dads gets a lot of this stuff. Once you donate to a charity, your name goes on The List and you get hammered for pleas to donate to every other charity. My dad would give to most of them, $5-10 here and there. Some send note pads, some greeting cards, and some return address labels.my mil passed in 2010-i still have decades worth of post it notes and small note pads along with greeting cards for any occasion
YES so...many...freaking...return address stickers, we tossed them all.
on paperwork-if your parents lived (as singletons and as married) in different locations over their lives and you come across anything that connects them to a prior address (w2, old utility bill, old receipts...) hold on to at least one for every address you can find. reason being-if something is floating out their in the world like an old utility deposit refund or an overpayment on bill or a long forgotten little bank account it can be turned over at some point to the state who then lists it on their website for the owner (or their heirs) to claim. with some things it's easy and just an id and ssn work, with others they want proof the claimant is the person who lived at the last known address that whomever turned it over had.
She wasn’t quite that bad but she saved hospital gowns (patient gowns and the yellow visitor gowns) from when her mother was hospitalized.
I hope it sells quickly for you.How is your mom doing with all of it?
Ds24 has his closing on Wednesday. He is so excited.
We found out later that his offer was accepted despite the seller getting another offer for $10k more than his. His agent said they chose his offer because he has a great credit score, has a very large down payment, and he's getting a conventional mortgage, not FHA or some special first time homebuyer's assistance. Those things tend to cause delays. It took a month and 6 days to go from accepting the offer to closing.
I wanted to surprise him with a care package from Amazon of cleaning supplies, laundry detergent, a mop, cleaning cloths, toilet plunger, etc. but it really adds up quickly and I'd rather buy it as subscribe & save to get the 15% discount but to do that you have to order in advance and I'm afraid to do it now, before it's official, just in case some issue arises. Maybe I can have it arrive next weekend. He insists it's immaculate and doesn't need cleaning.
He's been working 6 12-hr shifts per week all winter and just packing away all that OT $$. I don't even tell him to just keep swimming.
in the folder mil always pointed out the location of and reminded dh contained 'the important vital documents in the event of my death' we found car servicing records for a car long gone, years old dog vaccination/licensing docs and receipts for one of her family member's cremation-nothing that pertained to HER. a friend was faced with boxes and boxes of important paperwork co-mingled with decades of appliance books and warranties-he would call us complaining 'why? why? why? which we had no answer to (but we did appreciate that he found all the paperwork for her circa 50's kitchenaide mixer that he had gifted us
).
I have a 19 and 17 year old. My 19 year old is in his first year of college and my 17 year old is graduating HS this year. He do not have any money saved for them and they are paying for college on their own. Both will be living at home so we cover food (if eating at home or we go out. They cover any extra going out with friends) and they live here for free. I also work for a college access programs working with scholarships for college. Here is just my personal take on this.
I also need to do real research in how FAFSA views a 529 versus other means of saving for college. My kids range from 3-14 and, unfortunately, we did not start early off with our oldest. I'm clinging to the philosophy of "something is better than nothing" now. But I also don't want to do anything that actually creates more difficulties either...
Thanks for being so bold and courageous to share this with everyone. I think you are asking information from us, so I will try to offer some help.
529s are a great idea. Not sure what age your kids are - but every little bit would help them. Both Suze Orman and Dave Ramsey would suggest not putting money into the kid's college plans until you are financially secure.
Not sure where things are and how far away they are. But a couple ideas - if you are feeling it is out of control totally:
I understand the need, makes sense. I would however, recommend viewing all your debt as one big chunk.
Credit Card debt is so expensive... It truly is...
Without knowing your debt-to-income ratio it is hard to speak to this. My view generally is I would wait on any projects on the house until you know this will make it more profitable when you sell or make it (more like) somewhere you never want to leave. My suggestion would be to hold off on more projects until your debt is at least to the level you would like it to be - which means paying off the $11k loan and getting the CC down to the level you find more manageable.
