Is the Recession over in YOUR house?

[ohiomom28]

I work for a HVAC co. We have been slow due to the weather but not so much the recession. You would be surprised how much people still have to have their AC. They don't want to go without it. We are picking up now finally.

Other than that, we never really experienced the recession at our house. Our jobs were not affected. My parents were, but they are back to working 12 hours days now.

Hoping everything gets better soon!

 

[AshleyW]

No, no bubble here, either. We don't have kids and all we did was stop eating out one more night a week to put more money in our vacation funds to cover dumb things like gas increases and the airline industries baggage fees. We both work M-F so our utilities are not that high to begin with...

We carpool together to work, so our gas isn't that much. Our insurance has gone up, but nothing I can't handle. We don't rely on credit so that isn't an issue for us, either.

Same situation with my fiance & I. We over-budget every month, so even if prices increased, it wouldn't affect us. We drive to work together every day. We replaced our central air, and our utility bills actually went down about 50% thanks to that. We never use our credit cards, so interest rates don't affect us either. We're saving up for our 6 month emergency fund and actually are at a little over 70% of our goal after 3 months of saving.

 

[pooh4evr]

No Bubble here either- i stay home and DH job is very stable (MD) our utilities are all on budget billing, we don't use credit cards, insurance hasn't changed, kids in public school- we have paid off both cars, and a home improvement loan and we bought some stocks at the end of '08 when they were really low. so far so good.

 

[Donnainnj]

I feel we are luckier then most, but this year DH's bonus was about half what it normally is, and we were told there will be no raises this year.
Goods: he still has a job
he is working from home 3 days a week
he still got a bonus
not so good: no pay raise
smaller bonus
more work for less people (his area has had
people retire and die and they are usually
not replaced)
much more travel then in the past
I feel the goods outweigh the not so goods for us.

Donna

 

[turkeymama]

Not yet, and it won't be over for us at least until I graduate next May. We were doing great until hubby got laid off from being a manager of a mortgage loan company. Bank branch managers don't make near as much, but at least we're eating and keeping our heads above water.

 

[luvsJack]

Nope, not over here. Things seem to be getting a bit better but have a long way to go to being near normal. Lower income and higher prices! I can be thankful we do have jobs though.

 

[undertheradar]

What an amazing world. Here in California the worst is yet to come. Predictions are an increased unemployment rate above 12% by 2011. Gas is rising, increased $.07 gallon today to $3.269 a gallon for the cheapest grade. While home prices are starting to rise, sales volume is again dropping. This part of the state may be feeling more impact due to the corporation formerly known as Countrywide being based here and many jobs being lost. With the number of jobs lost nationwide, most major cities are just starting to experience the impact of the recession. I'm glad some areas are seeing an end to the constant downsizings and economic downturn, but fear that many more job losses are yet to come.

 

[ChrizJen]

I'd be curious to see if (in general) those hardest hit are couples with more than one child. It stands to reason that a single person (or a couple) who have no children would be better able to weather a layoff or a financial hardship than would a family with multiple children. Not that it matters, per se. But I would be curious to know.

 

[SadieDog]

No, not over here.

 

[JodiR]

Never was an issue here. Dh got promoted in April with a $27,000 + a year increase. Then I was laid of in early May. My unemployment is just slightly shy of what I was bringing home. Even if I never found a job again and my unemployment ends, we would be more than fine. But I am looking.

I am thinking of opening a kids clothing store though.

 

[DMickey28]

Nope ... We haven't been effected nearly as bad as some so we are lucky. We banked a lot of money at the end of 2008 which got us through the first 6 months of 2009. We are living rent/mortgage free now but saving money for a downpayment on a house.

DH is going to make $50K less this year than he did last year. He did get a new job offer which will be AWESOME, but that was up "on hold" this week for their quarterly earning call which is right now. We are praying that the job gets pushed through later this week. It's not a pay raise in the base but it has great future potential for him. We shall see.

Luckily, I have not had to go back to work but if he doesn't get a job and we secure the mortgage on the house things will change a bit.

 

[lovetonap]

We are fortunate in that we haven't been affected by the recession. We have always lived below our means and our income is steadily increasing.

 

[hopemax]

I think that anyone posting that there has been no effect must be living in a bubble! What with grocery items costing more for less product, utilities rising, insurance rising, savings interest rates declining, credit lines shrinking while interest rates increase, gasoline rising again. It would be impossible to not feel the current recession.

After DH got the notice of the layoff, but before it actually happened, he received a 5% pay raise. And he actually was in a sort of bidding war when the new job hired him, so between the raise and the new job he increased his salary by 1/3. So even though there have been price increases, the pay raise more than makes up for that; we didn't change our standard of living because we started saving a lot so we could buy a house. Which we will be closing on next month. At his new company, though, there also were major changes on how much the company paid for health insurance, but for the first time he is not "one of the little guys" so for us there was no change. Like I said, in my previous post, we have been extremely lucky.

 

[clgwli]

I'd be curious to see if (in general) those hardest hit are couples with more than one child. It stands to reason that a single person (or a couple) who have no children would be better able to weather a layoff or a financial hardship than would a family with multiple children. Not that it matters, per se. But I would be curious to know.

I don't know if that would make much of a difference honestly. I think how marketable the person is and how flooded the job market in a field would make a lot more difference. I know my DH was let go last year and the following week he was working a new job. Just a few months later he was working the job of his dreams. I am a SAHM and was looking for work immediately as well but he beat me to it. Even though we are both college graduates he is just more marketable and in our area the job market in his field was definitely not saturated with candidates looking for a job.

We have felt the effects of the recession but my DH has a very stable job in an excellent company right now that has zero debt. So we've been there but fortunately found the light at the end of the tunnel rather quickly. I do know some who have lost their jobs as well here, but in general it doesn't seem to be near as bad as what I have heard in other parts of the country.

I will be honest in that at least here in general prices at the grocery store haven't increased. Some items have but others have dropped. In general it balances out in the end.

 

[chicagodisneyfan]

The recession never came by my house. I have a secure job, husband has a secure job too. I received my biggest bonus ever in 2008 and have been told I will receive again in 2009.

We are very lucky.

 

[pppiglet]

Things are looking up here. Last year they put me on 4 days a week, then in April I only had to take 1 day off a month (DH too) and as of next week I am back to full time. I am so busy I have actually been working OT (DH too) and DS who got laid off last October (from the same company we work for) found a temp job in March that was suppose to last 6 weeks, it turned into 6 mos and they just hired him on permanently. Everyone else at work was just put back on 5 days (from 4days), but they have to take a 4% cut in pay. Sales are still down in our market, but we'll still be there.

 

[jlima]

Nope. Not in Nevada.

 

[rparmfamily]

Never had a recession in our house so I voted "YES".

DH is active duty military.

We have 3 kids, including 1 we just added this year.

 

[shy little mouse]

Checking in from the great state of Michigan. We have been in recession for YEARS now, and it is nowhere near over. You know it is bad when even hospitals are laying off employees.

 

[HeyIt'sMe]

I voted no.

This year my employer didn't give raises and then in April lowered everyone's salary by 3% + we get no bonuses this year + our 401(k) match was suspended. These cost-cutting measures are still in place.

DH's company gave small raises this year but stopped bonuses. Also, some employees had their hours cut 20% with a corresponding 20% cut in pay. DH wasn't one of them, thankfully.

But even with these changes we are doing fine - we weren't big spenders to begin with. We always watched our finances but are just watching them more closely now. I am feeling more hopeful about things - enough so that we are entertaining the thought of returning to WDW next Fall. We'll see if that happens.


As for our friends -

One of my friend's husband has been out of work since November 2008 (he's in sales) and his unemployment runs out soon.

Another friend's husband lost his job (he's in IT) and found another job within 2 months but he took a large paycut - he makes $18,000/year less now.

Lastly, we have friends who have been trying to sell their house since October 2007. Yes, that's 2007.