Freedomizing

The Garage is boiling hot and guess what its connected to?! Insulating your house tries to minimize the heat exchange, as an example, if it was 120 degrees out and you were cooling your house to 60 degrees no matter what R-Value you have your home will need energy to maintain that 60 degrees. On the other hand, if it is 60 degrees out it will take no energy to maintain the 60 degrees, internal temp. The hotter it is outside, the more energy it takes to keep inside cool. I found this out a couple of summers ago when I was lying in the bedroom, and I couldn't get the room to cool. I took my handy-dandy infrared temp and started poking around to see where I was losing the most cool air, or gaining the most hot air! Let me back up a minute here ... I moved into this home in about 2012, there were aluminum single pane windows, and my assumption was that was the reason the house was so darn hot. Thus, I went to work. I replaced all the windows with new efficient windows (YES DIY!) ...

I'm going to use terribly gross numbers to help illustrate my point here, but they are numbers that are near and dear to my heart. *Car Purchase : $40,000 *Car Insurance: $1000 / year *Registration : $600 / year Gas Mileage: $2000/ year 18 MPG @ $2.50 / gallon 15000 miles / year Car Deprecation: $4000 / year (goes down as years go on) Tires : $300 / year (1200/ 4 years) Maintenance : $500 / year (goes up as years go on about directly in anti-correlation to Deprecation) *Sunk costs meaning you own the car already therefore not using it doesn't change the costs. But if we were to break down these numbers (also assuming NO financing, you paid cash for your car) your car costs you on average $8200 / year!!!!!! That has nothing to do with a car payment, what if you have a $600/month car payment?! Now you are north of $14000/ year or over $1000/ month!!!!! Oh but I'm going to hear that the argument is that you have a much less expensive car, that gets almost 50 MPG!...

Having coffee with a client of mine we began discussing the markets and the directions they will take. Clearly I have absolutely no idea, however we began to discuss the effects of outside forces on the markets and what matters. Politics! Woa! Wait just a minute ... three things you are never to discuss Politics Religion and Finance! Yea well, I do, and I will continue, and yes I have been burned by doing so and generally, no, I don't think its a good idea to discuss these items. REASON? People are closed minded in general and will not indulge in outside opinions readily until credibility is obtained. Then we have to define credibility, and that is impossible as some folks give credibility because they found it on google, some because they heard it directly from a supreme being, some because of a piece of paper that said that person is schooled, some because they have letters after their name, you get my point. Hence generally do not talk about the three no no's unless you ...

You have to take this post with a grain of salt, my wife was lucky enough to move into a fantastic home right off the bat, we shopped for more than 18 months to find a deal that was ok by frugal me and fantastic by location for her. However, we battle now, as our friends and colleagues are moving up in the world we visit their homes for BBQ's and get together, and WOW what nice homes! New this, new that, large this and huge that. Three bedrooms 2.5 bath 4300 sq ft! DANG!!! The kitchen is massive! WOW!!! Living area with 37000 ft ceilings. Mc Mansions! So what do you do as a typical American, you go to Zillow and see what they paid, and then you look at your budget and see if you could buy that house. Diagnose where you want to live, and start looking at that ridiculous price range that you "can afford" because rates are crazy low and prices are crazy inflated. Pictures begin to show up of kitchens that are perfect, huge, amazing; I WANT I NEED! ... PAUSE ... Those p...

I was just finishing up a few emails marked "urgent" by my client, getting off the phone with the Dentist, who claimed I owed them money and unloading the dishwasher when the front came in. I needed to be out of the house at the latest of 5 o'clock to pick up the kids on time; it was sprinkling raining at 4:55, and it looked like it was going to get a whole lot worse! ALWAYS BE CYCLING!!!!! The internal argument began, and how easy is it to get in the car!? You must learn to pride yourself on having your car sit. The worst possible un-PC way I can put it is it is like an addiction. Count the days/weeks that you car doesn't move! The more days you have under your belt, the easier it is to get on that bike! And remember and repeat the ABC's Always Be Cycling!

"The days of chivalry are gone!" Damn right, when I'm the one giving bottles, prepping meals, changing diapers, and earning less than my wonderful wife! Ok, so I don't earn less (yet)! The rest is way too true! More than likely this is the first of many posts to come regarding Mr. Momming, I've got ideas spewing from me regarding this issue. So keep an eye out! Let us talk about one thing that you can do around the house raising kids to further your financial situation rather than flush it down the drain! First things first, have you ever tasted the shit that comes out of those baby jars, or these days those squirty things? Other than pure apple sauce, the shit tastes foreign, rotten and nothing like described. Get yourself one of these bad boys or something like it. Steam pretty much whatever, then blend then put in little "reusable" canisters (see that green placement there) as a matter of fact, if you didn't start this way and you have a...