The House
This weekend some friends of mine offered to help me clean up around my house and getting ready for sale (although it already has an offer). How nice, right?
In the end, yes. But for a while I was like, “why am I doing yardwork in a home I am short-selling and that already has a good offer?” Plus, I spent $33 on bark, and flowers, and dirt. I was feeling really dumb. My bank account is overdrawn at the moment (I didn’t compute my business cashflow correctly and the last payroll run killed me). And $33 is not something I have to spare on a wasteful event! Let alone the time and energy to weed and clean and crap. Humph.
Then we actually started working. It was a beautiful day out, and spending time with my friends weeding was probably the most relaxing and fullfilling thing I’ve done in some time. I started off so bitter about my pride (why don’t I just tell my friends?), and ended up pretty OK with the situation. Yes, it was a “waste” of $33…but taking a little bit of good pride in my house made me feel not so crappy about this whole giant mess.
Still, keeping my whole debt fiasco under wraps is having more and more concequenses both emotionlly and financially:
- My friends eat out quite a bit (financial side)
- I’m having to lie about why I am selling my house (emotional side)
Responding To Some Comments
- I have not listened to Dave Ramsey’s show. But I have read alot on his site, and understand some of his principles. I know about the “debt snowball” method. I just don’t have ANY extra $ at the moment to pay off anything right now.
- The DMP rolled all the personal loans/credit cards that I had not negotiated to 0% or that were student loans. I kept a my old wellsfargo student card out of the program and another citcard one that I got for 0% for a year. I want to try and pay those off on my own
- I will be selling some of the bigger items around my house on craigslist in the next month. Thanks Charles for the tip about amazon for books.
- The new updated debt sheet does look ALOT better than the old $334,442 in debt one. BUT the only reason for that is the new one assumes I get my house sold. I may and likely will have tax liabilites from the short sale. I’ll update more when more happens
- Yes, I got 0% for 1 year on many of my credit cards. They only offer this after you haven’t paid them for many months. It’s not a fun route to go. When I went in for my last credit counseling apt they got a copy of my credit report. My score has gone from a 709 (when I bought my house) to now in the 400’s. Yikes.
- The 120K I owe my mother was not a loan. She put me in charge of investing her money, and I day traded it away. Of all my debts, this is obviously the hardest one on me. It has affected our relationship, but it has not destroyed it.
- I ran that tracert thing someone mentioned and the “casey” was from West Sacramento. So, there you go. Seems like it was really that guy.
- It seems some people like reading this blog. Thanks for the comments. I can’t post daily, maybe someday, but right now I have to focus on my business, and selling all my crap.
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If you’re concerned about $33, then I know you’re on the right track.
good luck man, will be rooting for you
If I were you, I’d go to the library and get The Total Money Makeover, tomorrow. I would find a station and listen to the Dave Ramsey show. Just in the 5 minutes I’ve read your posts, I’ve seen about 5 different actions that you are taking, that would be strongly discouraged. I’m just trying to help, not beat you up. I’d also recommend ready, The Millionaire Next Door, this may help you with any embarrassment you are having. Honestly, if your friends make fun of your positive financial steps (not going out to eat, et all), it typically means that you are on the Right Track. Most people are broke.
hey man, i have been reading serin’s blog for a while, so finding this is really great. i just realized that reading about his story everyday really has been wearing on me. its great to see someone in a similar situation that is really fighting. i think that i am gonna take him off my list of blogs and keep yours instead. good luck to you. you obviously realize the mistakes you have made and what you need to do to turn it around. the silver lining (as you already realized) is that with this focus you will be a better business man and be able to look at yourself in the mirror even if you can’t pull this off (which you just might, considering the drastic moves that you are taking).
cheers.
You are truly an inspiration. Good Luck. I’ll be reading regularly.
If you have a computer with speakers (or headphones), you can listen to Dave Ramsey’s show for free every day. He webcasts the entire show from his web site You can also install itunes for free and subscribe to his 1 hour per day podcast. Give it a try. The best thing about Dave is that he has the ability to inspire. His techniques are mostly common sense. That’s not why I tune in every day. I tune in because it’s like having a free financial coach that keeps me on track and motivates me.
As for your not telling your friends why you are selling your house… How would you react if one of your friends told you they were selling their house because they had gotten themselves into a financial mess? I’m sure you’d be supportive, right? I’m sure your friends will be as well (assuming they are really friends). Telling them will probably lower your stress too. Not that it would be easy to do. I faced a similar issue with drinking. I stopped because I really needed to. I hid this from my friends (who *love* drinking) for a while. It took a lot of pressure off of me when I finally told them. They were completely supportive.
Keep up the good work.
-Jay
Dude, fess up…. those that judge you by material possessions or wealth are shallow friends not worth having.
I noticed in your post that your current credit cards only offered you the 0% APR after you went a few months without paying them. How many months was this, I thought that after around 3 months that most would just send the bill to a debt collector. Because I’ve got a 24% APR on a card now, and if all it takes to get a 0% APR is to miss payments then I might just have to try it out.
You don’t have to tell your friends about your debt. It does make it difficult to explain why you can’t go out for dinners, etc., but maybe you can find other things to suggest. The other day I spent a bit of time online and found a bunch of things to do in my city that are free. Cultural festivals and music festivals mostly. There are probably things you can do with your friends. Or why not suggest going over to their house and doing yardwork at their places, lol.
Getting out of debt is often a two steps forward, one step back kind of thing. At least you got a nice day out of it.
I’d like to hear more about your daytrading. How long were you trading? How did you get started? What type of trading were you doing? How much experience did you have before you started actively trading?
Why weren’t you using stops?
Just read this update. I though I might be the first one with this comment but others are on the same page as me.
Debtguy, tell your friends. They don’t need the gory details, but it will be much easier for you if they have an understanding of what’s going on. Tell them you made some pretty serious investment mistakes and your now working hard to make things right and get back on your feet.
Friends will understand and support you. A few might be jerks and tsk tsk among themselves, but screw em’. Guarentee some of your friends are carrying some heavy credit card debt too. Probably can’t beat you though.
Anyway, once you tell them you’ll feel a lot better. And if they are real friends you don’t want to be lieing or decieving them which is bound to happen sooner or later.
Good luck.
Good on you for nickel and diming yourself and knowing what your $33 really means in terms of the money you spent doing the yardwork, but knowing what intangible value it has.
I’m glad you explained the money from your mother. I was wondering about that.
I too am glad you are fighting your way out of debt. I’m not interested in Casey Serin’s story. He sounds kind of idiotic to me and without a lot of remorse for what he did to get himself into his dilly of a pickle.
I look forward to keeping tabs on you. I think you are doing the right thing by selling your stuff. Your stuff will never love you back the way your family and friends will.
Debt Kid, I like your story but I really think that you need to tell everyone that you care about that you are in debt. Here’s why:
It is an extremely difficult process to go through. It is a transformation, a long process. And by hiding it from people you will either become distant or resentful or lie or just get into more debt. None of those is a good option.
You need to have people around you who can support you in the ups and downs, not people who are asking you to go out to eat all of the time. I feel like you might be a little focused on your pride. Pride is good, but not if it keeps everything that you’ve done a secret. Also, people who are close to you know you are having money trouble, trust me. It would go easier if you just mentioned the pink elephant that is in the room. Then you will spend less time focusing on it.
I wish you the best and it sounds to me like you know what is important. And what a wonderful mother you have. Not many people would be able to forgive something like that. She sounds top-notch.
As for the food, you might consider some cambell’s condensed soups and crackers and/or some PB+J. I eat that stuff all the time and yes, it is a little more expensive than ramen, but when you can eat a meal for under 75 cents, its hard to complain.
Please call into the Dave Ramsey show. He will help you. He has a good heart and was in a similar situation when he was your age. THERE IS HOPE! Keep it up, DebtKid. I know you can do it!