Achieving your bucket list

Posted on February 6, 2013February 6, 2013 by Danielle

Whether we write it down or not, most of us have a bucket list. This is different from New Year’s resolutions. For example, most of us could probably list “lose weight” as a resolution, but it’s not part of a bucket list. A bucket list would be more like “climb Mount Everest” or “travel to Timbuktu”. Okay, probably not the last one these days, unless you’re part of the French military. But, is it all just dreaming?

It is if, like just about everything else that’s expensive and time consuming, you don’t have a plan. And if you’re old enough to be reading a financial planning blog , you need a plan to turn those dreams into reality. So, I’d like to suggest some steps which I am currently applying to my own bucket list:

Write it down. Writing it down makes it seem more real, and makes you really think through what you want. Two items on my own list which I’ll use as examples are travel to India and learn at least 4 new foreign languages.
Cost it out. I’ve traveled a lot, but India seems very exotic and very expensive. So I’ve started getting figures on exactly what the airfare would be and how much a two week tour might actually cost. It turns out that the trip might be significantly cheaper than in my imagination, and the web offers plenty of cost saving travel tips. Some bucket list items, like language study, don’t necessarily cost a lot of money but do require a time commitment. Once you know what you’re after, there may be good “angles” or ways to achieve the bucket item by taking advantage of the experience of others who have done the same thing. Especially if you expect to begin your bucket list when you retire, this should be an important factor in your retirement income needs planning.
Assign a time goal. I’d like to say deadline, but that might make it not-fun. So, my goal for India is two years, and my goal for languages is to spend at least 3 months and up to six months this year on one specific language, for at least one hour per day and if possible, two. I set the minimum goal so I have some chance of learning something, and the maximum goal because I can easily become bogged down in the “never-enough” syndrome. I also chose 4 languages: Spanish, Esperanto, Italian, & Dutch.
Decide what is good enough. I want a tour of India where the logistics are taken care of and I can count on a guide. In Europe I’m comfortable rambling around on my own, but I don’t want hesitation about language, transportation, and safety to prevent my actually seeing at least something of India.For the languages, good enough for me is being able to travel, read a newspaper, read museum signs and understand a docent tour, and be able to have a conversation with anyone (however imperfect). Sure, I’d love to be able to read novels and be mistaken for a local, and I may decide to develop one of the new languages to that level in the future, but right now I just want to be able to switch around comfortably between a few.
Nibble at it. Much of the fun of a bucket list may well be this planning. I’ve gotten interested in travel hacking–accumulating miles for airfare and especially upgrades. Business class to India, a long ride, would be especially nice. I’m raiding the library for travel guides. Indian authors, contemporary and classic, are calling to me.The web offers a terrific amount of information on how to become a polyglot (a person who speaks a number of languages). There’s practice available, reviews of programs and software, and meet-up groups where you can get over your embarrassment at how badly you speak. I’m particularly lucky that in Spanish there are plenty of Spanish language television stations in Chicago. Watching the evening news in Spanish, I’ve noticed that the emphasis in coverage is often quite different from English language news.
Begin! It’s easy to blather, but not begun is never done. Turning dreams into reality means making time to sort through what’s important, figure out what (if anything) it may cost and where the money will come from, and actually getting started.

See ya at O’Hare, if not before.

College expenses you haven’t planned for

Posted on January 15, 2013January 15, 2013 by Danielle

Corrugated shipping container, one type of &qu...

Corrugated shipping container, one type of “cardboard box” (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Soon (if not already) you’ll know if your child is one of the anointed ones. Early decisions from college applications have pretty much rolled in by now, and while the regular decisions are still sweating it out (or hoping for better), parents are busy filling out those college aid applications. It’s really crazy that you have to file aid applications without knowing whether your child is in or not, but I suppose the colleges could argue that you need an aid offer to know whether you’re going to accept their admissions offer. I’ve discussed aid qualifying in other posts on this site, but this time I’m going to mention a couple of surprise costs not usually included in most colleges’ costs of attendance statements, but you have to pay them anyway.

Transportation. Dear daughter has had so many breaks that sometimes I wonder why I’m paying for room and board at all. Look carefully at the college calendar. Many schools have a 5 year calendar available, so you’ll be able to know the exact day little Jennifer will don that cap and gown, provided she makes it in 4 or 5 years. But if your child is going to a school far enough away that you can’t easily drive to pick her up, count how many times you’re going to need to fly her back and forth (or estimate the cost of gas and hotel for a long road trip). Also, be aware that you’re not going to get any deal from the airlines on these trips. They’ve figured out that every college student is flying out the moment classes recess, and the airfare that’s $286 every other day of the week suddenly morphs into $486 on the day your child wants to travel. Also, the school may or may not provide a shuttle to the airport—bingo, another $60 in charges each time. If your child makes the round trip 5 times (school beginning/end, fall break, Thanksgiving break, Christmas break, spring break) it can easily add $2,000 to your needed funds. Frequent flyer seats? Ha. Ha.
Supplies. Sure, the school has told you to budget $500 for books. Maybe. But if your darling is taking a foreign language or science labs, those textbooks can be $150 or more, alone. The trend is to include online access and supplemental cds with those courses (which the kids never use, of course) making used textbooks or reselling the new ones not practicable. If the teacher decides to include supplemental books, like a French novel or two, cross your fingers that it’s available on Project Gutenberg. Many schools discourage students from purchasing individual printers by offering a certain amount of free printing from the college center or library. It’s easy to exceed this. If you do buy a cheap printer, don’t forget to add in ink and paper costs, which can easily amount to several hundred dollars per year.
Room decoration. Not only are they dinky, but most rooms can be extremely bare. And the mattresses are often extra long, making a purchase of a complete suite of bedding necessary. Then there’s the closets and storage containers, lamps, sometimes a rug, etc. We budgeted $200, but spent $500. And we didn’t bring a refrigerator, air conditioner, coffee maker, or any of the other stuff I saw some kids haul in.
Shipping. The closets are so small that we decided to ship winter clothes later. Then there were the books she couldn’t live without, the stuffed animals, the stuff she forgot on the first round, a supply of dark chocolate…Of course, you can’t just leave this stuff in the dorm room over the summer, because any college with an eye on raising money is renting out that dorm room to some summer program or camp. So you need to either ship it all back, or pay for storage, containers, and transportation to the storage facility over the summer. Believe it or not, this all can easily add up to $500-$1,000.
“Special” opportunities. Students will be pitched extra “opportunities” for break time: field schools, intensive workshops, discounted “educational” tours and spring break drinkathons. I’ve nixed those but the tab can be solidly in the four figures. I guess enough people sign on that it’s worthwhile offering these. I hope you can withstand the pleading.

And you thought the tuition was high, right?

Can’t get no satisfaction–Consumerism 2.0

Posted on December 19, 2012December 19, 2012 by Danielle

Sometimes I think I could have had a very profitable, though aggravating, career as a professional complainer. I’m not sure if it’s me or the modern world, but hardly a month goes by without some problem with a utility bill, a credit card, a bank account, or some crud that I’ve purchased. I also find that I’m somewhat entertained by columns in newspapers that fix “what’s your problem” or assorted travel snafus.

Actually, I’d like to quit that job (complaining, not financial planning!), but life seems to present me with endless opportunities. Maybe it’s because I spend my days focused on finances, but I hereby admit that I cannot bear to be cheated. I’m not scamming anything, or looking for a free ride or something I’m not entitled to, but when I pay good hard earned money, I think I (and you) should get what you paid for. Not so easy.

A lot of people simply give up because it takes so much time to thread your way through whatever corporate bureaucracy you’re up against. Even worse if the customer service rep’s English is a little shakey (although, in fairness, they tend to be a lot more polite than our, ahem, native speakers). If I’ve talked to the proper channels and don’t get satisfaction, my first line of defense is to ask for a supervisor. My daughter thinks it’s quite a sport to listen to Mom on the phone, and at some point she choruses, “Wait for it….” and holds her breath until I say let me talk to your supervisor. She’s never waited long.

Sometimes this doesn’t work so I share a method that has worked for me every time but one. Email the CEO of the company. The only one I have emailed who utterly failed to respond was Leslie Blodgett, CEO of the makeup company Bare Escentuals. (I’d purchased one of their very expensive brushes, which proceeded to shed bristles like a porcupine). In every other case, I’ve had a prompt and effective response from some competent, knowledgeable staff person or attorney. After all, who should care more about customer satisfaction than the CEO? And if he or she doesn’t, well, I’d certainly consider shorting that stock!

The trick is finding the correct email, so I share with you how I’ve done it. First, google “CEO Widget Company”. Now you have the right name, but rarely will you find the email. So, go to the website of the company and start browsing. I usually start with investor relations or the “About” page. Somewhere in that website you can usually find someone’s email address and this allows you to guess what the pattern is: john.doe@widget.com; jdoe@widget.com; doej@widget.com, etc. Sometimes it takes a few bounced emails before you hit on the right format, but when it doesn’t come back, bingo. If this utterly fails you can send a snail mail letter, but usually an email is faster—the last time I sent a letter, the response took a month, but I’ve never waited longer than 48 hours for an email message. Be sure to include a phone number, as the staff person usually calls.

Sure, I want my problem addressed, but I also think I’m doing them a favor—they could spend a fortune analyzing their customer service, but I’m giving them some real world feedback and hopefully helping them improve their business. And now I’m off to deal with those two year old tires with dry rot.