Green Panda Treehouse

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Photo Credit: by alborzshawn

Welcome!

If you’re visiting from US News’ AlphanConsumer, thank you for visiting my blog. The post was inspired by my last 2 apartments.

Here’s an overview of some of my most popular posts to get started:

Banking

• Does Your Bank Care About Online Banking Security?
• Another Reason Why I Hate Bank of America
• Make Banks Treat You Like The Valued Customer You Are
• Bank of America Raises ATM Fees

Budget & Savings

• His, Mine, and Ours: How We Pay Our Bills and Budget
• Rebuilding An Emergency Fund
• Eat Healthier & Save Money: Brownbag Your Lunch
• Build a Doable Budget in 2 Weeks
• Easy Ways to Get an Emergency Fund Started

Credit Cards

• How to Use Credit Cards Wisely
• I Got a Lower Rate on the Credit Card I Use
• Rich College Student: Understand Your Credit Cards
• Top 5 Credit Card Mistakes

Debt

• Worst Credit Card Offer I’ve Seen
• 5 Ways to Get Out of Debt
• Pay Off Debt First or Start Savings (Chicken or the Egg)

Education

• Getting The Most Financial Aid
• CLEP Can Reduce Your Student Loans
• Which Foreign Language Should I Learn?

Life

• What’s in My Wallet?
• Frugal Pet Care
• How to Avoid Arguing About Money
• 3 Ways To Wisely Spend Your Bonus
• Family and Finances

Here’s a series describing our struggle to get our money back from a car mechanic’s negligence.

Car Repairs Gone Bad Series:

• Car Repairs Gone Bad: When a Shop Refuses to Pay for Damages
• Car Repairs Gone Bad: When a Shop Refuses To Pay Part Duex
• Car Repairs Gone Bad: When a Shop Refuses To Pay Part Three
• How to Pitch Your Story to the Local News
• Small Claims Court: Basic Information
• Our Day in Court
• Win in Court!

Feel free to subscribe to my site to get the latest delivered to your inbox.

Photo Credit: A Princess

Yesterday my husband and I got a washer and dryer for the apartment. The total cost was around $190. We got the pair from Craigslist for $150. We asked a friend if we could borrow his truck and we paid $20 to cover using his gasoline.

The gentleman who sold the washer and dryer kept them in good condition. His wife just bought a new set and they needed to get rid of the older one. We just needed to get a new hose for the dryer and another hose for the washer. That was about $20 to get them from Lowe‘s.

The hardest part was getting it to our apartment which is on the third floor! To be honest, my back is a bit sore from the move. A kindly neighbor helped us move the washer, which was very much appreciated.

Installing a washer and dryer wasn’t too bad. You just need to put the hoses and plugs in the right spots. I’m happy we got this used set, as the cost of renting one for the apartment would be $20/month or more (depends on who you rent it from).

Since I’m relaxing at home for a bit, I decided to share some of my favorite post from his week:

• Gather Little by Little exposed credit cards companies with the secrets they DON’T want you to know.
• The subprime mortgage crisis is discussed at My Investing Blog in the form of an interview.
• CashMoneyLife has 9 Tips to Save Money on Your Next Computer.
• No Credit Needed has a wonder way to curb impulse spending. It’s the The $100-A-Day-Rule.
• Prime Time Money is celebrating with a $50 Giveaway! If you haven’t subscribed to this wonderful blog, please do.
• Do you like to travel? Plonkee has 21 resources for budget travel.
• Mrs. Micah has advice on learning to love water. I’m still working on that….. 
  
• Moolanomy has found 25 Ways To Save Money On Health Care.
• Jake was able to get his payment reversed and his interest rate lowered.

I hope everyone’s weekend is going well. My brother is coming to visit this afternoon so I’m looking forward to hanging with him.

Photo Credit:  babasteve

I used some of my emergency fund to help with the moving expenses. Let me explain. I got a job opportunity offered that would give me:

• A slight raise
• More flextime
• Less stress
• A reason to move to an area with a lower cost of living

Sounds good, doesn’t it? The catch was we had to move out of state in two weeks. Needless to say that put us into rush mode.

We were fortunate to find a place with a rent that fits within our budget.  We got the utilities turned on Thursday and moved in on Sunday night last month. I have to say I really like our new place and my job is going well.

I did have to dip into my emergency fund, but I have in motion a plan to build it up (and increase it by a bit).

1. Ignore my raise. I’m using my raise and putting it into savings. This is great because I know I can live on what I made before,  so it wont feel like I’m sacrificing a lot.  I should have the emergency fund back up to pre-move level by next Monday.
2. Cut down on eating out. I’m doing this because I realize that I need to cushion my emergency fund just a bit more.  I’ve been eating leftovers and sandwiches.
3. Save my extra gas money. My commute to work has went from 60 odd miles a day to less than 20 a day. It’s a nice change and puts some extra money for the emergency fund.

That’s my plan so far on getting the fund up. I also wrote about other ways to ‘find’ money in your budget for emergency funds. After refilling the emergency fund, I’m going to put the raise into eliminating my car loan. Being Frugal is also rebuilding her emergency fund. We have to compare notes some time.

How did you build or rebuild your emergency fund? What was the hardest part? What was the easiest?