Kevin's Watch

I have a family, and own 2 businesses. I don't do business with the general public, but mostly get my jobs through industry. The jobs we get are budgeted in advance and put out for bid rather than an impulse project that just came up. Therefore, my business lagged the downturn by a few months. It started impacting my business in Late November and while its turning around now, its not back to where it was, and I dont expect to have the kind of year in 2009 I have enjoyed for the past several.

The economy is affecting me at home now too. We are getting by but are much more conscious now on where we spend money. Here are some of the things my family is doing differently because of the poor economy:

1. Quit my personal training sessions ($65 per hour, 1-3 times per week). Following my own weight program now at the YMCA.

2. Wife cut down on tennis lessons. She is a tennis fanatic. this was huge.

3. Severely reduced how much we eat out; as a busy family it was easy to just go out at night rather than cook in -- we have reduced this to 1 time eating out per week -- and we clip coupons. I work from home but would often run errands at lunch and go by subway or jersy Mikes and get a sandwhich, then hit Starbucks. I quite doing that as well. I like to have coffee throughout the day, so I just started making my own and when I run errands I take one with me rather than go through Starbucks drive through.

4. I had storm damage from wind, lost a pine tree that cut through my fence. I fixed it myself rather than calling a service.

5. We had a family movie night at the theatre -- we went to the CVS Pharmacy who sells movie candy, and we bought our candy there versus the way overpriced stuff at the movies. Snuck in two sodas and shared. Saved about $20.

6. We watch how much we pay at the gas pump. If I have busness trip I take her car which gets much better mileage than my SUV. I have drastically reduced how much I am driving it right now.

7. I am drinking much cheaper scotch than I used to. I typically drink on the weekends only. We don't order alcohol if we eat out either, too expensive now.

8. I have an office in Tampa, and I used to go down there each month. I have reduced my trips down there and tried to take care of things in other ways rather than showing up personally.

So, what are you guys doing different now in this terrible economy? Are you feeling it at all? Or do you refuse to compromise your lifestyle?

If it wasn't always in the news, I wouldn't have noticed.

I am very sorry to hear you have been affected iQuestor.

The economic downturn has not effected me yet. My superannuation is indexed to the economy and it actually grew while everyone's fell, which stunned me. I am due for two pay increases, plus another salary increase soon. However, the Queensland premier is rumoured to be planning to freeze public servant pay increases, leave loading, superannuation benefits, etc, due to the economic crisis, which will be painful. However, given that I hardly spend a cent on anything - I spend at the most $40 a fortnight on food - and am about to cancel my personal training, I can afford to survive the pay freeze.

Heh, yeah, I didn't mean to come off as callous. Sorry to hear about your woes, iQuestor. To clarify: since I'm a full time student living on borrowed money and in rented accomodation, the fluctuations of the economy pretty much pass me by. It's meant a better deal on petrol, though, which is good.

I have to be honest, it worries me to see how bad the UK's economy is doing, Cov. I pass my the money exchange office almost daily, and note how the Australian dollar compares to the pound. The AUS has never been so strong.

We have done without for so long, that it mostly has not effected us. The biggest impact was Beorn did not go to the sleep away summer camp he had been going to since he was 8 this past summer. And although this next summer is the last year he could go, and it entails fabulous extras all the other years build up to, he won't be going again. We had begged and been helped by many the years he had gone; it's not an inexpensive camp. But, I didn't apply last year as I was weary of revealing our status to strangers and wanted a break. And this year it appears there is no one to ask for help as all the funding has pretty much dried up.

So...
...instead of camp, it looks like Beorn and I will be spending the summer teaching him how to drive...

...oh joy...

Being on a modest salary, I've never had anything resembling an extravagant lifestyle, so things are the same for me. I'm just plodding along and grateful to have a steady job.

I think if anything the state of the economy has made me appreciate exactly how precious having the job i have is. So many people are losing jobs now, it would freak me.

I'm glad I don't run my own business, but I feel for you iQuestor!

The nature of my work, and the fact that I'm good at it, should hopefully mean that I'm safe. So day to day, not much has changed. In my head, however, I do worry about how much we spend compared to save!

We did get a huge shock around the new year, when the German billionaire who owns the company that owns the pharmacy chain that owns the pharmacy I work for, jumped in front of a train after losing an awful lot of money. So far (touch wood) it hasn't affected our company. Even if it does, I hope I will be ok as a pharmacy will always need a pharmacist, no matter who owns it! It may be that my working day will get harder and more stressful and costs are cut and expectations of profit rise....

It's a mixed bag. My salary has taken a substantial hit, but I'm also not spending money like I used to. I'm doing some common-sense things (not eating out as often), but for the most part, I'm not really feeling the pinch.

Then again, if the economic outlook was better, I'd be buying another motorcycle.

Uh, yeah. I got RIFfed. Can't find a job that pays more than unemployment.

Put the house up for sale. Canceled cable. Shopping at Aldi. Eating out much less (funny how people always schedule viewings at dinner time).

Luckily, my wife graduates from UNCG in less than a month. She'll be the breadwinner while I finally take advantage of the post-911 GI Bill.

How many bikes do you own, Cail?

I work for a newspaper. Yeah, exactly. Balls! Right now I am on a one week furlough. That's right, had to take a week off and they don't pay me for it. I used to work 37-1/2 hrs per week, now I work 40 at the same rate. And they stopped matching our 401K.

Its starting to affect me.

Well, in my job, everything is the same other than my 401K isn't being matched anymore. But the wife was just laid off and we are still trying to figure out if COBRA is a better deal overall than putting her on my insurance. From what it looks like, COBRA might be the better deal, as my insurance sucks. But we haven't got the numbers yet, which is frustrating.

We are going to see where we are financially in a bit, but right now we have a hefty amount in savings and considerably less debt. I just paid off my car loan a month or two ago, and Carla paid off her student loans. We pretty much only have rent, a bed purchase, Carla's car loan, and utilities, and dsl. So we are tightening things up, talking of either dropping Netflix or reducing it to 1-at-a-time as with the baby showing up within the month, we won't have much time to watch anyway. I think we'll be ok provided the hospital doesn't ask us to pay too much with the birth, and that there aren't too many more things we have to buy for baby. A stroller and an older than infant car seat is about the biggest purchases I see in our future. We already have a heap of diapers, clothes and so forth, so I think so far things look manageable. But you never know what the future brings, and my luck generally sucks.

I got a really nice raise at the end of last year. However, this year, the law firm is doing weird stuff to cut back -- for instance, they're switching the staff from paying current to paying in arrears, which means basically I'll lose a week's pay this year and won't get it back 'til I quit. They haven't touched the 401(k) match yet. No layoffs so far either, but they did just announce that they're putting off bringing on the new baby associates -- they'll now start in early 2010 instead of this September. Some law firms have actually laid people off, so I'm counting my blessings that we haven't gone down that road yet.

My expenses were already pretty lean, and sadly I have a fair amount of debt thanks in part to having two kids in college. I'm not eating out as much, I've put off buying a new computer, and I'm trying to cut back on travel. But there wasn't a lot of fat in my budget to start with.

Back in November my company laid off 20% of the staff and our Mexico office was closed **1 MONTH** after I started working there.
Somehow I dodged the bullet but we all took a 10% paycut.
My wife's having some medical issues that is keeping her from working as much the last year so her income is just a trickle.
If I lost my job our health care costs would have been crippling.
November was not good for my sanity.
BUT the company restructured and I just got my 10% back last week and unless the economy tanks more then expected we should be ok.
Both cars are at the end of their lives but paid for and I refuse to start paying a monthly loan again.
I figure if I do lose my job I won't lose my car.
Which sucks because prices are so low now but I'm not taking a chance.
I have never really spend money extravagantly, always wait to buy things on sale and am a master of putting projects off so "cutting back".........

And iQuestor, other than popcorn I always bring bags of snacks and bottled water to the movies for the family on the rare times that we do go.

Well, since I don't have a job...

Meh...about the same, but only because I'm living off my savings. Which were effectively my share of what we got for my mom's house. Luckily that should be enough to tide me over until I get one. (Here's hoping...)

--A

Loremaster wrote:How many bikes do you own, Cail?

Just the one at the moment. It's my "fun" bike. I want to get something larger so that I can do the vast majority of my commuting with one (easier to find parking, awesome gas mileage, cheap insurance).

My girlfriend works for Fannie Mae, so there's a little uncertainty in her employment, though she works in risk assessment, so she should be safe, assuming that Fannie Mae stays around.

I know a lot of people who've got it far worse than we do.

I just bought a 2001 extended cab Ford Ranger with 89,000 mile on it for $3,000 because the guy needed the money. I hope that my job in the building industry holds up and I do not end up being the guy selling my stuff off cheap because I need the money. We seem to be a slightly insulated here, there is a lot of old money in the county where I live.

Cail wrote:I know a lot of people who've got it far worse than we do.

My apologies! I wasn't implying anything with my question, so please take no offence. If anything, I was just curious.