Four Things

There's a bit of self-tagging going around these days, and I liked this one, so I thought I'd chime in.

4 Things I'm Passionate About

1. Family
2. Music
3. Wine
4. Reading

4 Words or Phrases I Use Often

1. "Ça va, et toi?" (my French is limited)
2. "Supposably"
3. "Halfway under the bus"
4. "That's what she said."

4 Things I Want To Do Before I Die

1. Have children
2. Build a house
3. Spend at least six months in Italy
4. Learn to play the drums

4 Things I Have Learned From The Past

1. I'm not as smart as I think I am.
2. Starting late is better than not starting at all.
3. Loving someone doesn't mean they're perfect.
4. The fourth in a list of four profound insights is always the most elusive.

4 Places I Want To See Or Visit

1. Giza
2. Ayers Rock
3. Iguaçu Falls
4. Stonehenge

4 Favourite Restaurants

1. Bâton Rouge
2. Ki
3. Fred's Not Here
4. Any good Irish pub

4 Things that Happened Yesterday

1. I stuck (pretty much) to my shopping list at Costco
2. I nailed "My Name is Jonas" by Weezer in Guitar Hero III
3. I finally updated my computer to Ubuntu 8.10
4. I played guitar for more than two hours

4 People I Tag

You, you, you, and... you.

The worst financial advice I ever gave

I have a confession to make.

I have a blogging man-crush on Big Cajun Man. When I started thinking about creating my own personal finance blog, his was the first site I found while investigating the niche of personal finance blogs with a Canadian focus. Reading his blog (and its companion site) really inspired me to find my own voice on the internet, and he was one of the first bloggers to add me to his blogroll. I'll always think of him as a sort of big-blog-brother.

(On a side note, I believe the above paragraph holds the world record for most occurrences of the word "blog")

So when he e-mailed me with a challenge to post the worst piece of financial advice I've ever given, I was excited to get on board. I immediately started racking my brain for that one disastrous piece of advice that I've inflicted on a friend or loved one. Surely there was a shining example that would stand out as a beacon to all other bad advice.

It wasn't as easy as I thought. It turns out that I haven't given a lot of financial advice (good or bad) in my day. I'm sure I've hinted and nudged from time to time, but rarely in the form of active or formal advice. I'm quite new to this personal finance thing, and haven't had the opportunity or confidence to dole out a lot of financial wisdom. Fortunately for me (and my friends), this means I haven't created disasters in many financial lives.

Except my own.

I've written before about my financial fall from grace, and a major theme of this blog is my climb out of the financial hole I've dug for myself. Well, I couldn't have got to where I was a year ago without lots of lousy advice from yours truly. Here are a few of the gems I've come up with over the years:

• "You can afford it." - Ah, the old standby. Close cousin of "It's only $20", "You'll get paid on Thursday" and "The sale ends tomorrow!", this one alone must account for a third of my revolving debt. Small moves add up and make a huge difference over time; it's up to me which direction I want them to take me.


• "Lots of people are in debt; it's normal." - The sad thing about this one is that it's not untrue. Still, justifying my situation to myself in this way really showed a lack of maturity and ambition. Now that I've set a goal to get out of debt, I feel like I'm expecting more of myself, and that encourages me to rise to the task.


• "You deserve it." - Yes, I've also consistently fallen into the entitlement trap. Why shouldn't I drive a brand new car? Of course I should buy the latest season of The Simpsons! What do you mean, I shouldn't go out for dinner again? I can't say I've put this completely behind me, but I have developed some patience and learned to set priorities.

There you have it: the worst financial advice I've given myself over the years, and the lessons I've learned from it.

What's the worst financial advice you've ever given?

My financial vice

Five Cent Nickel recently wrote a post identifying his biggest financial vice, and several bloggers have taken the challenge and posted their own vices.

Being in the midst of my debt elimination process, it's a bit hard to narrow down the habits and purchases that hold me back the most. I know I've managed to rein in a lot of bad habits over the past year, and my spending on things like lunch at work has dropped dramatically. I think there are really two "vices" that are tied for the number one spot:

• Collecting - I am a rampant completist when it comes to music, movies and books. Once I have a few albums by a given artist, it becomes a mission for me to pick up their entire catalogue. Similarly, I've filled my bookshelves over the last few years with dozens of graphic novels, and hundreds of comic books (I'm sure J.D. can relate). I've managed to get myself on a strict budget for this sort of thing, but the urge is most definitely still there.


• Tracking my investments - I confess that I keep Google Finance open in my web browser throughout the work day, and I check my investment account balances at least once a day. This is unhealthy, and dangerous, especially with respect to my retirement accounts. The more closely I watch these investments, the bigger the chance that I'll react emotionally to a market jump, and make a stupid decision that affects my long-term outlook. One of the differences between index funds and ETFs is that index fund prices only change once a day, whereas ETFs fluctuate throughout the day. To me, the real-time tracking of ETFs is one of the most appealing things about switching to an ETF portfolio, but it's also one of the dangers that's keeping me on the fence.

There you go. One spending problem, and one risky behaviour.

What's your biggest financial vice?

My Money Mistake and How to Avoid it

Canadian Capitalist is three years old. As part of his birthday celebrations, he has asked fellow bloggers to post about a money mistake they've made, and how to avoid falling into the same trap. For me, the choice is obvious:

Lifestyle inflation.

I managed to make it through university with minimal student loans, and although I used a credit card while I was a student, I always paid the balance in full at the end of the month. While I was getting by on a student's wages, I seemed to have a pretty good sense of how much money was available to spend.

When I graduated and started my first full-time job, my income nearly doubled. This seemed to throw a switch in my brain, and I decided that I was suddenly rich, and could buy anything and everything I wanted. I had it in my mind that I was a responsible credit card user, so I started charging up a storm on my card, "knowing" that I would still be able to make full payment. At this point, a few factors came into play:

• I financed a new car


• Student loan payments started within a few months


• Higher income and fewer tax deductions meant that my "twice-as-high" salary didn't actually represent twice as much money in my paycheque

Suddenly, I started revolving a balance on my card, and even made some late payments. I started playing the balance transfer game, moving balances from card to card and chasing rate offers. Over the years, I've developed a more responsible approach to my finances, but it's only within the last few months that I've really started to turn the tables on my debt. It's really amazing how long the consequences of getting into debt can stay with you.

Here's my advice on how to avoid the same mistake:

1. Know your spending. From the time you first start to earn an income, keep track of how much you spend, and what you spend it on. This will be very important throughout your life.


2. Know your income. Always know exactly how much your actual take-home income really is. Don't get fixated on the annual salary you're offered; if you start a job at $50,000 per year, you're actually going to see less than 75% of that money after taxes.


3. Keep your spending below your income. By knowing your spending, and knowing your income, you will know what you can afford to buy. If you always keep your spending below your income, you will avoid debt, and build your savings.


4. Keep your spending at a lower rate of growth than your income. Every time you receive a raise, you have more money available. If you send a good portion of this new money to savings rather than increasing your spending, then you will always come out ahead.

My One Money Advice (MOMA) Meme

Well, it's official. I am now a part of the PF blogging community.

Sure, I've been blogging about personal finance for a couple of months, I'm listed at pfblogs.org, and I've already started to receive some link love from other PF blogs. My site even comes up as the number one result in a Google search for "Loonies And Sense". However, even with all this good stuff, it felt as if there was something missing.

Well, no more am I a fringe-dweller. I am now in this thing whole hog.

I've been tagged.

Paid Twice has tagged me to continue Moolanomy's My One Money Advice (MOMA) Meme. The aim of this meme is to help promote financial responsibility and awareness in our hyper consumption society.

The question: If you can give one advice, tip, or story related to money, what would you share?

Now, I'm new to this blogging thing, and I'm also new (check the stats in the sidebar) to responsible financial management. On the one hand, I'm inclined to doubt the value of any "advice" I could provide at this point. However, if I think back to what made me start this blog in the first place, I remember how much the idea of regular people sharing their experiences and opinions in an open forum appeals to me. So with that in mind, I'm game to provide My One Money Advice:

"Take control, and do it now."

I spent far too long haemorrhaging money and failing to save a dime, simply because I didn't think I had the means to change directions. By taking the time and effort to educate myself and make changes to the way I handle my money, I now feel, for the first time in years, that I am actually the driving force behind my finances. My debts are shrinking, my savings are growing, and I'm finding myself feeling better about money than I have in a long time. I still have a long way to go, but at least I know how I'm going to get there. I only wish that my 25-year-old self had taken these steps, so that we'd be in a better position today.

So there you go. That's my advice.

Now, let's hear from five more. Canadian Financial Stuff, Give Me Back My Five Bucks, Grad Money Matters, Irregular Payments and My Open Wallet...

You're it. What's your "One Money Advice"?