DutchGirl's journal

[DutchGirl]

Got an e-mail from client 1 that he was very happy with the results from my work and will send me the €75 shortly. Wew! I was a bit worried I'd never see those last euros. Hopefully I will see them on my bank account tomorrow.
Client 2 has a meeting with her supervisor on Tuesday. If she is still serious about getting my help, she'll contact me after that. If not, that's fine too. I tried to apply for a third job, but that person was very upset that I dared to ask €25 (about $32) per hour. So that's not going to work. But there'll be more things, I have no doubt.
I'm on holiday this upcoming week. Time to think about my life. I proposed to my current boss that we go steady . I currently have a contract until September, and I would like to prolong that and perhaps work more hours and get some more and different tasks. She said we'll talk about it after the holiday. I've had several signals that they are happy with my work so far, so I'm looking forward to that talk. (But I'll have to think some more on how many hours I'd want to work etc).

[DutchGirl]

Client 1 hasn't paid yet, I hope he is merely waiting for his student allowance to come in on the 24th. I saw client 2's advertisement, asking for help, come back up again two days ago, so I guess she won't be using my services after all. Silly her.
I've enjoyed my week off but also got bored. I think I still do need to identify some goals for my life. Finishing my PhD was/is a big one, but it also makes me very stressed and unhappy.
We did a lot of family visits this weekend and returning from the last one I started feeling ill. Had to call my boss to cancel work for today, I'm coughing and feeling bad and staying on the couch and running a low fever. Hopefully I'll feel better soon. The boyfriend takes good care of me (I did the same for him last week after he had a mole removed and a tooth restored on the same day).
I am also waiting for my next salary to come in on Wednesday, I have put some money in investments and now my checking account is at €11 (I'm not expecting to need money until Friday, so I'm good).

[secretwealth]

I've found keeping track of clients and making sure they get paid is a relatively small hassle--until you get a client who doesn't pay. I hope your client honors his obligations with you soon.
Also, I absolutely love the cabinets! I tried painting my walls in my apartment last year and failed miserably. I wish I had your talent.

[DutchGirl]

I still hope so, too. If he does get his student allowance on May 24th (today), he should pay me today or tomorrow. Keeping my fingers crossed.
Thanks for the compliments . I guess my parents taught me well here, since we lived on a big (rented) farm were lots of things needed to be painted. In my memory, there was a painting project every summer and mum didn't hesitate to give us our own set of doors/windows/window sills to paint. When she was visiting us last week I asked her to inspect the woodwork of our house, and now I know my next project will be the balcony doors upstairs . She says they'll need some paint this year, the other woodwork can wait.
My salary came in yesterday, was 150 euros more than I'd calculated (I'm not complaining!). I'll only be able to save 500 euros due to an annual donation to a good cause that has my heart. But still I'm saving, and next month I'll be able to save more again.
I re-read Your Money or Your Life, or actually the Dutch version, which is a free pdf (hurrah!). It's still inspiring to me, even after reading it three times. I found out that I have to work for 15 hours each month just to eat (my grocery bill is 300 euros per month). I'd like to get this down, but the boyfriend isn't really enthusiastic about it. On the other hand, he wants to go on a diet and lose twenty kilos, so I'm guessing we will see a reduction of food expenses anyway (he eats a lot of meat, and we do eat a lot of snacks these days).
I evaluated last month's expenses and was pleased to see that they were as planned, with the exception of the budget for "other expenses". I had put it at 50 euros, and it turned out to be 150 euros. It contained 75 euros of gifts and that is partly because my niece was born (hurrah!). It contained little to no "frivolous" expenses. I guess the 2 euro library late fee could have been avoided, as well as the 10 euros I spent on snacks while traveling for work.

[DutchGirl]

... He paid. Wew!
I now have 22.5k euros. I hope to get to 25.000 by September, which would mean I saved 12k euros in one year. For me, this is very cool (on a 24k euros post-tax salary...). I'll still need to pay for my PhD thesis party though, but there have been delays so it could be that this will only happen next year...
My boyfriend's diet will start tomorrow on June 1st. Also, he has just paid off his student loans (in one fell swoop) and is now saving himself 300 euros in interest per year. He is also looking to buy a new used car, possibly a cabrio (you know, the roof can open? Aaah... Convertible is the right word). Midlife crisis pending .

[jennypenny]

I drove a red convertible cabrio for a while--fun car! (guess my dad was having his mid-life crisis at the time) I remember it being a good car too. He had it a long time. You'll have to get a Grace Kelly scarf

[DutchGirl]

That's a funny image, me wrapped in a Grace Kelly scarf. Will do

[DutchGirl]

My boyfriend's still now and then surfing the web to find convertibles. He was doing it just now. But our current car has had its annual obligatory checkup, no major repairs needed, total costs €250, so it will probably stick around for a while. He bought it second-hand and it's still going strong after ten years and about 200k kilometers, about 124k miles.
The diet is really working, we both lost about four kilos so far, and our shared bank account for groceries is about €200 "fatter" than normally at this time of the month. So we're really saving money too.
But I have spent more money than I thought. I had promised to sponsor someone for a cancer drive and totally forgotten about it until the drive. Whoops. But I promised and yeah, it is for a good cause. Also, I bought eight t-shirts, five as birthday gifts for five family members and 3 for my boyfriend (I hope he'll like them). He does have enough t-shirts, actually, but they were so funny. Hmmm. Making up excuses here. Finally I bought the Tightwad gazette complete book. My cousin from the US will come and visit, so it was sent to her and she'll bring it with her (she does have some room in her luggage).
I have also worked more hours than originally planned, so hopefully that compensates my jolly spending spree somewhat. My salary is coming in next week, I'll look at the exact damage then...

[DutchGirl]

With an income of 2350 euros last month, I managed to spend 200 euros more than I had planned (of which 100 euros to a good cause, see the previous post) to a total of 1850 euros. So I saved 500 euros this month or roughly a bit above 20% of my income. I'm not too happy about this, I should do better again this month.
I lost 1 more kilo in the last week and hope to continue the good work. Our grocery checkings account has never looked better, so maybe next month (if we do well again this month) we can lower our monthly contributions to it.
My income was a bit below 2000 euros this month, which is lower than I hoped. I have the feeling that they increase the % that goes to taxes. Since I have a 0-hour-contract, I think they first put me in the lowest tax bracket because there was no way for them to tell how much I'll earn this year. And when I had earned more than what goes in the lowest tax bracket, they put me in the next tax bracket etc. If that's the case, I'll earn less and less every few months. Better to be prepared for that!

Anyway, due to lower expenses this month, I hope to save about 750 of those 2000, so that's over 33% again, which is better than last month. If only I can keep myself from spending on things I don't need...
EDIT: Oi... My salary overview was in the mail and after some calculations I found out I miscalculated the amount of hours I worked, I worked less hours thus I got less salary... But more salary in July, hurrah...
The Tightwad gazette complete book has arrived and is amusing to read. It's 700+ pages, so it'll take me some more time to read it all; which is excellent because I love reading; and I think she has a funny style of writing.

[DutchGirl]

Weight going down, less than two weeks to my next salary which should bring in 2000+ euros of which I'll be able to save at least 25%. I've started biking to and from work, instead of taking public transport. So far I've done this 5 times which has saved me at least 25 euros of public transport tickets. Expecting to do this at least four more times in the next few weeks. (I'll also have some days off in between, lovely). It also helps me to lose weight. Only downside is that it rains sometimes, so far I've managed to avoid biking in the rain through sheer luck.
I'm doing much better on the "sudden fun expenses" front. If I continue to be a good girl, I'll stay wihin my budget for this month.
Oh, plus my tax return of 1100 euros came in. It went straight to savings.

[DutchGirl]

@Bigato: thanks. I do have a raincoat, and while the bag attached to my bike (apparently it is called a cycle-bag in English?) isn't leak-free when it rains more than a few drops, I can of course put my stuff in a plastic bag inside this cycle-bag, so that it won't get wet. Last week I did bike through the rain and although it wasn't fun, it was quite ok. I'll be biking again today for about two hours.
I'm also working on painting the outside of the doors to our balcony. The paint was peeling slightly in the most exposed spots, but the wood wasn't damaged yet. So about exactly the right time to do a paint job... It has been a nuisance so far, with all the rain this week it has been hard to find the right time to do some work on this. Plus of course there are a lot of details that needed to be sanded and painted. But in between rain showers I've managed to put the first coat of paint on; I'm planning to do a second coat, starting about an hour from now (it's early morning, I wanna wake up first). All the small details are also a nuisance. I guess a professional painter could do this job in about 6 hours (if the sun permitted...) which would cost about 240 euros in this area, plus perhaps some more money for the paint. We have paid 70 euros so far for the paint, and I'll have some left for the door that leads to our roof terrace; which I'll paint whenever I've recovered from these two balcony doors.
Moneywise I'm doing fine, I've spent 3,50 euros on a quick snack yesterday, but otherwise no sudden shopping sprees. New money coming in exactly a week from now...

[DutchGirl]

Money came in, 200 euros more than I had expected (hurrah). I also discussed working more hours every week with my boss. Now I work on average 20 hours weekly, 4 more hours weekly would mean I earn about 400 more euros every month (going straight to my savings), 8 hours would mean 800 euros more every month. I would become FI much quicker that way, but at the expense of my free time. My boss will see what she can do, it would start in about October since they already made the schedules until the end of September.
I spent 1250 euros last month, and had an income of 1980 salary plus 1050 tax return, so that's a savings rate of 37% of my salary or 58% if you also count the annual tax return. I'm pleased. I had planned to spend 1240 euros, so I think I did rather well. I hope to do similarly well next month, although the month has started in he wrong way with me losing my wallet and blocking all debit cards, and then me finding my wallet again and now I will be charged some fees to activate the cards again. Let's call it "Stupid tax"... And hopefully learn from it.
PS. My current assets are 25k euros, which is already 2k more than I hoped to achieve about two months from now. It'll grow another $1.5k before the year is up, so then I will have doubled my assets in one year. Not bad

[DutchGirl]

My boss told me that they can't change my contract to 24 hours per week, but they will give me 24 hours per week, at least for the next several months. The organisation is downsizing and will be downsizing more in 2015. They don't want to change my contract or give me one for unlimited time, they don't want to give me more training. So far they have always been short on personnel and happy to hire me, so I am not too worried about job security, at least until 2015. But I've heard rumors that they want to replace people by computers (and I am very sceptic of that effort, but who knows?), so maybe my leaning towards ERE will pay out if by say 2020 they have succeeded to do so and don't need my services anymore.
The past two weeks I've been working say 30 hours per week which was a lot, also since i was fighting a stomach flu, this is compensated by having less hours in the next few weeks. I'll have time to work on my PhD thesis.
The boyfriend has started to work on a new job (as a freelancer) and is struggling with it. He doesn't want to work this job, he wants something more challenging. We've been talking about this for about half a year now, and I am a bit tired of him complaining but not taking any action. With his current income he can/will be ERE in five more years or so, but he isn't focusing on that. Still, I am curious what it'll do to him. Will the news: "you're rich, you can stop working now if you want" mean anything to him? Anyway, we'll see how that goes.
Ps today we had another talk in the car and sometimes I do believe that he would like to be able to stop worrying about money, in other words be ERE.

[DutchGirl]

Ahhh... Lovely... I have a day off. Haven't managed to do more than get showered and get dressed yet, plus there's a load in the washing machine. It's 11.30 AM and I'm feeling fine. Will go shopping shortly (for necessary stuff, I would say).
I analyzed my spending from February until now, so that's 6 months. Was happy with the results, I've managed to save almost 780 euros per month, or 35% of my income. I know some of you guys do much better, but if I look back in the past I used to be able to save about 5%, when I had a similar salary as now. So this is progress.
There's more progress to be made in the "food and fun" department especially, and we are working on reducing our expenses there.
The boyfriend's thinking about taking up woodworking as a hobby, which is funny as he is an IT guy. But I know a lot about wounds and bandages, so he'll be fine . In fact, we may be learning this new hobby together.
My father's still looking into possible investments in solar panels, when he wants to do it I can jump in with some of my money; but it'll probably be a few more months. Until that money I'll be forced to keep the money in my savings account, I don't want to lose part of it in investments and I can't lock it up in CDs for that short amount of time.

[DutchGirl]

Yesterday evening we (boyfriend and me plus my inlaws) went to a very decadent restaurant where we had five dishes (crab salad, cold soup, duck, fancy yoghurt and a scoop of icecream - plus wine/water) for the price of roughly $100 each. My boyfriend paid. I fucking hated it, I can make a nicer meal for 20 dollars per person (including wine). Anyway it was my boyfriend's present for his father's 75th birthday and my boyfriend's parents did enjoy themselves thoroughly, got drunk and laughed at the waiter behind his back because he was (probably) gay. Lovely.
I kept a smile on my face all evening, I think my boyfriend noticed some of my true feelings but the parents in law have not, I think. They are nice folks most of the time but they are a bit old-fashioned and not so smart. (Some of their good things: they often babysit their grandchildren, including the one with autism so that his parents can get a break now and then. Their stand-in grandchild is the 5-year-old girl from the Turkish neigbors to whom they are also some sort of surrogate grandparents with the real ones so far away).
Otherwise, my finances are fine. Income last month was 2450 euros, expenses at 1321 euros so a savings rate of almost 50%. Still some silly expenses on presents, 45 euros total (I bought my dad some very cool personalized stamps for a 30% fee on top of the stamps' value, for his birthday - he will use them, not keep them) and on going out, 70 euros for several times of eating out, though it was nice we could have done it less often.
I'm working more hours these months, so expecting monthly income to stay above 2000 euros, maybe at 2500 or so. On the other hand, the company has announced a reduction in working hours for next year, but it isn't clear yet how much and what that'll mean to me personally. I talked to a friend about switching jobs, but while doing so noticed that I still need to do some thinking myself: do I want to go back to that kind of job, do I want to work parttime or fulltime, do I want to take a job that fits with my level of training or one that's a bit less hectic, etc.

[chenda]

@ Dutchgirl - Is part time medical work relatively easy to do in holland ? (I think your a doctor, right ?)

[chenda]

deleted

[DutchGirl]

I'm in social medicine, so yeah, that's rather easy. General practitioners also more and more work parttime, and just work together with two or three of them to provide the necessary care to their patients. (Care during evenings, nights and weekends are also more and more provided in a centralized facility where each GP only has to work 2 to 3 shifts per month).
Working parttime is the hardest for doctors who are still in training and for specialists at the hospital. Even there I understand there are some specialists who negotiate a 3 to 4 day work week, but not all succeed at that. Old specialists often say "well I worked 100-hour-weeks as well when I was your age, so why wouldn't you" or "well, if you don't work 100-hour-work-weeks how are you going to get the necessary experience"? I'm not sure how much is true about that last bit. I think there have been a lot of reports of young doctors messing up because they were in the 14th hour of a 16-hour workday...

[DutchGirl]

Woot! My net worth will be 30k euros by the end of this year, which sounds fantastic to someone who was closer to a net worth of "whatever was left on her checkings account" just a few years ago. This month my investments gained value (from 6k to 6.2k or + 3% in one month) and I got an annual pay-out from a certificate of deposit. Expecting another CD payout next month, and of course I'm hoping my investments will keep gaining ground, but who knows... Most of my net worth gain is still from income of work, so that's where most growth will need to come from.
I'm currently putting any extra money in a savings account, because my father is looking into buying solar panels and if so, I want to invest in that with about 10k.
As I posted somewhere else, I might get a new job. Advantages of the current job are that its paycheck is bigger per hour worked. Advantages of the new job could be nicer, more interesting work, plus perhaps more growth potential. For both jobs there is a risk of being jobless 1 to 2 years from now, so that doesn't differ much. Perhaps with the new job I would have a better resume and thus more job options after that.
An estimate of how much money I would need once retired? Per month:

- roof over head 400 euros

- food 250 euros (less than now, I'll make more food from scratch)

- entertainment 100 euros

- transport 50 euros (travel to friends and family by train, bike maintenance)

- health 150 euros (includes insurance)

- misc 100 euros (includes telephone, other insurances, library membership, computer, clothing)
Total: 1050 euros.
At a SWR of 3% I should save up to 416.000 euros, which is a looooong way to go. If I assume I'll still make 250 euros monthly by working very very parttime until my pension plan kicks in at age 65, this drops to 336k.
As to "roof over head": the other option would be to pay my part of the house in cash, 100,000 euros, and then only pay about 50 euros a month in upkeep. Putting the 100,000 euros there instead of in investments will cost me about 4000 per year, so I could do both, investing in the house itself is a safer option (it will always be there and will mean reduced expenses forever), investing could bring in more, depending on the market.
Anyways... If I stay on track, keep a job, and the economy doesn't tank completely, I'm looking at 8-12 more years of work to go. I think I'll see about 6 years from now whether it'll be closer to 8 or closer to 12 years to go, and also I'll leave the decision up to then whether or not I want to continue working after that. The decision is then mine, now it's economic necessity to work.
I'll be 42 years old eight years from now. Hopefully I'll have a lot of enjoyable years ahead of me then, still. I also can help my family out; or could do volunteer work. My siblings are currently having kids, so by then I'll have some cool 10-year-old nieces and nephews to babysit/take to museums/visit. My parents are 72 years of age by then and might need some support (they are doing fine currently, in good health).
So I'm looking at a career that has to last at least 8 more years. To me, this is kind of a relief, comparing it to a career that was always pictured to me and would still have to last 33 more years from now. I feel like I can make these decisions that affect the next 10 years of my life; it would be more difficult to picture myself at work 20 or 30 years from now. (It's still an option that I'll want to work at age 50 or 60, sometimes my days-off now are boring and I get too lazy).

[DutchGirl]

Hey all, it's been another week so here's another update.
Not much happening on the money-front. It's the time of the month where my next salary is a few days to weeks away, all bills have been paid and I just need to spend some money on groceries and train tickets. So not much is happening, which is boring but good.
Today is election day in the Netherlands. Our government fell a few months ago over some internal disagreements and so now we can choose a new one. I already voted and tonight I will watch the news for a while to see who has won. I believe even in the Netherlands social security is disappearing more and more (the politicians who reduce benefits blame the economy, but I'm not sure whether they would be willing to rewind the decisions when the economy picks up again); so I did choose a party that may lean towards rebuilding them.
But let's not talk politics too much, shall we. Sometimes it makes me really pissed, discussing these things.
My father's still looking into solar cells for his roof, but there is progress. Three companies have sent him bids for the work; and he has asked several friends and family members (who are contractors, company managers, electricity workers) for their opinion. I'm more or less awaiting his decision and will support this financially (with a loan) if he wants and/or needs that to get this thing going. Some people say you shouldn't mix family and money, but in this case I am even willing to lose all of this money, but confident that he will pay me back in full. Mum and dad are responsible people who have taught me well.
Update on the elections... Interesting... first prognosis shows that 40% wants to go left (social, progressive), 40% wants to go right (conservative), and the other 20% wants to go to the middle. Getting a government that can rule with the majority might get tough.