Pilgrim's Progress

[Pilgrim]

January 2021 Report

After-Tax Net Income: $19,395
Expenses: $12,549



In January we bought a new-to-us car. A Honda Fit. So at the moment we have 3 vehicles, But I'm planning to sell our old Tacoma pickup, hopefully by the end of this month. Some of the car repair category was getting the pickup ready to sell. I really enjoy my truck, but with the new baby on the way, our family won't all fit in it anymore.

Noah's spending was high because I bought him a fancy bike for his birthday.

I also bought myself a new bike which is why hobbies are so high.

Cell phone bill was high because we prepaid for 3 months of Mint in January, as well as our T-Mobile bill.

[ItsALongStory]

Interesting way to think about it, but there are some massive assumptions in here. First off I would say that 4% is among the lowest projected returns i have seen ... as is 3% SWR. Both of these compound to draw out the timeline significantly so perhaps rerun this with the still very safe but perhaps more realistic 3.25% SWR and/or 5-6% investment returns. With such a short timeline your contributions will play a much bigger role than if you have time on your side, pushing up the required net income. Also remember that every added dollar is taxed at the highest marginal tax rate and you will also have to jump through some extra hoops to fill up Roth IRA type buckets from a certain income threshold.

Edit: removed the bit about home ownership as I now see you're renting.

These calculators are great but they are only as good as the assumptions. This appears to be a worst case scenario type projection which can be a great motivator, but do realize it's likely to be more attainable than this model suggests.

[ItsALongStory]

Your budget was pretty crazy for Jan both from an income and spending category.

One thing that stands out is the internet bill, is that just 1 month? Does it include cable? It seems very high to me.

[Hristo Botev]

Regarding the budget, folks here will tell you to focus first on the big 3: housing, transportation, and food. From the perspective of my spendy eyes your housing situation looks pretty great, with 3+ people at less than $1,100. Assuming the month was an outlier for transportation, a $5,500 Fit strikes me as a pretty smart choice for a family car (sorry you have to sell the Taco-truck; those things really are a lot of fun). Is that level of gas consumption normal? We’ve got a family of 4 with kids that have to be chaperoned around to sporting events in a 13 mpg truck and we pay about $30-40/mo. $1,250 for food is high, but as you’ve read through my journal you know I’ve come close to spending that on a single restaurant outing back in my even spendier days. Lastly, we pay $20 for internet and $26 for cell (2 cell phones) with Comcast. That seems like it might be some low hanging fruit.

Nothing like having the spendiest guy on this forum critique your budget; the NERVE!

[Pilgrim]

@ItsALongStory Appreciate your comments. You're correct that I had conservative assumptions. I did run the calculator with 4% SWR and 5% ROI with "4 Jacobs" expenses and the $/yr needed went down from 250k to 200k. If I was happy to FI in 10 years then $/yr only needs to be 100k. 10 years wouldn't be bad, I'd be 47 then.

Regarding our internet, that was high because it was 4 months in one. We received a new credit card some time back because of a security issue and I'd forgotten to update the internet. I'm surprised they never cut service after 4 months of not paying.

You make a good point about if our income was high enough to FI in 5 years we'd be hit with a heavy annual tax burden. That's the sucky part for sure. In 2020 we took taxes on the chin as we didn't contribute to any tax-free retirement accounts. Our goal was to get out of debt and build up a small cash reserve, which we did. My employer doesn't have a great 401k matching program. That is, sometimes they match, at their discretion, in the year following when you contributed.

At least in Florida there is no State income tax.

@Hristo You are getting an amazing deal with Comcast. I just checked and it's not available here unfortunately.

No problems on the critique of our spending, it was over the top by ERE standards in January.

Gasoline was an outlier. We've been driving the Crown Vic a lot (my wife for real estate and also an out of town trip) but the car still has an issue where it's only getting about 11mpg. I was thinking of trying to fix it myself. So far the diagnosis is that it needs a new computer.

For cell phones we're switching over to Mint (virtual network on top of T-Mobile) so that should go way down.

For food, you're right there is a lot of room to improve. This month our goal is to lower the grocery/food to $600. We'll see.

Yesterday I compared notes with a co-worker who also has two young children. He said his monthly food/grocery/eating out was $1,800-$2,000. It just depends on who I compare myself with...

***

My son and I took a bike ride over to Lowe's this morning (about 1/2 mile away) and picked up a new fill/float valve for the toilet ($12). It was a quick replacement to fix the toilet, which wasn't filling unless you reached in the tank and shook the valve. True ERE principles would have been to fix the old crummy one. Or call the landlord and have them fix it for free. But I dislike coordinating service calls and scheduling.

My wife and I spent the afternoon going through things around the house and paring down. I think we had 4 trash bags worth of stuff for the garbage, plus a trip to Goodwill.

After dropping off everything at Goodwill, I went inside (which I rarely do, usually just drop stuff off) and was rather disappointed. I was looking for a pipe wrench, and they don't even have a tool section. And this Goodwill is massive. I noticed they had lots of new items spread throughout the store too. With the amount of donations they receive, there shouldn't be any need to sell new! There WAS an abundance of certain categories (clothes, old electronics, books) but I wondered where all the other donations went?

Sorry if this is pretty boring.

[ItsALongStory]

I agree that a small fix that you can do yourself, such as the toilet valve, is just easier to do vs relying on landlord. Other options could have been to tell him/her, offer to fix it yourself and withhold it from your next rent payment. In the end $12 doesn't break the bank but every little bit helps and you might even buy some goodwill from the LL in the process.

Good to hear a lot of the other expenses were lumpy, catching up on old unpaid bills and then switching to a low cost cell carrier. Should make a big difference if you can get the groceries figured out. I have also compared my food spending with folks in my social circle and while we are by no means frugal it was certainly better than most. The early retirement/frugal folks out there don't necessarily speak about it as there is some stigma involved imo, so beware with whom you compare I suppose.

Reading this forum always makes me question why I hold onto certain things. My personal belongings fit in about 2.5 suitcases but I found about 6-7 clothing items to donate. Thanks for the nudge on that

[rube]

Re. the float/valve: as a landlord I am happy to reimburse the renter for such things and I have done this on a couple of occasions. It's easier/cheaper for me and sometimes faster/easier for the renter, win-win.

[Hristo Botev]

A couple follow up thoughts. Regarding the toilet, I’m not a landlord but I suspect that enough of those little project and your ll will realize you are one of those rare tenants who takes care of the little stuff yourself, without bothering him, and in as cost effective manner as can be expected (my guess is your ll would prefer that if you’re going to fix it, you go buy a $12 replacement rather than jury rig some fix). You’re both making his life easier and helping him to maintain his asset; and you are getting the repair done quicker, on your own schedule, and exercising some DIY skill development—win/win. And I imagine that makes you the kind of tenant a ll will be careful not to run out by raising the rent by too much in subsequent years.

Regarding food; I also enjoy from time to time comparing my spending to my neighbors and peers; it makes me feel better. BUT, they are horrible role models in that sense. The folks on this forum are much better to compare myself against, bc it prevents me from getting complacent. E.g., DS had his first communion yesterday and we had a small celebration with vaccinated grandparents. In the past that might have meant some very expensive take out from “your choice,” and some very expensive fancy cake from some boutique baker, in the name of supporting local businesss. Really all geared towards showing off to neighbors, friends—keeping up with the Jones. Anyway, bc of my time on this forum we instead got a couple pizzas from our local pizza place (one of two restaurant outings for the month) and a cake from DQ (the franchisees have been in the community for more than a decade). And we would have made both the pizza and the cake ourselves, but we’d spent the day cleaning the house and tackling some other little projects, like I needed to snake the guest bathroom toilet (fun w/ kids’ overuse of toilet paper!)—all stuff we would have outsourced in another life.

From a Christian standpoint, comparing your spending to your friends, etc. will result in pride. Comparing with folks on this forum will result in humility. Just don’t compare your spending with mine, bc you’re already doing better.

[Pilgrim]

Regarding "comparisons": What I'm really digging about the community here is the example of so many great role models. You're right Hristo, this forum is making me humble.

@Hristo Congrats on your sons communion milestone. Also, sounds like you had just as fun of a party afterwards without breaking the bank.

@ItsALongStory Isn't it funny how there is always something more to pare down? In my own experiences, there is psychologically only so much I can pare down at one time. Like 10%. So in going through clothes or books or whatever, I have to do multiple sessions. Each time the pile gets leaner.

Having all my possessions in a few suitcases sounds amazing. I read elsewhere you were in Europe. Sounds like a grand adventure. I'd enjoy hearing the "Long Story" (from your username).

Do you have a storage unit back in the States? If not, my hat is off to you!

When I traveled back when single I was able to reduce my possessions to my backpack, about 5 large boxes I left in my parents shed, and a digital piano I loaned to my sister. Nowadays we have far more.

I've realized there are things I've been lugging around for years such as handwritten journals and momentos that are basically museum pieces from my past. They have no purpose in the present. So recently I've been trying to digitize the journals (Genius Scan app) and take pictures of the momentos so I can discard it all.

Thoughts on "leveling up" with our food budget

For food/eating out, last year our goal was loosely to keep those costs under $1,000/mo. I just checked and in 2020 we averaged $1,078/mo for those two categories combined. I thought we were doing pretty good. Not anymore! Ha, that's why this month we're shooting for $600/mo.

But the real "aha" moment I'm having is we could eat healthier, more tasty food on $600 (or $400, or perhaps $100) through the principles of ERE. Because savings money doesn't have to be a matter of being a cheap miser (which turns me off), but in simply changing the entire system of doing things.

E.g. taking 10% off the monthly food budget could be achieved by tightening our belt and doing without. However, taking 50% off our food budget requires an entire new way of doing things (cooking from staples). This "entire new way of doing things" could taste better (depending on culinary skills) and be better for us (less processed food & preservatives).

To reduce food budget by 90% would require gardening and homemade food-production, which in turn could taste even better, be more nutritious, etc.

I was mistakenly thinking the only way we could make significant cuts on food would be deprivation (weekly fasting?) and couponing. Not so. In fact, I haven't read anyone on here using couponing.

Fixing up the Landlord's house

In the past when I've mentioned things I've fixed to the landlord, she has then come over and inspected the fixes (never had a problem with what I've done though). She has probably been to our house 20 times in the year and a half we've lived here, for one reason or the other. Really annoying, it reminds us regularly that this is not our house, but hers.

In the past, she has given me a discount on rent for fixing something, so I know she is OK with that.

Last month the LED overhead light in our kitchen went out. I took it down and the connections seemed good. There was a 12v power supply that I suspect went bad. I briefly looked online for an exact replacement 12v power supply and didn't see one. The P/S had a small form factor to fit in the fixture. I went by Home Depot and they had the same LED fixture for $32 so I just bought an entire replacement (yikes). I actually felt pretty horrible throwing the old fixture in the trash since that seemed really wasteful. I took the easy way out of throwing money at the problem (buy a new fixture) and have it solved (about 5 minutes to install the replacement) than try repair the old one. That was pre-ERE. Maybe now I would approach the problem more frugally.

At the time my wife and I discussed telling the landlord, but decided she would want to inspect the old one, then inspect my installation of the new one, and we really would prefer not to deal with that hassle.

I've realized we do waste a lot of money though.

[ItsALongStory]

I would probably suck it up and deal with the LL visit if it means she will be paying for the fixes, especially as it starts adding up. Again, as others have said, you are saving her hundreds per year by doing things yourself so she should be appreciative and treat you like the top tenants you are.

I'll certainly think about writing up the long story, thanks for the nudge. We sold most of our belongings but my wife has emotional attachment to a lot of things and so we kept mostly art work and things of sentimental value at her son and daughter's places respectively. They each have plenty of room so we didn't feel like it was too much to ask. I'd say it amounted to about 15 boxes large moving boxes so still pretty significant. We ultimately made the move to Europe with a total of 6 large suitcases and two carry-ons. It now fits in our fiat tipo (a mid size wagon) and it works out wonderfully so far.

[Pilgrim]

*** ERE BOOK ***

So I'm reading through Jacob's book Early Retirement Extreme. Almost done. To me, it's very engaging, I don't find it dry at all. I keep bringing up points with my DW and we discuss them. This morning we talked a lot about food planning and also the "true" expense of purchasing an item.

This is a library book I checked out and it was the first library book I'd checked out in years. It seemed incongruous to start a journey of extreme frugality with purchasing a book, though in theory I do want to support Jacob / the cause.

Since my library card had expired I did have to pay a renewal fee. Also, my library system only has one copy of this book and it was already checked out from another branch. So for the first time in my life I requested a hold and transfer from the library And it worked. Though I had to wait a few weeks.

*** MODELS OF LIFE ***

At one point Jacob talked about how there are only a limited number of models of life/human behavior, and that people keep re-discovering the same principals over and over. Sort of like Solomon saying, "There is nothing new under the sun."

I would be curious to hear some opinions of various models.

One model that often comes to my mind is sailing. Particularly, getting "in the groove," This is where on any sort of beam reach or upwind tack, there is a narrow range of sail trim where wind maintains a laminar flow on both sides of the sail. This creates lift and allows a sailboat to move into the wind (albeit at an angle usually no closer than 45 degrees).

To visually tell if the wind is flowing smoothly on both sides of the sail, sometimes little pieces of yarn will be tied to various places on each side of the sail. If the yarns are streaming back on both sides of the sail then all is good. However, if the angle of attack becomes too shallow or too steep, the yarns on one side of the sail or the other will start dancing around. If things get too far out of balance the sail will start luffing (or even flogging) which also lets you know the adjustments are off. However, to get everything aligned "just so" takes a careful balance of many variables (including how the boat is steered through the waves, whether the wind strength is holding steady or gusty, how the ballast is arranged, how tight the downhaul, boom vang, or other various sail controls are adjusted, etc).

When everything is adjusted right, and there is a brisk wind, the boat will power up and take off. The feeling of harmony with nature is intense.

In life, at my job or in my family, I often think, "Oh, this is just like sailing." At times everything is balanced and there is a harmony with my spouse/family/co-workers, etc. At other times there is chaos, and that is like the sails flogging while the boat is being pitched around in lumpy seas.

This is just one model, and maybe not one Jacob was thinking of, but it is an example I often think of. I try to get my life, "In the groove". I think another term for this is homeostasis.

*** CAMPER ***

I've been thinking about whether we need a 3/1 house or a 2/1 house. Currently we have a 2/1. We'd like to purchase a place in the next year.

We have one child with a second on the way. The kids can share a room for a long time, but the 3rd room would be nice for an in-house office, visitors, and a school room (we'd like to homeschool).

In the ERE book, Jacob talks about the importance of getting the smallest lodging that you absolutely need, as a tactic for reducing lodging costs.

One solution we've thought of was to get a 2/1 house and then buy a small camper that could be multi-purpose for office/visitors/traveling/schoolroom/spare room to get away/etc.

If we paid, say, $50,000 less for a 2/1 than a 3/1 (not to mention less property taxes and utilities), but spent $15,000 on a camper, would that be a good move, I wonder? Still mulling it over. We went to an RV show a few months ago and one thing I was discouraged about was how cheap the quality seemed of the various campers.

*** DOWNSIZING ***

This month so far we have sold our pickup truck, got rid of furniture, sold a sailing dinghy, and gave away our trampoline. Plus a lot of smaller things. It feels quite nice to have less projects and clutter around.

Since our big couch is now gone (it was really shot, we got it used for free several years ago), we temporarily pulled out our camping chairs and they are setup in the living room. They're more comfortable than the couch was, but it looks tacky I suppose. Not sure if DW will let us keep this new arrangement. We'll see.

[singvestor]

Really enjoying your journal, Pilgrim! Seems we both have rather high spending to control. Camper idea might be a setback for retirement, depreciating asset, running costs and all. Maybe pitch a tent in the garden instead

[Pilgrim]

@singvestor, great idea on the tent. I agree, a camper does seem like it could be a money suck and be counter what I'm trying to accomplish.

After running the numbers, I'm hitting a brick wall on how to reduce our housing costs. The cheapest option I've come up with is our family living in a 1 bedroom apartment for $625/mo. My wife would go a long with it, but it doesn't seem ideal.

*** Biking to work ****

The last few weeks I've been biking to work. It's only 1 mile through residential. I've always thought it made sense to live close by my job, and have made that a priority my adult life. However, that hasn't stopped me from driving my car anyways. With the new influences on my life (ERE) I'm biking instead.

One day last week I felt lazy and decided to take the car instead. But when I went outside I realized my car was parked in front of my wifes car in our narrow driveway. At that moment, it seemed like more work to rearrange the cars in the driveway then just get on my bike and go.

It's kind of funny that riding my bike now seems like the more lazy option than starting up two vehicles and juggling them around. With all the humidity here my windows fog up all the way to work which is a pain. On my bike I don't have that problem. So really, now the bike seems easier.

[Pilgrim]

*** FEBRUARY 2021 EXPENSE SUMMARY ***



Expense Commentary

Our electric bill was ridiculous. Recently we've shut off the central air so next month should be lower. I wouldn't have done it just to save money, but I also want to be more in touch with nature, develop some toughness for our family, and be FI sooner.

Our cell phone should go down to $50/month moving forward because we just switched to Mint and ditched T-Mobile after 5 years of paying $120/mo.

Our fixed health costs are $454/mo plus we had another $100 for a checkup for our DS.

*** Feb 2021 Income ***

After tax net income this month was $4,352. We also sold the truck for $5,750 and a dinghy for $950.

[Hristo Botev]

Really enjoying your journal @Pilgrim; please do keep sharing your thoughts/progress.

I'll just chime in on the camper/housing thing, as it's something that's just consumed way too much of our time and energy over the past 5-8 years or so; and we made a whole lot of mistakes (meanwhile making a lot of money for DW's realtor friend!). We bought a 3/2 renovated 1920s bungalow right around when DD was born. The house sat on a small postage stamp of a yard with an alleyway in the back in a typical in-town streetcar suburb that was walking or biking distance to everything that we needed to get to. In hindsight that was probably the perfect house for us, not as a "starter" home but as our family home; and we could have been happy in that house forever. (DW wasn't a big fan of the neighbors; which is important.) However, we convinced ourselves that we needed more space and so we sold the house after 5 years for a nice profit, which we used in part to pay off the rest of our student loans; so that was nice. But the house we bought (a 5-br, 2,600 sq. ft house with a full basement on an acre of land) was just a massive money and time suck, and while we loved the neighbors (still do), we downsized to a 3/2 apartment downtown for a few months while we unsuccessfully tried to sell the house 1 year in (nothing like paying mortgage and rent at the same time). In year 2 we were finally able to sell the house at a loss once you factor in realtor commissions, and we downsized to a 3/2.5 townhome that wasn't terribly far from work or the kids' school, and we tried biking the kids to school a few times; but the house was on a very busy road and I ended up in the ICU from a bike accident coming home from work one day. Anyway, we FINALLY settled (knock on wood) in our current townhome, about a year and a half ago, which is probably a 2/2.5, but which we use as a 3-br with DD's room in a finished room behind the garage that the prior owner had built out as an office. So, that was just a WHOLE lot of time, energy, and money spent to end up where we're at; and I just throw that out there to say it's a pain in the ass (I also suspect that part of the reason I ended up in the ICU with pneumonia in 2019 was b/c my body was totally beat down from the move to our current place), and so my only advice to you would be just keep renting until you're both pretty damn certain on what it is you want to buy.

All that's to say that we would have paid off the student loans one way or another, and while it seems nice in hindsight that we were able to cash-out the home equity from buying the highly desirable in-town craftsman bungalow at the bottom of the housing market crash and then selling it 5 years later for a windfall, financially speaking (and lifestyle-wise) we'd have been best off if we'd just stayed put in the "starter" home. Also, we could have cashed out anyway by doing a cash-out refi, without having to move.

Regarding the camper and the rooms, if we had 2 boys or 2 girls they'd be sharing a room indefinitely. But we don't, and so the sharing a room thing ended late last year as DD is now 10 years old and sharing a room with an 8 yr old boy just ain't going to work anymore. So, something to keep in mind. Yes, a 2/1 + camper set up would give you some flexibility to use the camper as a makeshift guest room/office/bonus room (though IIRC from my time in Florida, the real "Florida" solution is to use the 2-car garage for that purpose, which would probably be better insulated than a typical camper anyway!); but you're probably not going to want to put one of your kids in the camper as a room when/if it comes time to split them up.

Mind you I'm not discouraging a camper necessarily, as that's a purchase we are about to make ourselves, though 85% of the reason we're buying it is simply as a "toy," at least for the time being. FWIW, Airstreams hold their value a lot better than your typical camper.

Anyway, sorry for the long post; hope you might be able to learn something from my many mistakes.

[Pilgrim]

@Hristo Thank you for the comments and perspectives. One of the things I've appreciated since finding this forum recently is how much combined experience there is to learn from of other people on similar (but uniquely different) paths of frugality and intentional living. I can read someone's journal and say, "They did X which resulted in Y outcome, take note."

This is in contrast to people I know in real life who are on similar paths too, but similar in the sense of debt, fancy cars, and the like. This forum ties together people trying to live a different kind of life.

In that sense, this community reminds me a lot of the community I experienced when my wife and I lived on a boat in a marina. There was an instant bond with other "liveaboards" because 1) we were all doing something considered "odd" by our culture and 2) the thing we were doing (living in a very small space on the water) was challenging. This created instant camaraderie.

Similarly, on this forum everyone is to live counter-culturally (each to a different degree, but similar in kind) and that effort is not easy. Ergo, instant camaraderie!

But to your points, making sure of what we want before buying is a lesson I'll take to heart. Part of me would love the acreage and rustic farmhouse, but the reasonable part of me knows I don't want the maintenance. Sounds like you had that experience to an extent. Then the busy road turned out to be a worse negative than perhaps you originally thought. Your current situation sounds ideal from a location standpoint.

How do you feel about a townhome vs. a detached house? Or vs. condo or apartment living? I've shied away from townhomes because of the HOA, but maybe we should give them another look.

I think right now we're just tired of renting. I'm 37 and have never owned a house before. There are many things we could do to make our current rental a nice place to live. Like cut down the trees, add a carport, put a nice shed in the backyard, upgrade the bathroom, etc. In short, spend a lot of money. But it's not our house so we just make do.

For the camper, you're right that it won't work as a bedroom for later when our son and daughter need their own room. Of course since our daughter isn't born yet, we have several years on that one.

I think we'll hold off on the camper for now, as it's not really the best solution and would add more complexity to our life. I'm a sucker for buying things and then regretting later when my time is sucked up with tinkering with/upgrading/maintaining said item. These days I'm on a kick to ruthlessly simplify to have my time/energy back for simpler pursuits like kicking the ball around with my DS (3 years old).

Regarding the amount of space needed... I used to work with Indians (from India). I remember one time being at the apartment of one of my coworkers who had a wife and two young kids (about 3 year old boy and 5 year old girl). In the living room they had a couple lawn chairs and a card table with a TV on it. They also had a chest with some toys for the kids. My coworker commented that the apartment was much larger than they needed (it was a 1/1). He said the only time they used the bedroom was at night when they pulled some mats and blankets out of the closet and threw them on the ground where they all slept together. He said they could easiliy throw the mats down in the living room instead of the bedroom.

I remember thinking that most American parents with two children wouldn't be commenting on a 1 bedroom apartment being TOO big. When I remember his attitude, it reminds me that the amount of space I think I need is largely a construct in my mind.

[Pilgrim]

*** POISON IVY ***

A few weeks ago I got poison ivy on my leg. I don't know how, I don't remember being in the woods.

Since then it has kept "spreading." I know they say poison ivy can't spread, it's just more oil finding its way onto your skin (or that the oil penetrates skin at different rates depending on where).

Now I have patches of poison ivy pretty much all over, with new outbreaks in little places pretty much every day. This morning I had it on top of my foot. This is fairly miserable, as you can imagine.

I've realized there is likely still oil on my clothes getting me.

I think what may have happened was a few weeks ago I had the bright idea to wash my old tent to get the rest of the waterproofing off (it was coming off like dandruff from age). The trick worked well, and now my tent is very soft and clean but not waterproof at all. In fact, even all the taped seams came off. But I think it may have had poison ivy on it from my last camping trip. In turn, all the urushiol oils perhaps got in our washer and dryer (yes, I threw it in the dryer briefly too).

THEN, as I've been washing clothes over the last few weeks it's (maybe?) been getting oils on my clothes, which is transferring to me. This is the current working theory.

I read online I should wash all my clothes with extra soap in scalding water to remove the oils. Which is what I'm going to do tomorrow when I get home from this business trip I'm on.

If anyone has other ideas, let me know.

[Pilgrim]

*** PER DIEMS FROM WORK ***

So over the last couple years I've travelled a fair bit for my job. Last year it was about 2 months total.

I have a company credit card and the standard deal has been I reserve my own travel (airfare, rental cars, hotel, etc) with that card, and also use it for all food and incidentals on the trip. This has worked out fine, but does result in my eating at a nice place pretty much every single night while traveling. I usually have one or two co-workers with me so the evening meal is a nice time to decompress and relax. We also stay in mid-range hotels (~$100/night). I also take care of my co-workers hotels, airfare, and pay for their food on these trips too (with company credit card of course).

Recently I requested to be switched to a per diem system and my company said OK. So now I get $96/day for lodging and $55/day for food. This is all tax-free, I just pay for all the food and lodging on my own now.

Anyways, this has resulted in an immediate, radical shift in my company travel habits. For instance, I'm on a short trip right now and my co-worker and I grabbed Subway this evening for supper. We neither purchased any food at the airport yesterday either. Also, last night we stayed in a real dive. It was pretty cheap, but also pretty bad. For instance, my room wreaked of smoke even though it was non-smoking. There also was a rickety door in my room that had access to the adjacent room, which was occupied. The noise my neighbors made sounded like it was directly in my room. It was still about $60 for the night, but I've stayed in nicer places in Africa.

I'm going home tomorrow, but next week I have another trip and I was thinking of bringing my tent and camping at a free primitive campground I know of. On these trips I'm doing field work, not office work, so sleeping in a tent wouldn't be a problem. I really enjoy camping, and this would be an opportunity to effectively get paid to camp. (I wouldn't bring the poison ivy tent.)

Anyways, anyone have thoughts on this?

I remember in C40's journal he would sometimes get travel vouchers from airlines for switching his flight on business trips, and then sell them on eBay. I was impressed. Yesterday they were offering a voucher for people to change their flight (up to $250!) and I would have done it, but I was travelling with a co-worker and we needed to get to our destination together and at a decent time so it wasn't practical.

[Hristo Botev]

How do you feel about a townhome vs. a detached house? Or vs. condo or apartment living? I've shied away from townhomes because of the HOA, but maybe we should give them another look.

As a family of 4 we've lived in detached homes, a townhome, a 3rd floor apartment in a 5 floor apartment building, and a 2nd floor condo (our in-laws) in a 4 floor condo building (I'm exhausted just writing that down). The issues we had with apartment and condo living are: (1) noise disturbances from above and receiving complaints about the same from below, the latter of which is impossible to avoid with young kids; and (2) limited/no ability to just send the kids out unsupervised to "go play outside." For us, right now, we like our current townhouse set up because the townhouse property has A LOT of community green space, with a gate at one end so there's no cut-thru traffic, with lots of neighborhood kids for our kids to play with. We don't have quite as much privacy here as we did at our last townhouse, something which I've complained about before on this forum. This is because of the fact that we share a porch with our adjoining neighbors and because of the way the townhomes are built generally, which means people are outside a bit more than was the case at our old townhome. BUT, this set up results in more of a neighborhood/community feel; at our last townhome you could go days without seeing or hearing a neighbor because we all had 2-car garages which was how everyone entered and exited their homes, even though we all lived feet apart from one another (our experience has been that those concrete firewalls are pretty fantastic as noise barriers). So, I'll take having slightly less privacy in exchange for a stronger neighborhood. Interestingly, we have more privacy here than we did in detached homes, especially our first streetcar suburb home, where the roofs were so close to one another that we had a movie filmed there that required the star to jump from one roof to the next. We definitely knew everyone's business in the detached homes, and everyone knew ours. Regarding the HOA, at the old townhome complex it paid for water, trash, sewer, and a couple other things, though no real community amenities to speak of except mow and blow landscaping, erosion control/drainage, etc.; so at $200/mo. it was kind of a bargain. Our current one is $250 and it doesn't cover water/sewer, but it does cover general landscaping services to cover all of that wonderful (and rare in the city) community green space (including a community garden and composting site, though that's mostly paid for by the separate garden club), pristine and heavily-used tennis court and community pool, and a handful of other things like paying our property management company. It's definitely the case that the HOA fee doesn't ever go away, like property taxes, and it's only going to go up. And there are lots of stories of poorly managed HOAs. I try and remedy those concerns by serving on the HOA board, which is time consuming but it makes sure our interests (and those of other families with young kids) are represented, and that the HOA fee doesn't go up unless it absolutely has to.

All that's to say that I was burned, repeatedly, with unexpected costs at the 5-bedroom house on 1 acre, with tree removal and all sorts of other issues on top of the mortgage(s), taxes, and insurance. And I'm fine with an HOA fee that provides some certainty as to what those costs will be, and that has a professional manager that does a better job getting various service providers than I could on my own (I have much more leverage dealing with landscapers, pool people, tennis court people, gate repair people, etc. as an HOA rep than I ever would as an individual homeowner; and that also applies to things like roof repair, etc. that neighbors can join together and tackle collectively). I'll also say that I actually prefer NOT having water paid for by the HOA, because it forces me to be less wasteful than I otherwise would.

Anyway, another long post on your journal; this is what happens when I'm not forced to edit myself.

[Hristo Botev]

1 more thing.

Regarding the amount of space needed... I used to work with Indians (from India). I remember one time being at the apartment of one of my coworkers who had a wife and two young kids (about 3 year old boy and 5 year old girl). In the living room they had a couple lawn chairs and a card table with a TV on it. They also had a chest with some toys for the kids. My coworker commented that the apartment was much larger than they needed (it was a 1/1). He said the only time they used the bedroom was at night when they pulled some mats and blankets out of the closet and threw them on the ground where they all slept together. He said they could easiliy throw the mats down in the living room instead of the bedroom.

I remember thinking that most American parents with two children wouldn't be commenting on a 1 bedroom apartment being TOO big. When I remember his attitude, it reminds me that the amount of space I think I need is largely a construct in my mind.

For DW it was, funny enough, binge-watching episodes of House Hunters International and getting annoyed at Americans complaining about how they needed more space when they'd see some otherwise perfect house or condo in Europe or elsewhere. That said, I'll just caution that when the kids are younger it's often the case to ask: why the hell do we think we need so much space when the kids seem to constantly be on top of us all the time anyway? But then, they get older; and that 1-bedroom (or 1 "room"!) apartment/condo shared between 4 people is going to get real small, real quick. And like it or not, unless you are going to homeschool your kids and keep them from interacting with any "normal" American kids, it's going to be an issue at some point that you've got a sister and brother sharing a room together. That's not to say that means you need to let your kids' friends peer pressure YOU, it's just to say that it's not always going to be convincing to tell your kids, "well, in X country they do Y"; the response is going to be: "OK, but we don't live in X, we live in America!" Again, that doesn't mean you cave and give in to typical American consumerism and lifestyle, it's just to say it's easier to reject what the greater culture is doing when you are single, or DINKs, or even when you've got babies/toddlers; but pre-teen and teenage kids are going to challenge you on that, every step of the way. Pick your battles. There's a fallacy out there that I'm sure you already know is BS that parents have total autonomy over their kids' lives; that parents get to dictate how their family lives. That's not the case; as the kids get older and start asserting independence they have to be allowed to (and they will insist upon) having a say in things. And if you want to raise kids who, for the most part, won't grow up resenting you, you have to let that happen. It seems more and more I see YouTube/Instagram lifestyle types who I've followed occasionally because they were living some sort of "free" vagabond lifestyle, WITH KIDS; and then, when those kids get older--guess what? They settle into a typical 2 or 3-br home/condo, and try and explain why it's not some sort of "defeat" to their Instagrammy lifestyle.

I'd be interested in knowing if that Indian family still lives in that 1-bedroom now that their kids are older.