#Can a personal loan be used for a mortgage

[fincrif]

Should You Take a Personal Loan to Pay Off a Mortgage?

Introduction

Owning a home is a significant milestone, but mortgage repayments can sometimes become overwhelming. Homeowners who struggle with high-interest mortgage payments or financial instability often seek ways to ease their debt burden. One option that some consider is taking a personal loan to pay off their mortgage. But is this a smart financial move?

In this guide, we will analyze whether using a personal loan to pay off a mortgage is a viable option, its advantages and risks, and alternative solutions to consider.

Can You Use a Personal Loan to Pay Off a Mortgage?

Technically, you can use a personal loan for any purpose, including paying off a mortgage. However, whether it is a wise decision depends on various factors, including interest rates, repayment tenure, and financial stability.

A personal loan is an unsecured loan, meaning it doesn’t require collateral. Mortgages, on the other hand, are secured loans backed by your property. Since personal loans typically have higher interest rates than mortgages, switching from a secured loan to an unsecured loan might not always be beneficial.

Reasons Why People Consider a Personal Loan for Mortgage Payoff

Homeowners may consider using a personal loan for mortgage repayment due to:

High-Interest Rates on Existing Mortgage – If the current mortgage has a higher interest rate than available personal loans, some borrowers may consider refinancing.

Urgent Financial Need – If they struggle with their mortgage and cannot refinance, they may seek a short-term solution.

Faster Repayment Desire – Some homeowners want to clear their mortgage quickly and believe a personal loan with a shorter tenure can help.

Pros of Using a Personal Loan to Pay Off a Mortgage

1. Faster Repayment

Most personal loans come with repayment tenures of 1 to 5 years. If you can afford higher EMIs, a personal loan may help you become debt-free sooner compared to a 20–30 year mortgage tenure.

2. No Collateral Required

Unlike mortgages, which use your home as collateral, a personal loan is unsecured. This means you won’t risk losing your property in case of non-payment.

3. Fixed Interest Rates

Many mortgages have floating interest rates, leading to unpredictable EMI fluctuations. A personal loan typically has fixed interest rates, ensuring stable repayments.

4. Quick Approval and Disbursal

Unlike mortgage refinancing, which can take weeks to process, a personal loan is approved within 24-48 hours, making it a faster funding option.

Cons of Using a Personal Loan to Pay Off a Mortgage

1. Higher Interest Rates

Most personal loans carry interest rates between 10% and 24%, whereas home loans often range from 7% to 9%. Paying off a low-interest mortgage with a high-interest personal loan could increase overall costs.

2. Shorter Loan Tenure

While a shorter loan tenure helps in quicker repayment, it also results in higher EMIs, which may strain your monthly budget.

3. Impact on Credit Score

Applying for a personal loan can lead to a temporary dip in your credit score due to the hard inquiry by lenders. Additionally, if you struggle with repayments, it can negatively affect your creditworthiness.

4. Processing Fees and Prepayment Charges

Both personal loans and mortgages come with processing fees. Some lenders also charge prepayment penalties for early mortgage closure, increasing the overall expense.

Best Personal Loan Options for Mortgage Repayment

If you still wish to use a personal loan to pay off your mortgage, consider these top lenders:

1. IDFC First Bank Personal Loan

Loan Amount: ₹1 lakh to ₹40 lakhs

Interest Rate: Starts from 10.49% p.a.

Tenure: Up to 5 years

Apply Now

2. Bajaj Finserv Personal Loan

Loan Amount: Up to ₹25 lakhs

Interest Rate: 11% to 18% p.a.

Flexible tenure up to 5 years

Check Eligibility

3. Tata Capital Personal Loan

Loan Amount: ₹75,000 to ₹35 lakhs

Interest Rate: 10.99% onwards

No collateral required

Find Out More

4. Axis Finance Personal Loan

Loan Amount: ₹50,000 to ₹15 lakhs

Interest Rate: Competitive rates

Fast online application

Learn More

Alternatives to Taking a Personal Loan for Mortgage Payoff

Rather than switching to a personal loan, consider these better alternatives:

1. Home Loan Balance Transfer

Many banks allow mortgage balance transfers to lenders offering lower interest rates. This can significantly reduce your EMI burden.

2. Loan Against Property (LAP)

If you need urgent funds, taking a loan against property can offer lower interest rates than a personal loan, as it remains a secured borrowing.

3. Increase EMI Contributions

If you have extra funds, making additional payments towards your mortgage can reduce interest payments without taking a new loan.

4. Top-Up Home Loan

If you already have a mortgage, you may qualify for a top-up home loan at a lower interest rate than a personal loan, making it a cost-effective option.

Who Should Consider a Personal Loan for Mortgage Payoff?

Taking a personal loan to clear a mortgage is only advisable under specific conditions:

If your mortgage interest rate is significantly higher than the available personal loan rates.

If you have strong financial stability and can manage the higher EMI burden of a personal loan.

If you plan to repay the loan quickly and minimize interest accumulation.

Conclusion

While using a personal loan to pay off a mortgage may seem like a convenient option, it often comes with higher costs due to elevated interest rates and shorter repayment terms. Before making a decision, analyze your financial situation, compare alternatives, and opt for a solution that minimizes your debt burden efficiently.

For better personal loan options, visit Fincrif and compare different lenders to find the most suitable financial solution for your needs.

[natalieironside]

So I used to be a pizza deliver driver, and that was pretty great for me; it made me feel like a video game character doing Quests. And when you started your shift as a driver, you got a wad of 15 singles for making change which was deducted from your tips at the end of the night. And this was back in the very early 20teens so $15 American just so happened to also be the price of half a tank of gas and a pack of Marlboro reds, so it was often also a sort of interest-free loan.

Now, a trope in pornography which was once so common that I myself have never actually seen a genuine portrayal of it but only seen it parodied runs thusly: A brave hero is delivering a pizza to some beautiful person who, upon receipt of the pizza, says, "Unfortunately I don't have any money; could I perhaps cover the cost of the pizza with sexual favors?" And always the hero agrees to this Faustian bargain which I'm sure must seem quite reasonable to you uninitiated civilians.

But, see, I'm making minimum wage. I have no savings. And I already spent my bank on half a tank of gas and a pack of Marlboro reds. So I'm $15 in the hole, and do you know what happens when you don't cash out at the end of the night? The manager calls the cops, and the cops come to your house. Mr. Domino is gonna get his $15 back by hook or by crook. I seen it happen. So if I accept the beautiful person's modest proposal, I'm mortgaging future tips against the $15 *and* the price of the pizza--which can get up there, depending on the order--and if I don't fix those books by the end of my shift, that could get to be a real pain in my ass.

Just doesn't make sense, y'know, from like a business perspective. Maybe it'd be worth a gamble. Maybe if it was like a beautiful woman who was a service top and also a werewolf, maybe you roll the dice and hope for the hard 6. But you gotta be risk-aware, is all I'm sayin.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Marshmallow Longtermism

The paperback edition of The Lost Cause, my nationally bestselling, hopeful solarpunk novel is out this week!

My latest column for Locus Magazine is "Marshmallow Longtermism"; it's a reflection on how conservatives self-mythologize as the standards-bearers for deferred gratification and making hard trade-offs, but are utterly lacking in these traits when it comes to climate change and inequality:

https://locusmag.com/2024/09/cory-doctorow-marshmallow-longtermism/

Conservatives often root our societal ills in a childish impatience, and cast themselves as wise adults who understand that "you can't get something for nothing." Think here of the memes about lazy kids who would rather spend on avocado toast and fancy third-wave coffee rather than paying off their student loans. In this framing, poverty is a consequence of immaturity. To be a functional adult is to be sober in all things: not only does a grownup limit their intoxicant intake to head off hangovers, they also go to the gym to prevent future health problems, they save their discretionary income to cover a down-payment and student loans.

This isn't asceticism, though: it's a mature decision to delay gratification. Avocado toast is a reward for a life well-lived: once you've paid off your mortgage and put your kid through college, then you can have that oat-milk latte. This is just "sound reasoning": every day you fail to pay off your student loan represents another day of compounding interest. Pay off the loan first, and you'll save many avo toasts' worth of interest and your net toast consumption can go way, way up.

Cleaving the world into the patient (the mature, the adult, the wise) and the impatient (the childish, the foolish, the feckless) does important political work. It transforms every societal ill into a personal failing: the prisoner in the dock who stole to survive can be recast as a deficient whose partying on study-nights led to their failure to achieve the grades needed for a merit scholarship, a first-class degree, and a high-paying job.

Dividing the human race into "the wise" and "the foolish" forms an ethical basis for hierarchy. If some of us are born (or raised) for wisdom, then naturally those people should be in charge. Moreover, putting the innately foolish in charge is a recipe for disaster. The political scientist Corey Robin identifies this as the unifying belief common to every kind of conservativism: that some are born to rule, others are born to be ruled over:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/01/set-healthy-boundaries/#healthy-populism

This is why conservatives are so affronted by affirmative action, whose premise is that the absence of minorities in the halls of power stems from systemic bias. For conservatives, the fact that people like themselves are running things is evidence of their own virtue and suitability for rule. In conservative canon, the act of shunting aside members of dominant groups to make space for members of disfavored minorities isn't justice, it's dangerous "virtue signaling" that puts the childish and unfit in positions of authority.

Again, this does important political work. If you are ideologically committed to deregulation, and then a giant, deregulated sea-freighter crashes into a bridge, you can avoid any discussion of re-regulating the industry by insisting that we are living in a corrupted age where the unfit are unjustly elevated to positions of authority. That bridge wasn't killed by deregulation – it's demise is the fault of the DEI hire who captained the ship:

https://www.axios.com/local/salt-lake-city/2024/03/26/baltimore-bridge-dei-utah-lawmaker-phil-lyman-misinformation

The idea of a society made up of the patient and wise and the impatient and foolish is as old as Aesop's "The Ant and the Grasshopper," but it acquired a sheen of scientific legitimacy in 1970, with Walter Mischel's legendary "Stanford Marshmallow Experiment":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment

In this experiment, kids were left alone in a locked room with a single marshmallow, after being told that they would get two marshmallows in 15 minutes, but only if they waited until them to eat the marshmallow before them. Mischel followed these kids for decades, finding that the kids who delayed gratification and got that second marshmallow did better on every axis – educational attainment, employment, and income. Adult brain-scans of these subjects revealed structural differences between the patient and the impatient.

For many years, the Stanford Marshmallow experiment has been used to validate the cleavage of humanity in the patient and wise and impatient and foolish. Those brain scans were said to reveal the biological basis for thinking of humanity's innate rulers as a superior subspecies, hidden in plain sight, destined to rule.

Then came the "replication crisis," in which numerous bedrock psychological studies from the mid 20th century were re-run by scientists whose fresh vigor disproved and/or complicated the career-defining findings of the giants of behavioral "science." When researchers re-ran Mischel's tests, they discovered an important gloss to his findings. By questioning the kids who ate the marshmallows right away, rather than waiting to get two marshmallows, they discovered that these kids weren't impatient, they were rational.

The kids who ate the marshmallows were more likely to come from poorer households. These kids had repeatedly been disappointed by the adults in their lives, who routinely broke their promises to the kids. Sometimes, this was well-intentioned, as when an economically precarious parent promised a treat, only to come up short because of an unexpected bill. Sometimes, this was just callousness, as when teachers, social workers or other authority figures fobbed these kids off with promises they knew they couldn't keep.

The marshmallow-eating kids had rationally analyzed their previous experiences and were making a sound bet that a marshmallow on the plate now was worth more than a strange adult's promise of two marshmallows. The "patient" kids who waited for the second marshmallow weren't so much patient as they were trusting: they had grown up with parents who had the kind of financial cushion that let them follow through on their promises, and who had the kind of social power that convinced other adults – teachers, etc – to follow through on their promises to their kids.

Once you understand this, the lesson of the Marshmallow Experiment is inverted. The reason two marshmallow kids thrived is that they came from privileged backgrounds: their high grades were down to private tutors, not the choice to study rather than partying. Their plum jobs and high salaries came from university and family connections, not merit. Their brain differences were the result of a life free from the chronic, extreme stress that comes with poverty.

Post-replication crisis, the moral of the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment is that everyone experiences a mix of patience and impatience, but for the people born to privilege, the consequences of impatience are blunted and the rewards of patience are maximized.

Which explains a lot about how rich people actually behave. Take Charles Koch, who grew his father's coal empire a thousandfold by making long-term investments in automation. Koch is a vocal proponent of patience and long-term thinking, and is openly contemptuous of publicly traded companies because of the pressure from shareholders to give preference to short-term extraction over long-term planning. He's got a point.

Koch isn't just a fossil fuel baron, he's also a wildly successful ideologue. Koch is one of a handful of oligarchs who have transformed American politics by patiently investing in a kraken's worth of think tanks, universities, PACs, astroturf organizations, Star chambers and other world-girding tentacles. After decades of gerrymandering, voter suppression, court-packing and propagandizing, the American billionaire class has seized control of the US and its institutions. Patience pays!

But Koch's longtermism is highly selective. Arguably, Charles Koch bears more personal responsibility for delaying action on the climate emergency than any other person, alive or dead. Addressing greenhouse gasses is the most grasshopper-and-the-ant-ass crisis of all. Every day we delayed doing something about this foreseeable, well-understood climate debt added sky-high compounding interest. In failing to act, we saved billions – but we stuck our future selves with trillions in debt for which no bankruptcy procedure exists.

By convincing us not to invest in retooling for renewables in order to make his billions, Koch was committing the sin of premature avocado toast, times a billion. His inability to defer gratification – which he imposed on the rest of us – means that we are likely to lose much of world's coastal cities (including the state of Florida), and will have to find trillions to cope with wildfires, zoonotic plagues, and hundreds of millions of climate refugees.

Koch isn't a serene Buddha whose ability to surf over his impetuous attachments qualifies him to make decisions for the rest of us. Rather, he – like everyone else – is a flawed vessel whose blind spots are just as stubborn as ours. But unlike a person whose lack of foresight leads to drug addiction and petty crimes to support their habit, Koch's flaws don't just hurt a few people, they hurt our entire species and the only planet that can support it.

The selective marshmallow patience of the rich creates problems beyond climate debt. Koch and his fellow oligarchs are, first and foremost, supporters of oligarchy, an intrinsically destabilizing political arrangement that actually threatens their fortunes. Policies that favor the wealthy are always seeking an equilibrium between instability and inequality: a rich person can either submit to having their money taxed away to build hospitals, roads and schools, or they can invest in building high walls and paying guards to keep the rest of us from building guillotines on their lawns.

Rich people gobble that marshmallow like there's no tomorrow (literally). They always overestimate how much bang they'll get for their guard-labor buck, and underestimate how determined the poors will get after watching their children die of starvation and preventable diseases.

All of us benefit from some kind of cushion from our bad judgment, but not too much. The problem isn't that wealthy people get to make a few poor choices without suffering brutal consequences – it's that they hoard this benefit. Most of us are one missed student debt payment away from penalties and interest that add twenty years to our loan, while Charles Koch can set the planet on fire and continue to act as though he was born with the special judgment that means he knows what's best for us.

On SEPTEMBER 24th, I'll be speaking IN PERSON at the BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY!!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/04/deferred-gratification/#selective-foresight

Image: Mark S (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/markoz46/4864682934/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

First, let me apologise for making people worry. I appreciate all those who reached out and I'm sorry that I couldn't get back to you all.

I have been through a very rough spiral. It was building for months, and I am still not fully okay.

For those who want context, it's under the cut.

I bought a house in May. It's expensive. I wasn't ready financially or in many ways for that step, but my partner convinced me. I told him as much but I was not heard. Alas, I have a mortgage, full time work, astudent loan, and an ongoing school program to contend with. It hasn't been easy and it caught up to me.

At the same time, a person who traumatised me and I have no way of fully extricating from my life, has moved closer. To keep the peace, I have to associate with him to a degree and he pretends that nothing ever happened. To him, it was nothing.

In June, I moved. It was hard and fast paced. I did most of the paperwork etc for the whole process and obv helped with the physical transition as well. I was responsible for deadlines and checklists for not just myself but my partner.

I was plugging holes in a sinking boat.

At the same time, I had obligations to my family. Every weekend if I wasn't dealing with the house and all that goes into it, I was running around to babysit or see family or whathave you.

In July, I pinched a nerve behind my tailbone. I missed a week of work bc my injury but it took longer for my to recover. I am still feeling it today. It was more than physical, but emotional.

I also got three periods that month. Hormonal can't begin to explain how fucked up I've been.

On top of all that, there are underlying issues associated with other trauma and discontent. I'm realising that I have been loyal and tolerant to the point of my own detriment.

I don't want to hurt people how I've been hurt, so I don't speak up. When people tell me something about myself, I let all the doubts planted in my mind from years of abuse convince me that they're right. I can admit my faults but often times I will think that proof of one flaw means everything about me is rotten.

People forget about me or just don't care. Both or either. They don't put the same effort in that I do. I find it hard to connect because years of disregard and neglect have told me that the other side just won't care.

But I'm not just hurt, I'm angry. I'm seeking therapy and trying to figure this out.

It all boiled over after my last post. Nothing I do is enough. For anyone. Not even when it's a hobby. I was frustrated bc the place I use for escape just made me feel like less than.

Obviously, I don't mean everyone or even the majority. I appreciate the discourse and fun and everything here! There are so many awesome people to interact with and I have missed you all, however, my headspace was bad. Very bad. I had thoughts I haven't dealt with in years.

I put my nose down and just went to work. I didn't wanna talk to anyone. I didn't wanna be in the world.

I did some reading, eventually some non-fandom writing, and sometimes, I just stayed alive.

I don't know if I'm really okay but I'm trying.

To those who have been so patient and supportive, you deserve everything. To those who are silent supporters, you do too. And even to those people who send me the most vile hate, you deserve to lift yourself out of the dark space you're stuck in. Hopefully, I can, too.

[pansysgothgf]

Thursday Tidbit Tease

I was tagged by the lovely @inell thank you so much!!

Here’s a few paragraphs from my 8b speculation fic! I’m having so much fun putting these two through the blender :)

The realtor is nice, a friend of Eddie’s mom from church. She’s sworn not to tell a soul about the little house two blocks over from his parents place, or about the mortgage loan Eddie’s applying for. He’s not sure he believes her, but whatever.

He’s going to be with his son. He can’t find it in him to care about anything else.

The appointment probably only goes as well as it does because Buck is there, asking all the questions Eddie forgets to. While Eddie was focused on Chris’ needs (close to his school, close to his grandparents, accessible, a pool in the back), Buck focused on… well.

He focused on the things Eddie’s mentioned wanting in a house.

“How’s the water pressure? Does it have a bath? Hot water helps with Eddie’s chronic pain. Oh, where’s the closest fire station?” Buck smiles at the screen, all-American charisma making Jo-Anne melt. “We’re firefighters, I want to make sure the commute isn’t too long, Eds hates driving.”

Jo-Anne giggles, moving so that her cleavage is clearly in frame. “Sorry, did you say you were a friend of Edmundo’s? You know, some of these houses have fully-furnished basement apartments, you moving here too would certainly help out with rent. It would also help with the views in the neighbourhood.”

Without his express permission, Eddie’s hand goes tight on Buck’s knee, where it had been casually resting. Casual and friendly. Just making sure they both stay in frame. Nothing crazy, really.

Buck’s breath hitches, and he nods a little. “Uh, definitely something to think about.”

Which, what? Why would Buck ever move out to El Paso? He hated the humidity in Texas when they went up for the wildfires and he loves everything about L.A.! He even loves driving in L.A., like a crazy person. Not to mention his family is here, the 118 and the Hans, why would he ever give that up?

I’m not going to tag anyone because I’m getting to this pretty late, but feel free to use this as your tag if you’d like to join! (And tag me so I can read it ☺️)

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

here's a wild one for y'all. cw for parental death. names have been changed, it is a kinda specific situation but I think only 1 of my family members is on Tumblr so whatever. sorry it got so long, it's a complicated situation and still VERY fresh so my brain is kinda fried lol.

tldr my dad passed away without a will and we want to give his long-distance "side" gf the house he helped her buy. I'm worried she won't be able to afford the mortgage, but don't really want to give her any of the monetary payouts. WIBTA if my brothers and I kept all of the cash?

so late last week (it's Dec 19 as of submitting) my father (60s M) passed away in a sudden car accident on his way to work. I'm (late 20s ftM) his oldest child, I also have a younger brother (mid 20s M) who we'll call Phineas and an even younger half-brother (almost tween, M) who we'll call Aaron.

so I'd describe my dad as a kind and loving but stubborn and stupid man. I would also guess, based on what I know of his love life, that he was polyamorous but didn't realize it due to his conservative Christian upbringing and didn't know it was an option so instead ended up being...well, kinda an adulterer tbh. this isn't to excuse his actual actions bc they were obviously wrong, but is the way the situation reads to me, a polyamorous person.

Dad had a long distance girlfriend (50s??? maybe??? F) on the West Coast (we live near the East Coast), we'll call her Melody. I met her a few years back when he flew Phineas and I with him to visit her. she's a sweet woman from what I know of her. when I got the news of his passing, I was the one who called her to let her know what happened. (which sucked.)

well, what I Didn't know until I was trying to scrape together travel arrangements (I live 5 hours away from Phineas and my dad) was that he also had a Wife (60sF), who we'll call Patricia. (it wasn't a legal marriage, it was "in the eyes of the Lord" as they said, due to legal complications to do with her social security benefits or something. which is why the arrangements for his death fell onto Phineas and I as his adult children. but if he called her his wife then as far as I'm concerned that's what she is.) he didn't really tell me or Phineas about the full nature of their relationship. Phineas found out bc our dad was spending so much time with her that he'd practically moved in w her, put two and two together and asked her to confirm. I never even knew she existed till all this happened. he had told his parents and siblings about her, and they approved of her. we can only speculate why he kept it so quiet to us, she thinks bc of his history with Real Duds that we'd be upset somehow. idk.

so anyway Patricia knew about Melody. my dad was already seeing Melody when he started seeing Patricia. I don't know what he was thinking when he got with Patricia tbh, can't ask him now anyway, but she knew about Melody the whole time. wasn't thrilled about it, constantly told him he needed to tell her the truth and end things, but doesn't truly hold that against Melody herself bc she didn't know.

Melody, however, did not know about Patricia. he was planning to tell her at some point. kept meaning to. still loved her, didn't wanna hurt her, but was also trying to be monogamously committed to Patricia too. he never got around to actually ending things with Melody before he passed, and as far as she knew he was still planning to move out there and get married to her. he even took out a loan to help her pay for her late mother's house, both their names are on the mortgage and deed.

which brings me to my question. my dad didn't seem to have a will (not that we can find anyway), so Phineas and I are the ones in charge of distributing his various belongings and payouts and such. we both agree that we don't have any use for some house across the country, and Melody is already living in it anyway. imo she should just Have It. however, she is also Pretty Poor. I don't know the specifics of her situation (or, really, much about the complications of home ownership?) but I do worry about her ability to continue to pay the mortgage, assuming that's a thing. we're still waiting to hear about all the details and numbers and have somebody who actually knows about that stuff translate it into layman's terms for us non-homeowners (or in Phineas's case, Brand New Homeowner) so we can get a full picture of how all that is going to work legally speaking.

Dad also had life insurance thru his employer. we are still working thru the red tape at his company to figure out who the beneficiary is, the most likely candidate being me as the eldest child. Phineas and I are agreed that we'll at least be splitting most, if not all, the money evenly between us and Aaron. Patricia is INSISTENT that she doesn't want any of it, she wants us kids to keep it bc unlike some of his exes she never cared about his money (he made GOOD money, but still ended up kinda poor due to both being generous to, and having been taken advantage of by, multiple women since my bio mom died. including having to shell out an insane amount of child support for Aaron despite already having a very active role in his life. like he paid more child support than either I or my fiancee even make at our jobs, while also frequently just straight up directly providing for him where he could). because of his income it's looking like a pretty hefty payout.

however, my brother and I are both pretty poor as well. while we don't know the exact amount we're getting, some are speculating a number that, even split 3 ways, would be Life-Changing for us. we're talking 5 figure amounts, more than I or my fiancee make in a year. like we'll still need to work for a living but, for example, it could be a down-payment on a house or a massive safety net for when I'm out of work (I have a steady job but with seasonal unpaid breaks). it could help Phineas afford expensive repairs for the trailer he now owns, which my dad was supposed to help pay for. in the right account with a decent interest rate, it could be tuition for when Aaron goes to college.

I feel like I Should probably toss some of that money Melody's way, esp since I feel so bad that she's getting the one-two punch of finding out her bf died AND also he had a wife she wasn't aware of. but my brothers and I could really use that money as well. I don't know that Phineas wants to send her any, we're saving that conversation for when we know more of the exact numbers. I don't even know how much Dad was paying towards it, or if he even was anymore. plus--and this is kinda a minor detail--but there's kind of a general vibe I'm getting from the Family (ALL 4 of my dad's siblings AND both his parents are somehow still alive) that Melody is kinda...unliked. they love Patricia and were CONSTANTLY frustrated that he was still visiting Melody and frequently sending her money; I get the feeling they viewed her the same as some of his other gold-digging exes so i think maybe sending her Even More Money would look a little weird? like she's already getting full ownership of a house out of the deal. most of them are in agreement that Phineas and I are the ones who get the final say on the bulk of these decisions but they're...a little pushy anyway.

like I said, we don't know what any of the actual numbers look like AT ALL yet, so it might actually be fine. but WIBTA if we just left her the sole homeowner when she couldn't really afford it, and not send her any money? the consensus will probably show up too late to affect our decision but hey, figured the situation would make for a wild ride anyway (or maybe I just feel like that bc it has been for me LOL).

What are these acronyms?

[hyperbolicreverie]

Been rereading A Crown of Flowers recently and I kinda have to ask cause I don’t think I’ve seen it discussed anywhere in the fic itself (though it is pretty irrelevant to the main story so I can see why not) but how the hell did Law get Cora’s house under his name? Or is it still Cora’s house and Law’s just living in it but been paying the bills under Cora’s name? Cause if it’s the later I am busting a gut laughing at the image of 13 y/o Law committing identity fraud as a nigh ageless fae to the IRS

See, this question is funny for two reasons, and that's because I 100% believe Law would have committed identity fraud as a teenager (and I've already implied he did commit massive amounts of fraud or at the very least some underhanded trickery to get his home clinic tricked out), but also because I work in the loan department of a financial institution in real life, and this perhaps makes me weirdly qualified to know the logistics of this.

It is mentioned in passing in Chapter 12 that Sengoku helped Rosinante buy the house. But, given that Sengoku is well aware that asking an immortal to comply to the payment schedule of a thirty year mortgage is the highest of follies, and he was not trusting enough that at some point Rosinante's identity wouldn't bear investigating, the deed was amended to add Law's name to it during the six months they were together, because Law has things like, you know, a birth certificate and other proof of identity. (There are provisions for adding minors to deeds in many places). Then, smart person that he was, he set up a house account on automatic payment so that Rosinante didn't have to think too hard about it.

Law being Law, he was aware of this account and its details before Rosinante disappeared (if only because you know Rosinante didn't think to keep stuff like that where a precocious teenager is going to find it, and because Law too would be curious to know the details of Gentry owning a house), so when Rosinante disappeared, he just...kept using it. He had definitely planned for what to do if for some reason it stopped working, and he's probably figured out at this point that Sengoku's the one responsible for it. Doesn't mean he won't take advantage of it.

Did he commit massive amounts of fraud to pay for medical school and all his supplies? Absolutely. If you could magically avoid college debt, wouldn't you? Hilariously, the house is the most legally straight and narrow thing he owns outside of his personal bank account.

[phoenixyfriend]

Ko-Fi prompt from Isabelo:

Hi! I'm new to the workforce and now that I have some money I'm worried it's losing its value to inflation just sitting in my bank. I wanted to ask if you have ideas on how to counteract inflation, maybe through investing?

I've been putting this off for a long time because...

I am not a finance person. I am not an investments person. I actually kinda turned and ran from that whole sector of the business world, at first because I didn't understand it, and then once I did understand it, because I disagreed with much of it on a fundamental level.

But... I can describe some factors and options, and hope to get you started.

I AM NOT LEGALLY QUALIFIED TO GIVE FINANCIAL ADVICE. THIS IS NOT FINANCIAL ADVICE.

What is inflation, and what impacts it?

Inflation is the rate at which money loses value over time. It's the reason something that cost 50 cents in the 1840s costs $50 now.

A lot of things do impact inflation, like housing costs and wage increases and supply chains, but the big one that is relevant here is federal interest rates. The short version: if you borrow money from the government, you have to pay it back. The higher the interest rates on those loans, the lower inflation is. This is for... a lot of reasons that are complicated. The reason I bring it up is less so:

The government offers investments:

So yeah, the feds can impact inflation, but they also offer investment opportunities. There are three common types available to the average person: Bonds, Bills, and Notes. I'll link to an article on Investopedia again, but the summary is as follows: You buy a bill, bond, or note from the government. You have loaned them money, as if you are the bank. Then, they give it back, with interest.

Treasury Bills: shortest timeframe (four weeks to a year), and lowest return on investment. You buy it at a discount (let's say $475), and then the government returns the "full value" that the bond is, nominally (let's say $500). You don't earn twice-yearly interest, but you did earn $25 on the basis of Loaning The Government Some Cash.

Treasury Notes: 2-10 year timeframe. Very popular, very stable. Banks watch it to see how they should plan the interest rates for mortgages and other large loans. Also pretty high liquidity, which means you can sell it to someone else if you suddenly need the cash before your ten-year waiting period is up. You get interest payments twice a year.

Treasury Bonds: 20-30 years. This is like... the inverse of a house mortgage. It takes forever, but it does have the highest yield. You get interest payments twice a year.

Why invest money into the US Treasury department, whether through the above or a different government paper? (Savings bonds aren't on sold the set schedule that treasury bonds are, but they only come in 30-year terms.)

It is very, very low risk. It is pretty much the lowest risk investment a person can make, at least in the US. (I'm afraid I don't know if you're American, but if you're not, your country probably has something similar.)

Interest rates do change, often in reaction or in relation to inflation. If your primary concern is inflation, not getting a high return on investment, I would look into government papers as a way to ensure your money is not losing value on you.

This is the website that tells you the government's own data for current yield and sales, etc. You can find a schedule for upcoming auctions, as well.

High-yield bank accounts:

Savings accounts can come with a pretty unremarkable but steady return on investment; you just need to make sure you find one that suits you. Some of the higher-yield accounts require a minimum balance or a yearly fee... but if you've got a good enough chunk of cash to start with, that might be worth it for you.

They are almost as reliable as government bonds, and are insured by the government up to $250,000. Right now, they come with a lower ROI than most bonds/bills/notes (federal interest rates are pretty high at the moment, to combat inflation). Unlike government papers, though, you can deposit and withdraw money from a savings account pretty much any time.

Certificates of Deposit:

Okay, imagine you are loaning money to your bank, with the fixed term of "I will get this money back with interest, but only in ten years when the contract is up" like the Treasury Notes.

That's what this is.

Also, Investopedia updates near-daily with the highest rates of the moment, which is pretty cool.

Property:

Honestly, if you're coming to me for advice, you almost definitely cannot afford to treat real estate as an investment thing. You would be going to an actual financial professional. As such... IDK, people definitely do it, and it's a standby for a reason, but it's not... you don't want to be a victim of the housing bubble, you know? And me giving advice would probably make you one. So. Talk to a professional if this is the route you want to take.

Retirement accounts:

Pension accounts are a kind of savings account. You've heard of a 401(k)? It's that. Basically, you put your money in a savings account with a company that specializes in pensions, and they invest it in a variety of different fields and markets (you can generally choose some of this) in order to ensure that the money grows enough that you can hopefully retire on it in fifty years. The ROI is usually higher than inflation.

These kinds of accounts have a higher potential for returns than bonds or treasury notes, buuuuut they're less reliable and more sensitive to market fluctuations.

However, your employer may pay into it, matching your contribution. If they agree to match up to 4%, and you pay 4% of your paycheck into an pension fund, then they will pay that same amount and you are functionally getting 8% of your paycheck put into retirement while only paying for half of it yourself.

Mutual Funds:

I've definitely linked this article before, but the short version is:

An investment company buys 100 shares of stock: 10 shares each in 10 different "general" companies. You, who cannot afford a share of each of these companies, buy 1 singular share of that investment company. That share is then treated as one-tenth of a share of each of those 10 "general" companies. You are one of 100 people who has each bought "one stock" that is actually one tenth of ten different stocks.

Most retirement funds are actually a form of mutual fund that includes employer contributions.

Pros: It's more stable than investing directly in the stock market, because you can diversify without having to pay the full price of a share in each company you invest in.

Cons: The investment company does get a cut, and they are... often not great influences on the economy at large. Mutual funds are technically supposed to be more regulated than hedge funds (which are, you know, often venture capital/private equity), but a lot of mutual funds like insurance companies and pension funds will invest a portion of their own money into hedge funds, which is... technically their job. But, you know, capitalism.

Directly investing in the stock market:

Follow people who actually know what they're doing and are not Evil Finance Bros who only care about the bottom line. I haven't watched more than a few videos yet, but The Financial Diet has had good energy on this topic from what I've seen so far, and I enjoy the very general trends I hear about on Morning Brew.

That said, we are not talking about speculative capital gains. We are talking about making sure inflation doesn't screw with you.

DIVIDENDS are profit that the company shares to investors every quarter. Did the company make $2 billion after paying its mortgages, employees, energy bill, etc? Great, that $2 billion will be shared out among the hundreds of thousands of stocks. You'll probably only get a few cents back per stock (e.g. Walmart has been trading at $50-$60 for the past six months, and their dividends have been 57 cents and then 20.75 cents), but it adds up... sort of. The Walmart example is listed as having dividends that are lower than inflation, so you're actually losing money. It's part of why people rely on capital gains so much, rather than dividends, when it comes to building wealth.

Blue Chip Stocks: These are old, stable companies that you can expect to return on your investment at a steady rate. You probably aren't going to see your share jump from $5 to $50 in a year, but you also probably won't see it do the reverse. You will most likely get reliable, if not amazing, dividends.

Preferred Stocks: These are stock shares that have more reliable dividends, but no voting rights. Since you are, presumably, not a billionaire that can theoretically gain a controlling share, I can't imagine the voting rights in a given company are all that important anyway.

Anyway, hope this much-delayed Intro To Investing was, if not worth the wait, at least, a bit longer than you expected.

Hey! You got interest on the word count! It's topical! Ish.

[void-my-warranty]

Open House (18+)

Pairing: Victor Creed/Fem Reader Content Warnings: None Word Count: 3.2k

Safehouse Chapter 7 (all chapters here)

He lied. 

Well, technically you don’t know that at first. You go about your life that first week, floating on a rose scented cloud, secretly happy and oblivious to any problems around you. Any day now, he’ll be back. Knocking on your door or waiting for you on his porch or, hell, you’d even take a break in. But days pass and he… doesn’t. 

And then the things start happening.

Your workplace has local news always playing in the breakroom, and in the back of your mind you’re aware that they’ve been talking about some double suicide for the last two days, but it’s not until the phrase, “Friends of Humanity,” finally works it’s way down your ear canals that you actually look at the TV. There, right on the screen, is the face of the man who was addressing the crowd at the rally. On the other side of the screen is a face you don’t recognize, but the news anchor lets you know he’s some important person in the organization. 

It seems too incredible to believe. You were so angry at that man less than a week ago, so much that you wanted to hurt him, and now he’s dead. He and the other guy must have found a scrap of conscience and decided to end it. But you look at the date of the deaths, and it doesn’t make sense. You heard him speaking just the day before, saw the fire in his eyes at how firmly he believed in his cause. A suicide you can imagine, for some unrelated reason, but a double suicide? Of two people in the same organization? Incredible.  

But that’s merely the smallest of The Things. 

It’s the following week when you log in to pay your mortgage before you get a late fee, and you’re mindlessly searching around, clicking between pages, not sure what you’re actually looking for because this part has always been so automatic. You frown and actually pay attention to the screen, to where you need to click, and you finally comprehend that the button is gone. You squint incredulously at the screen, trying to decide if you just imagined that orange ‘Submit Payment’ button that used to be right there. Has the website changed? Moved the options around?

You’re stubbornly clicking around for a few minutes before you finally give up and call the bank. They go through the normal verifications and finally you get to talk to somebody. 

“Okay, yeah, so I went online to pay my mortgage and it’s not giving me the option to do that for some reason.”

“Okay,” replies the bank lady, “let me check it on my end… Okay, yes I see the loan… okay, so it’s already paid.”

“No, no, I haven’t paid it yet. That’s what I was trying to do.”

“I’m sorry—“ there’s a moment of confused silence before she says, “I’m not understanding the problem. The loan is closed, it’s been paid in full.”

Okay, so this isn’t going to be as easy as you’d hoped. “No, listen, we got this house like, two years ago. I’m just trying to make my monthly payment.”

There’s a resigned sigh, like she just can’t believe that you’re asking questions about your own financials. “Okay, let me pull it up.”

A few minutes of silence later, and, “This loan was paid in full on the seventh of this month, with a funds transfer of four-hundred ninety-two thousand dollars and sixty-four cents. Your letter of mortgage release should be in the mail very soon.” 

You just sit there, stunned, your frustration melting away to shock. “Can you…” you get out weakly, then clear your throat and try again, “Can you see who did the transfer?”

“Mmm, yes. I’m looking at it right now, and it’s got your signature.”

“Okay… O-okay, um— Thankyougoodbye.” 

You end the call and lean back in dumb shock, failing to fully process what just happened. Intellectually you know that this is not a mistake. This kind of bank error would be one in a billion on its own, but to have your own signature there… It's not a mistake. It’s real. Intellectually you know this. But you also know that there’s only one person in your life who might have the means and ability to do something like this, but the idea that he would want to is just totally impossible.

“Hey, how’s it going?”

You lift your eyes and blink up at Tyler, who in your stupor you didn’t notice approaching your desk. And that’s just great because you’ve done so well avoiding him until now. 

“Um, hi Tyler. I'm sorry, it’s kind of a bad time. I'm on my lunch break and I just got some news about… something. Just trying to process it.”

“Aww man, I’m sorry. I just, uh, wanted to touch base with you, since we haven’t talked since the date and I’m not really clear on… what happened.”

“What happened?” You repeat back stupidly. 

“Yeah. I mean, did we…? You and me?” He lowers his voice and asks, “Sleep together?”

Oh. Scenes of a very different happening that night flash unconsciously through your mind. You, naked from the waist up, getting Victor’s claws on your skin for the first time. You spilling out all of your biggest fears, and him just patiently listening. You, with nowhere to go, pressed up tight against a hard chest while he pushes you into the relief you need. 

“Nothing happened,” you mumble. 

It was nothing. Just a one night stand, and he didn’t even let you exchange phone numbers, and it meant nothing. And the fact that your mortgage page is staring at you right now with a zero dollar balance is actually, truly terrifying. There was no conversation about this. At no point did you ever consent to, fuck, a sugar relationship. There’s no way to transfer the money back, no way to ever pay him back for this. He slept with you one time, and he bought you an entire house. It’s… degrading. 

It sinks an absolute boulder of anxiety in your stomach at what he’s going to ask for in return. 

What’s even worth half a million dollars? Surely even surrogacy wasn’t nearly that much. Maybe a… kink… surrogacy? Where he impregnates you and makes you eat shit and sleep in a dog crate or something? You could see that hitting the right dollar amount, but Christ, to pay up front before you come to any kind of understanding…

“–So anyways, I’m free tonight if you want to come over. We could watch old movies or something. Do you like old movies?”

Your vision slowly adjusts back to Tyler’s face. He’s smiling a big ol’ fake smile, becoming more and more forced by the second. You can practically see the wall surrounding him, hiding who he truly is behind a plastic sheet of how he wants to be perceived. 

“No, I don’t want to come over tonight. I think we’re done, Tyler.”

The smile falters and then drops away completely. You see a nasty light in his eye that you never thought him capable of before, and he mutters, “Bitch,” before turning and walking away.

“Incel,” you mutter back, too quiet for it to carry. Your lunch break is up and you try to work, mind all a blur.

You go home that night and sit in your decorated living room and just stare. Look around at that house that’s now somehow yours. Not the bank’s, not your ex’s, yours. With that extra money every month you could decorate the whole thing. Wallpaper everywhere, a jungle of plants, a piano… Shit, you could invest. Max out your retirement fund every month and buy some stocks. 

Or you could sell it. Move to an apartment and immediately have more money in the bank than you could have ever imagined. If you invested that, things would really get going. Regardless of what you choose, regardless of what Victor wants in return, you sit there and feel a weight lift from your chest, one sank so deep into you that you never noticed its existence until it’s gone. 

It’s such a relief that when the one, final, colossal Thing happens, it totally blindsides you.

---------------------------------

You’re walking William for a little Saturday sunshine, and everything is good. The air is slightly less humid and there’s a little wind, so you go farther than you normally do. All the way to the end of the sidewalk, just like you walked that one night with Victor. It’s approaching three weeks since you last saw him, and that’s unsettling. The vague idea that something has happened to him grows more and more urgent every day, but you have absolutely no way of knowing or checking. You only have a first name and a face. He’s given you nothing, purposefully, like that’s not going to have you running what ifs through your mind for weeks. 

On the way back you walk down Victor’s cul-de-sac like you usually do, like you’ve done every day since you hooked up, and your attention is held by the SUV you see parked on the curb in front of his house. It has to belong to one of the neighbors, right? That happens. Neighbors sometimes park in front of an adjacent house, even though, fuck, the next door neighbors have completely empty driveways. 

You’re approaching his curve of the sidewalk, scanning for any clue to the vehicle, and Victor’s front door suddenly opens. Your feet come to a stumbling halt, because out walks a blonde woman. 

She’s pretty. Older than you, but prettier. She’s got nice clothes and perfectly styled hair, and you’re just so aghast that Victor has a woman in his house, you don’t notice the sign she’s got under her arm until she stops by the sidewalk and begins to hammer it into the dirt. 

She finally looks up to acknowledge your incredibly rude, open mouthed stare, and says, “Good morning! Are you looking to buy in this neighborhood?”

“U-um,” you stutter, “Maybe.”

“Well this house is fresh on the market! It’s got some nice updates inside. Open house is tomorrow at noon if you want to stop by!”

You mutter a thanks and force your feet to keep walking. It’s so unexpected and awful that you walk all the way home before the understanding fully sinks in. Victor’s not coming back. He’s fucking gone. You had a one night stand, and he knew he was leaving so of course he didn’t take your phone number, and he paid off your mortgage to soften the blow, or to maybe to keep you quiet about what you suspected. You’ll never see him again because you’re a liability. You fingered him for who he is, and he had to cut his losses. He practically told you as much– fuck– when he had his hand over your mouth. 

You’re just an inconvenience who’s too stupid to bother killing. That right there, that knowledge is what really guts you. Makes you sit down and stare numbly at the wall and ignore William’s questioning licks on your fingers. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with you, what you’ve been chasing all this time: you can’t bear to be inconsequential. The need to be someone, to do something with your life, has always lit a fire in you. And maybe all this desperate longing to be wanted by someone important is just your way of meeting that need, because it’s the only option you feel you have. You know you won’t ever have a significant job or kids or power of any kind, but for one day, you had Victor. And it felt like a little bit of consequence, for that one day.  

All night you tell yourself you won’t go to the open house, but when the time rolls around you go anyway. You can’t help it. All those months you wished and imagined getting to see the inside of your mystery man’s house, and were always denied the pleasure. Well, today you can just walk right in and snoop to your heart’s content, so you do. 

“All the furniture conveys with the house,” the realtor announces cheerily. “The kitchen and master bath have been recently renovated with subway tile.”

It’s nothing like you pictured. There are no half cleaned guns lying across sofa arms, no energy drinks or building plans spread out across the coffee table. It’s like a hotel in its bare, dull mediocrity. Normal, normal, everything is fucking normal. Not a single scuff on the walls or personalization of any kind. 

You stare down at the couch, where you had imagined so many times a scene of you right here, in his living room, straddling him on the couch and making out until he begs you to touch him. And there’s the dining table, where you fantasized about eating cereal with him while he deftly avoids your questions about what he does for work. You almost don’t want to see the master bedroom, but you do anyway because you deserve that pain. You need to see every bit of this house, and let it fully sink in what an absolute fool you are. You must feel like this so you will learn this lesson once and for all. 

Finally your allotted torture is done, and you step off the porch and look back at the house for one, final longing. The security camera is gone. Everything that ever made this Victor’s house is gone. Well, except the rocking chair. 

An idea sparks in your mind, and you head home before anyone can somehow pluck it from your thoughts. It’s literally so dumb and foolish, but your wounded heart latches onto it and won’t let it go. You obsess over it for the rest of the day, into the night, and finally when it’s late enough that most people are asleep, you go. 

With a promise to William that you’ll be back soon, you close your front door behind you and walk down the sidewalk until you get to Victor’s house. The realtor’s face is smiling brightly back at you from the For Sale sign, and it seems so wrong that all of the outside lights are on like that. The exterior is still plain, but for some reason it just looks incredibly ordinary now, and you’d never give it a second glance if you saw it tonight for the first time. 

You climb those steps and walk across the porch to sit in the rocking chair. There are little gouges at the end of the arms, like someone came by and stuck a pen knife into the wood a few hundred times. You lay your palms out flat against those imperfections and let the sensation of roughness permeate your skin. 

You sit there and look out across the lawn to the sidewalk, and in your mind’s eye you see yourself walking by. First with your old dog, looking curious and on edge at being alone in a new neighborhood. Then with William, sad but recovering, more confident now because you have little left to lose. Your hair is pulled back in a ponytail and you’re wearing that pink sports bra that always peeks out the neck hole of your shirts. There is nothing interesting or significant about you except the fact that you’re fucking annoying, barely giving the other houses a look before staring intently at this dark porch, hoping to invade someone’s privacy with your idiot eyes. 

You imagine sitting here, pockmarking the wood because you’re so pissed off at this woman. All you want is a little bit of time to relax after fucking murdering someone, and you’re giving off every possible sign that you want to be alone, and this stupid girl won’t stop walking by and perceiving you. First you’re mad. You consider killing her, nice and slow, making her apologize sweetly to you and mean it. But what kind of hitman would you be if you let someone as weak as her dictate your emotions? You change your mind. You turn the light on, let her see you and how big and dangerous you are, but she’s too pathetic to care. It only eggs her on, makes her walk by more often and stare more openly. 

So you stalk her one night. She’s started going out of the neighborhood, which is really fucking convenient for you because there won’t be as much immediate suspicion when she’s found. There’s woods there and you could snatch her so easy, gag her and make sure she feels the agony of what she’s gotten herself into. It’ll feel so good to let her see every horrible part of you, just like she’s wanted all this time, and for her to take it all back and regret every second that she ever wanted to know. 

But for some reason you don’t. You walk right back to your house and ignore the way she’s trying to get a look at your face. It doesn’t make any sense why you don’t take her, but you decide not to linger on it. There will be plenty more opportunities to make her pay. She’s just as easy to stalk the next night, and this time you’re nice and prepared. Black and menacing and bloodthirsty. You make sure she’s properly frightened even before she can see you. Normal people would run, give you a fun little game, but of course she’s too stupid for that. She runs her mouth. Explains how perceptive she’s been, gives you every fucking reason to end her. And you don’t. You still don’t understand why, but you let her go. 

She makes contact the next time. Invites you for a walk and then over to her house, gives you the perfect setup for a slow and private murder. And then she’s there in the kitchen, confessing her stupid feelings for you, and you see the perfect opening. You see how you can ruin her and then make her live the rest of her life in that wreckage. It’s the evilest thing you can imagine, so of course you do it. You touch her and listen to her and call her baby and make her cum hard. You make her feel special, like she means something to you. Like she’s somehow earned your attention. And then you fucking leave. Oh, it feels so good.  

With a deep inhale you, yourself, pull out of the fantasy. You sink your own fingernails into the wood of the rocking chair and clench your jaw hard enough to hurt. You still haven’t shed a tear on Victor’s behalf, and you’re not about to start now. You just stand up and, heart pounding, and carefully hoist that rocking chair over your head.

It’s late enough that not a single soul catches you carrying that chair, one step at a time, all the way back to your house and around to your backyard. You put it on the back deck because, though excitement is coursing through you at your crime, you’re too nervous it will somehow be recognized on your front porch. Chest heaving from the exertion of getting it up the stairs, you plop down on Victor’s stolen furniture and breathe steadily until everything slowly settles inside you. 

And you get out your phone and download Tinder.

Next Part

[docholligay]

Doc if you were in charge of the skills high schoolers needed to have under their belt by the time they graduated, what would you pick?

Oh there are so many choices.

If I opened my own school, it would have a class that was just called, 'LIfe Skills" and it would not be an elective and you would take it every semester, every year. It would act like you are a fuckin moron. All the kids would hate it, and they would all thank me later.

A selection:

Here's how to apply for a mortgage loan/credit card/student loan and here is how interest and credit scores work.

How to create and use a budget

Basic car maintenance and theory

Basic desktop computer use and troubleshooting. (No student of mine is not gonna know where the fucking documents folder is)

Basic home repair issues.

Basic cooking and nutrition, including menu planning.

Every year in various components: Reading comprehension and media literacy. Including reading legal and technical English. You don't need to know how to do your taxes, which changes every year, if you can comprehend legal and technical English*

De-escalation and gun safety.

Household skills: How to do laundry, how to do dishes, how to sew a button and mend clothing, iron, how to sweep and mop, shit I have had to genuinely teach people.

Dining and social manners. You can act like a jackass, but you can't say I didn't teach you.

Conflict. How to disagree with someone and stay listening, how not to take disagreement on every issue personally, how to approach conflicts.

This is not exhaustive, but I think it's something people should know to be a reasonable adult in the world.

*As someone who does her taxes by hand every year, and is self-employed which adds an extra layer of difficulty, filing is actually totally doable. Not only is it reading comprehension, but the IRS has so so so many articles to further explain rules to you. They want you to do it correctly.

[mappingthemoon]

In light of Elom rummaging around in everyone's private personal information and probably selling it on the dork web, may I advise: NOW IS A REALLY GOOD TIME TO FREEZE YOUR CREDIT.

It is free to freeze your credit. You can unfreeze and re-freeze it for free as many times as you wish.

When your credit is frozen, it means no one can open up an account in your name, including bank accounts, credit cards, loans, mortgages, I think also some cell phone companies, etc. (any account or service which requires a credit check, pretty much). When you want to open an account, you can lift the freeze temporarily so they can do a credit check and then re-freeze immediately. This is super easy to do and adds an extra layer of protection against identity theft.

You will need to set up freezes with each credit reporting company: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. This post from Experian includes info for all three credit bureaus: https://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/credit-education/preventing-fraud/security-freeze/

Setting the freeze online is very simple, but you can also do it via phone or mail. If online, you may have to sign up for accounts with all three bureaus, and in some cases you may have to submit your SSN online to verify your identity, so if you don't want to do that, choose the phone or mail option.

(Added bonus: You may receive less junk mail credit card offers and stuff since these companies will no longer be able to see your credit report all the time without permission.)

You can monitor your own credit for free at https://www.annualcreditreport.com/

You used to only be able to request a report from each bureau once a year, but during COVID they changed it to free weekly reports. I personally request one company's report every four months (first from Equifax, then Experian, then TransUnion). Looking at your report regularly will help you stay on top of any bad shit like accounts opened under your name that you didn't open. You can do this perfectly fine by requesting your reports from the source; I would NOT recommend using services like Credit Karma where you have to connect all your accounts to some company's database so they can try to sell you shit under the guise of offering "monitoring" services.

Note: Your credit report will NOT show your "credit score" for free, if you want that, you'll have to pay money, but tbh the entire concept of a credit score is a scam and paying money for the arbitrary number is more of a scam. It's more important to pay attention to keeping your accounts in good standing (paid on time) and obvs making sure you don't get mixed up in identity theft or some dumbass clerical error that isn't your fault. (Example: At age 21 upon taking out my first loan [narrator voice: and that was her first mistake...], I discovered that my parents' mortgage was associated with my credit report, and even though it was taken out before I was born and my name and SSN are different than my parents', I had to submit tons of evidence in triplicate to prove that it wasn't my loan and get it removed from my report!)

Ok one last thing, I'm not trying to veer off into an identity theft prevention master post rn, BUT, it's also a good idea to avoid letting your debit/credit/banking info sit around in various shopping websites' databases. Every single online store is all like, "Save your card for faster checkout?" Fuck that, it's a trap! When possible, I mediate every payment through PayPal or Venmo. Those companies are also not great, but at least there is less risk in only having your banking info in a couple of databases rather than 50 different ones for each store you bought something from.

GOOD LUCK OUT THERE. Who knows, maybe money will become obsolete and/or irrelevant in the next few years and none of this shit will matter anymore 🫠

[msfbgraves]

Do you think Daniel is a millionaire in the show? And that Terry really is a billionaire? Idk how Johnny and Miguel survive in California, poor things.

I think that Daniel has, as I think they call it, "excellent collatoral", or "liquidity" or some shit, which means that he can borrow all the money for his expenses. I mean, to open a business, with their backgrounds, they will have saved for a deposit on a loan, no way they were given that money. May have been an investor if they were paying a cut of their future profits. So, do they have a million in the bank after everything they owe? I really doubt it. Could they get their hands on like 300 k if they needed it? Yes. Is that money theirs? No.

They have a shittown of money coming in on car sales, but they owe the bank a shitton too. They need to keep a lot of money flowing. The trick is to gradually owe the bank less and less, so that at the time you come to sell the business, most of that sum is yours. But you also don't give all your money to the bank. Most small business' owners pensions are what they get when they sell the business. Now, a single car wash in Alberquerque cost about 900 k. Daniels owns four or so franchises, which are definitely worth several millions when sold. But how much does he owe? If they want to give the business to Sam, they can't live off the money for the sale. Which means they must have invested in some form of pension. Which may actually pay out several hundreds of thousands a year should the time come. And of course by then they could make a good profit on their house which is also worth over a million.

But that all depends on the business generating that sweet sweet money for the bank business loans and the pension funds and the mortgage and the insurance... If that stops spinning money, and the price they can get when they sell it drops - they're in deep shit. And I mean deep shit. So if they lose their supplier, Doyona? Which means they have to pay a lot more per car to sell when switching to another? Yikes, that is really serious. So it doesn't really matter how much he has in the bank. The question is how much can he get upon sale and when not selling, how big is his pension payout, and how much will be left. Will they downsize the house upon retirement? How much will they get for that?

Will Daniel be a millionaire when the business keeps doing well and all that profit starts flowing in to their bank accounts, owing the bank less and less? Yes! But they might have to employ Sam for a decade or so, so that they can build up personal wealth to retire on. They have access to money now based on the performance of the business, but that money isn't theirs. If everything got really bad they could probably pay off the bank with the sales of the business, sell their house and still have a million left with that, so they'll be able to live without worry as perfectly normal middle class people. But the lifestyle they have now is dependent on a money generating business. They make a big payout, or they cash in on the money they make the last decade they own it before they pass it on? Yeah, they're millionaires.

But now, they're not. The value of the business tanks, a wealthy future goes with it.

Terry is bribing judges and buying up Cobra Kai franchises out of pocket. He doesn't give a shit if any of his franchises, or the whole business, tanks. He's investing in other people's businesses...

He's definitely someone who owns hundreds of millions. Is he a billionaire? A billion is 1000 million. I don't know. Probably. It's not something you can tell anymore by what car or wine or house they own. Nothing you consume is making a dent on even 500 million. It's staggeringly much. So maybe he isn't and can still easily fork out millions to invest in some kind of startup. But, the way he uses connections? And where he is? Keeps investing even now?

Very likely.

[mermazeablaze]

I need to vent about my SIL especially after losing my MIL last week. This might be a lengthy post. Because I'm petty, angry & hurt. I need the catharsis of publicly shaming her sans her name.

My SIL grew up spoiled. She wanted for nothing. What she couldn't get from others, she learned to manipulate from them.

My hubs & his brothers had to beg, plead & steal for all they had.

SIL beat the shit out of my husband when he was around 5yrs old so badly with an extension cord - he still has nerve damage in his back.

Anytime she didn't get her way, she took it out on him because he was the youngest at the time.

SIL was a teen mom & there's no shame in that. But she has always been ashamed of being Hispanic.

She would bleach her son's head as a toddler & when he got older forced him to wear blue contacts until he stood up for himself in middle school.

SIL gloats & brags about ruining lives just because she's practiced enough to do it - careers, families, citizenship, etc

When our girls were smaller we gave SIL a chance hoping she had shed her skin. Nope, SIL was still SIL. She used her own nieces to make herself look good - new SOs, new friends & bosses. Once she seemed wholesome enough & secure, she wanted nothing to do with them.

SIL always lives outside of her means. When hubs Gpa was still alive she forced him to pay her mortgage, auto loan & so much more. Meanwhile vacays, cruises, designer clothes, motorcycles, bought her own cabin, etc

When Gpa cut her off, she bled everyone else within her reach, except us, dry & called it a day.

SIL tried buying our three daughters social security cards from us to get her bio father's family into the USA. When we told her no, she called CPS on us.

SIL treated MIL like shit. Which wasn't a surprise. SIL didn't like MIL was one of the few who didn't spoil her during her life. It was everyone else around her who did. & so SIL made it a point to ice out MIL, including keeping her son, MIL's grandson from her.

SIL tried to convince her son that his own son wasn't his just because she didn't like the girl. SIL made this girl's life a living hell. SIL forced him to terminate his parental rights, which he did. A paternity test proved he was his son, but by then the damage was done. The girl ran from that family & didn't look back.

SIL's son married a girl who had a child with someone else, nothing wrong with that. SIL had an issue with that because he was fresh out of HS. They now have a daughter together. SIL's son rarely interacts with her.

When MIL had her stroke that placed her in a long term nursing home - SIL got POA. SIL embezzled what money SSI gave her outside of paying for the home. We knew this would happen, but SIL was the only one capable of being her POA.

We found out one of my BILs was a child predator who preyed on one of our daughters. SIL who could care less about him before all of this - is suddenly his protector. & said despite what he did, he deserves love & his family. Girl, what? 👁️👄👁️

When Gpa died of Alzheimer's. We were not notified despite being very close with him. We had to find out through Google searching his name here & there. It was a few months after his death.

MIL, her stepsister & all of the grandkids were supposed to get an inheritance when Gpa died. Husband never received his. But he didn't want to take SIL to court. He just said, "She can choke on it."

The nursing home kept calling my husband about MIL because they hadn't heard from SIL in weeks, sometimes months. The only person visiting MIL was her husband she was separated from. We couldn't visit her because SIL told the home we couldn't without her permission.

We found out MIL had been diagnosed with uterine cancer while in the nursing home. We found out through one of the phone calls when they couldn't get a hold of SIL.

More phone calls from nursing home because they can't reach SIL to schedule cancer treatments.

Eventually the calls from nursing home said MILs cancer had progressed to the point of hospice because of the lack of consistent medical intervention.

SIL *finally* contacts us & said we can visit MIL before she's moved to hospice.

MIL was never moved to hospice we found this out because one of hubs paternal cousins got a job at the nursing home.

Last week when MIL died we found out because the nursing home contacted us because guess what? They couldn't get ahold of SIL.

SIL didn't even bother to contact us about her death. She posted about the funeral on her FB page. My aunt told me the details because I have SIL blocked, husband doesn't have her blocked.

I was confused about the funeral home being used because it wasn't the one that side of the family uses. So I called them. SIL went cheap - no embalming (not that I agree with it), no viewing, no open casket, just a graveside service.

I also found out MIL would not be buried next to her dad despite having a plot. She was so proud of that plot before being in the nursing home & comforted that she would be next to him. We still don't know if SIL sold the plot before MIL died because of her POA.

We visited MILs grave a few hours after the service (we didn't attend because predator BIL) & found out she was buried next to her mother, aunt & both maternal grandparents. Which made us glad she was at least next to some family.

There was no headstone at her grave. Which we know isn't placed right away. But knowing SILs behavior - we went in person & spoke to the funeral director. SIL did not purchase one, but said she would be back to place one on a payment plan. We told the funeral director that either SIL will ghost her or meetup & not buy one.

We told the funeral director we would purchase the headstone, but to tell SIL there was an 'anonymous donor'.

SIL did come in for the payment plan appointment, but once she heard there was an 'anonymous donor' - the funeral director said, "SIL had her checkbook out & immediately put it back in her purse when she heard there was a donor. She said she'll pay whatever they (us) don't pay."

We're paying for all of it tomorrow. Out of love for MIL, but also BDE & pettiness at this point.

One last thing. SIL used a free obit service, Echovita, which I'm not mad at. But it was a stock obit that ChatGPT wrote. Echovita has that as a feature. I got on Echovita & wrote one my damn self, that was actually personalized.

End Vent

[soniabigcheese]

A Couple of Things

Out of sheer curiosity, I've signed up for the communities thing that keeps popping up.

I don't know what I'm doing but this will be dedicated to crafts of all varieties, styles and skill sets. Whether anybody is amazing or just starting out.

It is currently in a queue and I'm not sure if it will be approved. If not no biggie, I tried. If so then ....

Helllllllllppppp?!?!?!

I could have opted for Thunderbirds/Anderson related stuff, but someone else can have that privilege, since I'm not that knowledgeable

Second thing.

And this is a biggie.

I may/may not take on a new project. It will be costly and take up a lot of my time. I sort of have the backing of one person but it will seriously piss off another.

And that's to clear my father in laws house and make an attempt to bring it back to life. Because right now, it is in a real sorry state and would sell for peanuts if the buyers are smart enough.

Hubby said that there will be the money from his dad's estate - to which I warned him that it might not be enough. With neither of us working, the fire damage to the property etc. That would be problematic in getting loans or another mortgage.

I need a miracle - or a juicy win on the lottery to even get started.

And you all know who it will piss off.

I am not doing this for spite, I just want a project to do and put my mark on the place before putting it on the market at its full value. Or maybe .... possibly move in.

I know we're better off selling, but it is such a beautiful property that has been seriously neglected for many years.

[copperbadge]

Hello, Sam! I’m one of your neighbours, and I’m presently job hunting, coming out of a professional services career. I’ve been eyeing work in the nonprofit sector, and was wondering if you have any advice on entering you might share? I am aware it doesn’t typically pay the way for-profit tends to, which is fine; Chicago’s COL is Chicago’s COL, though, and can I reasonably expect to be able to continue to live in the city?

Hey fellow Chicagoan!

So, it kind of depends on a couple of factors, like what jobs you're looking at in the nonprofit sector, which nonprofit you end up with, and what your current COL is in Chicago. I was living...comfortable-ish on $55K/yr, but I was in a cheap one-bedroom rental situation and had reduced-fee student loans, no partner or children, and was used to living very cheaply. I now earn roughly $75K/yr with a mortgage and no student loans, but I still had to put a few things on credit to do the Europe trip (since paid off). For context, after taxes $75K a year is roughly $5K/mo, of which I get about $2.5K/mo after mortgage and bills (including vision and dental insurance, which I don't get through my work).

I work for a small nonprofit of about 35 people (about half in fundraising) with a yearly fundraise of $10M or so. I was actually far less well-compensated at my last job, which was a massive organization with a 200-person fundraising team alone. But if you're coming from for-profit your best bet is still to look at large orgs, like United Way or UIC or similar. I know from experience the museums in Chicago, while delightful, generally have to pay somewhat below industry standard (when I changed jobs from a $55K to a $75K job, the Art Institute was offering $40K for the same position).

Without knowing your previous industry and where you're looking to land it's tough to offer useful information, but it is possible to live in Chicago, even in downtown, and work for a nonprofit, it just depends on other factors. And I don't have a ton of info on what other non-fundraising people who work at nonprofits get paid. :/

If you like, feel free to hit me up at copperbadge@gmail.com and I'm happy to get more specific; I can also pass along some good jobsearch websites for specifically the nonprofit field. But I would definitely start by researching larger nonprofits, either local to Chicago or national with Chicago branches, and checking out comp salaries in your field.

[rainbowdoom32]

Just a note to all the other writers out there. You can NOT inherit debt in the US.

If someone dies in debt, their assets are sold off to pay their creditors. Any remaining debt after the assets are gone are forgiven.

You can inherit a company that's in debt, but bankruptcy laws mean that your personal finances won't be touched if it fails.

Some work arounds:

Parents Committed Identity Fraud using chidls identity to take out loans, character should be struggling with getting the debts forgiven via legal system. (But it's reasonable to struggle to get representation and for debt collectors to continue harassing them)

Keeping the House: if the mortgage on a house is outstanding you can inherit the house and the obligation to pay the mortgage. Leaving the character in debt to avoid homelessness

Failing Buisness: you can inherit and in debt business. And whole if you declare bankruptcy they won't tap your personal finances a character can bleed their personal finances in an attempt to keep it going

Mob Loan: if the loan was through an extra-legal organization they won't care about whether or not the law says they can go after the heir for the debt. They're not operating under the legal system anyway.

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.