#but since my bank account is not literally at zero dollars after paying rent/bills my brain is like.

[grimweathers]

hey anyone else sick of crying about the News and World Events

[rayofsunas]

Incendiary Hearts — Chapter One

A/N: the first chapter of Incendiary Hearts. Tell me how you guys feel in the comments, and hopefully, you enjoy it! I won't have an update schedule, I'm going to update whenever I feel like it and probably more than not when I finish the chapters. I'm going to try to make this long for you guys, but I might fail. Also, got7 members will be mentioned, but none have a specific significance or role in the story. Nothing really happened this chapter, it was just an introduction to Y/n's story/past stuff like that. Minho will appear next chapter! Thank you for reading!

Pairing(s): Lee Minho x Reader, Sarai (OC) x Park Jinyoung (got7)

Warnings: swearing, sarcasm, angst, fluff, implied alcohol and cigarettes, implied violence, not into detail mentions of blood

Genre: boxer au! non-idol au! angst 

Chapters: chapter directory | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Word Count: 3k (I was like three hundred away from 4k)

Synopsis: after being cut off from all of her parents form of cash flow, nineteen-year-old Y/N Y/L/N must find a way to survive on her own without the help of her parents. A job revelation gone wrong and Y/N finds her self working in the last place she saw herself.

For the first time in your life, you were expected to do everything on your own. All thanks to your frank parents who didn't see a problem with signing your name off of your own bank account, that happened to be a joint bank account, but that was beside the point. It was in your name, but the downside was that it was in your parent's name as well.

And they didn't just stop there. They continued on to sign their names off of the apartment contracts they'd bought for you less than seven months ago, and had made sure everything was in your name. The sewer bill, electrical bill, the monthly rent. It was all in your name now. And you were expected to pay it on the fourth of every month.

They didn't stop there either.

Why?

All because you told them that you were no longer interested in taking a certain career path. It was all pretty childish in your opinion, but that's your parents for you.

Maybe you should've been more careful and not trusting your parents would be more than careful. You'd be safe. At nineteen you still relied on your parents, but now that you really couldn't because they cut you off, you didn't know what to do.

Your whole life, everything's been done for you. Your first job at seventeen was like a family business of sorts. You remember telling your mother sometime in November that you wanted a job. Your friends had been pestering and teasing you, all because you didn't have a job. And frankly, it was bothering you. So you told your mother about your worries and she immediately shushed you and told you she'd work things out.

You never expected her to hand you an application for her own job— actually she didn't work there. God no, your mother hadn't been known to work either, she probably hasn't since she married your father. She and you both relied on your father's money. But she did own a business of her own, without a doubt your father helped her get it started; it was some boutique on the upper east side of Seoul. You've only ever stepped inside once or twice with your mother and that was as a child to go in and collect the money earned each month. She had always said you were welcome to work there and had been telling you for years. But you sort of forgot about it, since that never was a solid job your parents would want for you in the future as an adult. They had other things in mind.

But she offered, basically forced you to work there. You'd be helping customers, almost all of them rich women looking for gowns to wear to fancy parties, weddings, functions that sort of thing. In return, your mother would pocket money into your shared bank account, that you always had the idea would be turned over to your name only as soon as you turned eighteen. You were dead wrong though.

On the other hand, though, you had it easy, much easier than other teens who had to work for their own money and their own materialist things.

You hadn't personally known anyone like that; someone who had to work for their own money, because all of your friends were like you. Rich, spoiled, didn't have to necessarily go out, struggle and find a job on their own without the help of their more than happy to help parents; of course with the use of their money and status in society.

But now with barely enough money in your bank account, bills and rent to pay on the fifth of September, you were starting to panic.

They left you out to dry without a clue as to what to do.

Why? All because you blatantly told them you had no interested in attending law school anymore. Now that, was a family tradition. Your mother had gone to law school, your father too. That's where they met. Your uncles on your fraternal side of the family were all lawyers and your grandfather on your mother's side was a judge. It was kind of expected of you since a young age that you'd either be a criminal defense lawyer—someone who defended the accuser in a criminal case, like murder or illegal doings— or a business lawyer, helping out people who got into sticky situations with their businesses.

But after turning both of those options down, your parents began to quickly take everything away from you. Their reasoning was that if you weren't going to do the one thing they asked of you, you didn't deserve to be benefiting from their money. That's a word for word what your dad harshly stated before he and your mother hand and hand left your apartment, seeming pleased with themselves.

"I guess they were being somewhat generous. They let me keep my apartment and even left a few hundred in my bank account," you nervously chuckled, slamming your computer screen shut before turning to face your cousin Sarai. "But now I'm expected to pay bills. And a few hundred dollars can only go so far when you live in an expensive apartment like this."

"It's messed up," The brunette commented. "But you're right, you have a couple hundred, you could at least pay a few bills." The older girl by only a few months shrugged nonchalantly, trying her best to help you out. "The money will disappear soon. Do you know how much this apartment costs monthly? Four thousand dollars."

"Well, you do have an ocean view, and you live on the upper east side. I don't know what you expected the price to be.”

Looking up from the marble table you were sitting at, you sent a fiery glare towards your cousin. "You're not helping!"

Asking Sarai for help was the best help you could possibly get in a situation like this. She wasn't necessarily the best at giving advice, but she worked on her own, earned her own money, had her own job. A job her rich parents didn't help her get. So she really was the best person to help right now, being extremely reliable and resourceful in that sense. All of your friends had jobs their patents got them, like at their fathers companies or mothers side businesses like bakeries or boutiques. They wouldn't know how to help, they were being fed cash flow from their parents, and didn't know the real struggle like Sarai did. Just like you, your friends sadly were the stereotypical rich kids of the block.

Suddenly panicking you hurriedly spit out, "Sometimes I think they did this on purpose. Do you think they'd purposely screwed me over just to watch me suffer?!"

Sarai waved you off as if telling you that you were overreacting. "Of course not! That's nonsense," she voiced her opinion. "They're just angry. They'll come around, eventually."

"I owe money on the fourth next month, that's only rent. And then the added appliance bills and electrical bills, that's just a few thousands right there," Right now was not the time to panic. But you were new to this, literally like four hours new and didn't like being thrown into situations where you felt like walls were coming down; you felt exposed.

"I need food, necessities, I'm lucky if I even survive through this month!" The older girl scoffed as she rolled her brown eyes. "You'll survive. You're just going to have to do it the harder way."

"Sarai, what am I going to do? I have zero working experience. No one will want to hire me." You cried out, wishing you hadn't been so reliable on your parents in the past. It made you sheltered and not know how to comprehend what to do on your own. "Maybe you don't need experience. I heard about a gym or something like that a while back, they pay you decently if you help train people."

"A gym?" You've never been to an actual gym, always too lazy to work out. The closest to a gym you've ever been too was gym class in school... Obviously, those two gyms were completely different from each other.

"Yeah, I think. Though, I could be wrong." She shrugged again, her glossed lips twisting into a frown as she began to think thoughtfully.

"Where did you hear this from?" You were skeptical. Although Sarai was very reliable, sometimes her facts weren't actually facts. For all you knew this gym could be some entirely different workplace or a place that wasn't even hiring if it was real.

She was more reliable in the sense that she'd be there for you if you asked, like emotionally; She'd sympathize with you. After taking a sip of her glass of water, she opened her mouth to say, "Jinyoung, he just left his job, and was looking for a new one. Said something about a gym on 20th street on the Southside." You nodded thoughtfully, hoping she was actually right and that what her boyfriend had told her was factual. But then you thought once more and went even deeper, realizing that the Southside of town wasn't in the best conditions. There are a lot of bar and street fights at night, people could get mugged if in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"Actually, I don't know if I should."

She deadpanned giving you a skeptical glare as if wondering if you were completely sane.

"...Don't you need a job?"

"Yes, but it's dangerous! I'll get mugged.

"Carry pepper spray." She reached into her purse beside her on a bar stool, pulling out a tiny sized purple pepper spray container. "Squeeze this when your target is in range, it'll blind them briefly and you'll be able to getaway. It burns like a bitch, so be careful to not accidentally spray yourself."

A smirk formed on your face at what your cousin had said, tipping you in on what sounded like had happened to her. "How would you know it burns?" You questioned teasingly.

Her dark chocolate eyes swirled with irritation. "I may have accidentally sprayed myself after not realizing it was pointed in the wrong direction."

"Wow. What a dumbass." You cackled annoyingly.

Her pointer finger pointed at your still fork, threateningly "This dumbass just helped you out!"

You couldn't help but scoff at your favorite older cousin, who was more like a best friend to you than anything. "Yeah okay," you continued, "I guess I could always check it out," you let out a sigh, afterward continuing to mutter, "Thanks Sarai."

"Don't thank me, I'd like to think you would help me in a situation like this." She smiled wholeheartedly, happy to of been able to help you a bit, also taking advantage of the moment like always to try and tease you. "Shut up, of course, I would help you!" You jumped up quickly to punch her arm, which immediately retracted to her chest in a form of protection from your abuse and maybe in a way of hoping to reduce the amount of searing pain she was feeling.

"For someone who I know has never been to a gym before, you hit really hard." She hissed, arm threateningly raising to punch your own arm mockingly, but her hand never came down on your arm like she had made it look like.

"You know me so well," you said. "Thank you for helping me. It means the world." All teasing and jokes aside, what Sarai was doing seriously did mean the world to you. Without her help, you're even more lost than you already felt. It was a start. She was helping make the start possible.

"Of course. I'll text you the address later alright? Try and get some sleep, stressing over things won't help. It'll result in a mental breakdown." She approached you, hands no longer balled into fists in an attacking way, instead her arms were outstretched lovingly, wanting to embrace you.

You accepted that embrace. It was one of the warmest embraces you'd ever received from someone in tough times. Something you were longing for. Whenever something went wrong in your life, your parents gave you hugs of course and they tried to show you how much they loved you.

But what they showed you was a wad of cash and their hugs were short-lived, not very comforting and lacked warmth. They could be compared to the chilly, vast arctic tundra; vast in the sense that they always seemed detached, their hugs not making you feel safe, at home or warm at all.

"I know, I know. You remind me all of the time." You groaned childishly, she patted your back harshly. "Shut up, I'm looking out for you. I love you, alright?"

You nodded feeling the warmth disappear altogether before she disappeared off towards the front door.

"Love you too. Drive safely!"

-

The next morning was eventful, to say the least. You woke up like always, got dressed and began stressing like always. You tried to follow Sarai's instructions, which at the time were not to panic or stress, but you were worried, you were nervous, slightly terrified. So how could you not do those things?

What if you were rejected? What if they weren't looking for anyone right now? What if the place was some abandoned where-house or shack, something like that. What if it was worse? A place where gangs or cults resided... practicing their cult-like situations and worshipped bloodshed upon people like it was God.

You seemed to think of what if's all day, and were stuck in a time loop of them, that is until you eventually pulled up to the address google maps had sent you too, with the help from Sarai who had given you the address beforehand.

You gathered your keys and phone in your hands and with one last stressful sigh, you hopped out of your car with ease and stood on the sidewalk.

But there was a problem. All you were staring at was an abandoned brick building, one that looked like it hadn't been used in years. Around you wasn’t much of a street, at least it wasn't a street like you had expected in your mind last night.

You expected a street jammed packed with shops, maybe a Grocery Store or Quick Mart, then the Gym that Sarai had briefly gone into detail about; seeing as she didn't know much about the place either.

But when you glanced down the dead-ended street labeled 20th street, you realized nothing lined either side of the sidewalks. No buildings, no properties, nothing, zilch. Just dry dust blowing when the wind waved by, and not a single sign of an oxygen source; neither trees or bushes. No wonder by the air seemed to thick and dry, and made you feel less relaxed the more you breathed in its stuffy contents.

Frankly speaking, it looked like an unfinished construction site, maybe an abandoned one at that. A place that was supposed to be home to businesses or something, but thrown away for some reason.

It was all too weird. Something out of a horror movie. It definitely didn't make you feel even better about this possible job.

But what shocked you most was when you eventually turned to stare down the red and brown brick building, you spotted cars, motorcycles, and a single bicycle off to the side in a dirt like area, that seemed to mimic a parking lot or serve as said purpose.

With no other buildings or businesses on this dead-ended street, you came to a realizing maybe this place was in occupancy. I mean, why the hell would thirty or so vehicles with the exception of the black bicycle, be stationed beside the only building on the empty wasteland street?

When you came back to reality, you distinguished a boy standing near a door that lead inside the warehouse. You began approaching him, assuming he at least had to know about this place if he was standing outside, guarding the door. When you eventually came face to face with him you realized he wasn't particularly large in stature, and seemed rather short compared to other males you'd been around. He wore all black and glared you down the minute you stopped in front of him. The bridge of his nose was dotted with freckles, and his hair was a golden blonde, unnatural looking but still gave off the aura that it could be his natural hair color.

If his cute looks weren't threatening in any way, his voice definitely set the mood. "Who are you?" The boy didn't sound older than twenty years old, maybe even close to your age if you guessed right. But his deep voice shocked you completely.

You gulped, eyes averting down nervously. What was this... Was this how job hunting was? Was this how applying to a job was... You're out of nowhere questioned what your name is and scared into answering?

Gulping once more you bravely opened continued, "My name is Y/n—"

The blonde eyed you skeptically. "I've never heard that name around here before." He mumbled thoughtfully, dark brown eyebrows knitting closely together as if he was expecting a roster of familiar names. 

You wanted to rudely hiss something along the lines of, 'of course you've never heard my name before. We've never met until now.'. But his voice worried you. Plus he was a stranger stationed outside an odd-looking building, on a street that barely could even count as a street in your eyes. There was no telling what he could do, no matter how small, young, and adorable he appeared.

"Is this the gym?" You took a step back hoping to find a sign somewhere along the brick walls but didn't find anything besides a white spot that without a doubt was seagull poo.

"Gym?" You thought he was pulling your leg, rubbing off as mischievous and acting like he didn't have a clue in the world as to what you were talking about. You just laughed nervously, your hand waving him off. 

"Yeah, I heard from someone this place was a gym." After he seemed to be thinking it over, the unnatural blonde nodded and opened his mouth as he let out an 'Ah'.

"You're one of those." He scoffed spitting near your foot, making you shiver at his disgusting behavior.

You asked yourself, "One of those..." but he ignored you completely, stepping aside all together allowing you access inside. "Go down the stairs off to the right, find CB. He's a blonde. Shouldn't be hard to miss."

"Uh, thanks, I guess?" You nodded thanks to him, continuing to briskly step by the young boy who smelt of cheap alcohol and possibly cigarettes. You just hoped he wasn't the one drinking or using them, and prayed that it was someone who he previously had been around before you arrived.

One thing you didn't miss though before fully entering away from his sight was that you could've sworn the freckled boy muttered, 'they're going to chew her up'

You didn't know what that meant at all. But it put you even more on edge and made you extremely nervous. You wanted to back down, but you were set in a state of determination. You needed this job. If you turned back down, you didn't know what else you could do.

Working at a gym seemed easy enough right? Unlike other jobs out there. Plus it wasn't like you'd just willingly go back to your parents' ways. They weren't looping you up, not anymore.

You climbed down the seemingly long metal stairs, finding yourself getting closer to wherever this CB guy was. You knew you had to of been getting close because you heard chanting and yelling from many different voices and people. The stairway was dark, the only source of light coming at the very bottom and straight ahead, which is where you heard the yells coming from.

You kept hearing voices chant 'ringer!ringer!ringer' and 'hyunjin!hyunjin!hyunjin’.

And that just made you feel even more worried. What the hell was going on? Should you turn back?

As much as you wanted to turn back though, your feet kept gliding down the stairs out of curiosity: and when you finally stepped into the light, you were shocked at what you saw. A huge crowd, couldn't be more than two hundred or so men and women, possibly teenagers with how young that blonde looked back upstairs. They were the ones chanting, yelling and cheering, but for what? Or rather so, for who? They all seemed to be circled around something that was positioned in the middle of the sweat smelling room.

You heard a bell before you saw anything different from the sight you were already seeing, and then you watched as in the middle of the circle, a guy with seemingly long hair stood up, his pale chest, coated with little droplets of what looked like red splotches was exposed to you, and his eyes were mischievous as he scanned over the crowd with said brown orbs. A distinctive feature on him in your opinion was a dark mole under his left eye.

His bloody fist was raised in the air by a shorter guy dressed in black who stood beside him proudly, in a way that made up believe he’d just won something. His gorgeous face had a scratch that was bleeding above his right eye

He looked like he'd just gotten into a bloody fight, and he came out victorious...

Like I said earlier, you've never been to a gym before. But you knew for sure that this sort of brawling or whatever it was didn't happen at gyms.

So what the hell is this place?

[darcyfarber]

7 Simple Steps to Creating a Budget to Save $500 Per Month

Did you know that almost 80% of people are living paycheck to paycheck? In fact, since 2006 the paycheck-to-paycheck lifestyle has increased every year from 65% in 2006 to almost 80% today.

What if those same people could stop living paycheck to paycheck and actually save money?

The simple fact is those who choose to create a budget and stick to it will not only stop the paycheck-to-paycheck lifestyle — they will on average save $500 per month.

Over the next few minutes, I am going to walk you step-by-step in creating a very simple and effective budget. I am also going to give you a free budget tool to use and show you how to use it.

Now, let’s start with step one.

WATCH NOW to see step-by-step how to create your own budget, including the free budgeting forms so you can get started today.

Step 1: Go Back 90 Days

As the saying goes; what gets measured gets managed. The first step is to determine exactly what your money has been doing before you can tell it what to do. 

You are going to print all bank statements for the past 90 days (three months).

If you only use a checking account and a debit card, then you will only be printing three monthly statements.

However, if you use a credit card (or multiple credit cards), you will need to print off 90 days worth of statements for all accounts.

Step 2: Make Categories

Once you have 90 days worth of bank statements in front of you, it’s time to create categories. This is going to make budgeting much easier.

Once you start going through your expenses, you will start to notice expenses that you can put into categories. Examples could include groceries, fuel, dining out, entertainment, shopping or health.

The fewer the categories, the better. No more than 20 categories is ideal.

Average of 90 Days

With each category, you are going to take the average of the 90 days worth of expenses. For example, if you have $1,500 total expenses for groceries, then your monthly average is going to be $500. 

The Fixed Expenses

Circle or highlight all expenses that are the same each month. This may be your rent, mortgage, cable, cell phone, car payment, insurance, or basically anything you know is going to be the same amount each month.

Step 3: Enter Into Your Budget

Once you have gone back through 90 days and created categories for your expenses, it’s time to start entering those expenses into your actual budget.

Start with Your Take-Home Pay

The first number you need is your projected monthly take-home pay. You can think of this as the amount of money that hits your checking account within the month.

For example, your income may be $80,000 per year, but your take home pay after taxes and all deductions may be closer to $50,000 per year. Therefore your take-home pay would be $4,333 per month instead of $6,667.

Transfer Categories to Your New Budget

Remember, in step one you went back 90 days and in step two you created categories based on those 90 days worth of transactions.

From here, you will now enter in the categories you created and the monthly average for each category. 

Step 4: Zero Out Your Budget

Now it’s time to create a zero-based budget. 

All this means is you will have a plan for every dollar that comes in as take-home pay. Whether your income is $2,000 or $20,000 per month, every single dollar will be told what to do before you actually spend it.

Expenses Will Be Higher Than Income

Ninety-nine out of hundred times, your average monthly expenses will be more than your take-home pay. If this happens to you, take a deep breath and realize this is completely normal. This is also why over 75% of people report they are living paycheck to paycheck.

This is where you will go back and determine the needs versus the wants.

There is no right or wrong way when going through the needs versus the wants. It’s one hundred percent up to you. The bottom line is your take-home pay minus all of your expenses must equal zero.

Take Home Pay  —  Expenses = ZERO

Step 5: Follow Your Plan

Once you have created your zero based budget, it’s now time to follow your plan. Remember, this is the play YOU created for YOUR MONEY.

Every time you make a purchase or a payment is made, you will record it in your new budget. 

Best Practice: Always ask for a receipt. Then at the end of the day, take the 2-3 minutes and add them into your budget.

Step 6: Make Adjustments

The chances of you being perfect your first month are zero percent. In fact you will never be perfect — you’ll become really good, but never perfect.

If you remember from steps one and two, you printed off 90 days worth of bank statements, made categories, and averaged the expenses into monthly amounts. This was to create a baseline based on average spending habits. 

Therefore, this does not mean you’re going to be perfect within every category.

Make Progress, Not Perfection

Here is a fact: You will have at least 37 emergency budget meetings within that first month. Maybe you underestimated groceries (everyone always does) and overestimated fuel for your cars.

Or you may have allocatd too much for dining out and not enough for shopping. You may even realize you need a separate category just for Amazon.

If this is you, keep in mind this is one hundred percent normal and you are not a failure, not weird, and doing everything right.

Click Here for the Free Budget Mini Course: Download the free budget forms and then watch me show you exactly how create your own budget!

Step 7: Rinse and Repeat

Your first month is a trial month. It’s not going to be even close to perfect and you’re going to feel like a complete failure at times. 

Don’t give up.

Month one won’t go great, month two will be better, and month three will actually be easy. Give yourself 90 days to get comfortable with your budget.

The Result

The biggest raise you will ever receive in your working lifetime is the day you decide to live on a budget.

The average student of Money Peach saves $500 per month by simply creating a plan for every dollar that comes into their life. At the end of the year, this is $6,000 saved. In just five years, $30,000 is saved without ever making more money.

What could you do with an extra $500 per month? Pay off debt faster? Save for a big purchase? Travel more? Live life without the stress of money?

It’s your turn to get the money right. You got this my friend!

Frequently Asked Questions

When should I create my budget?

Right now.

But, in the future you always want to create your budget BEFORE the month actually starts. The idea is you will create a plan for every dollar that comes into your life before you actually receive and spend it.

Budgeting is proactive versus reactive. 

When you create a budget before the month begins, you are now telling your money what to do and where to go instead of wondering where it all went.

Does it matter when I get paid?

No. 

Whether you are paid once weekly, bi-weekly, the 1st and the 15th, or once-per-month does not matter. Just add up how much you get paid between the 1st and the last day of the month, and then use that as your income (take-home-pay) for your budget.

Why budget on a monthly schedule versus a pay period schedule?

Your life is already set up on a monthly schedule. Your mortgage or rent, your bills, insurance, auto payments and everything else in life is already set up to be paid once per month. 

We are just going to follow the plan that has already been created for us.

Simplicity is the key to creating and sticking to a budget long-term. The goal is to not only create a budget, but to follow the plan we created for our money every month going forward.

What if I don’t get paid the same amount each month?

This is completely normal and it’s called irregular income budgeting. Just like you did in step one and two where you averaged out your 90-days worth of bank statements, you will do the same for your income.

Example: Month 1 you earn $4,000, month 2 you earn $8,000 and month 3 you don’t earn any month at all. Therefore, your average income will be $4,000. 

It would be wise to save the extra money from month 2 in a savings account earmarked for your income. This way you have something to draw from in a down month.

Keep in mind — you will take a new 90-day rolling average at the start of each month.

If I plan on using every dollar I earn, wouldn’t my checking account be zero?

You will definitely need to create a “buffer” inside your checking account so you never come close to zero (or ever overdraft). 

Pro Tip: Put the due date next to all of your bills (your fixed expenses) inside your budget. Now, take a look at your budget and you will notice you will have a period of 7-10 days where the majority of your monthly expenses will come out. This allows you to determine how much of a buffer you will need.

Example: You get paid $2,500 on the 1st and 15th of the month. Between the 1st and the 7th of the month, your bills and monthly expenses will add up to be $2,700 per month. Now you can see you need at least $200 extra for those first two weeks in order to avoid an overdraft. A best practice would be to set aside an extra $500 in your checking account so you know your checking account will always stay above a $300 minimum balance.

What if I don’t have enough money to zero-out my budget?

This is completely normal and happens to the majority of people who first create a budget. This is also why over 75% of people are living paycheck to paycheck.

You will need to go back through the Needs vs Wants section of the worksheet from the mini course. This will be short-term painful for the long-term gain.

If I go over budget, how do I account for that next month?

You will never spend exactly what your income is within any given month. Your life has too many moving parts to literally spend exactly what you earn inside a 30-day period.

One month you may have overspent and the following month you may have underspent.

When this happens, simply add the unspent amount (or subtract the overspent amount) from your income the following month.

Example: At the end of April, you see you overspent by $100. Next month you would simply subtract $100 from your income and then zero out your budget.

Watch Now: Let Me Show You How to Create Your Budget

Now that you have a pretty good idea of how a budget works, I am going to give you the budget forms and walk you step-by-step with how to use them. If you have any questions at all, please post in the comments section below.

Good luck and congratulations on creating your budget!

Watch Now

7 Simple Steps to Creating a Budget to Save $500 Per Month published first on https://mysingaporepools.weebly.com/

[kennethherrerablog]

7 Simple Steps to Creating a Budget to Save $500 Per Month

Did you know that almost 80% of people are living paycheck to paycheck? In fact, since 2006 the paycheck-to-paycheck lifestyle has increased every year from 65% in 2006 to almost 80% today.

What if those same people could stop living paycheck to paycheck and actually save money?

The simple fact is those who choose to create a budget and stick to it will not only stop the paycheck-to-paycheck lifestyle — they will on average save $500 per month.

Over the next few minutes, I am going to walk you step-by-step in creating a very simple and effective budget. I am also going to give you a free budget tool to use and show you how to use it.

Now, let’s start with step one.

WATCH NOW to see step-by-step how to create your own budget, including the free budgeting forms so you can get started today.

Step 1: Go Back 90 Days

As the saying goes; what gets measured gets managed. The first step is to determine exactly what your money has been doing before you can tell it what to do. 

You are going to print all bank statements for the past 90 days (three months).

If you only use a checking account and a debit card, then you will only be printing three monthly statements.

However, if you use a credit card (or multiple credit cards), you will need to print off 90 days worth of statements for all accounts.

Step 2: Make Categories

Once you have 90 days worth of bank statements in front of you, it’s time to create categories. This is going to make budgeting much easier.

Once you start going through your expenses, you will start to notice expenses that you can put into categories. Examples could include groceries, fuel, dining out, entertainment, shopping or health.

The fewer the categories, the better. No more than 20 categories is ideal.

Average of 90 Days

With each category, you are going to take the average of the 90 days worth of expenses. For example, if you have $1,500 total expenses for groceries, then your monthly average is going to be $500. 

The Fixed Expenses

Circle or highlight all expenses that are the same each month. This may be your rent, mortgage, cable, cell phone, car payment, insurance, or basically anything you know is going to be the same amount each month.

Step 3: Enter Into Your Budget

Once you have gone back through 90 days and created categories for your expenses, it’s time to start entering those expenses into your actual budget.

Start with Your Take-Home Pay

The first number you need is your projected monthly take-home pay. You can think of this as the amount of money that hits your checking account within the month.

For example, your income may be $80,000 per year, but your take home pay after taxes and all deductions may be closer to $50,000 per year. Therefore your take-home pay would be $4,333 per month instead of $6,667.

Transfer Categories to Your New Budget

Remember, in step one you went back 90 days and in step two you created categories based on those 90 days worth of transactions.

From here, you will now enter in the categories you created and the monthly average for each category. 

Step 4: Zero Out Your Budget

Now it’s time to create a zero-based budget. 

All this means is you will have a plan for every dollar that comes in as take-home pay. Whether your income is $2,000 or $20,000 per month, every single dollar will be told what to do before you actually spend it.

Expenses Will Be Higher Than Income

Ninety-nine out of hundred times, your average monthly expenses will be more than your take-home pay. If this happens to you, take a deep breath and realize this is completely normal. This is also why over 75% of people report they are living paycheck to paycheck.

This is where you will go back and determine the needs versus the wants.

There is no right or wrong way when going through the needs versus the wants. It’s one hundred percent up to you. The bottom line is your take-home pay minus all of your expenses must equal zero.

Take Home Pay  —  Expenses = ZERO

Step 5: Follow Your Plan

Once you have created your zero based budget, it’s now time to follow your plan. Remember, this is the play YOU created for YOUR MONEY.

Every time you make a purchase or a payment is made, you will record it in your new budget. 

Best Practice: Always ask for a receipt. Then at the end of the day, take the 2-3 minutes and add them into your budget.

Step 6: Make Adjustments

The chances of you being perfect your first month are zero percent. In fact you will never be perfect — you’ll become really good, but never perfect.

If you remember from steps one and two, you printed off 90 days worth of bank statements, made categories, and averaged the expenses into monthly amounts. This was to create a baseline based on average spending habits. 

Therefore, this does not mean you’re going to be perfect within every category.

Make Progress, Not Perfection

Here is a fact: You will have at least 37 emergency budget meetings within that first month. Maybe you underestimated groceries (everyone always does) and overestimated fuel for your cars.

Or you may have allocatd too much for dining out and not enough for shopping. You may even realize you need a separate category just for Amazon.

If this is you, keep in mind this is one hundred percent normal and you are not a failure, not weird, and doing everything right.

Click Here for the Free Budget Mini Course: Download the free budget forms and then watch me show you exactly how create your own budget!

Step 7: Rinse and Repeat

Your first month is a trial month. It’s not going to be even close to perfect and you’re going to feel like a complete failure at times. 

Don’t give up.

Month one won’t go great, month two will be better, and month three will actually be easy. Give yourself 90 days to get comfortable with your budget.

The Result

The biggest raise you will ever receive in your working lifetime is the day you decide to live on a budget.

The average student of Money Peach saves $500 per month by simply creating a plan for every dollar that comes into their life. At the end of the year, this is $6,000 saved. In just five years, $30,000 is saved without ever making more money.

What could you do with an extra $500 per month? Pay off debt faster? Save for a big purchase? Travel more? Live life without the stress of money?

It’s your turn to get the money right. You got this my friend!

Frequently Asked Questions

When should I create my budget?

Right now.

But, in the future you always want to create your budget BEFORE the month actually starts. The idea is you will create a plan for every dollar that comes into your life before you actually receive and spend it.

Budgeting is proactive versus reactive. 

When you create a budget before the month begins, you are now telling your money what to do and where to go instead of wondering where it all went.

Does it matter when I get paid?

No. 

Whether you are paid once weekly, bi-weekly, the 1st and the 15th, or once-per-month does not matter. Just add up how much you get paid between the 1st and the last day of the month, and then use that as your income (take-home-pay) for your budget.

Why budget on a monthly schedule versus a pay period schedule?

Your life is already set up on a monthly schedule. Your mortgage or rent, your bills, insurance, auto payments and everything else in life is already set up to be paid once per month. 

We are just going to follow the plan that has already been created for us.

Simplicity is the key to creating and sticking to a budget long-term. The goal is to not only create a budget, but to follow the plan we created for our money every month going forward.

What if I don’t get paid the same amount each month?

This is completely normal and it’s called irregular income budgeting. Just like you did in step one and two where you averaged out your 90-days worth of bank statements, you will do the same for your income.

Example: Month 1 you earn $4,000, month 2 you earn $8,000 and month 3 you don’t earn any month at all. Therefore, your average income will be $4,000. 

It would be wise to save the extra money from month 2 in a savings account earmarked for your income. This way you have something to draw from in a down month.

Keep in mind — you will take a new 90-day rolling average at the start of each month.

If I plan on using every dollar I earn, wouldn’t my checking account be zero?

You will definitely need to create a “buffer” inside your checking account so you never come close to zero (or ever overdraft). 

Pro Tip: Put the due date next to all of your bills (your fixed expenses) inside your budget. Now, take a look at your budget and you will notice you will have a period of 7-10 days where the majority of your monthly expenses will come out. This allows you to determine how much of a buffer you will need.

Example: You get paid $2,500 on the 1st and 15th of the month. Between the 1st and the 7th of the month, your bills and monthly expenses will add up to be $2,700 per month. Now you can see you need at least $200 extra for those first two weeks in order to avoid an overdraft. A best practice would be to set aside an extra $500 in your checking account so you know your checking account will always stay above a $300 minimum balance.

What if I don’t have enough money to zero-out my budget?

This is completely normal and happens to the majority of people who first create a budget. This is also why over 75% of people are living paycheck to paycheck.

You will need to go back through the Needs vs Wants section of the worksheet from the mini course. This will be short-term painful for the long-term gain.

If I go over budget, how do I account for that next month?

You will never spend exactly what your income is within any given month. Your life has too many moving parts to literally spend exactly what you earn inside a 30-day period.

One month you may have overspent and the following month you may have underspent.

When this happens, simply add the unspent amount (or subtract the overspent amount) from your income the following month.

Example: At the end of April, you see you overspent by $100. Next month you would simply subtract $100 from your income and then zero out your budget.

Watch Now: Let Me Show You How to Create Your Budget

Now that you have a pretty good idea of how a budget works, I am going to give you the budget forms and walk you step-by-step with how to use them. If you have any questions at all, please post in the comments section below.

Good luck and congratulations on creating your budget!

Watch Now

7 Simple Steps to Creating a Budget to Save $500 Per Month published first on https://justinbetreviews.tumblr.com/

[rebeccahpedersen]

Monday’s Quick Hits!

TorontoRealtyBlog

Too Much Information…

Have you ever had gum-grafting?

I did.  On Friday.  And it was far worse than I thought it would be.

I almost chickened out, to be quite honest.  After they froze my teeth, mouth, lips, gums, and basically half my face, I panicked.  But eventually I calmed down, and in the words of Gary Gilmore I just said, “Let’s do it.”

It’s awful.  I’ve been splitting blood for three days, and that made for some very interesting client interactions on Saturday & Sunday.

So………on to something real estate related, then?

–

F*** The Rich, And Tax Them Too!

Nobody cares about this, right?

Only me?

In 2019, I see just as many examples of people caring too much about things that don’t affect them as I do the complete opposite: people not caring at all.

Toronto City Council, in its infinite wisdom, is contemplating (ie. this is already a done deal) the creation of a new land transfer tax threshold for those properties selling over $3,000,000.

Read the article here:

“Create New Land Transfer Tax Bracket On Home Sales Over $3-Million, Toronto Councillors Propose”

Man, it must be nice to be a city councilor!  You just sit around all day and come up with ideas for new taxes, without consulting anybody in the process.

This idea is being floated by none other than Joe Cresey, he who would literally put a safe-injection site in your living room if he could.  In fact, he might have already tried, but you wouldn’t have been told, because he doesn’t like communicating with his constituents when they disagree with him.

Now I understand that people who don’t own housing, or people who purchased for $985,000 really don’t care about the land transfer tax that those buying over $3,000,000 are going to pay.  But maybe they should.

Let’s not forget, the Toronto Land Transfer Tax didn’t exist until 2008 when Mayor David Miller essentially pulled it out of nowhere.  Well, not nowhere, of course.  The Ontario government already had the same tax in place, but the Toronto government thought nothing of doubling the tax.  Imagine Toronto City Council suddenly coming up with a 13% sales tax to match the HST?  And suddenly we paid 26% in tax on every purchase we made?  Crazy, I know.  Except that this is exactly what happened with land transfer tax, and the fight against it just wasn’t strong enough.

Toronto expects to collect a whopping $730 Million this year from land transfer tax, which goes a long way toward paying the bills at city hall.

But how much is too much?

City council has increased the land transfer tax amounts twice already since its debut in 2008.

And we’re constantly hearing the boo-hoo’s of city council about “missing their targets” and not raping home-buyers enough, as per this December 2018 article:

“City Of Toronto Land Transfer Tax Revenues Miss Target For First Time”

Just couldn’t quite make that $818 Million “target,” eh?  Boo-f’ing hoo.

Imagine that.  A “target” for tax revenue.

Am I the only one insulted by this?

I just can’t get over the fact that this tax didn’t exist just over ten years ago, and now the city cries when it can’t quite get it’s billion dollars for absolutely, positively, nothing.

This is a nothing tax, plain and simple.

We pay property tax to the city, which is a tax directly attributable to services received in exchange for home ownership.

And the insult to injury here is the new’ish fee of $75.00 required in order to pay your land transfer tax bill just to begin with!

Folks, don’t delude yourselves into thinking that city council’s pending increase in LTT for homes over $3M is an isolated event.  It merely opens the door to further taxes down the road.

Every resident of the city should be outraged.  Or, I dunno, maybe you just love paying taxes…

–

Can I Get A Do-Over?

This is from the library of “Worst possible scenario.”

Imagine you put your home on the market and everything is going according to plan.  You’re getting showings, the open house is busy, and you’re gearing up for an “offer night” on Monday.

But then imagine the worst possible scenario.

What could it be?

Perhaps, I dunno, a massive tree falling down in a storm and crushing the house?

Close.

A couple of weeks ago, a house flooded during the Sunday open house, and this was one day before offers were scheduled to be reviewed on the following night.

If I were the listing agent for the property, there’s no question what I would do: I would terminate the listing, fix the problem, and re-list in a couple of weeks, or a month, when the buyer pool is less scared of the problem.

What did the agents in this particular case do?

They went ahead with the offer night!

They sent an email to everybody that had shown the house and disclosed what had happened, which was great; that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do.  But it just reeked of “Nothing to see here, folks.  Just this little spot of water, which we’ve cleaned up, and now there’s no problem.”

Why in the world would they go ahead with the offer night?

What buyer in his or her right mind would purchase a house that just flooded?

The listing agent sent a 3-page email complete with times, dates, repairs, and photos, which, again, is exactly what you’re supposed to do if and when making a disclosure.  But the tragic decision to go ahead and try to sell this house on the scheduled offer night, to buyers that wanted to purchase a newly-flooded house, was terribly misplaced.

The house still sold, and over asking too.  I know, I know, “over asking” means less and less these days, but it did sell a good amount over list.

However, there’s absolutely, positively no doubting that one, two, or ten buyers said, “Thanks, but no thanks” at the prospect of buying a house that just flooded, and for the life of me, I just can’t understand this course of action by the sellers and the listing agent.  Unless they needed to sell, like, that day, then there’s just no reason for this.

–

How Tough Is The Rental Market?

Really tough, if you’re incapable of performing common, routine, day-to-day functions.  Honestly, just listen to this…

I have a listing right now in an area in the northwest-GTA, and the interactions I’m getting with would-be tenants and agents are bizarre.

I’m looking at an Equifax Credit Score of 522 right now.  Five-twenty-two.

I have never seen a credit score that low in 15 years.  I’ve never actually seen one below 600.  Bless these folks for trying, but two prospective tenants who both have credit scores in the 500’s, one of them unemployed, and looking to spend 65% of their household income on rent.  It doesn’t make sense.

But the real kicker here was the folks who took eight days to get their offer and supporting documentation together.  For real, an agent sent me an offer to lease eight days ago, with zero accompanying information.  Even if it wasn’t common knowledge in the agent community that you need to have a credit check, employment letter, and rental application (plus often pay stubs and references from previous landlords), I always write this on my listings!

I told the agent that the offer wouldn’t suffice, and he just said, “Oh.  Okay.  So now what?”  It made me want to spit blood….

I outlined exactly what the agent needed to do, and every day for the past eight days, I’ve been receiving one more piece of the puzzle.  Except even those pieces don’t fit.

For example, I received an email saying, “Here is the husband’s credit report,” only it wasn’t a credit report, but rather it was an iPhone screen-caputre of the first page of an Equifax Credit Score Report, which is typically 12-15 pages in length.  I told the agent to please have the tenant download the report, save it as a PDF, and email it.  I was told, “He doesn’t know how to do that, and I can’t help him right now.”

Really?  Then how is he going to take care of a house?

These folks completely disregarded the process required to find housing in this market, and seemed to be willfully ignorant about what they needed to do.  The agent kept asking me, “Is this really necessary?  These are good people.  I promise!”

This went on for eight days; I’m talking employment letters that aren’t signed by anybody, and are in an MS Word file, upside-down photos of the OREA Rental Application, only 1/3 filled out, and a screen-capture of a TD Bank account with 10-15 debits/credits, but no date, no name, no account number, nothing.  So, this would-be tenant spent $87.20 at Fido last month?  Great!

And you know what?  I don’t blame the prospective tenants.  I blame the agents representing them.

It’s times like these I couldn’t be happier that it now takes a 2-year college course through Humber College to get into real estate.

–

Not In My Backyard!

A friend of mine is part of a running group that passes through several different areas of the city with a horde of joggers every week, and I was shocked to hear about his latest experience.

Do you know Heath Street?  Great spot, right?  Family-friendly, scenic, really nice jogging trails connecting to the ravine.

Well, a local yahoo apparently told this group of runners that they “weren’t welcome” and stressed that they, apparently, had no right to trespass on this particular section of city-owned streets.

But it didn’t end there; this yahoo also called the head of the running group (I suppose this person was listed online?) to complain, and tell them to stay away.

Isn’t that nuts?

It reminds me of the Nike ads from the late 1990’s comparing the treatment of skateboarders to other athletes.  They did one about running…

  –

Bottom Of The Barrel?

You know we’ve really become lax with the rules surrounding home building when you see this noted on the MLS listing:

“All Building Permits In Place And All Done Legally”

Really?  We’re actually advertising this now?

It’s like a parent bragging, “I take care of my kids.”  We’re just noting things that are supposed to be done?

A person selling a newly-built house got permits?  And it was done legally?  And this simply MUST be noted on the listing?

Yeah, well, I guess that’s where we are now.  That’s how far we’ve come.

Toronto is full of homes that were renovated without permits; some even built without permits!  And I have a sneaking suspicion that the Canada Revenue Agency is going to start coming after the buyers of homes if they can’t go after the builders.

Consider the “substantial renovation.”  You all know what this is, right?

The developer keeps the side walls of a brick bungalow so he can claim this wasn’t a “new build” but rather a “substantial renovation,” and then doesn’t apply for the TARION warranty so he doesn’t have to charge GST.

The Canada Revenue Agency has become more fierce than ever.  Just ask your accountant, and he or she will tell you stories.  And guess what, folks?  They’re coming after your substantial renovation.

Like every other agent in Toronto, I have sold homes without a TARION warranty.

But going forward, consider the red flag raised.

–

Okay, if you see me this week, just cut me some slack.

Yes, I look like a vampire.

Yes, I look like I have the mumps too.

Yes, I scare my daughter daily with my bright purple mouth, dripping blood like a zombie.

And yes, I have consumed eight packs of Kraft Dinner, five cans of Zoodles, and a family-pack of Spaghettini cooked so soft you could almost drink it.

Happy Monday, everybody!

The post Monday’s Quick Hits! appeared first on Toronto Realty Blog.

Originated from https://ift.tt/2CzvaIQ

[rebeccahpedersen]

Monday’s Quick Hits!

TorontoRealtyBlog

Too Much Information…

Have you ever had gum-grafting?

I did.  On Friday.  And it was far worse than I thought it would be.

I almost chickened out, to be quite honest.  After they froze my teeth, mouth, lips, gums, and basically half my face, I panicked.  But eventually I calmed down, and in the words of Gary Gilmore I just said, “Let’s do it.”

It’s awful.  I’ve been splitting blood for three days, and that made for some very interesting client interactions on Saturday & Sunday.

So………on to something real estate related, then?

–

F*** The Rich, And Tax Them Too!

Nobody cares about this, right?

Only me?

In 2019, I see just as many examples of people caring too much about things that don’t affect them as I do the complete opposite: people not caring at all.

Toronto City Council, in its infinite wisdom, is contemplating (ie. this is already a done deal) the creation of a new land transfer tax threshold for those properties selling over $3,000,000.

Read the article here:

“Create New Land Transfer Tax Bracket On Home Sales Over $3-Million, Toronto Councillors Propose”

Man, it must be nice to be a city councilor!  You just sit around all day and come up with ideas for new taxes, without consulting anybody in the process.

This idea is being floated by none other than Joe Cresey, he who would literally put a safe-injection site in your living room if he could.  In fact, he might have already tried, but you wouldn’t have been told, because he doesn’t like communicating with his constituents when they disagree with him.

Now I understand that people who don’t own housing, or people who purchased for $985,000 really don’t care about the land transfer tax that those buying over $3,000,000 are going to pay.  But maybe they should.

Let’s not forget, the Toronto Land Transfer Tax didn’t exist until 2008 when Mayor David Miller essentially pulled it out of nowhere.  Well, not nowhere, of course.  The Ontario government already had the same tax in place, but the Toronto government thought nothing of doubling the tax.  Imagine Toronto City Council suddenly coming up with a 13% sales tax to match the HST?  And suddenly we paid 26% in tax on every purchase we made?  Crazy, I know.  Except that this is exactly what happened with land transfer tax, and the fight against it just wasn’t strong enough.

Toronto expects to collect a whopping $730 Million this year from land transfer tax, which goes a long way toward paying the bills at city hall.

But how much is too much?

City council has increased the land transfer tax amounts twice already since its debut in 2008.

And we’re constantly hearing the boo-hoo’s of city council about “missing their targets” and not raping home-buyers enough, as per this December 2018 article:

“City Of Toronto Land Transfer Tax Revenues Miss Target For First Time”

Just couldn’t quite make that $818 Million “target,” eh?  Boo-f’ing hoo.

Imagine that.  A “target” for tax revenue.

Am I the only one insulted by this?

I just can’t get over the fact that this tax didn’t exist just over ten years ago, and now the city cries when it can’t quite get it’s billion dollars for absolutely, positively, nothing.

This is a nothing tax, plain and simple.

We pay property tax to the city, which is a tax directly attributable to services received in exchange for home ownership.

And the insult to injury here is the new’ish fee of $75.00 required in order to pay your land transfer tax bill just to begin with!

Folks, don’t delude yourselves into thinking that city council’s pending increase in LTT for homes over $3M is an isolated event.  It merely opens the door to further taxes down the road.

Every resident of the city should be outraged.  Or, I dunno, maybe you just love paying taxes…

–

Can I Get A Do-Over?

This is from the library of “Worst possible scenario.”

Imagine you put your home on the market and everything is going according to plan.  You’re getting showings, the open house is busy, and you’re gearing up for an “offer night” on Monday.

But then imagine the worst possible scenario.

What could it be?

Perhaps, I dunno, a massive tree falling down in a storm and crushing the house?

Close.

A couple of weeks ago, a house flooded during the Sunday open house, and this was one day before offers were scheduled to be reviewed on the following night.

If I were the listing agent for the property, there’s no question what I would do: I would terminate the listing, fix the problem, and re-list in a couple of weeks, or a month, when the buyer pool is less scared of the problem.

What did the agents in this particular case do?

They went ahead with the offer night!

They sent an email to everybody that had shown the house and disclosed what had happened, which was great; that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do.  But it just reeked of “Nothing to see here, folks.  Just this little spot of water, which we’ve cleaned up, and now there’s no problem.”

Why in the world would they go ahead with the offer night?

What buyer in his or her right mind would purchase a house that just flooded?

The listing agent sent a 3-page email complete with times, dates, repairs, and photos, which, again, is exactly what you’re supposed to do if and when making a disclosure.  But the tragic decision to go ahead and try to sell this house on the scheduled offer night, to buyers that wanted to purchase a newly-flooded house, was terribly misplaced.

The house still sold, and over asking too.  I know, I know, “over asking” means less and less these days, but it did sell a good amount over list.

However, there’s absolutely, positively no doubting that one, two, or ten buyers said, “Thanks, but no thanks” at the prospect of buying a house that just flooded, and for the life of me, I just can’t understand this course of action by the sellers and the listing agent.  Unless they needed to sell, like, that day, then there’s just no reason for this.

–

How Tough Is The Rental Market?

Really tough, if you’re incapable of performing common, routine, day-to-day functions.  Honestly, just listen to this…

I have a listing right now in an area in the northwest-GTA, and the interactions I’m getting with would-be tenants and agents are bizarre.

I’m looking at an Equifax Credit Score of 522 right now.  Five-twenty-two.

I have never seen a credit score that low in 15 years.  I’ve never actually seen one below 600.  Bless these folks for trying, but two prospective tenants who both have credit scores in the 500’s, one of them unemployed, and looking to spend 65% of their household income on rent.  It doesn’t make sense.

But the real kicker here was the folks who took eight days to get their offer and supporting documentation together.  For real, an agent sent me an offer to lease eight days ago, with zero accompanying information.  Even if it wasn’t common knowledge in the agent community that you need to have a credit check, employment letter, and rental application (plus often pay stubs and references from previous landlords), I always write this on my listings!

I told the agent that the offer wouldn’t suffice, and he just said, “Oh.  Okay.  So now what?”  It made me want to spit blood….

I outlined exactly what the agent needed to do, and every day for the past eight days, I’ve been receiving one more piece of the puzzle.  Except even those pieces don’t fit.

For example, I received an email saying, “Here is the husband’s credit report,” only it wasn’t a credit report, but rather it was an iPhone screen-caputre of the first page of an Equifax Credit Score Report, which is typically 12-15 pages in length.  I told the agent to please have the tenant download the report, save it as a PDF, and email it.  I was told, “He doesn’t know how to do that, and I can’t help him right now.”

Really?  Then how is he going to take care of a house?

These folks completely disregarded the process required to find housing in this market, and seemed to be willfully ignorant about what they needed to do.  The agent kept asking me, “Is this really necessary?  These are good people.  I promise!”

This went on for eight days; I’m talking employment letters that aren’t signed by anybody, and are in an MS Word file, upside-down photos of the OREA Rental Application, only 1/3 filled out, and a screen-capture of a TD Bank account with 10-15 debits/credits, but no date, no name, no account number, nothing.  So, this would-be tenant spent $87.20 at Fido last month?  Great!

And you know what?  I don’t blame the prospective tenants.  I blame the agents representing them.

It’s times like these I couldn’t be happier that it now takes a 2-year college course through Humber College to get into real estate.

–

Not In My Backyard!

A friend of mine is part of a running group that passes through several different areas of the city with a horde of joggers every week, and I was shocked to hear about his latest experience.

Do you know Heath Street?  Great spot, right?  Family-friendly, scenic, really nice jogging trails connecting to the ravine.

Well, a local yahoo apparently told this group of runners that they “weren’t welcome” and stressed that they, apparently, had no right to trespass on this particular section of city-owned streets.

But it didn’t end there; this yahoo also called the head of the running group (I suppose this person was listed online?) to complain, and tell them to stay away.

Isn’t that nuts?

It reminds me of the Nike ads from the late 1990’s comparing the treatment of skateboarders to other athletes.  They did one about running…

  –

Bottom Of The Barrel?

You know we’ve really become lax with the rules surrounding home building when you see this noted on the MLS listing:

“All Building Permits In Place And All Done Legally”

Really?  We’re actually advertising this now?

It’s like a parent bragging, “I take care of my kids.”  We’re just noting things that are supposed to be done?

A person selling a newly-built house got permits?  And it was done legally?  And this simply MUST be noted on the listing?

Yeah, well, I guess that’s where we are now.  That’s how far we’ve come.

Toronto is full of homes that were renovated without permits; some even built without permits!  And I have a sneaking suspicion that the Canada Revenue Agency is going to start coming after the buyers of homes if they can’t go after the builders.

Consider the “substantial renovation.”  You all know what this is, right?

The developer keeps the side walls of a brick bungalow so he can claim this wasn’t a “new build” but rather a “substantial renovation,” and then doesn’t apply for the TARION warranty so he doesn’t have to charge GST.

The Canada Revenue Agency has become more fierce than ever.  Just ask your accountant, and he or she will tell you stories.  And guess what, folks?  They’re coming after your substantial renovation.

Like every other agent in Toronto, I have sold homes without a TARION warranty.

But going forward, consider the red flag raised.

–

Okay, if you see me this week, just cut me some slack.

Yes, I look like a vampire.

Yes, I look like I have the mumps too.

Yes, I scare my daughter daily with my bright purple mouth, dripping blood like a zombie.

And yes, I have consumed eight packs of Kraft Dinner, five cans of Zoodles, and a family-pack of Spaghettini cooked so soft you could almost drink it.

Happy Monday, everybody!

The post Monday’s Quick Hits! appeared first on Toronto Realty Blog.

Originated from https://ift.tt/2CzvaIQ