Ack, sorry for the updates! Work has been slamming me hard. Again, my apologies.
Yay! My MacBook Pro 17" is here!!! <3 FedEx for delivering toys even in the cold rain. ;) Expect more updates later from my new machine, heh.
~hhh.cubed ^_^
Monday, March 10, 2008
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Slow Day
Sorry y'all, but I don't have a real post today. Things have been busy with work, but I promise an update tomorrow!
In unrelated news, the Apple iPhone SDK came out today! I will definitely be playing with it tonight. My goal is to get my Nike+ Amp watch working with my iPhone eventually, or at least I hope so.
Last but not least, I finally won a Prosper.com bid! FINALLY. We'll see if my new strategies can improve my win rate.
~hhh.cubed ^_^
In unrelated news, the Apple iPhone SDK came out today! I will definitely be playing with it tonight. My goal is to get my Nike+ Amp watch working with my iPhone eventually, or at least I hope so.
Last but not least, I finally won a Prosper.com bid! FINALLY. We'll see if my new strategies can improve my win rate.
~hhh.cubed ^_^
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Sniping Debt
Wow, I never thought I'd have so much trouble bidding on debt on Prosper.com, but I'm getting outbid left and right! Every day I get new outbid notices... I never even had this much trouble on eBay! I think I figured out the trick, though: you can still bid on 100% funded people! Once they're 100% funded, if there is still time left on the loan any bid is fair game, you just have to come in lower. I was getting outbid by like 4% for some AA-rated borrowers, sheesh!
With life being busy as hell it's a bit difficult to keep up with a whole queue of "auctions" but then again I guess that's what power eBayers do all the time. Someone really needs to make a good widget to track their auctions (and end times) on Prosper.com. I suppose I could dust off the old Apple Dashcode app...
~hhh.cubed ^_^
With life being busy as hell it's a bit difficult to keep up with a whole queue of "auctions" but then again I guess that's what power eBayers do all the time. Someone really needs to make a good widget to track their auctions (and end times) on Prosper.com. I suppose I could dust off the old Apple Dashcode app...
~hhh.cubed ^_^
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Do I Really Need: to have it NOW
Well, this is going to be the first of a series of articles I write that discusses necessity, but in a financial sense. I hope y'all like these, because I'm planning on doing about one a week!
So say you're walking down the plaza (or nowadays, outdoor strip malls) and you pass by a store with something shiny in the window. You glance back, and it's the that you've wanted all your life! At this point, let's pause the mental flashback...
Okay, so right now you have two (and ONLY two) choices: buy it now, or don't. It's that simple, you can purchase said item right then and there -- this is what we call an "impulse buy" -- or you can fight off the urge and just keep walking. We've all been in this position before, and most of us are guilty of executing the impulse buy at least a couple of times in our life, especially right after we just got our paycheck, or bonus, or support payment, or. You know what I'm talking about. We're ALL guilty.
Well I'm here to tell you to try to nip that practice in the bud! There's too many things draining our bank accounts nowadays, from toll fees, insurance and taxes, gasoline, to basic necessities like food, water, electricity, gas, etc. Can you really afford to make that impulse buy in the long run?
If you're reading this and your name just so happens to be Donald Trump, then stop reading. Make that impulse buy, and props for keeping that American flag flying despite your cowardly, greedy HOA. For the rest of us mortals, let's think about it. I usually stop and take 10 deep breaths before I even BEGIN to make a decision, and once I'm ready the thought process looks like this:
1.) Do I need it?
2.) Do I really need it?
3.) Do I really, really, REALLY need it?
4.) Will my wife/husband/child/cat be upset if I buy it?
5.) [and here's the most important question of all] How much potential interest from investments am I losing if I buy it?
Notice a trend, here? Anything short of rent, food, water, electricity, and gas is for the most part NOT a necessity, and the longer you can hold off on buying it the more you can earn in the long run. Ask yourself if you even need it, and whether or not you'll be enjoying it a year from now, much less a week from now!
The overall question to ask is if you even need it, but should the answer be 'yes' then an equally important question to ask is "when?" If you can live without it until at least your next monthly billing cycle, then that's already a good first step; delaying it a few weeks at least removes the "impulse" factor from the decision, since it's now a "scheduled buy", and you can go ahead and put the money you would've spent into a savings account. The next question to ask is "how long can I live without it?" If the answer is "quite a wihle" then you should either reconsider your need for it, or maybe schedule it as a sort of reward down the line for hitting a major mile marker or accomplishing a goal.
I won't go into the details of how much potential earnings you'd lose if you made the impulse purchase instead of investing it (it has been rehashed dozens if not hundreds of times over the internet); you already know that you'd be losing a lot of potential income. It's obvious to everyone, even you, except when you are standing there in front of that window gawking at with your fingers inching towards your wallet. Just keep this in mind the next time you go shopping (or leave your wallet at home!).
~hhh.cubed ^_^
So say you're walking down the plaza (or nowadays, outdoor strip malls) and you pass by a store with something shiny in the window. You glance back, and it's the
Okay, so right now you have two (and ONLY two) choices: buy it now, or don't. It's that simple, you can purchase said item right then and there -- this is what we call an "impulse buy" -- or you can fight off the urge and just keep walking. We've all been in this position before, and most of us are guilty of executing the impulse buy at least a couple of times in our life, especially right after we just got our paycheck, or bonus, or support payment, or
Well I'm here to tell you to try to nip that practice in the
If you're reading this and your name just so happens to be Donald Trump, then stop reading. Make that impulse buy, and props for keeping that American flag flying despite your cowardly, greedy HOA. For the rest of us mortals, let's think about it. I usually stop and take 10 deep breaths before I even BEGIN to make a decision, and once I'm ready the thought process looks like this:
1.) Do I need it?
2.) Do I really need it?
3.) Do I really, really, REALLY need it?
4.) Will my wife/husband/child/cat be upset if I buy it?
5.) [and here's the most important question of all] How much potential interest from investments am I losing if I buy it?
Notice a trend, here? Anything short of rent, food, water, electricity, and gas is for the most part NOT a necessity, and the longer you can hold off on buying it the more you can earn in the long run. Ask yourself if you even need it, and whether or not you'll be enjoying it a year from now, much less a week from now!
The overall question to ask is if you even need it, but should the answer be 'yes' then an equally important question to ask is "when?" If you can live without it until at least your next monthly billing cycle, then that's already a good first step; delaying it a few weeks at least removes the "impulse" factor from the decision, since it's now a "scheduled buy", and you can go ahead and put the money you would've spent into a savings account. The next question to ask is "how long can I live without it?" If the answer is "quite a wihle" then you should either reconsider your need for it, or maybe schedule it as a sort of reward down the line for hitting a major mile marker or accomplishing a goal.
I won't go into the details of how much potential earnings you'd lose if you made the impulse purchase instead of investing it (it has been rehashed dozens if not hundreds of times over the internet); you already know that you'd be losing a lot of potential income. It's obvious to everyone, even you, except when you are standing there in front of that window gawking at
~hhh.cubed ^_^
Monday, March 3, 2008
Buying your way down
To followup with my last (depressing) post concerning economy/market slowdowns (which followed what I would call an optimistic post on investment strategy), it would seem like I've got my head in a bind. What's that, is he going slightly mad (no offense, Freddie)? Surely he must be confused, you all exclaim...!
Let me clarify my actual reasoning (and reassure everyone I'm not bound for the half-way house... yet): invest a bit now in commodities that look reasonably priced. Companies like IBM, Intel, and Nokia aren't going anywhere except up in the long-term. They're so undervalued right now that they look like a steal. And yes, while they may take a few hits for the worse in the short-term, in the long-term you'll be glad you took the plunge. That being said, all things in life are a gamble, so keep some extra cash handy to hedge your bets (bonus points if you literally are hedging with options) so you can buy your way down, or worst-case-scenario liquidate the doomed commodity and help pump dinero into a saving fund or ETF.
~hhh.cubed ^_^
Let me clarify my actual reasoning (and reassure everyone I'm not bound for the half-way house... yet): invest a bit now in commodities that look reasonably priced. Companies like IBM, Intel, and Nokia aren't going anywhere except up in the long-term. They're so undervalued right now that they look like a steal. And yes, while they may take a few hits for the worse in the short-term, in the long-term you'll be glad you took the plunge. That being said, all things in life are a gamble, so keep some extra cash handy to hedge your bets (bonus points if you literally are hedging with options) so you can buy your way down, or worst-case-scenario liquidate the doomed commodity and help pump dinero into a saving fund or ETF.
~hhh.cubed ^_^
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