The House Hunting Saga Continues...And It Isn't Good News

This morning we met with our realtor to make an offer on house #6.  The fact that we had needed to make offers on six houses should have been a sign that we probably weren't supposed to buy a house right now.  Anyway, because she couldn't get a hold of our lender and get a pre-approval letter which needed to be submitted with the offer, our realtor suggested that we talk to their in-house lender and see if he could give us a pre-approval letter.
After wading through our documents and crunching numbers and running a credit check he said he had good news and bad news.  The good news is that we are pre-qualified for "however much we want" according to him (around $250,000 based on our income) but the bad news is that we had a late payment on our mortgage in February and won't be able to get a mortgage loan until twelve months after that late payment.  That means we can't even make an offer on a house until MARCH!  Hubby is not happy. I'm not happy with the previous lender who should have known this.
We figured out that the mortgage payment on our previous house showed up as late because it was due on February 1st but we thought that since the house was sold then and would close on the 9th, we didn't need to send the payment as the loan would be paid in full just a week later.  Wrong thinking however, as this showed up on our credit report as a late payment. Ayayay
So hubby is irked as he is really tired of traveling and wants to buy a place and settle down immediately and I just feel sorry for our realtor who has shown us dozens of houses all for naught.  Surprisingly I am not angry or disappointed about having to wait.  Although I am not religious, I am pretty spiritual and figure that God puts us where we are supposed to be so if we aren't supposed to be in our own house until early summer then that's that.
Now our options are wide open for four months.  We may choose to rent a place in Las Vegas or hubby's cousin said we can continue to stay with her as long as we want (free of charge which is a good price but I would feel like we are imposing if we end up staying there for seven months!) or we can go back to Atlanta for a few months or we can visit the family in Connecticut (that idea got a big fat NO from hubby who is decidedly averse to snow and cold) or we can go back to the Philippines for a few months (technically a cheap place to live however with a huge extended family there it can get downright expensive)...or? I guess we will need to decide something soon.  Ideally hubby would win a big poker tournament and we would be able to pay cash for a place but I'm not holding my breath on that one...
I am also a bit relieved, however, that we are in a holding pattern.  With each house that we had made an offer on, the price kept rising as we were coming under the "bigger is better" and "gotta have it now" spell.  You may have experienced this as well...if a two bedroom, 1000 square foot home is good, then a three bedroom, 1400 square foot is better and it is "just five thousand dollars more."  Unfortunately I have done this with cars a number of times (your basic $15,000 new car is nice but for $20,000 I can get this much better car) so before we know it we have exceeded our budget and bought something much bigger and more expensive than we wanted when we started out.  In fact, we had started our house buying journey with a $50,000 offer on a condo and were up to $90,000 on the last house. Yikes. 
And even though we would qualify for a much bigger home loan, our goal when we started this process was to have a tiny house (so we wouldn't have to go back and buy all of the stuff we had sold at the beginning of the year to furnish it) and a tiny house payment (we are aiming for around $500 a month total, less than 20% of our income).  We have done the "house payment takes nearly 60% of our income" thing and that was stressful, stupid, and irresponsible...but I can see how people can easily fall into that trap if they keep seeing bigger and better houses.
So now...we wait.
Sorry about the long rant, I do feel much better now after writing all of this.
Also, Happy Halloween!!!!  Be safe out there with your kids.
Also (to prove that my luck isn't horrible horrible) just before I got to the library where I am writing this post there was a huge head on accident two cars ahead of me on the road.  This has happened to me a couple of times before and it is totally freaky.  I hope the people in the wreck are OK.  Life is very unpredictable.

I'm Psyched for My Money Challenge!

Starting on Tuesday (November 1st) I have challenged myself to earn $1000 during the month of November.  This is what I have done as a way to get a jump start on my challenge:

• When I sent the monthly invoice to one of my clients for keeping her website updated, I mentioned that it was starting to look a little dated and for $200 I could update the layout so it would look more modern.  I haven't heard back yet but hopefully she will take me up on the offer.
• I browsed Kickstarter yesterday.  They let you do fundraising campaigns for all kinds of arts projects as well as for writing. I am amazed at how much money other people have been able to raise for their projects this way!  I may do a campaign for the non fiction book I want to write.
• I am trying to build up the courage to sell bottled water on the Las Vegas Strip next week.  The weather should be pretty warm and it seems fairly simple--we have a cooler and I can buy some ice and bottled water then make about $20 per case that I sell.  Hubby thinks I might get arrested.  I think I may die of embarrassment (I'm kind of shy and not the outgoing type of sales personality that would make someone successful at such an endeavour).
• I'm starting my money challenge with $40.  Hubby won about $800 at poker the other day and gave me $100 (which I think is more than fair as he has been paying all of the bills for nearly a year now).  I used $60 to pay for our cell phones for November (that is the only bill I pay each month) and now I have $40 left.  I think I will use this for the bottled water project then use the money I get from that project to buy pizzas to sell at the university.
• On a side note, also during the month of November, I am going to try to go all Paleo for a month.  My eating habits are now pretty atrocious and I can really feel the way all of the junk I have been eating is affecting my body so I need to try something else...like not having In N Out burger every other day. Yikes.

That's all of now, I hope you all have a wonderful Halloween!!

Eating Cheap in Las Vegas

We've been coming to Las Vegas for more than 20 years.  I sorely miss the days when there was super cheap food on every corner.  These days Las Vegas food seems to have gone "upscale" with prices to match!  While I try to eat breakfast everyday at the cousin's house and hubby will occasionally cook dinner for all of the cousins so he will also have something to eat, I'm not much of a fan of Filipino food so we end up eating out for most of our lunch and dinner meals.  Here's what we have been eating:

• Del Taco has a three tacos for $1.09 on Tuesdays.  Their tacos are pretty good.
• Tacos Mexico is a local place which has amazingly good tacos, just like the kind you would find on a street corner in Mexico, for only $1.09 (see picture above).  They also have a condiment bar where you can get free radishes, cucumbers, and carrots so I make a little free salad out of these items to go with my meal.
• Popeye's Chicken has a two pieces of chicken for 99 cents special on Tuesday so we usually eat chicken on Tuesdays.
• El Pollo Loco has tacos similar to the Tacos Mexico tacos only in the chicken variety for $1.19 each so we eat there pretty often as well (good thing I like Mexican food!).
• My favorite fast food place is Wendy's where I get a salad, baked potato, and chili (and pour the chili over the baked potato) for about $3.50.
• Hubby loves the choices of Filipino restaurants here in Las Vegas.  His favorite is Ito'y Sariling Atin which offers a complete breakfast for $2.99 (rice, soup, egg, meat choice, and coffee).  I eat this too occasionally.
• Hubby and I will sometimes go to Subway for a $5 foot long which we split because a whole sandwich is too much for either of us.  I pile it up with every salad type item there is and we end up with a pretty balanced meal.
• We ALWAYS have water to drink with our meals no matter which restaurant we go to (it's free and healthier for us than soda).
• I love dim sum so occasionally we will go to the Cathay House at the Palms or Ping Pang Pong at the Gold Coast casino for dim sum (about $10 for three or four orders of dim sum).
• We found a wonderful $7.99 steak dinner at the Ellis Island Casino and Brewery.  For only $7.99 you get a soup or salad, rolls, a GOOD steak, steamed vegies, baked potato, and a glass or beer or root beer.  Definitely one of the best deals we have found so far for nights when we feel like splurging. 
• Occasionally when we are tired of eating out we will go to the Super Walmart and put together a picnic as we walk through the grocery aisles and deli.
• Also occasionally we will feel like a burger so either hit up the dollar menu at Burger King or Jack in the Box or go to In and Out Burger which makes amazingly good (and cheap!) burgers.

On a side note, I can't wait until I have my own kitchen to cook and bake in!!  Eating out is fine but it gets old after a while!

50 Ways to Earn Extra Cash

Yesterday I was all fired up about my November "Earn $1000" challenge.  So I got right to work thinking of ways I could bring in that extra cash.  There are some things I can't do (sell my blood or eggs) and some things I won't do (anything illegal or immoral) but that still leaves lots of good ideas for bringing in a little extra money.  Here's my list:

1. Write ten articles for Freelance Switch (I have written for them before; they pay $50 per article)
2. Write ten articles for Dollar Stretcher (I have written for them before and made around $70 per article)
3. Charge for nails site (I made a simple website for a business but haven't charged them since; I should at least charge them for the hosting fee)
4. Put independent ads on one of my websites (I have a website that gets 1000+ visitors a day but I have yet to monetize it other than Adsense)
5. Create a better web design and put more ads on one of my websites (Ditto)
6. Do a kickstarter campaign (I still need to look into this to see if it would work)
7. Monetize all blogs (I haven't done a very good job of this)
8. Swap meet stall x 12 days (This would be expensive to get started and I don't know what my product would be)
9. Help people at storage unit (I noticed when we were moving our stuff into the storage unit other people looked like they would need help moving stuff in and out; I may give my name and number to the lady that runs the facility and for $15 or $20 an hour I could help people that needed it there)
10. Redesign NWR site (I may propose a website redesign to one of my clients and charge them, of course)
11. Get percentage of donations for IAC (I could do some fundraising work for my former non profit and make a deal to keep a small percent of the money raised)
12. Flyers to do immigration paperwork (I have done a lot of immigration paperwork in the past and thought about putting up flyers to help people apply for citizenship for a small charge)  (*I just found out that this is now illegal on the federal level as well as the state level.  Although I haven't done immigration forms since we started traveling last winter, it is too bad that people will now hove to pay exorbitant prices for attorneys to fill out simple USCIS forms for them!  http://blog.uscis.gov/2011/06/uscis-initiative-to-combat-unauthorized.html )
13. Write novel and get it published or publish myself (I have a novel that is about 75% finished, if I get busy on it maybe I could get it published and make some money from it)
14. Write ebook and sell online (I have considered writing an ebook to sell on the website that has 1000+ visitors a day as a way to help monetize the site)
15. Sell bottled water (I read this idea somewhere and thought what better place to fill a cooler with bottled water and ice then walk down The Strip and sell it--it's hot out there and water is expensive on The Strip!)
16. Do some craigslist gigs (I like doing short time gigs but I looked at the Vegas CraigsList gigs and most of it looked like porn stuff :0   )
17. Be a Las Vegas tour guide (I could definitely pick people up from the airport and give them a quick tour of the area for a fee)
18. Hold a sign on the corner and dance (I see these people holding signs for stores on the corner all the time and figured I could do that as well...but it is still kind of hot outside).
19. Sell ad space on our car (I'm not sure if this is done here but in other places businesses pay people to put their advertising on their cars)
20. Perform on the street (There are a lot of street performers in the Freemont area...and they seem to make money doing this...hmmm)
21. Do online surveys (I have read numerous posts about doing this, I believe it isn't much per survey but you can make like $50 a day doing this)
22. Online: elance, mechanical turk, demand studios, associated content (all of these places have simple freelance work that they may a minimal amount for)
23. Niche blog on Filipino cooking (hubby is an excellent Filipino food cook; I may start a blog with videos posted on YouTube which could be monetized)
24. 1000 places WA book/blog (A friend and I talked about doing a book/blog about Washington; we may still do this)
25. Set up remail office/co-work space (I am fascinated with the co-work idea but it would cost a lot of money to get this going)
26. Sell baked goods (I love to bake but I would need to find a commercial kitchen and a place to sell the items)
27. Gamble (we are in Las Vegas after all and I am a pretty good pai gow player but of course income from this isn't guaranteed)
28. Day trading (people do make money day trading but I'm not sure how well I would do with this)
29. Make vanity websites
30. Teach a class (on what I'm not sure)
31. Computer set up (I am always the one people call to set up their new computers and/or fix their computer problems so I could probably do this for money)
32. Las Vegas day trips (hubby and I like to go find new experiences around Las Vegas each day, maybe we can include paying customers on our adventures)
33. Buy stuff to resell on etsy or ebay or craigslist (some people--hi blogger friends!--are great at doing this and it looks interesting but I'm not sure how I would do at this)
34. Wear a sign and walk the strip (again, instead of using the car to show off advertising for a business, I could wear a sandwich board and walk The Strip)
35. Sell one of my websites (the one that gets 1000+ visitors a day)
36. Youtube videos of hubby cooking (some people make money from just their YouTube videos and don't even need a blog with it; I want to find out how this is done and make hubby a cooking star!)
37. Resumes in 10 minutes (another idea for my booth at the swap meet; now I write resumes for free for anyone who asks)
38. Sell pizza at UNLV or Nellis barracks (college students and guys in the military are usually hungry, when I was in college I would buy a bunch of $5 pizzas then sell them at the university for $10)
39. Work concessions at National Finals Rodeo (there are so many concessionaires at UNLV and the convention center during big events that this might be an interesting part time job)
40. Do extreme couponing then sell stuff at the swap meet (if I can buy stuff really cheap I could resell it at the swap meet for a profit)
41. Save frap money (hubby gives me $5 a day for Starbucks, I could save this money and end up with$150!)
42. Sell laptop and netbook (I have these two items in our storage shed that I don't need any more, I may try selling them even though they probably won't bring in much money)
43. Ask people to give me money (every day I pass people on the street begging for money, I guess I could do this as well)
44. Set up a social media campaign for a business (some businesses want to get into social media but don't know how. I could help them)
45. Be about.com guide (I saw where about.com hires people to write for certain sections and they get paid about $700 a month for part time work)
46. 101 things to do in Vegas tumblr with seo (some websites on a narrowly focused topic draw lots of hits, and therefore more ad money, so I may do this)
47. Run errands for seniors (there are A LOT of seniors in Las Vegas so I thought about setting up an errand service for them)
48. Holiday work at the mall (stores at the malls are hiring for holiday help so I may apply)
49. Be an online juror for e-juries or trialjuries.com (I just learned about this last night and I love court cases plus you get paid to do this. Fun!)
50. Shop for people (there may be a market for people to do other people's Christmas shopping for them)

That was all I could come up with.  I may do one, some, or all of these idea during the course of next month in order to make my $1000.

My November 'Make $1000 Challenge'

I was going to do the NaNoWriMo challenge in November (I still may, I haven't decided yet).  Then I was going to challenge myself to have 30 new experiences in Las Vegas during the month of November (can you tell I like challenges?).  And then I decided that I need some money because hopefully by early December we will be moving into our new place and will need to furnish it.  I am also dying for a new laptop, camera, and android phone.  Plus Christmas is coming up (yikes!).  So some extra money would come in handy right about now.
I haven't earned much money since somewhere around January and it is a disconcerting feeling when I can't even buy a $100 item because I have no idea where that $100 will come from (in my previous life as a money-earning person, a $100 purchase was nothing now it is a Very. Big. Deal.). 
So my challenge to myself (and you if you are so inclined to join me) is to make $1000 during the month of November.
Currently I have no idea how I will do this as selling things is out (I have nothing left to sell), earning it via overtime at a job is out (I have no job), and stripping or something equally nefarious--we are in Las Vegas after all--is out (they would pay me to get OFF the stage...).  But some how I am going to earn me $1000 by the end of November...I just don't know how yet.  Of course I will post on this blog each day my success (or lack thereof) and hopefully give you some ideas that you can use to make some extra money as well.

Links...Mostly for Writers

Since almost all of you who read this are also writers, I thought these links might be helpful

• NaNoWriMo (national novel writing month starts in nine days!)
• How to Write an E-book in 30 Days
• Janet Fitch's 10 Rules for Writers
• AllTop (my favorite aggregator):  Writing    Blogging
• And, not writing related,...How to Get Stuff for Free

An Update...Houses, Writing, and Oprah...Oh My!

I'm going to have to start labeling these posts Monday Update, Tuesday Update, etc because it seems I don't write much content of substance lately, just quick updates whenever I have the opportunity.  Here's what I've been up to lately...

• We will make an offer on home #5 today.  I swear we have looked at dozens and dozens of properties but it is like swimming with the sharks--we make an offer and an investor (and there are LOTS of investors looking at cheap Vegas property these days) swoops in and makes a slightly higher but all cash offer and "poof" our deal is off the table.  The property we have settled on is one that we looked at three times so hubby figures that is the one we were probably meant to have.  There's an equal number of positives (big bedrooms, really clean, high ceilings, great parking, granite counter tops) and negatives (further from the Strip, weirdly shaped living room, near a busy road) but I think we can live with the negatives because we don't plan to live there very long, maybe a few years until prices rise then we can sell it for a profit and move to something better if we decide to stay in Las Vegas.  If nothing else it is super cheap ($70k) so we could always use it for a rental.  We'll see what happens. I won't believe we have actually got a house here until the moving van pulls up and we unload all of our stuff!
• I am loving all there is to do in Las Vegas.  Yesterday I went to a Ron Paul Rally (I love Ron Paul!) which was exciting.  This weekend we are going to the national police K-9 trials (which is free) and we may spring for the $20 tickets to the national Pro Bull Rider finals which will be here next weekend.  We have found an awesome $7.99 complete steak dinner special, have enjoyed lots of free buffets compliments of hubby's poker playing, and relatives come and go from this city like it is next door to where they live instead of across the country so we have been seeing lots of people we haven't seen in ages which has been fun.
• I still need to make some money.  I haven't really needed money since we have been traveling and there is nothing to buy that we can take with us but now there are a few material items I would like but simply don't have the money for so unless I get some sort of income coming in, I will be relegated to enjoying all of the old stuff I have been carting around in my backpack for almost a year.  I have an idea for a business which I may start here.  A job would be a last resort.
• Speaking of money, I have started working on my book again.  I was going full force on it last year but got lazy and didn't look at it for months.  Then I thought about the whole process of getting it published and again, got kind of demoralized.  Then I read about this girl and it looks like there may be a light at the end of the tunnel.  Plus it seems like every time I turn on the TV Oprah is on there saying "find your calling!" and I know that writing is my calling but I just wish it was something else.
• Speaking of money and writing...the internet hasn't been very agreeable with my computer at the place we are staying so each day when hubby goes to play poker I usually go to a nearby library (or a closed Starbucks in the back of the Rio where I can sit and use their wi fi for free) and get all of my online stuff done.  It's kind of odd because I have had internet at my home for years as well as in most of the places we have been staying since we started traveling but by doing it this way, not only am I getting free internet and a nice place to concentrate to do my webs and blogs, but when we get home in the evening I am more or less forced to work on my book because I don't have internet accessable to kill time with.  I am seriously thinking about not having internet at our new house (or cable TV for that matter, I just want to get a digital TV converter box for the basic stations).  Not only will this save us money but I will get a lot more work done this way! 

5 Things That Save Us the Most Money While Traveling

I got to thinking about how much money we have saved while traveling over the past year and there are a handful of ways that consistently seem to save us money (both while traveling and while staying put for a while in one place):

1. Cheap food.  We often seek out the cheapest places to eat, from hole in the wall taco shops to the Dollar Menu at fast food places (my favorite is a baked potato covered with a small bowl of chili at Wendys).  We also tend to cook cheap food at the places we are staying (soups, stews, beans and rice Mexican dishes, etc).  If we do go fancy and eat prime rib, you can bet it is from a free comp at the casino.
2. Traveling light.  We each travel with one suitcase that we can carry on to airplanes.  Not only does this save us the checked baggage fee each time we fly but it really limits the amount of clothes we have (this means we hardly ever shop for clothes--why didn't I learn this thousands of dollars ago when I had to have nearly a whole new wardrobe each season??).
3. Free and cheap entertainment.  The good thing about traveling is that everything is new to us when we get to different cities so we don't run out of "new" places to see.  Since we are holding tight to our money, however, the entertainment options that we find have to be both interesting AND cheap (preferably free).
4. Finding the lowest prices on...everything.  I used to be pretty set in my ways. I HAD to have high speed internet at home, I HAD to go to a certain hair salon, I HAD to shop at the department stores my friends went to...  These days, especially when we are in an unfamiliar area, we are happy to just find things that we need.  So far we have found free internet (at lots of places), cheap hair salons (I paid around $2 for a haircut in the Philippines), and have currently rigged up our clothes on cheap-o racks we found at a thrift store (since the set up is temporary and we just wanted to get our clothes out of our suitcases, we got some cheap-o book racks out of our storage unit and organized our clothes on these...no need buying new racks they may or may not be workable in our new house).
5. Using coupons.  Whenever possible we try to use coupons and discounts at the places we go.  We have found these everywhere including: the local newspaper, online, advertised in the window of the business, through Living Social and Groupon, via word of mouth from friends and relatives who live in the area, on the back of receipts from local businesses, etc.

(Yet Another) Update on What We are Doing

It's been a super busy week.  A week ago yesterday we arrived in Las Vegas. Here's what's been happening:

• The house situation.  As soon as we got the moving van unpacked and our stuff put into storage (literally...like a half hour later) we started looking for a place to buy.  We looked at about ten places and we found a condo that hubby totally loved so we made an offer on it.  The next day the seller came back with a counter offer which we agreed to.  Then the next day the seller gave us another counter offer (?) basically asking for a quick appraisal that we would pay for (the place was priced kind of high and I didn't even think it would appraise out at that price so I asked that if the seller was so confident in his price that HE pay for the appraisal and we would reimburse him when financing was complete OR he could agree to come down to the appraised price if it came in lower than the asking price).  Seller didn't like that so we rejected the deal.  We looked some more places and found a house that I totally loved so we made an offer.  It is a short sale which should strike fear into the heart of a buyer but since this is the first short sale we have made an offer on we are just in limbo for up to a month until the bank decides whether they want to sell it to us (we offered the asking price but then I heard that banks will offer short sales at super low prices then come back with a higher sale price once they know that someone is interested in the property).  tl;dr: buying a house in Las Vegas is a nightmare.
• The travel situation.  We were scheduled to have made a firm offer on a house then go to Connecticut on Tuesday evening.  We are still in Las Vegas.  We figured that with the housing situation up in the air, the last thing we should do is go 3,000 miles away.  That's what we did last time when we went back to Seattle then the deal fell through and we were too far away to look for another property until we came back to Las Vegas.  So that was $325 down the drain (the cost to change the tickets would have been over $300 just for the change fee). tl;dr: Airline costs are a nightmare too!
• Living in Las Vegas.  We are enjoying Las Vegas although we are still in a tenuous position here.  We are staying with a cousin who said we are welcome as long as we want to stay but we would still be happier with our own place.  We are enjoying finding all of the free and cheap things to do in Las Vegas, enjoying the weather (high 80s today!!), enjoying the food, and hubby is a happy camper at the poker tables.  Las Vegas is overall awesome!
• I need money.  Although we are getting by fine on hubby's income, I still feel like I need to make some money.  When we get the house I am sure I will want to decorate it (and probably do some home improvement projects too) and we have also been talking about going back to the Philippines next fall which will be a huge expense (everyone there is getting old and we don't want to wait too long to see them again).  Of course we will need cash for all of these things since we don't use credit so I need to get me some cash.  I have looked at the job ads and it is my usual response to job ads (ick! blah!) since I am not one to like a 9-5 job (which is why I have been self employed most of my life).  So I need to get busy setting up a business.  And I would really like to write a book.  Maybe a business around a book? 

That's about all that is happening so far.  My fingers are crossed that we get the beautiful house that I love!

p.s. Each day we try to explore something new--a restaurant, a place, a casino, an event, etc.  Today we went to check out the (free) conservatory at the Bellagio Casino. The photo above is of a grass horse which is part of their fall display.

10 Ways We Are Saving Money in Las Vegas

We have been in Las Vegas for almost a week, and of course my miserly tendencies are taking over.  Here's ten ways we have been saving money in Las Vegas:

1. We are staying with a relative here while we are waiting to buy our new home.  We often do this when we are traveling--stay with friends and family--because it saves a boatload of money over paying for a hotel!
2. We go out in the late morning and don't come back until early evening.  In other words, we plan our day and then go around and do the things we want to do (eat, hubby plays poker, shop, meet with the realtor, etc) instead of making many trips back and forth to home.  When we schedule a circuit of all of our tasks for the day we are able to save gas (oddly enough we haven't had to fill up the gas tank since we got here even though we are out every day, unlike in Seattle where we fill up twice a week sometimes.  Hubby says it's because the terrain is flat here instead of very hilly and the city is actually pretty small, size-wise, so we don't drive as far to get to places as in Seattle.  So maybe the money tip here is to move to a flat place in order to save gas?!).
3. We are eagerly seeking out the best--and cheapest!--places to eat out when we don't cook at home.  So far we only eat breakfast at home then lunch and dinner out.  We have found a wonderful Filipino restaurant which serves a huge lunch for $3.99 (both of us share this) and a taco place with amazingly good Mexican-style tacos for $1.09 each (two is plenty for each of us). 
4. Hubby is a poker player (fortunately when he loses it isn't too much and also fortunately, he usually wins or comes out even) and one of the things with playing poker is that the casinos "comp" people who play any of the games there.  In the last five days hubby has received free: two dinner buffets, two seafood buffets, and $20 for use in the casino's (amazing) Chinese restaurant. So besides utilizing comps, we have been checking to see what casinos comp the best.
5. I bought an aluminum water bottle and some green tea today and my goal is to make my own beverage at home before we leave and drink it throughout the day.  While I am pretty much a Starbucks addict, the casino's Starbucks charge over $5 per drink!  That's way too much so I am hoping to break my Starbucks habit ASAP.
6. I have been researching free and cheap things to do for entertainment in Las Vegas (and there are PLENTY of things to do here).  Last night we went and watched the Freemont Experience (a video/music presentation on the cover between the buildings downtown) which was free.  Later this week we will do the Ethel M candy factory and cactus garden tour which is free (and includes free samples!!!).  There is supposed to be a beautiful botanical garden at the Bellagio which is free which we will visit sometime.  Also, while I watched one matinee movie while hubby was playing (it was still $8 which is expensive for a movie) we found a theater that shows all movies for $1.50 which we will definitely check out.
7. Exercise is free here.  We have been doing so much walking that I can't see why anyone would need to go to a gym.  There is plenty to see, the weather is perfect for walking (plus you can walk miles in the casinos), and when you get bored walking one place, there is always somewhere else to go.
8. There are about a million places to shop here.  Every store you have ever heard of, not one but two premium outlet malls, each large casino has a shopping plaza...yikes.  So I am staying away from shopping as much as possible and have only hit Walmart for necessities and the LeSportsac outlet because I couldn't resist getting a new (but 65% off!) discount bag.
9. As soon as we get an address here we will get local ID (Las Vegas driver's licenses).  We found out that locals get lots of cheap deals on attractions and meals that tourists have to pay much more for.  Hubby's cousins have this down to a science and can tell you every discount for locals in the entire Las Vegas Valley.
10. Since we haven't moved yet, we have been doing some window shopping (instead of real shopping which saves lots of money and besides, we don't have any more space to store any new purchases).  Today we made an offer on a two bed, two bath condo (we were looking at bigger houses but want to refrain from buying big again which requires bigger energy bills) and we both decided that sparse furnishings are the way to go.  Finally...we agree on something!  We will furnish the new place with what we have and fill in the holes as we go with sale/discount/thrift store items.  We don't want to end up like last time with a house full of stuff that, should we want to sell it, won't bring more than 10 cents on the dollar.

Of course I will make it my goal to find more and more cheap ways to live here (unless I want to go back to work which mostly I don't want to do unless I find something interesting to do).  Also, on the way here I dropped my $200+ Canon digital camera and something inside broke because every photo after that had a big glob right in the middle of the picture so instead of getting something similar I went for the cheapest camera I could find (a $99 Casio Exilim) which I am happy to report still takes good pictures (like the one at the top of this post).
p.s. I have started (yet another) blog to record all of my "living in Las Vegas" stuff so my travel blog doesn't become a Las Vegas blog.  You can find it here.

Seven Things

Obviously I am way way behind on my reading but I came across this blog post at Making Sense of Cents and thought I would add to the collection of posts on this topic.
The idea is to list seven things you can't give up, seven things you could give up, and seven things you have already given up.  Here's my list:

Seven Things I Can't Give Up

1. Internet access (the internet provides my income, social life, education, etc).
2. Starbucks (I've tried!  I can't!).
3. Tithing (this is something I am compelled to do every month).
4. Reading (I am a voracious reader...at least I get free books at the library and online).
5. The hubby (we are like Siamese twins, always together and we like it that way).
6. My cell phone (it, like the internet, is my only connection to the outside world).
7. Helping people (it's just what I do).

Seven Things I Could Give Up

1. Eating out (we don't eat out as much as we used to and now only eat out for convenience but I can certainly do without it).
2. The dryer (now that we are in Las Vegas, I really should try hanging clothes outside to save money. I'm lazy though).
3. Facebook (I use it to keep up with what family is doing but it is inane and a waste of time).
4. Nail polish (it's a hassle keeping my nails looking nice now that I do it myself...maybe I will just go with the natural look).
5. Traveling so much (hopefully we will get a place and settle down soon; I am looking for a happy medium between staying home and traveling).
6. The need to feel responsible for everyone and everything (it's a bad habit).
7. Wheat and dairy and chocolate (I waver back and forth between a good diet and a not so good diet; I have given these items up in the past but keep going back to them).

Seven Things I Have Already Given Up

1. My car (we are now a one car family and it saves us a TON of money).
2. Credit cards (ditto).
3. A home (we have been "homeless" since February and traveling.  I never thought it would be possible to give up the security of a home but we did and it isn't so bad).
4. Designer everything.  I used to have to have a new (designer) outfit every time we went to the club.  I loved designer purses, designer shoes, designer home decor...basically if there was something to boost my ego and spend a lot of money on at the same time I was there.  I'm not there any more and it isn't as traumatic a change as I thought it would be.
5. A job.  At the beginning of this year things kind of culminated in me not having a job for the first time since I was 16.  For some reason I seem to have more money now than those days when I would panic nearly every day about how much my check would be, what would happen if I lost my job, how I could stand one more day with a hideous co worker, etc.
6. Friends.  It's odd but when you don't have a home and job, you don't have a lot of "built in" friends.  I have a handful of very good friends and that's it, not dozens and dozens of work and neighborhood-related friends who were more friends out of convenience than anything else.
7. Spending money I didn't have (including credit cards, loans from friends, overdrawing my bank account, etc).

Past Good Deeds Can Really Pay Off!

Since the house finding in Las Vegas is taking longer than expected--it would go faster if people would quit beating us to putting in their bids on the houses WE want--we may end up cancelling our trip to Connecticut and just stay here in Las Vegas until we end up with an actual house to move in to. 
Yesterday the hubby asked his cousin if she would mind if we stayed with her for another week or so until we find an apartment to rent for a few months and she said she wouldn't hear of it--until we move into our house we are staying with her.  He of course thanked her and apologized for the inconvenience but she said "you remember those years ago when April helped me out?  This won't even come close to paying her back."  Wow.  I didn't even remember being much help to her but I did help her out during her divorce (some 20 years ago...which I had totally forgot about) and she stayed at our house for a couple of months while she was getting back on her feet (something else I had totally forgot about).
And then it dawned on me that everyone we have stayed with this past year had mentioned something similar to us.  Hubby's sister commented on how he had helped put her through college (40 years ago! Hubby can barely remember last month so he didn't even remember this), his cousin that we stayed with in Seattle mentioned how he and his family had stayed with us for a couple of months (again, many years ago) while their house was being built, and my friend in Japan mentioned the time she and a friend stayed at my house during her travels to the US and the time I met her in San Diego and took her around California to see the sites.
The odd thing is that I barely remembered these things and we certainly didn't expect to be "paid back" for doing any of these things.  Doing favors for people or helping people out when needed is something I learned as a kid from my mother and grandparents who were all very giving (even though they had very little to give).  Back then it was called 'being neighborly'.  So I guess the moral of this post is that while helping people out should be done willingly and without regard for any payback, the universe/karma is quite good about bringing the payback back around...even if it is many years later.  Wow.  Amazing.

Moving to Vegas...Here's How Much It Has Cost So Far

We are a week into our move to Las Vegas.  (Don't get me started on the fact that it has been raining since we got here...I'm from Seattle and expected much better weather!).  We have been looking at houses for two days and they are all becoming a blur but hopefully we will find something to make an offer on before we leave for Connecticut next week.  Here's how much our move cost:

• First, and pretty importantly, hubby has a bunch of cousins here so we have a place to stay for free while we are shopping for a house.
• We rented a 15' Budget rental truck and car carrier for the move.  Doing it ourselves was much cheaper than hiring a moving company.  I also checked the rates for U Haul and PODS but both were more expensive (note: PODS would have cost about the same but we would have still had to drive our car down so the cost for gas would have put the price higher than doing it the way we did).  Cost for the truck: $972.02.  Cost for the gas: $599.26.  Cost for the hotel (we drove the whole distance in two days, stopping overnight at Motel 6 after 14 HOURS of driving on the first day): $44.70.
• We loaded all of our stuff from our storage shed into the truck ourselves with the help of a couple of (very nice) friends.  We had some unused restaurant gift certificates for some nice restaurants in Seattle so we gave them these as payment.
• When we got to Las Vegas, a cousin referred us to the storage company she uses so we got our first month free.  The cost of the storage shed (10x10) is $75 a month which is $20 more than we were paying in our old location but it is bigger and it is air conditioned so I guess that's why it cost more.  Hopefully we will be able to close the house sale within two months so that would be $75 for two months!
• Hubby and I unpacked the moving truck ourselves and loaded the stuff into the storage shed (it took A LOT of work!).  Hubby keeps reminding me he is 62 and shouldn't be doing this but we were too cheap to go find some day laborers to do the job for us so slowly but surely we eventually got the truck unloaded. 
• We have been cooking at home so this is saving some money but it is hard to eat all three meals at home while we are guests.  I think when we move to our new place I will eat at home for a solid month since this is something I miss because of traveling so much.

So that's the cost of our move so far.  A cheaper way to move would have been to sell everything and drive down with people found on CraigsList to share the cost of gas but the stuff we had in storage would cost much more than the $1700 that we have spent so far to replace once we get moved.
tl;dr  Moving is hard work and not cheap.

Checking In...And We Are Off to Vegas

It's been a whole week since I last posted!  Sorry, it's been a zoo around here so here's a quick update:

• We leave for Las Vegas tomorrow.  We will be picking up a truck from Budget Truck Rental (a lot cheaper than U Haul and way way cheaper than using PODS--which I would have preferred because it is a simple way to move--but we are saving money in every way possible so a semi-expensive rental truck and towing the car behind us is what we will do).  I am NOT looking forward to the 20 hour drive to Las Vegas, but then again, we are doing this as cheaply as possible...  Money lesson: expensive=comfortable. Cheap=uncomfortable.
• When we get to Las Vegas we will put our stuff in storage until we find a house to buy and the sale closes.  Fortunately the cousin we will be staying with in Las Vegas while we are looking for a house gave me the number to the storage unit place she uses so we will get our first month free and she will also get a free month for referring us.  That turned out well financially for everyone.  Money lesson: let people know if you need help with something and they may surprise you will what they come up with!
• As soon as we get the truck unloaded and returned we will be meeting up with the realtor and we will find a place to buy within a week (I hope, our tickets to Connecticut have us leaving Las Vegas a week after we arrive!).  The realtor has already sent us some great-looking listings so we are hopeful that we will find something.  Although we originally wanted a small condo, I think we will end up with a bigger house but that may work out OK because it sounds like we will have a lot of guests after we get settled.  Money lesson: thank goodness the houses in Las Vegas are super cheap and there are plenty to choose from!
• A week after we arrive in Las Vegas we will be heading to Connecticut to visit family and friends.  We were supposed to go there last spring but got side tracked with a longer-than-expected stay in Atlanta.  We don't have a return ticket because we don't know how fast the house will close so after a month or so in Connecticut, we may end up going to Atlanta until the house closes if it takes longer than expected.  I want to get out of Connecticut before it snows!  Money lesson: not really a lesson, but I hope we can find cheap tickets to get us to Atlanta and/or back to Las Vegas!
• Hubby just learned how to use FaceBook.  It is good because he can keep up with the kids and grandkids, it isn't so good because he asks me a million questions about it (usually while I am in the middle of proofreading documents or designing a website). Eeekkk  Money lesson: just like I try to be patient with money things, I need to be more patient with hubby!
• I really miss baking. I'm not sure why it just hit me but all of the sudden I want to bake.  I want to bake pizza and cookies and a cake and bread...  It isn't really convenient to bake where we are staying so I will just dream about my new kitchen and wait a couple of more months.  Money lesson: it is hard to cook for yourself while you are on the road.
• Finally, I kind of can't wait to move to Las Vegas and try some of the money saving things I learned in Japan.  For example, my friend always hangs her laundry outside to dry and never uses her dryer, she has an on-demand water heater which I want to find out about getting installed because it seems a much better (and cheaper) option than having a big tank of water that is kept continually hot.  Also, I want to look into solar power.  Las Vegas has a lot of sun so it just makes sense to use it to power our house if at all possible.  Money lesson: I'm going to try to be super frugal once we get settled.

I hope you are all doing well and will get back to reading your blogs as soon as possible!