Author Topic: Overheard at Work  (Read 13253425 times)

alewpanda

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20200 on: June 07, 2018, 09:31:31 PM »
A customer at our retail clothing store was talking about buying several items and hesitated, telling her friend something to the effect of "not wanting to spend too much money and having debt to pay off".

My coworking cheerily says "We will spend our whole lives in debt, so I just buy whatever the f-- I want!"

Customers laugh and agree.  Make their purchases.


I wanted so, so desperately to contradict my coworker....but in the moment I didn't even know how to respond.......

Hirondelle

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20201 on: June 07, 2018, 11:02:50 PM »
My coworker wants to move back to her old (HCOL) city as she misses her friends. This will mean a 2h+ one way commute, high travel costs that will only partially reimbursed and a $300 increase in rent!

Now I'm all for being close to family/friends, but there's not many wins in this one to me. She's only been here for a short time, I've only started to feel like I have friends around now which is the 7 month mark. I feel like she isn't even willing to try to build up a life here.

(no kids or partner involved, parents don't need care yet)

Linea_Norway

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20202 on: June 08, 2018, 01:44:34 AM »
My coworker wants to move back to her old (HCOL) city as she misses her friends. This will mean a 2h+ one way commute, high travel costs that will only partially reimbursed and a $300 increase in rent!

Now I'm all for being close to family/friends, but there's not many wins in this one to me. She's only been here for a short time, I've only started to feel like I have friends around now which is the 7 month mark. I feel like she isn't even willing to try to build up a life here.

(no kids or partner involved, parents don't need care yet)

Indeed, moving to a new place and given up within a year doesn't sound like trying very hard.

But I do think people are different. Some might need daily interaction with their friends, while others can cope with occasional contact. Otherwise she could just have visited them more often, that might have been a cheaper alternative.

Imma

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20203 on: June 08, 2018, 02:15:04 PM »
My coworker wants to move back to her old (HCOL) city as she misses her friends. This will mean a 2h+ one way commute, high travel costs that will only partially reimbursed and a $300 increase in rent!

Now I'm all for being close to family/friends, but there's not many wins in this one to me. She's only been here for a short time, I've only started to feel like I have friends around now which is the 7 month mark. I feel like she isn't even willing to try to build up a life here.

(no kids or partner involved, parents don't need care yet)

Indeed, moving to a new place and given up within a year doesn't sound like trying very hard.

But I do think people are different. Some might need daily interaction with their friends, while others can cope with occasional contact. Otherwise she could just have visited them more often, that might have been a cheaper alternative.

On one hand I know from experience that it takes a long time to properly settle somewhere, on the other hand I can imagine that sometimes you're just certain that you're never going to feel at home somewhere. I know I could never live in a place like Amsterdam. Just visiting kills me. I'm from a small town in the south and I guess I'm a small town girl through and through. On the other hand, I'm sure I could live in Hirondelle's city or the city I went to university.

A friend of mine is temporarily living around the corner for about a month and I get ridiculously happy that we can now meet spontaneously. In the nearly 10 years since I've left my hometown I've never had new friends that just turned up at my house like we used to do back home. It's only now that I realise how much I miss that.

talltexan

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20204 on: June 12, 2018, 08:43:12 AM »
When I was age 22, I budgeted about $5,000 for moving expenses from Texas to Illinois to start graduate school. At that time my net worth was about $10,000, not that I had ever thought of it like that. Looking at those numbers today, I'm embarrassed. At least I spent the next five years car-free!

Hula Hoop

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20205 on: June 12, 2018, 09:38:52 AM »
Coworker told me yesterday that she's on the South Beach Diet so she has to start cooking.  She's in her mid 50s, very overweight, single with no kids and apparently never learned how to cook. She previously complained to me that she was worried about ending up homeless in retirement due to her lack of retirement savings.  But I always saw her buying both breakfast and lunch in the cafeteria.  Apparently she was buying dinners too.

I had to explain to her how to cook steamed spinach.  She then told me that she didn't know how to cook any other vegetables either as previously she had just ordered them in restaurants.  Appaently the South Beach diet requires lots of steams veggies and grilled lean meats and she does not even know how to cook these so has to learn.

She told me that her mother was a SAHM and did all the cooking so none of the kids in the family had to learn how.  Sometimes I'm grateful that I was raised by a single mother who worked full time.  I was cooking dinner for me, my mother and my little sister at 13-14.




Just Joe

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20206 on: June 12, 2018, 10:46:02 AM »
With YouTube and "All Recipes" and the hundreds of thousands of free cooking websites/videos out there - none of us who can afford groceries have an excuse to eat badly at home. 

SpareChange

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20207 on: June 12, 2018, 11:20:42 AM »
Coworker. Late fifties. Great guy. Terrible with money, but he knows it. Bought a brand new fancy truck about 3 years ago. Told me the interest rate was 12%. Used it for his 40 minute commute. His wife drove a minicooper bought used. Fast forward to last year. Trades in his 2 year old truck for another brand new truck. Payments are over $600/mon. Also trades in his wife's minicooper, which was about to be paid off, for a brand new car (forget which model). Between payments, gas, and insurance alone, he's got to be shelling out over $1,000/mon just on the truck for basic transportation. Damn.

Just Joe

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20208 on: June 12, 2018, 12:41:02 PM »
Is your coworker complaining yet about not having the cash to go on vacation this summer?

FIRE@50

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20209 on: June 12, 2018, 12:46:58 PM »
With YouTube and "All Recipes" and the hundreds of thousands of free cooking websites/videos out there - none of us who can afford groceries have an excuse to eat badly at home.

I think I learned to cook by watching PBS. That is so old school.

o2bfree

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Just 7 more years
« Reply #20210 on: June 12, 2018, 02:04:36 PM »
A conversation with a coworker I haven't talked to in awhile started with a long intro about how her husband had to have an expensive new truck, so "mama got a new Honda". Then this:

She and her husband bought a house in Arizona. They like the weather better there, and are going to retire there. For now, they fly there a couple times a month to check up on the place and "recharge". How packing up, arranging pet care, and getting to and from airports for a 2-day trip can be recharging is beyond me. Let alone maintaining two homes.

Anyways, her husband really hates his job, but she told him "suck it up for 7 more years then we'll have the rest of our lives together". She's 57 and has had some potentially fatal health problems. Maybe they're holding out for Medicare, but it seems like a rather risky gamble time-wise when they probably could have managed their money differently and been retired now.

MgoSam

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Re: Just 7 more years
« Reply #20211 on: June 12, 2018, 02:21:16 PM »
they fly there a couple times a month to check up on the place and "recharge". How packing up, arranging pet care, and getting to and from airports for a 2-day trip can be recharging is beyond me. Let alone maintaining two homes.


Yikes! I have friends with a cabin and I do get envious that they get to go up seemingly anytime they want during warm weather days. It would be nice to get away. And then I realized the stress of having to maintain another home.

And with pets that would be even worse. I want to get a dog but can't due to my travel and work schedule (and many more reasons). I love how my cousin and other people are just like, "Bring it to doggie day dare." My cousin said that his place is "only $25 a day per dog." Yeah...no!


SupersavingMMM

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20212 on: June 12, 2018, 02:32:02 PM »
One of my favourite people at work, a genuinely lovely girl.

Complained about the cost of bottled water she had just bought and was drinking from.   We have a dispenser - chilled, free, all you can drink.

🤷🏼‍♀️

Gremlin

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Re: Just 7 more years
« Reply #20213 on: June 12, 2018, 05:12:20 PM »
Yikes! I have friends with a cabin and I do get envious that they get to go up seemingly anytime they want during warm weather days. It would be nice to get away. And then I realized the stress of having to maintain another home.


At one point before "enlightenment", Mrs Gremlin and I thought about buying a second place near the beach about an hour away.  We crunched the numbers and worked out that the cost of owning such a place would mean that we'd have to go there pretty much every weekend in order to come out ahead of doing a holiday let whenever we got the urge for a beach weekend away.  Needless to say, it very quickly became an easy decision not to buy!

Linea_Norway

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Re: Just 7 more years
« Reply #20214 on: June 13, 2018, 01:18:45 AM »
Yikes! I have friends with a cabin and I do get envious that they get to go up seemingly anytime they want during warm weather days. It would be nice to get away. And then I realized the stress of having to maintain another home.


At one point before "enlightenment", Mrs Gremlin and I thought about buying a second place near the beach about an hour away.  We crunched the numbers and worked out that the cost of owning such a place would mean that we'd have to go there pretty much every weekend in order to come out ahead of doing a holiday let whenever we got the urge for a beach weekend away.  Needless to say, it very quickly became an easy decision not to buy!

There has been a whole thread about whether having a cabin is a good idea. The conclusion is that the more simple the cabin is (off the grid, not garden, small), the cheaper it is and the least work to maintain. If the cabin becomes a second home, it is a lot of work and pricy.
We have a simple type of cabin, but with electricity and property tax on it and we pay approx 2000 USD a year for using it 30-40 days spread over the year. Not counting transportation cost.

Chris22

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Re: Just 7 more years
« Reply #20215 on: June 13, 2018, 07:42:49 AM »
Yikes! I have friends with a cabin and I do get envious that they get to go up seemingly anytime they want during warm weather days. It would be nice to get away. And then I realized the stress of having to maintain another home.


At one point before "enlightenment", Mrs Gremlin and I thought about buying a second place near the beach about an hour away.  We crunched the numbers and worked out that the cost of owning such a place would mean that we'd have to go there pretty much every weekend in order to come out ahead of doing a holiday let whenever we got the urge for a beach weekend away.  Needless to say, it very quickly became an easy decision not to buy!

There has been a whole thread about whether having a cabin is a good idea. The conclusion is that the more simple the cabin is (off the grid, not garden, small), the cheaper it is and the least work to maintain. If the cabin becomes a second home, it is a lot of work and pricy.
We have a simple type of cabin, but with electricity and property tax on it and we pay approx 2000 USD a year for using it 30-40 days spread over the year. Not counting transportation cost.

There's also other considerations.

For one, vacation property will not likely appreciate like the stock market, but it won't depreciate like a vacation (i.e. worth $0).  My wife's family has a cabin they bought in the 1980s for ~$100k in cash (plus probably another $100k over that time in property taxes), it's now worth ~$400k.  Yes, had they invested that money they'd have more than the $400k, but had they spent the same +/- $100k over the last 30 years renting it for $1k/wk 3x a year they'd have $0. 

Second, for a lot of people, a second home is a labor of love.  Hell, look at MMM, he loves to work with his hands, so much so that he basically retired to start a construction company.  It is not inconceivable that other people view the maintenance on their vacation home the same way; it's a project they can work on and they enjoy it.  Hell, my FIL basically invents work at his cabin so he can have stuff to work on up there because he can't just sit on the dock all day, he'd get bored; he's much happier working on the cabin. 

SpareChange

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20216 on: June 13, 2018, 09:19:12 AM »
Is your coworker complaining yet about not having the cash to go on vacation this summer?

Not yet. For a time he quit his job here last year to go to a place with a better work schedule. In the process he cashed out his 401k (about 80k), so I'm sure the tax bill was considerable. The place he went to ended up closing its doors 6 months later, and he ended up coming back here at reduced hours. He says he's got a ways to go on his mortgage as well. Wife is in mid sixties and works pt. He says she can't get SS, but might get a small pension.   

grandep

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20217 on: June 13, 2018, 04:08:00 PM »
Is your coworker complaining yet about not having the cash to go on vacation this summer?

Not yet. For a time he quit his job here last year to go to a place with a better work schedule. In the process he cashed out his 401k (about 80k), so I'm sure the tax bill was considerable. The place he went to ended up closing its doors 6 months later, and he ended up coming back here at reduced hours. He says he's got a ways to go on his mortgage as well. Wife is in mid sixties and works pt. He says she can't get SS, but might get a small pension.

Woof, cashing out an 80k 401k just to come back to the same job a year later? That's rough.

SpareChange

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20218 on: June 14, 2018, 12:28:46 AM »
Is your coworker complaining yet about not having the cash to go on vacation this summer?

Not yet. For a time he quit his job here last year to go to a place with a better work schedule. In the process he cashed out his 401k (about 80k), so I'm sure the tax bill was considerable. The place he went to ended up closing its doors 6 months later, and he ended up coming back here at reduced hours. He says he's got a ways to go on his mortgage as well. Wife is in mid sixties and works pt. He says she can't get SS, but might get a small pension.


Woof, cashing out an 80k 401k just to come back to the same job a year later? That's rough.

Yeah, and it was the only retirement he's got coming to him, other than SS. He'll be working quite a while longer. Unfortunately, he has some chronic health issues creeping in too.

Greenback Reproduction Specialist

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20219 on: June 14, 2018, 07:50:41 AM »
"First time it ever happened in baseball, they played it in slow motion and you can see it, they both went up for the ball and BOOM, both their crotches hit each others."

Lol WTF

Megma

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20220 on: June 14, 2018, 10:47:42 AM »
Overheard new CW tell other CW that she just called to setup the automatic contributions to her ROTH again, now that she is once again employed - all good.

The rep told her that her ROTH the money in her account hasn't been invested for the past 6(!) years, it's just being held in cash.

How have you not looked at any statement to notice that in the past 6 years? Wow.

katethekitcat

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20221 on: June 14, 2018, 10:54:47 AM »
Senior manager at my firm laughed in my face when I told him I want to retire by 45 (an extremely conservative estimate, but I knew he wouldn't believe anything earlier). Told me it was impossible, that markets often crashed, etc.

Over the next hour, conversation included showing pictures of his enormous pool, discussions of the new cars he regularly buys for family members, and complaining that a diamond he once bought for his wife turned out to be a fake and he then had to spend thousands MORE buying her a new (real) one.

Yeah, I couldn't have retired by 45 if I were him either.

Davnasty

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20222 on: June 14, 2018, 01:26:47 PM »
"First time it ever happened in baseball, they played it in slow motion and you can see it, they both went up for the ball and BOOM, both their crotches hit each others."

Lol WTF

Had to recall the name of this thread. This is appropriate. Also, I'm probably going to look for that video later.

ysette9

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20223 on: June 14, 2018, 02:30:58 PM »
Do you work at a junior high?

Feral Car Rescue

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20224 on: June 15, 2018, 03:53:52 PM »
So my company payroll system is a little weird starting out, such that it takes 3 weeks from your start date to receive your first paycheck (actually this has been standard at every company I've worked at, but several people I know say it's just the worst). But they tell you this up-front, plus they paid for all of your moving expenses, so I saved my paychecks from my previous job, and also used the cashout from my sick leave to hold me over til I got my next paycheck. It wasn't much, but it was enough to rent an apartment and drive me and my immediate family the 1800 miles to get to my new residence (I paid for us to have a Christmas trip, because I wasn't gonna be able to come home for the holidays), and buy food, etc.

Anyhoo. Was talking to a coworker at lunch, and somehow this awkward 3-week window of time came up. She and her husband didn't have a lot of money to come out here, so they had to use their credit card to make ends meet during that 3 week period. She mentioned she "wasn't allowed" to put any more on that card until she paid off what they had incurred during that 3 week period of time.

They moved here, to a LCOL area, 4 years ago... and their combined gross income is close to $150k...

firelight

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20225 on: June 15, 2018, 07:44:02 PM »
Wow! How much did they spend to move?

ysette9

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Overheard at Work
« Reply #20226 on: June 15, 2018, 07:55:49 PM »
When I was in undergrad I got a summer internship in another state. I drove out there, rented a room on Craigslist, and started working.
 It took the usual two weeks before a check got cut. A physical check went out for the first pay period. That got mailed to my parents’ house in my home state. They then had to mail it to me, and I had to then mail it to my bank in a third state (the dark days before mobile deposit). In all it was over a month before I saw any money and I was buying groceries on my credit card because I was a broke college student. That was the closest I’ve come to a bad situation. Thankfully I always had the privilege of knowing that if shit hit the fan, I could get my parents to loan me enough to keep myself fed. I also knew I never wanted to legitimately find myself in a position where I wasn’t sure whether I could buy groceries. Scary stuff.

Feral Car Rescue

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20227 on: June 15, 2018, 09:22:27 PM »
Wow! How much did they spend to move?
I was afraid to ask... And afraid of my response... I know moving can be expensive (The receipt that the moving company gave me for how much they charged my company was 26k!!!!) but as employees we weren't responsible for any of that, just hotel and gas to get to our work location, and even that was reimbursed a month or so after we started working. So this would be basic living expenses- apartment deposit, rent, groceries, maybe some housewares, etc. Totally get you might need to use a card that first month to take care of expenses before your paycheck hits, but 4 years?

auntie_betty

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Re: Just 7 more years
« Reply #20228 on: June 16, 2018, 03:33:29 PM »
Yikes! I have friends with a cabin and I do get envious that they get to go up seemingly anytime they want during warm weather days. It would be nice to get away. And then I realized the stress of having to maintain another home.


At one point before "enlightenment", Mrs Gremlin and I thought about buying a second place near the beach about an hour away.  We crunched the numbers and worked out that the cost of owning such a place would mean that we'd have to go there pretty much every weekend in order to come out ahead of doing a holiday let whenever we got the urge for a beach weekend away.  Needless to say, it very quickly became an easy decision not to buy!

There has been a whole thread about whether having a cabin is a good idea. The conclusion is that the more simple the cabin is (off the grid, not garden, small), the cheaper it is and the least work to maintain. If the cabin becomes a second home, it is a lot of work and pricy.
We have a simple type of cabin, but with electricity and property tax on it and we pay approx 2000 USD a year for using it 30-40 days spread over the year. Not counting transportation cost.

There's also other considerations.

For one, vacation property will not likely appreciate like the stock market, but it won't depreciate like a vacation (i.e. worth $0).  My wife's family has a cabin they bought in the 1980s for ~$100k in cash (plus probably another $100k over that time in property taxes), it's now worth ~$400k.  Yes, had they invested that money they'd have more than the $400k, but had they spent the same +/- $100k over the last 30 years renting it for $1k/wk 3x a year they'd have $0. 

Second, for a lot of people, a second home is a labor of love.  Hell, look at MMM, he loves to work with his hands, so much so that he basically retired to start a construction company.  It is not inconceivable that other people view the maintenance on their vacation home the same way; it's a project they can work on and they enjoy it.  Hell, my FIL basically invents work at his cabin so he can have stuff to work on up there because he can't just sit on the dock all day, he'd get bored; he's much happier working on the cabin.

For me, buying a vacation home was the worst financial mistake I ever made - the Spanish property market crashed and now, 10 years later, it's still only worth just over 1/2 what I paid for it.

And yet, the value is incalculable. The very first night we stayed there I sat on the terrace and watched the sun set over the mountain, then all the lights in the village on the hill come on. I decided there and then I didn't want it as a holiday home, I wanted to live there.

It took seven years of scrimping and saving every penny, minimum 3.5 hour commutes etc - but I retired at 53 (then we moved to the coast instead but I still miss my twinkling lights!). No way would I have been able to achieve it if I hadn't had something concrete to aim for.


Best financial mistake I ever made (and now we have long term tenants in holiday apartment).

eazyebeneezer

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20229 on: June 17, 2018, 04:32:59 PM »
Overheard new CW tell other CW that she just called to setup the automatic contributions to her ROTH again, now that she is once again employed - all good.

The rep told her that her ROTH the money in her account hasn't been invested for the past 6(!) years, it's just being held in cash.

How have you not looked at any statement to notice that in the past 6 years? Wow.

This is embarrassing. I did that for four years. Face palm. The thing is someone had told me I should choose a target date fund. Somewhere else on the website I selected my target date for retirement, but it wasn't for investment purposes, more like a calculator. When the balance was staying the same I was blissfully ignorant as to why. Finally figured it out when I started diving into the FI stuff. Yes, it was stupid, but nobody teaches you this stuff until you go learn it for yourself.

Siebrie

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20230 on: June 18, 2018, 04:34:01 AM »
My 62-year old colleague, working for my company as a freelance Accounting clerk/typist/processor/data entry/double-checker for the last 25 years, saw her contract terminated overnight.

We often had lunch together (brought from home), and our conversation often turned to her difficulties in paying-off her mortgage/social security contributions/etc. She and her partner had had a row of bad luck and bad financial choices, including not reading the market properly. For instance, her partner was offered to relocate to Belgium for work, which he accepted and they moved, a great adventure. However, within a year, the plant was closed. They had sold their house in the UK, and within two years, the buyers had sold it on for three times the buying price.

They stayed in Belgium, bought an apartment with a flexible interest rate, which was supposed to follow the market rate. However, it only went up (of course...): 5% after the first year, and another 5% after the second year. At a time where everyone has 2 or 3% mortgage rates, they have 14%! I told her to talk to the bank, and to take their mortgage elsewhere, but because they are both self-employed, making only little money, it is difficult to get a mortgage anywhere, and the bank won't budge.

They still have a few family members and friends in the UK, and like to visit twice a year. Eurostar (train) costs around €200 return, and they enjoy taking it. However, taking the ferry (boat) costs only €100-€150 return. There is not much of a travel time difference.

With the limited funds they have, my colleague collects hat pins, her partner collects horror movies and horror fiction, together they collect choral sheet music (they used to sing in two choirs). They always buy, and never sell. I have suggested libraries, selling, secondhand sites, etc, but they buy to keep. And then buy the cupboards to keep the sheet music, and additional insurance because it's both valuable and a fire hazard..... If the newspaper article I saw last week is anything to go by, actual sheet music is destined to lose its value shortly, with orchestras moving to tablets.

She is 62, her partner about 55; she planned to work another few years until the mortgage was paid off. With Brexit looming, it is very unclear what (and if) the pensions will pay out. She has a British pension from the years she worked over there, she has a tiny Belgian pension from when she was employed, and a Belgian self-employed pension. She has not yet checked the conditions under which these will be paid out, nor has she checked under which conditions the State Pensions of the two countries will pay out. She is trusting the UK government to do what they should do, the decent thing.

It's both frustrating and fascinating. She is a very sweet person, and I feel very sorry for her.

Guesl982374

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20231 on: June 18, 2018, 07:57:18 AM »
A guy at work just said he has spend $2500 on alcohol in the last 3 weeks. There was no special occasion in this period, just going out with mates

Vegas? Haha

no just in Perth, Australia.

Just wow...Depending on the cost of drinks (in HCOL USA anywhere from $7.50 to $20/drink) that's like 40-110 drinks / week or 6-16 drinks a day!! I think your CW might have a dependency problem....

Imma

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20232 on: June 18, 2018, 11:23:40 AM »
My 62-year old colleague, working for my company as a freelance Accounting clerk/typist/processor/data entry/double-checker for the last 25 years, saw her contract terminated overnight.

We often had lunch together (brought from home), and our conversation often turned to her difficulties in paying-off her mortgage/social security contributions/etc. She and her partner had had a row of bad luck and bad financial choices, including not reading the market properly. For instance, her partner was offered to relocate to Belgium for work, which he accepted and they moved, a great adventure. However, within a year, the plant was closed. They had sold their house in the UK, and within two years, the buyers had sold it on for three times the buying price.

They stayed in Belgium, bought an apartment with a flexible interest rate, which was supposed to follow the market rate. However, it only went up (of course...): 5% after the first year, and another 5% after the second year. At a time where everyone has 2 or 3% mortgage rates, they have 14%! I told her to talk to the bank, and to take their mortgage elsewhere, but because they are both self-employed, making only little money, it is difficult to get a mortgage anywhere, and the bank won't budge.

They still have a few family members and friends in the UK, and like to visit twice a year. Eurostar (train) costs around €200 return, and they enjoy taking it. However, taking the ferry (boat) costs only €100-€150 return. There is not much of a travel time difference.

With the limited funds they have, my colleague collects hat pins, her partner collects horror movies and horror fiction, together they collect choral sheet music (they used to sing in two choirs). They always buy, and never sell. I have suggested libraries, selling, secondhand sites, etc, but they buy to keep. And then buy the cupboards to keep the sheet music, and additional insurance because it's both valuable and a fire hazard..... If the newspaper article I saw last week is anything to go by, actual sheet music is destined to lose its value shortly, with orchestras moving to tablets.

She is 62, her partner about 55; she planned to work another few years until the mortgage was paid off. With Brexit looming, it is very unclear what (and if) the pensions will pay out. She has a British pension from the years she worked over there, she has a tiny Belgian pension from when she was employed, and a Belgian self-employed pension. She has not yet checked the conditions under which these will be paid out, nor has she checked under which conditions the State Pensions of the two countries will pay out. She is trusting the UK government to do what they should do, the decent thing.

It's both frustrating and fascinating. She is a very sweet person, and I feel very sorry for her.

It's always so sad to see nice people make so many small errors of judgement that they end up in big trouble, and they probably don't even know where they went wrong.

I would suggest to your coworker to find out if it's even legal to pay 14% interest. I'm in NL and almost can't imagine it would be legal in here.

myrrh

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20233 on: June 18, 2018, 12:30:54 PM »
NOOOoooooo!!! You will take my paper music away from my cold dead hands. How can you mark up music on a tablet? How can you even see the notes with a tablet on a stand? How can you fit three pages of music on one stand so that you can play half the song without turning the page? Or does each person get three or four tablets? :P

Um. Back to the original subject. Coworker is planning on retiring this year. He's 70 and has been taking social security and will get a pension, but he bought a new car last winter and his wife bought a new car last summer.  His wife is 10 years younger and he elected to have her get 1/2 his pension once he passes. He says they'll be paying the mortgage until he's 90. It's not really my business but I wonder how it will work out.

Dollar Slice

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20234 on: June 18, 2018, 01:43:36 PM »
NOOOoooooo!!! You will take my paper music away from my cold dead hands. How can you mark up music on a tablet? How can you even see the notes with a tablet on a stand? How can you fit three pages of music on one stand so that you can play half the song without turning the page?

I see a lot of younger classical string players using them. (And one notable composer who will sit in the wings and follow along on his tablet to make sure no one fucks up his music.) They use a Bluetooth foot-operated thingy to turn the pages - tap your toe, the page turns. Works better for some instruments than others.

joleran

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20235 on: June 18, 2018, 02:39:23 PM »
NOOOoooooo!!! You will take my paper music away from my cold dead hands. How can you mark up music on a tablet? How can you even see the notes with a tablet on a stand? How can you fit three pages of music on one stand so that you can play half the song without turning the page? Or does each person get three or four tablets? :P

Not only can you easily mark up the music in various ways, the tablet will automatically recognize what you are playing and flip the pages for you.

Warlord1986

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20236 on: June 18, 2018, 02:44:26 PM »
The office admin assistant just told us that her daughter will pay $12,000 for one semester at Georgetown for their nurse practitioner program (I think). I know it's Georgetown, but oi.

The admin has admitted she will never retire and has nothing saved.

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20237 on: June 18, 2018, 03:28:34 PM »
The office admin assistant just told us that her daughter will pay $12,000 for one semester at Georgetown for their nurse practitioner program (I think). I know it's Georgetown, but oi.

That seems low by half.  Must be a substantial aid package. 

Dave1442397

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20238 on: June 18, 2018, 04:03:01 PM »
Coworker is planning on retiring this year. He's 70 and has been taking social security and will get a pension, but he bought a new car last winter and his wife bought a new car last summer.  His wife is 10 years younger and he elected to have her get 1/2 his pension once he passes. He says they'll be paying the mortgage until he's 90. It's not really my business but I wonder how it will work out.

Sounds like it may work out pretty well for her. Not so much for him.

rockstache

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20239 on: June 19, 2018, 07:20:37 AM »
The office admin assistant just told us that her daughter will pay $12,000 for one semester at Georgetown for their nurse practitioner program (I think). I know it's Georgetown, but oi.

That seems low by half.  Must be a substantial aid package.

I was kind of thinking that too. Undergrad tuition at my husbands big name (but not Georgetown big), school is $55,000 per year. Does not include housing, meals, or fees.

Warlord1986

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20240 on: June 19, 2018, 07:31:39 AM »
She's only taking 2 classes, and that does not include books, housing, etc.

artemidorus

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20241 on: June 19, 2018, 09:31:25 AM »
My co-worker asks if I have Amazon Prime, leading to a conversation about how he just signed up because he wanted an Amazon credit card.

"Now they give you 5% off at Whole Foods if you use an Amazon Prime credit card. We spend about $25,000 a year at Whole Foods, so it'll save us over $1,000."

It's just him and his wife. No kids. Spending over $2,000 a month on groceries.

But hey, good on him trying to save 5%. Baby steps.

artemidorus

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20242 on: June 19, 2018, 10:11:48 AM »
My co-worker asks if I have Amazon Prime, leading to a conversation about how he just signed up because he wanted an Amazon credit card.

"Now they give you 5% off at Whole Foods if you use an Amazon Prime credit card. We spend about $25,000 a year at Whole Foods, so it'll save us over $1,000."

It's just him and his wife. No kids. Spending over $2,000 a month on groceries.

But hey, good on him trying to save 5%. Baby steps.
Holy crap. Here I was getting cranky at my husband because we're over budget on groceries this month, but we're sitting at $357. How do you even spend that month on groceries?!

I know they're both vegan and only eat organic food, which is how they likely justify it to themselves. I won't pretend to know exactly how much that raises your grocery bill, but I am sure others with those dietary restrictions can weigh in that it's still outlandish, as my Google Machine tells me a family of 2 with really expensive tastes should still only bring you to around $9K a year in groceries.

I have many stories about terrible spending decisions these people make, so I know they don't budget at all and make many wasteful decisions, and half this food probably goes in the trash. It's the same old story with them, this was just the quote that finally broke me and made me create an account after years of reading.

Dollar Slice

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20243 on: June 19, 2018, 10:17:30 AM »
My co-worker asks if I have Amazon Prime, leading to a conversation about how he just signed up because he wanted an Amazon credit card.

"Now they give you 5% off at Whole Foods if you use an Amazon Prime credit card. We spend about $25,000 a year at Whole Foods, so it'll save us over $1,000."

It's just him and his wife. No kids. Spending over $2,000 a month on groceries.

But hey, good on him trying to save 5%. Baby steps.
Holy crap. Here I was getting cranky at my husband because we're over budget on groceries this month, but we're sitting at $357. How do you even spend that month on groceries?!

I know they're both vegan and only eat organic food, which is how they likely justify it to themselves. I won't pretend to know exactly how much that raises your grocery bill, but I am sure others with those dietary restrictions can weigh in that it's still outlandish

Oof. My first thought was that they were eating high-end steaks a couple of times a week (Whole Foods sells some that are $20+ a pound) but if they are vegan, I bet they are spending a ton on meat and dairy substitutes - there are some really expensive brands. Do they drink? Throw in a bottle of wine for dinner every day and that could easily be $500/mo. or more.

artemidorus

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20244 on: June 19, 2018, 11:08:23 AM »
My co-worker asks if I have Amazon Prime, leading to a conversation about how he just signed up because he wanted an Amazon credit card.

"Now they give you 5% off at Whole Foods if you use an Amazon Prime credit card. We spend about $25,000 a year at Whole Foods, so it'll save us over $1,000."

It's just him and his wife. No kids. Spending over $2,000 a month on groceries.

But hey, good on him trying to save 5%. Baby steps.
Holy crap. Here I was getting cranky at my husband because we're over budget on groceries this month, but we're sitting at $357. How do you even spend that month on groceries?!

I know they're both vegan and only eat organic food, which is how they likely justify it to themselves. I won't pretend to know exactly how much that raises your grocery bill, but I am sure others with those dietary restrictions can weigh in that it's still outlandish

Oof. My first thought was that they were eating high-end steaks a couple of times a week (Whole Foods sells some that are $20+ a pound) but if they are vegan, I bet they are spending a ton on meat and dairy substitutes - there are some really expensive brands. Do they drink? Throw in a bottle of wine for dinner every day and that could easily be $500/mo. or more.

My co-worker isn't a drinker. So if it is a bill that's largely alcohol, the wife is doing it on her own. Seems like a stretch, but it's possibly a contributing factor.

And I've ruled out the "really bad at math" explanation. He's very good at math in our job (even if he can't budget), and even rounding up drastically, wouldn't be off by $10,000 on an estimate of his grocery bills.

He has an encyclopedic memory of every Whole Foods in a 100 mile radius - he discusses the pro's and con's of each with anyone he overhears mention the chain, so it's not like he just goes to the one that is closest to him. I honestly think his hobby is wasting money at Whole Foods, buying everything he could possibly try like it's a new toy, and tossing it half of what they buy when it goes bad.

FIRE@50

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20245 on: June 19, 2018, 11:18:03 AM »
I was at an HOA meeting last night and guy A mentions that guy B won't be around anymore because he is retiring. Guy B says, 'well I'm not really retiring but I realized that now that I'm in my 70's, I should cut back to part-time.' I don't know anything about his finances, but I just kind of felt bad for him. Other people in the room were congratulating him. I'm hoping that he just really loves working.

Dragonswan

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20246 on: June 19, 2018, 12:34:45 PM »
My co-worker asks if I have Amazon Prime, leading to a conversation about how he just signed up because he wanted an Amazon credit card.

"Now they give you 5% off at Whole Foods if you use an Amazon Prime credit card. We spend about $25,000 a year at Whole Foods, so it'll save us over $1,000."

It's just him and his wife. No kids. Spending over $2,000 a month on groceries.

But hey, good on him trying to save 5%. Baby steps.
Holy crap. Here I was getting cranky at my husband because we're over budget on groceries this month, but we're sitting at $357. How do you even spend that month on groceries?!

I know they're both vegan and only eat organic food, which is how they likely justify it to themselves. I won't pretend to know exactly how much that raises your grocery bill, but I am sure others with those dietary restrictions can weigh in that it's still outlandish

Oof. My first thought was that they were eating high-end steaks a couple of times a week (Whole Foods sells some that are $20+ a pound) but if they are vegan, I bet they are spending a ton on meat and dairy substitutes - there are some really expensive brands. Do they drink? Throw in a bottle of wine for dinner every day and that could easily be $500/mo. or more.

My co-worker isn't a drinker. So if it is a bill that's largely alcohol, the wife is doing it on her own. Seems like a stretch, but it's possibly a contributing factor.

And I've ruled out the "really bad at math" explanation. He's very good at math in our job (even if he can't budget), and even rounding up drastically, wouldn't be off by $10,000 on an estimate of his grocery bills.

He has an encyclopedic memory of every Whole Foods in a 100 mile radius - he discusses the pro's and con's of each with anyone he overhears mention the chain, so it's not like he just goes to the one that is closest to him. I honestly think his hobby is wasting money at Whole Foods, buying everything he could possibly try like it's a new toy, and tossing it half of what they buy when it goes bad.
Wow! you'll know I tend towards spendy and make allowances for some un mustachian things.  But this is inexcusable.  Even in Whole Paycheck you have to work at spending that kind of money.  And Vegan?  Does he buy truffles?  Really pricey imported cheese?  Dine at one of their cafes twice a week?  Then maybe that gets you to 1K/person/month.  Still insane and I'm not pardoning his crime against his financials.

Dragonswan

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20247 on: June 19, 2018, 12:42:56 PM »
Yep I've figured it out.  He's addicted to Pule cheese: made from the milk of Balkan donkeys from Serbia.  About $600/lb.

FIRE@50

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20248 on: June 19, 2018, 12:49:06 PM »
Yep I've figured it out.  He's addicted to Pule cheese: made from the milk of Balkan donkeys from Serbia.  About $600/lb.

I know you were just making a joke, but cheese obviously isn't vegan.

I think you might be onto something with the prepared foods though. If you bought lunch and dinner from there on a regular basis, your bill would be pretty shocking.

Dragonswan

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Re: Overheard at Work
« Reply #20249 on: June 19, 2018, 01:17:20 PM »
Yes I was joking.  I was going to use black truffles at $700 a pound, but cheese made from exotic donkeys was way funnier.