I regularly get semi-threatening letters from credit card providers informing me that if I want to keep my account open, then the credit card must be used periodically. It must be active to stay open. Then, I have to use the card within 30 days of the date of the letter or risk them closing the account. Credit Card Active is the solve for that problem.

Credit Card Active is the one stop solution for anyone who wants to keep their unused credit cards open.

Yes, I built an entire website dedicated to this one thing. It works like this. I sell “memberships” for each of the credit cards you would like to keep open. The “membership” purchase results in a nominal charge to your credit card either monthly, quarterly or annually. You can choose whatever interval best suits your needs.

Yes, I realize the likely audience interested in this is probably FIRE or Fat FIRE credit card rewards and bonus chasers who care deeply about their credit scores and don’t mind paying the equivalent of about a penny per day to avoid those letters and keep their credit cards open in perpetuity.

Now, you may be asking yourself, does it really matter if an unused credit card gets cancelled? The answer is YES it matters. And, I’ll be addressing that in a future post….or you can cheat and find those answers at Credit Card Active right now!

The post Announcing Credit Card Active appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

While I waited for 2015 budgets to open, a strange thing started happening. Based on my reputation and network I started picking up side work in December 2014 for companies with overflow. It was far from full time work, but it was work! It filled time that I previously dedicated to networking and job searching, but it actually paid me. I was contributing to the household financially again. And, within 2 months an opportunity opened up to step in when someone went out on maternity leave.

Gross Revenue:

Dec 2014 – $4,650

Jan 2015 – $10,300

Feb 2015 – $16,000 woohoo!

That was very good money for someone still unemployed….until the person returned from leave. By this point though, I was actually enjoying the gig economy. Why work for some big corporation when they can drop you at any minute? I had a taste for the freedom now. However, the downside of being a gig worker is it sometimes dries up and my hours dropped off in March and April though.

March 2015 – $10,000

April – $6,500

Still, combined with my wife’s income we were well above our typical monthly spend (~$5k) at that time. It was sustainable, and we were saving some money.

Subcontracting Joy?

May was the month that everything changed. I knew the current clients were not enough so I was actively hustling for more. And, the one client that changed everything came from a surprising source. A representative from my former employer (don’t burn bridges!) reached out, and mentioned that a local multi-national needed some help in an area where I could probably be valuable. Since the client was huge and would never contract with a self-employed human without $10M in liablility insurance, I would have to sub-contract through my former employer to do the work. Grrr.

What does that mean? It means they basically get paid to sit around and watch me work then handle invoicing. For that reason it sucks. For every other reason, it’s great. I gave them an hourly rate that I knew was basically the maximum that anyone in my position should charge. They added $25/hr on top of that, and the multi-national for some reason agreed to that rate. The gig was supposed to be 10 hours per week and last until I got that piece of the business organized and compliant. I figured they would see in the first month that it made no sense to pay a consultant this much to do what I was doing.

Competency Breeds Contentment

Instead, they seemed to notice the work was beneath my experience level and since they had more projects than they could handle, they started handing off pieces of their work to me. This vastly improved their quality of life….and my bank account. It was close to full-time work, and it was paying me almost double what I was making previously. I was essentially self-employed with no 401k, no health insurance, no disability insurance, no paid vacation but also no overhead. I was a flexible contractor that could step in and cover work when it was needed and then scale back hours when it wasn’t as busy. They loved it. I loved it.

But, I knew it couldn’t last. As soon as they were doing the 2016 budget I just knew they would see my line item and kick me to the curb. Hell, I could see it because I helped set up the budget. That never happened though. It turns out that a few years before I came, this company had to go through a series of layoffs, and it decimated morale. Now they were gun shy on over-hiring so there was always too much to do, and contractors were the essential, disposable workforce that removed the risk of layoffs from the actual employees.

Today

That was 2016. Today is August 31, 2020 I’m still there (and I’m in the 2021 budget). I have definitely moved around across multiple products. I’ve also onboarded at least 4 people to replace me (so they could be done with me), but the work has always been there. I do not just try to create work for myself which is likely another reason I’ve been kept around. I’ve been upfront the whole time. I’m only here as long as you guys want me here, and when you don’t, I will happily exit. No hard feelings. The truth is I’ve been there so long that my historical knowledge almost makes me indispensible.

While others politic and fight for the next raise or promotion, I am quietly content doing work I love at a very high level (and making bank). It’s led to a great work/life balance and I am so grateful for the layoff. I’ve learned so much about myself along the way!

The post I Lost My Job – Day #2,285 So Grateful for the Layoff appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

As you may recall, I’ve been ranting about the idiocy of the Reg D rules for almost a decade. It only took a global pandemic to get them to remove them. Technically, this is only an “interim final rule“, but I can’t see us going backwards from here.

I long ago reworked my banking accounts so I could work around the rules to move money to the right places. So, what are the implications for the common man seeking to optimize his personal finance?

1. One less fee for the big banks to hit you with. Previously, if you exceeded the 6 transfers in a month, they could and would hit you with Regulation D fees for the violation. My own bank only warned me about a dozen times through a form letter, but it was still a bit unnerving. No more!
2. Why have a checking account? Most automatic withdrawals can be made from a savings account so just set them all up to come out of savings. That allows you to focus the bulk of your cash in a higher interest place. And, let’s you centralize in a single account if you wish.

Regarding #2, I know not everyone is on board with the cash-less and check-less society that we are headed towards, but that trend is not going to stop. In fact, who wants to touch your corona-contaminated funds now?

Anyway, happy days are here (in this small way)! Celebrate the end of Regulation D, and maybe you’ll hear from me again soon…

The post Finally… appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.

I have to say I expected to be fully employed by this point, but it just hasn’t happened that way.  It’s actual been an incredibly fruitful job search.  I continue to get solid feedback from all of my interviews with multiple firms wishing they could create a position for me.  I’m in talks with 2 of them right now, but the reality is that everyday I wake up jobless.  Eventually, it starts to get to you.  The only way out is to keep grinding though.  I’m continuing to learn important lessons along the way too:

1. If your company offers outplacement help, use it.  Leverage it.  I find the firm I’ve been working with is fairly cookie cutter in it’s approach, but you know what?  They still have tidbits that are useful.  The resume writer they assigned to me really improved my resume in ways I had not thought about.  It spins my skills and experience in new ways that I know come across better than how I had written.  In addition, she’s revised my cover letter approach, my LinkedIn profile, and created a corporate bio.  Totally worth my efforts.
2. Don’t stop applying for positions just because you have interviews you feel are leading to an offer.  Twice in this process I’ve wasted a week in this kind of limbo.  There is nothing to be gained by this.  If you get interviews after accepting an offer, you can simply turn them down.  Don’t use anticipation for an offer as an excuse to stop working on your job search.
3.  Keep networking!  I say it in every post.  It continues to hold true.  Every week I am trying to get out there.  Sometimes, like last week, they really lead to nothing more than some new contacts on LinkedIn.  Other times they’re really opening doors.
4. Apply for unemployment.  Once you are out of severance/vacation pay, you are eligible to apply for unemployment benefits.  Do it!  It’s not mortgage-sustaining income, but it will keep food on the table and the lights turned on.  For me it amounts to $350/wk.  It does take time and effort to get the process moving so I recommend understanding the process in your state while you are still milking any exit pay you received – that certainly helped me.  Do not let your pride get in the way.  You paid into this system for years just in case an emergency like this ever came up, and now it has so consider part of your uncertainty fund that you don’t have to refill!
5. Never, ever think this couldn’t happen to you.  If you work for anyone other than yourself, you could lose that job.  To that end, I do have some good news.  The Project X startup I began mentioning in my net worth posts over 2 years ago has finally gotten external seed funding.  It isn’t a ton of money, but once you have one group that believes in you, it’s often easier to convince others to join in the funding party.  The current funds should cover our servers for a year and a very minimal viable product that we can then showcase.  It’s not my day job yet, but it’s a step in the right direction!

Alright, that’s about all I have time for today.  Keep valuing the jobs that you have and striving for something better!  I hope to be back soon with good news.

Related articles across the web

• I Lost My Job – Now What?
• I Lost My Job – Day #0 Termination Day
• I Lost My Job – Day #-17 HEALTH INSURANCE!
• When Outplacement Is Stingy After A Job Loss
• Seven Resume Myths That Won’t Get Your Hired

The post I Lost My Job – Day #66 Lessons in Pride and Anticipation appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

I’ve also gathered some lessons too.  Wanna hear them?  I hope so.  Here goes:

1. Read your termination agreement twice, at least.  –  I found errors in my agreement that would have essentially put me in violation of the agreement the moment I signed it.  I pointed out the errors, and then read the next draft only to find that they had failed to correct some of them.  So, I go another draft.  All of this took time and effort on my part and has delayed my severance. (Note:  some people suggest having an attorney read your agreement – I didn’t bother because it was all standard fare)
2. Severance can get delayed (see point 1) – I should get my severance (in a lump sum) by the end of this month.  That’s no big deal to me that it got delayed two weeks, but it is definitely important to make sure you have enough float in your primary accounts to cover this shortfall.
3. Don’t burn bridges. – On the way out I was incredibly professional, even more that usual, and I tried to be overly accommodating.  At times this was not easy to stomach, but the week after my final day someone from my company called to see if I was interested in a contractor position that would embed me with a local client.  This is one of my top two choices, and there is no way it would have happened if I had acted poorly during the exit process.
4. Network. – I think I’ve mentioned it in every post in this series.  My network has been the lifeblood of my job search.  I don’t know how you feel about LinkedIn, but if you aren’t building a network there, you probably should be.
5. Keep living and celebrate small victories. – I continue to spend – frugally and within reason.  I had a good interview yesterday, and took myself to lunch and watched some World Cup to wind down.  It was a $20 lunch, but it felt great to celebrate a little, and I saved the other half for today’s lunch  This morning I went clothes shopping with DW for work clothes for her.  While there I found a lovely pair of Marc Anthony dress slacks that I will likely need in any new position I take so I invested in my wardrobe.  And yes, yes they were marked down to $12 from $120 so that made the cost easier to swallow.
6. Exercise. – Getting out of the house and either doing yardwork or running or even walking is essential.  We know that exercise can help people keep their spirits up, and it is critical to walk away from your computer at some intervals during the day.  Otherwise, you will languish there searching for the needle in the haystack.

So, if you’re out there and your unemployed, do your best to keep moving and keep your head held high.  It will all work out…eventually.

Related articles across the web

• I Lost My Job – Day# -24
• I Lost My Job – Day #-17 HEALTH INSURANCE!
• I Lost My Job – Now What?
• I Lost My Job – Day #0 Termination Day

The post I Lost My Job – Day #19 Strange Lessons appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

• How to Choose
• Year 1 Update
• Year 2 Update
• Year 3 Update

Dear Son,

It’s time to look at your stocks again!  These are interesting times at our house as you turned 8.  Due to my recent job loss there is probably more uncertainty and stress than you have become accustomed to in your short and relatively blessed existence.  In the short term, I’m sure it’s not easy, but in the long term I have come to appreciate times of hardship as opportunities for growth – many times in ways that surprised me.  Right now I’m astonished at all of the colleagues and friends who have stepped up in meaningful ways to help me find my next position.  I think it’s an excellent lesson in treating people with kindness and respect when there’s really nothing in it for you.  That genuineness translates into friendships and relationships that really serve as a bulwark in harder times.  It turns out that we are not only prepared financially to endure this hardship, but we are also surrounded by a community that supports our well-being in so many other meaningful ways.

In terms of your personal growth, I am most proud of the voracious reader you’ve become.  Last year, reading was a struggle, and now it is a joy to have to come in your room well past bedtime to get you to put your latest adventure down and get some rest.  I credit your new Montessori school and one of your peers for stimulating this new passion, but ultimately it is you who continues to cultivate this love.  And, I’m starting to get a little scared at how good you are at martial arts!

Our economy continues to slowly recover, but I am optimistic that I will find employment.  It certainly feels better to be unemployed right now than it would have if this were 1 or 2 years ago.  Let’s hope so.

As with our family, there has been some change in your portfolio.  Most notably, Harris Teeter was bought out by Kroger last year, and the transaction went through at the end of January.  This left you with a final return of about 40% on that investment.  Not bad!  I used the funds from this buyout and the small amount of remaining cash in your account to purchase 5 shares in one of my favorite dividend stocks, Altria Group.  Is it wrong to have bought you shares in a stock that promotes habits that lead to major negative health consequences?  Perhaps, but now you and I have voting rights in terms of how direct the future of the company and can have meaningful conversations about corporate ethics with an excellent real world example.  In addition, you’ll reap the associated dividend gains which are non-trivial.  Currently, you’re up 16% in 4 months since the purchase.

There have been no other in-flows or out-flow to speak of.  The overall theme has been one of expanded growth, especially in your technology exposure areas (AAPL, AMZN, & VGT).  Every stock is in double digit positive returns.  All in all you were up 16% from 2012-13 and now another 22% this past year.  Looking at the cost basis in aggregate, you’re up 66% since we started.  The market recovery has certainly outpaced the overall economic recovery which of course means that those of us within a certain SES are benefiting far more than others with fewer opportunities.

NOTE:  Altria group cost basis is not included in the total since it is a re-investment.

Related articles across the web

• I Lost My Job – Now What?
• I Lost My Job – Day #-17 HEALTH INSURANCE!
• I Lost My Job – Day #0 Termination Day
• I Lost My Job – Day# -24

The post Stocks For Your Kids: Year 4 Update appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

Well, here it is Friday, May 30 also known as Termination Day or The Day I Lost My Job.  I would like to tell you it was exciting at the office today, but in reality I had a meeting with my supervisor and one with HR to talk through my “termination letter” and “separation agreement”.  Neither was full of any drama except they screwed up the termination agreement dates, and it had to be re-issued.  The meeting with my supervisor was short and sweet basically thanking me for my years of service and mumbling something about corporate structures and wishing things were different.  This is just how it goes.  It’s not personal no matter how personal it is.

The real excitement over the last 2 weeks has been on the job search side.  Have I mentioned networking to you lately?  I have spoken or interviewed with 10 companies so far.  7 of those I got through networking.  The other 3 came from a random LinkedIn request, a submission through an HR portal of hell, and a headhunter contacting me.  Can I just say again, network, network, network.

I already have an idea of where I’m likely to end up, and if this happens, it will be surreal.  It’s still early though.  I haven’t even got my severance yet!

I also have not registered for unemployment yet, but I’m quite excited about it.  I consider this a rare opportunity to learn about a system I’m unlikely to encounter again (fingers crossed).  So, I can’t wait to tell you more once I actually learn something.

In the meantime, I’m taking suggestions on how to spend my leisure time (when not networking, scouring the internet for jobs, prepping for interviews, fetching dry cleaning, organizing my office, and actually going on interviews).  Certainly the new X-men movie is in my future

Related articles across the web

• I Lost My Job – Day #-17 HEALTH INSURANCE!
• I Lost My Job – Now What?
• I Lost My Job – Day# -24

The post I Lost My Job – Day #0 Termination Day appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

Not only am I the primary provider of income to my family, but I am also the sole provider of health insurance.  As a result of my upcoming termination our family’s health coverage will end.  DW has had a lot of health issues so this is a really big deal for us.  Here’s how we’re dealing with that:

• We could go with COBRA.  If you don’t know about COBRA, it basically serves a continuation of your current insurance except you end up paying a much higher price because it’s no longer subsidized by your employer.  For us, I think that cost would close to $1,700/mth.  What?!  Yeah, that’s the cost of healthcare, even on a high deductible plan.  Horrendous and not acceptable.  That’s a lot more than I pay for our mortgage.
• We could go with nothing.  Well, no we can’t.  First, DW’s health is too tenuous for us to risk something like that.  Second the Affordable Care Act makes that kind of thing subject to fines so why pay the fines with no coverage when you can go to the ACA exchange and get covered.
• We could go to the ACA exchange and look for a plan.  We did, and it was actually pretty simple to do it all.   There are of course lots of variables involved, but if you focus on those most relevant to you, you can quickly narrow the list.  We found a Gold plan that we liked and would move some of DW’s providers in network.  It’s going to be about $750/mth.  That’s a lot of money too.  It’s about twice what I’m paying with my employer subsidized plan, but it’s $1k/mth cheaper than COBRA.  (Pro tip:  you need to sign up before the 15th of the month you’re in in order for the coverage to kick in at the start of the new month)

So, we’re all set right?  Not even.  The new plan doesn’t include dental.  So, what are we doing there?  Well, we’ve all already visited the dentist once this year, but we’re allowed 2 visits for prophylaxis per calendar year, and we get to choose when that happens.  So, we’re all going to the dentist this month to get our covered dental checkups and hoping I find a job in 6 months before our teeth rot out!

The job search itself is now progressing a bit more slowly.  I have applied to all the low hanging fruit out there locally, and I continue to mine the job sites and network as much as possible.  It will just take time, and I have to be patient.  At least I have the health insurance peice already figured out.

I do have an interview on Friday so wish me luck!

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The post I Lost My Job – Day #-17 HEALTH INSURANCE! appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

My job doesn’t end until the end of May so let’s call this day # -23.  Until that time I am fully employed, and I also have permission from my current boss to look for positions internally.  So, I have a couple of departments I am reaching out to, but my hopes are not high that this will work both because my skills are a bit specialized and because I have a bitter taste in my mouth when I think of continuing on with a company that is treating me and so many others in such a dismissive manner. I first got the notion that bad things were in the works in mid-April when one of my best friends was blindsided in a “catch up” meeting that HR reps lurking on the phone.  He has basically the same skill set as I do.  He was just working in a different department.  As soon as I got word I knew it was time to take action.  That’s where I’ll start the story today with some critical action steps. In anticipation of potential job loss,

1. I alerted DW.  There is no reason to hide this kind of information from your spouse.  It’s much easier to have an open discussion about the possibilities.  I know many others are not granted this kind of opportunity, and my heart goes out to those who walk into a meeting and are given 15 minutes to clean out their desks and get escorted out by security.  I feel like these discussions were very helpful for in terms of preparation and being in this together.
2. I cut my 401k contribution.  Any reader of this blog knows I max the crap out of my 401k to get the most tax advantages I can.  In this case with a potential loss of income coming, I needed to focus on short-term cashflow so I slashed my contribution rate back to the 5% level.  Why 5%?  That’s the match level at my company, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to leave any money on the table!
3. I cut my student loan payments.  With the same reasoning, I cut about $200/mth from my student loan payments.  I had been paying the variable rate loans at an accelerated rate to take advantage of the favorable interest rate environment.  This was simply taking my foot off the accelerator.
4. I started aggressively networking.  I think I went to 2 local networking events in that first week.  At the first, I re-connected with some folks at my business school and got invited to teach a course in analytics.  Since then I’ve found someone to co-teach with and started developing the course objectives.  An outstanding opportunity for future networking (not for the $).  At the second, there were about 8 people, and I was a bit disappointed.  But, it turns out I connected well with one guy who operated in a space related to analytics that really opened my eyes to look a little more broadly about my skill set.  That led to a lunch and more discussion.  He took my resume and just yesterday I noticed a job appeared on their website that might be a fit.  I emailed him immediately to gauge from him how to proceed.  Promising.  All of this occurred simply because I bothered to network.  It’s not always the easiest thing to do, but you will be shocked all the people you know that know people you might need to get to know.
5. I started job searching.  Primarily, I use LinkedIn and Indeed for my job searches.  I also have select companies where I have saved searches that alert me when relevant postings occur.  But, I didn’t stop there.  I built a list of all of the local companies relevant to me and went to their job listing pages.  Not everything you want to apply for is on Monster.  Some companies expect you to come to them, and that’s just what I’m doing.  I now have a long list of bookmarked job listings that I can get through in about 20 minutes.
6. I applied for some positions.  When I say this what I really mean is I found positions that might be a fit, then I used LinkedIn to find out who I know at the company.  A resume handed to a hiring manager by someone you both know is going to get a lot more attention than one that goes through the HR black hole.  Always network your way in if you can.  I can almost guarantee you my next job will come from networking and not some of these blind resumes and cover letters I’m sending out.  You never know though so I’m participating in this part of the process too.

If there’s one piece of advice I can leave you with it’s this:  Network when you don’t need to.  That is, it’s much better to have contacts and relationships already established before you need to leverage them.  It takes a lot of desperation out of the conversation if you’re reconnecting with someone you already know.

You’ll have to excuse me now.  I have to go prepare for a networking call!

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The post I Lost My Job – Day# -24 appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.

I was beginning to think I was done with this blog.  I haven’t posted this year because in large part I haven’t felt like I have anything new to say that isn’t being regurgitated ad nauseum across the web, but isn’t it amazing how opportunity presents itself.  I was informed on Friday that my position was basically being eliminated at the end of this month.  The writing has to some extent been all over the wall for quite a while.  I’m the last surviving member of my group prior to our company’s takeover a couple of year’s ago. Sole survivor until now.  That either means I’m a glutton for punishment or loyal to a fault.  Actually, it’s probably both.

So now what?  Well, I thought it might be helpful to others to walk through this period with me.  Perhaps there’s something I can share that will be helpful to others or perhaps my readers can help me get through this.  Hopefully, it’s both.

It’s hard to do this without focusing on the emotional and other reactions you have and the first reaction I must assume is something like this:

I am:

Scared! – Definitely.  As basically the sole provider for my family it’s very scary to think of think of this income source disappearing.

Pissed! – Definitely.  This passed quickly, perhaps because I had already assessed the situation and saw it was par for the course with this company.  No matter how personally you take this kind of thing and how much it affects you and your family’s survival, to them it’s just business.  The sooner you accept this, the quicker you can focus on what matters.  It reminds of a favorite quote:

“Life becomes easier when you learn to accept an apology you never got.” – Robert Brault

Relieved! – Definitely.  This job stopped being fun about 2 years ago.  All of my friends have already left, and the best parts of my role have been marginalized and devalued.  I would not apply for my job today in it’s current form.  I am so excited for the next opportunity.

Prepared! – Definitely.  Plan for the best, but prepare for the worst has been my personal finance mantra for years.  We have lived well below our means in order to save the money that will get us through this time.  More than anything else, I feel prepared.

Throughout the next few posts I’ll walk you further through my process.  I’m happy to take your questions, and I welcome your comments!

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• Let’s Talk About Envy
• Net Worth Trends: A Good Run in ’13

The post I Lost My Job – Now What? appeared first on Sunk Costs Are Irrelevant.