I've been trying to become a responsible adult lately. Financially, at least. I've always been good
with money as far as paying bills and keeping my debts low, but I've never done well understanding things like investing. Some more responsible friends have gotten me, over the past two years, to do a couple of things, one being that I opened up a high yield savings account and have a reasonable chunk of change in there. However, most of that money is in reserve for the day my show gets canceled or I'm out of work for a long time. It's also, for instance, a good reason why I was able to take a month off and go to Australia. The other thing I finally did (just this year, by the way) is open an IRA. So, I've got the savings account, the IRA, and whatever retirement fund is headed my way from my union. Lately, a few different people have recommended the idea of buying things and paying all bills with a credit card, while my paycheck sits in the high yield savings account accruing interest. Then, at the end of the credit card statement period, before any interest is accrued to the account, paying it back out of said savings account. This actually makes good sense to me except for one thing - I pay my bills online at B of A's Billpay. As far as I can tell, I can only pay my bills from my checking account. Anyone know how to pay bills with a credit card, without having to go to every company's web site and manually pay there with it?
The song of the day is "Money" by Pink Floyd off their 1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon. I have to admit, I never made it to the Pink Floyd party. Roger Waters left the band in 1985 when I was only 14. But I have come to appreciate much of their music in my more recent years. Someday, I'll have to actually buy some CDs and see how much I like them. Especially Dark Side, so I can try playing it along to Wizard of Oz, like Diane suggested.
with money as far as paying bills and keeping my debts low, but I've never done well understanding things like investing. Some more responsible friends have gotten me, over the past two years, to do a couple of things, one being that I opened up a high yield savings account and have a reasonable chunk of change in there. However, most of that money is in reserve for the day my show gets canceled or I'm out of work for a long time. It's also, for instance, a good reason why I was able to take a month off and go to Australia. The other thing I finally did (just this year, by the way) is open an IRA. So, I've got the savings account, the IRA, and whatever retirement fund is headed my way from my union. Lately, a few different people have recommended the idea of buying things and paying all bills with a credit card, while my paycheck sits in the high yield savings account accruing interest. Then, at the end of the credit card statement period, before any interest is accrued to the account, paying it back out of said savings account. This actually makes good sense to me except for one thing - I pay my bills online at B of A's Billpay. As far as I can tell, I can only pay my bills from my checking account. Anyone know how to pay bills with a credit card, without having to go to every company's web site and manually pay there with it?
The song of the day is "Money" by Pink Floyd off their 1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon. I have to admit, I never made it to the Pink Floyd party. Roger Waters left the band in 1985 when I was only 14. But I have come to appreciate much of their music in my more recent years. Someday, I'll have to actually buy some CDs and see how much I like them. Especially Dark Side, so I can try playing it along to Wizard of Oz, like Diane suggested.
posted by EditThis at 6:02 PM
7 Comments:
I still pay my bills by writing a check and mailing it out!!
To pay your bills with a credit card you would have to use cash advance checks which have a higher rate of interest than purchases on the credit card. There generally is also a limit on how many such checks you can write. I'm not sure this plan would work . . . As an example, if your check was 10k, it would probably only sit in the savings account for 20 days before you would need to pay the credit cards in order to insure no interest charges - you'd only be earning a few dollars on it - not enough to justify all the work, and the risk of incurring charges if it doesn't all work out exactly right
Buy and read Smart Women Finish Rich by David Bach.
Flix - shame on you. You won't even have to buy the stamps if you do it online!
Diane - thanks for the book recommendation. I hear what you're saying with the checks, but my friends had implied you could pay right off the card.
I've been a huge Pink Floyd fan for as long as I can remember, which is why it was particularly thrilling for me recently to hang out with David Gilmour's touring drummer. It didn't hurt that he's hotter than hell and a cool guy to boot.
Interesting that I should read this post just a few seconds after preparing next month's budget. Whew! There'll be no eviction notice on my door...this month, anyway.
I tried to pay my bills online except when I received the confirmation email that the charge was accpeted and then the next month finding out that I was charged a late fee for not paying my bill. It was then I switched back to writing checks and mailing them out. At least I have control of what happens.
Yeah, the Pink Floyd parade passed me by and I don't think I missed out on anything.
I pay some bills with my American Express. Which is something you can set up on the amex website. They have lists of companies such as utilities and what not and you just set it up very similar to the bank online thing. I then pay my amex from my us bank checking account. You could probably have a minium amount in the checking and then transfer funds from savings to pay the bills. I rarely if ever use a stamp. I also get amex rewards and use it for things like airmiles and such. Amex does not let you carry a balance and there is no credit limit- hence you can accrue a huge amex bill- I can even pay the mortgage with it.
Whn is Neil Diamond going to be in the song of the day- looking through my collection and I think everyone knows song song blue ~Jen B.
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