March 2008 - KambingBujang - Two Kids And Gadgets

Monthly Archives: March 2008

Money and Five Things I Most Truly Love Doing.

Mar 31

This post was inspired by simple dollar’s article: reflection on money and I want to share with you on how money can reflected by five things i most truly love doing.

”what five things do you most truly love doing?.Think of the things that you both enjoy in the moment and also enjoy looking back on later. Do any of these cost money?”

Watching movies
I used to watching movies with my wife every week because we both love it. Usually we didn’t care about the genre or the title of the film since we have an activity that we are both enjoy. Well, one ticket costs me RM11 and we spend our money at cinemas about RM88 a month.

Walking on the park
The best activity that we both love doing is walking on the park or garden. We both sharing our stories or our favorite topic of the week and walking around and never stops talking and laughing.

Take Photographs
My wife loves so much in taking photos, she brings camera plus her cameraphone wherever she goes. She pushes the snap button when something caught her eyes. We happily doing this together and it involves no money, except for the initial investment to buy the camera and cameraphone that cost us RM1900 and the cost of printing the photos.

Read something at book store outlet.
On Sundays, we spice up our bored life by reading books and magazines at book store outlet that allows us to read more than 2 hours or so. This costs us nothing and we gain something valuable by doing this. Actually, we want to do this reading activity at the closest library but they don’t open on Sunday

Visit our friends and relatives.
We often visit our families to make sure the valuable relationship is heathly and continuos. Yes, we enjoy doing this activity and delight every moment of it. We surely have to bring something nice like fruits and chocolates but not necessary expensive. If our friends and families visit us at our place, we have to buy a decent dinner for them, and involves some money but it worth spending. Togetherness brings happiness and laughs; it shares our feelings emotionally.

Ringgit paths to heaven: 27th March 2008

Mar 27

This post offers great and interesting links that converse about money, finance, and economy.

Here what I’ve found 5 best post and article that catched my eyes when i was roaming around the blogosphere.

1. 5 Strategies to Survive An Economic Slowdown

”If you lose your ability to generate income, do you have enough cash reserve to stay afloat? More importantly do you have an emergency plan to keep you out of trouble? ”

Here comes the slow.. by the time you read this, your current situation may be; jobless, no money, buried with debt, or trap in mortgage crisis. Moolanomy.com offers you 5 strategies to survive

2. The $200,000 Baby

”Apparently the average cost of raising a child has risen over the $200,000 level for the first time. This money stops at 18, no college, wedding and endowments beyond. Yep, just $200 grand hit to your personal finances to get this little guy through High School.As a parent of three it is amazing the costs, some hidden and some blatant in raising a kid.”

Thinking about raising a child?think again. But well, what the hell. Children are the long-term investments. Raising the children of 6 is my dream, I will put my hardest effort to realize it.

3. No Needs For A Budget – Use The Cost Of Living Approach

”Instead of playing with columns of numbers, drop one category of your budget and increase another one, you can simply try to save more money every month. If you can change your spending habits and put $500 aside several months in a row,you now can buy your new car (knowing that your saving capacity will drop down to $0)”

thefinancialblogger.com has a brilliant idea. I believe that most of us see the budget approach is too technical. It may be wasting your time if you’re not really into it. Try dump some of your money into the savings immediately to avoid unnecessary spending, leave some money for daily expenses.

4. 10 Steps to Take if You Can’t Pay Your Bills

”A hardship plan can be many different things. They will often reduce the interest rate and lower the payments or they will allow you to make partial payments and tack the remaining balance onto the end of the loan.”

Tell the creditor you cannot pay bills, discuss with them to develop new plan for you. This point is the best step to take if you unable perform payment.

5. Things I Learned About Money from the Thais

”Frugality is a way of life in Thailand. They were hilariously frugal. Things that we take for granted are guarded very closely in Thailand.”

Most of thai people having problems to cope with the cost of living.The salary is way below average of US people. Imagine if you if your salary $10 perday. Frugality is the only way to live, they try to save everything they have to make sure they can eat tommorrow. Frugality is the only way to survive.

photo by:macrokita.com

Understanding Economics

Mar 26

This post offers you simple explanation on what is economics, microeconomics, and macroeconomics.

Economics:

“the science which studies human behaviour as a relationship between ends and scarce means which have alternative uses.”

-lionel robbins

”Economics is the study of how individuals and societies choose to employ those resources: what goods and services will be produced, how they will be produced, and how they will be distributed among the members of society. ”

-Britannica Concise Encyclopedia

Simple explanation: to observe how people like you and me making decision to fulfill our need and wants in the world of limited resources, and how a group of people determine to provide an adequate basic needs for society.

Microeconomics:

”a branch of economics that studies how individuals, households, and firms make decisions to allocate limited resources”

-wikipedia

Simple explanation: The study focus on basic economic player such as company (Petronas), individuals (you and me), and a household(a social unit living together) making choices and decisions while the resources are limited.

Macroeconomics:
”Study of the entire economy in terms of the total amount of goods and services produced, total income earned, level of employment of productive resources, and general behaviour of prices.”

-britannica Concise Encylopedia

”Macroeconomics is a branch of economics that deals with the performance, structure, and behavior of a national economy as a whole.”

-wikipedia

Simple explanation: Observation of an economy, example economy of Malaysia. Macroeconomics has an extension study of how a country handle and manage unemployment, national income, rate of growth, GDP (growth domestic product), inflation, and price level.

Economics is one of favorite subject when I was at University. It could really teach us about certain economics behavior. I am interested on how the government play role in economics; to decrease unemployment, to increase productivity, how they making decision, on what policy they have to implement.

All these things happen around us everyday, we could see whether it is good, or it is ridiculous decision the government made on certain issues.

What you don’t know can hurt you financially

Mar 25

These questions were created by Laura Rowley for us to answers. Ok, let me answer all the Qs.

1. Suppose you had $100 in a savings account and the interest rate was 2 percent per year. After five years, how much do you think you would have in the account if you left the money to grow: More than $102, exactly $102, or less than $102? My answer: More than $102.

2. Imagine that the interest rate on your savings account was 1 percent per year and inflation was 2 percent per year. After one year, would you be able to buy more than, exactly the same as, or less than today with the money in the account? My answer : less than today with the money in the account

3. Do you think that the return than a stock mutual fund.” following statement is true or false?: “Buying a single-company stock usually provides a safer. My answers: true

After done checking with the answers given, I only score 2 out of 3 answers. It shows that only I have a basic knowledge in financial, I guess.

This article gives me a lot of reason to think and revise my financial situation. Actually there’s a lot things that we don’t know can hurt us in financial ways.

The author wrote about what we don’t know about financial

· How the credit card balance to can be double in a matter of time.

· Inflation can devaluate our currency.

· Manage to handle risk diversification of investment.

Here’s some good advice that I think we should follow:

· Keep track of your spending for a month or two.

· Sign up for your 401(k) – As known as EPF in Malaysia.

· Put a number on your ultimate goal – your money should be equals to 12 times of your income for retirement.

Please read the full article: What you don’t know can hurt you financially

The end of cheap food, in Kota Bharu

Mar 24

For five days I’ve been in Kota Bharu to visit my parent in law to celebrate our newborn baby. As early plan, they suppose to visit us at Hospital Putrajaya. But sadly, they couldn’t travel all the way from Kota Bharu because of my father in law’s condition. Both of them were excited to meet our son.

First time my plane landed on Kota Bharu, I was eager to go to my favorite food stall – Gerai Jaimah Nasi Kukus. After unloading all my stuff at our parent’s home, me and wife went to eat at the stall but only to learn that the price has increased 40 sen; from Rm3.50 to Rm3.90. The increase of 11.4% gave a little bit burden for the ones who love to eat Nasi Kukus in Kota Bharu because all the Nasi Kukus Stalls also have been infected.

Beras Siam or Siamese Rice also has increased sharply according to my mother in law. For 25kg of Siamese Rice price only at Rm42 but after the general election, the price chalked up three times in a short period of time. See this table for simple explanation:

Cost of 25kg Siamese rice
Before Election <8th: RM42 ,
After Election >8th Mar: RM55, RM62
As at 23 March 2008:RM67

The rising price was frustrated because me and my wife have planned to bought 25kg of Siamese Rice and bring back to our home. It is one of my methods to save money on groceries and I think it is the best way to save; balik kampong every four month and buy Siamese Rice.

Other foods have increased in Kota Bharu recently:
+Tapai Ubi (Breakfast) – from RM1.00 to RM1.20
+Nasi Lemak – from RM1.00 to RM1.20
+Fried Rice – from RM1.50 to RM2.00

Even though the price increased on most major foods in Kota Bharu, it is still economical compared to foods and groceries in Selangor. I’m still amazed that fresh orange cost me 60 sen when I wandering around at Pasar Malam.

For all I know, the inflation has invaded the land of Kelantan, especially in Kota Bharu. Just don’t overspend for unnecessary items or ignore the price hikes- be careful, learn how to fight inflation. Here I suggest my own How I save money.

The New Budgeting Approach : An envelope budget systems

Mar 23

There’s a great post on how to use new ways to manage your budget efficiently. Mr Debtbeater guides on how to create an envelope budget system and show you step by step using the system.

Here I note out some of the important tips

Be flexible

Try to go easy with your budget, be flexible

Choosing categories.

Choose five categories that you think important to you.

Calculate Amounts.

Divide your money into the categories.
Write down how much that you want each category on the envelope.

Keep track of Envelope ‘’deposits’’.

Just keep track your expenses with your budget by using simple spreadsheet.
Write down the date of the transaction on the envelope.

Fill the envelopes with cash.

The advantages of envelope budget system
The Envelope Budget system is a new way on how to develop our discipline when comes to budgeting. Some advantages in this system are:

Allow us to track properly our spending behaviour.
You save time upon reviewing your monthly budget.
Make you live below your means – spend less than you earned.
More cash involved, means that less credit usage.
A new cool way to upgrade your traditional budgeting systems.

I think this new whole system could help with expenses that are unfixed, the figure keeps changing every month like groceries, clothes, water utility, and electric bills. I would like to implement it our budget next month, see it suitable or not with our spending behavior.

Read full article : How to create an Envelope Budgeting system.

Malaysia To Maintain Fuel Subsidy

Mar 18

This stunning news was really giving me a little shock for the first time. It’s not that I’m not happy to know that the government will not granted any increase on petrol price, but the statement that government made was really ignited my rage.

All these years, we have been told that Petronas and the government couldn’t give subsidies on petrol anymore because of the high price. It is said that they would gain losses if continue to contribute subsidies.

”Malaysia plans to maintain state subsidies despite record crude oil prices,
the country’s premier said on Friday, less than a week after leading his party
to the worst election disaster in its history.”

According this news, the petrol subsidies actually were influent by the politic environment, not by Petronas’ rising operation cost over 40 billion ringgit. The poor result of election recently paid them good lesson about ‘not to play fire with us (Malaysian people) or trying to manipulate us with your excuse, excuse, and excuses.

Read the full news: Malaysia to maintain fuel subsidies

My father and his brand new Bravia.

Mar 17

I usually sleep at 10.30 every night. One night i was about to sleep, my father knocked my door and asked if I didn’t mind set up his new TV he just bought from Sen Heng.

‘Why dad bought a new TV? Our TV at hall didn’t show a sign of malfunction yet’ that was the question crossed my mind and i was surprised to see Sony Bravia box at the back of the car. (Nice Bravia ad)

After setting up the luxurious 32 inch Sony Bravia LCD TV, I asked my father:

Me: Dad, why did you actually buy this TV, ours didn’t broke yet?
Father: I was getting bored waiting your mom’s to finish her aerobic class, so I entered the store and bought TV and Laptop.
Me: A laptop? You just bought PC last year. Don’t you think it’s kinda wasting?
Father: Nope, it’s kinda mobile. I can go online wherever I want.
Me: Ok dad, it’s your money and I can’t argue about that.
Father: Relax, son! It only eats me RM150 a month.

My father has the purchasing power of four times better than me and his desire is likely four times than mine. He has less commitment and responsibility than before – what I mean here is that he only finances my younger sister and my brother’s cost of living and education. His other four children have live on their own feet and don’t need financial support from their father anymore.

As a conclusion, my father has a lot of money with low expenses, so he started to strike off all the things on his wish list.

Ringgit Paths to Heaven : 16th March 2008

Mar 16

++Video of What successful people never do

++Temptation is like a decease to us. Sometimes we don’t really want to buy luxurious items. We try so hard to fight but in the end we lose the battle.

++Is Google in Trouble & Facing Bankruptcy?

++How to battle credit card fees: Watch your interest rate Be wary of late fees Be aware of the gotchas.

++The number of American households worth $1 million or more – not including the house itself – grew at the lowest rate in five years, according to a report released Wednesday

++See the Housing Bubble Map of Misery [Pic]

++Even the best and most reasonable emergency fund can be insufficient to take care of a major medical expense

Cooking our own meal. Save time vs. save money.

Mar 13

We know that the consumer goods are increasing recently. With the non-consumer goods are likely to escalate as well, me and my wife decided to cook at home rather than eat at restaurant.

But there’s other thing needs to consider and that is time. It is as valuable as money also. Money can be regenerated but time is irreversible. You cannot turn back the time no matter what.

Cooking at home does save you a lot of money. You can see the differences if you dining out. Let’s see if you eat restaurant, the price of a cup of rice is RM1.20. A cup of rice only costs you RM0.20 if you cook at home.

Cost of meals if we eat at restaurant:
Fish (2 persons) = RM 5.00
Chicken (2 persons) = RM6.00
Vegetable (2 persons) = RM 3.50
Total = RM14.50

And if we cook at home:
Fish (2 persons) = RM1.50 (saves RM3.50)
Chicken (2 persons) = RM2.00 (saves RM4.00)
Vegetable (2 persons) = RM1.00 (saves RM2.50)
Total = RM4.50

We save about RM 10 a day if we cook our own meals. In a year, we save about RM3600.

Cooking at home may eat up your time over an hour if you want to serve 3 dishes of food. Dining out actually save you a lot of time. Just choose any meal that you have in mind, call up waiter and order. In 15 minutes, your food is well served and ready to eat.

You save 1 hour when you eat at restaurant but cost you about RM7 per person (RM14.50/2). For one hour, you can many productivity things like writing, exercising, email answering, reading and many more.

As my opinion, eat at restaurant is for busy people whose time is precious and valuable item and it is not a good decision to cook at home despite it saves money.

For the ones who have family like us, it is the best for our money to cook at home plus we can spend time together doing the activity that we love.

GOLDMAN SACHS: Oil May Reach $200 a Barrell — SOON!!!

Mar 13

In yet another dramatic sign of just how truly fucked this economy is, leading market strategists contend that the fundamentals are there for a ‘super spike’ to push oil prices higher, much higher. NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — With $100-a-barrel here for now, Goldman Sachs says $200 a barrel could be a reality in the not-too-distant future

read more | digg story

How can I get 80k by just saving RM100 every month.

Mar 12

Last year, I have invested in one mutual fund called Public China Ittikal Fund managed by highly acclaimed Public Mutual Bhd. Last night I try to draw the illustration of 20 years of investment to see how my money growth in that period.

Below is the table of 20 years of investment with the interest rate is considered constant 10% every year.

Why 20 years?
My previous post, I’ve stated that my goal is only 12 years of investment. But now I think 20 years is a good measurement for a long-term goal and I believe it is the best for me for not to take out that money before it hits 20. With an increment of RM 1200 deposit every year, I can get over RM80,000 when I’m 43 year-old.

What do you need to get RM80k in 20 years?
I need a steady saving of RM100 every month without a miss to get RM1200 in a year. It also needs discipline and strict budget. It’s not easy to wait for 20 years of investment; it requires patience in my heart to get over my greed to fulfil my goal.

Will the interest rate goes 10% every year?
No. It is only the drawings of 20 years of my investment with 10% steady interest rate. We should be well informed that the interest rate will go up and down throughout the years. Let’s hope it will give us the average of 10% every year.

PCIF is the favourable mutual fund in Malaysia. See why I chose PCIF as my first investment.

How This Economy Is Going To Play Out

Mar 11

15 preditions for the future..none of it good. The writer just predict all the bad things might happened. But I don’t believe Asian country collapse along with American economy, that’s just so ridiculous. Ok, my prediction is that the US will completely shattered, the Asian’s economy will rise.

read more | digg story

Evil Inflation : the definition, the cause, how to fight.

Mar 08

We’ll be expecting the government will increase the price of petrol after the 2008 election due to unbearable high price of crude oils. With the consumer goods’ price was already taken its place to a higher level, we feel that the world is unfair and we wonder how these can happen.

What is inflation?
According to answers.com; A persistent increase in the level of consumer prices or a persistent decline in the purchasing power of money, caused by an increase in available currency and credit beyond the proportion of available goods and services.

To me, inflation is a significant rising in price of items I usually use, buy, and consume. These items are the needful things where I use it to survive or to continue my lifestyle. Even if the price is high, I still need to buy it.

This video can actually tells you what inflation is.

What cause inflation?
+A rise in production costs or raw materials. e.g. Crude oil prices.
+Federal Taxes on certain consumer product. E.g. Cigarettes
+International lending and national debts.

How to kick out inflation?
++Save some money.
++Spend less than you earn.
++Consider substitute items. The best example I can give is replacing regular petrol tank into natural gas tank. It is reasonably cheap and gives you more miles to your car.

What’s next after inflation?
Hyperinflation is when the government print out money paper excessively in order to satisfy the government and private spending. Example; They print out three zero digits on the RM100 paper note while it’s truth value decreasing.

And the countries had been infected by it a long time ago:
++Angola
++Argentina
++Austria
++Brazil
++Germany
++Hungary
++Turkey
Click here for full list of hyperinflation around the world.

See this video of 1200% inflation in Zimbabwe for the good example of hyperinflation.

How do people define inflation.
It’s hard to believe that inflation has hits most of the country. I hope we could pray and believe everything going to be alright.
+ Party’s over: uppity Chinese and Indian workers spur inflation
+ Inflation is Rearing its Ugly Head Again
+ Inflation is an important issue for everyone in New Zealand

How do people feel about inflation around the world?
I put the keyword ‘as inflation’ and here’s what I’ve found
+ Drug prices for elderly rise twice as much as inflation
+ As inflation subsides, disinflation seamlessly fades into deflation.
+ Gold and oil soar as inflation fears grow
+ Cameroon crisis continues as inflation surges

Inflation really knocks me off and whenever the government announce the fuel price increment, I get frustrated and curse the sky.

Can you suggest what we can do to fight inflation?

America’s Debt Crisis Lot Worse Than Reported / $48 Trillion

Mar 05

Last year total debt increased $3.9 Trillion, 5 times more than GDP.External debt owed foreign interests increased $1 Trillion;Household, business and financial sector debt soared 9%.72% ($35 trillion) of total debt was created since 1990,a period primarily driven by debt instead of by productive activity.

read more | digg story

My Ringgit has gone wild and uncontrolled.

Mar 03

Last month’s expenses exploded suddenly because of unexpected events happened. Emergency situation and other things turn out beyond my expectation. Here, I list down what have occurred last month:

+My eyeglasses frame was damage, went to repair, and break again. RM 160.00
Consider it emergency case because it broke unexpectedly and I can’t live without my eyeglasses, I’ll go blind. So I have to use my emergency fund to pay a new frame because my current frame can’t be repaired.

+Labour fee: RM420. Prepaid call card in case of emergency: RM60.00. Massage for new mom: RM150.00 Other Medical Expenses: RM 110.
My wife had delivered our cutest little baby on February. I already separated for labouring budget in emergency fund and I don’t have to worry about insufficient money when it comes to medical expenses.

+Flight for Balik Kampung : RM86.00 + RM285.00
I planned to visit my parent-in-law and share our happiness of our newborn baby. Ok, I’m not supposed to use emergency fund for this kind of purpose, but I have no money left. I reluctantly used it and I know I broke the emergency fund rule.

+My little nephew throw a rock to my back glass pane of car for fun: RM350.00
At that moment, I felt furious and I really spanked my nephew for doing that thing. New back glass pane cost RM350.00. I really need to use the car and so I drew out my emergency fund.

I’m glad I have emergency fund that covered all these unpredicted expenses and I feel a little bit relief because my regular monthly cash flow ran smoothly without heavy distortion. As at 3rd march 2008, my emergency fund decrease 70% and it may be takes a while to recover. My goal for the next three months is to concentrate on raising emergency fund and I’ll set aside my money for RM300 a month.

What I’ve learned from this situation.
++Unexpected things happen and we need to get prepared when they come.
++Emergency fund is useful when in case of emergency.
++Emergency fund is a mandatory thing for everyone.
++It gives you financial safety net, so your cash flow didn’t blow up.
++Don’t use your emergency fund for fun, travelling, high tech gadget, and others.

I might be in the financial stress if I don’t make an emergency fund a few years back. I’m very thankful because I have no money problem when handling unexpected event.

Would You? Work 4 Times a Month and Make $115,000

Mar 02

Sites like SugarDaddy.com lure young women by offering them far more money than they could get in most professions. What’s wrong with this picture?

read more | digg story

20 Money Hacks: Tips and Tricks to Improve Your Finances

Mar 02

Improving your finances improves your happiness, in general, so I thought it would be important to share stuff that’s worked for me.Here I point out the list below : ++Use cash. ++Stay home. ++Cook at home. ++Exercise. ++Use the envelope system. ++Pay savings and debt first. ++Exercise at home. ++Cut out cable TV.++Declutter. ++Lend and borrow. ++Barter. ++Use online savings. ++Try frugal gift-giving. ++Teach your kids about advertising, saving, earning, and gift-giving. ++Find happiness in life, not spending.

read more | digg story

Scroll to top