Sunday, October 31, 2010

Debt Busters!

I find this article is good and interesting so I post it here. Hope can help us..

Debt Busters!Blake Ellis
Friday, October 22,


Jaime Tardy

From putting spare change to work to going on a spending fast, these folks found creative ways to chop their debt.

Courtesy: Anna Newell Jones
Jones, 31, dyed her bag blue and her jeans black to extend the color -- instead of buying new clothes.

Anna Newell Jones

Strategy: Go on a spending fast for a year
Advice: Get creative. There are endless ways to save.

I had been spending over my means for a while. Every month I was spending at least $300, overdrafting my account and feeling horrible about it.

I realized I had all these wants and it was an insatiable thing. I would say, "Oh, I love this top from Anthropologie," and then as soon as I got it everything would be great... until I wanted something else. So I knew I needed to do something drastic. And one day, it clicked.

I decided to start a spending fast for the new year, which meant no spending on anything except absolute necessities -- like my mortgage, utilities, car payments -- oh, and hair dyeing. That was one "want" that I turned into a necessity as I started to see my roots grow in.

I can't buy clothes, no coffee out, no eating out. To save money, I've done the normal budgeting things like buying generic brands of groceries. But I've also started wearing all black and dyeing my clothes to extend the color. I've been re-gifting, growing my hair long to avoid haircuts, stuffing two loads of laundry into one and eating a lot of old canned food I've found in my cupboard. I also make random stuff to sell in my spare time. I have a store at Etsy.com where I sell zombie portraits of people, super cute baby onesies and banners, tags and shipping labels.

My year-long spending fast began on January 1, and so far, I have saved $5,772.25. $4,800 of that went to credit cards and the rest will go to paying my parents back the $3,247.97 I owe them and my $10,000 in student loans.


Courtesy: Lance Pickett
Lance Pickett, 32, and his wife put their "wants" on a Dream Board while they pay off their debt, and they track how close they are to paying off their mortgage.

Lance Pickett

Strategy: Live without the little things
Advice: Don't go too far -- like trying cloth diapers to save $60

My wife and I owed $18,000 in student loans, $6,000 in car loans, $2,000 in credit cards and $152,000 in my mortgage.

We were living paycheck to paycheck and I was tired of seeing my bank account zero out every month. So we wanted to get out of as much debt as possible as soon as possible. We started by saving an extra 1/12th of our total required expenses -- like mortgage, utilities and Internet -- each month, in order to have one month worth of bills saved up at the end of the year. Then we got excited and doubled that. In three years we had six months of living expenses and threw that into a high interest CD at 5%. That really got us going, seeing the money grow -- and we became obsessed with eliminating debt.

We just really took a look at what we need and only spending money on those things. I used to eat out a lot and that cost me $200 a month. Now we invite friends to "eat-in" at our house. We have a garden and purchase produce from co-op programs. Before we became debt-obsessed we would also get nice Christmas gifts for each other, but now we limit each other to $50.

Now, if there's something we want we put it on our "Dream Board," a cork board by our bedroom door that we see everyday. And it will stay there until we're debt free. It also has the loan schedule for our house, and each month we scratch off a month. Next to the schedule, we post our ultimate "want" that we agree to purchase -- with cash of course -- once our house is paid off. I have a 2010 Camaro waiting for me.

Cutting back so much has been hard, but we've learned a lot along the way. My wife learned some things are worth paying more for after trying to use cloth diapers -- which most people use as burp rags -- pinned inside training pants with plastic pants over them for our two kids, all so that she could reuse the diapers and not spend $60 a month on Pull-ups. As a result they both got horrible rashes, so we switched to a cheaper brand of regular diapers.

Altogether, we've paid off around $90,000 since 2005.


Courtesy: Jowharah McNeil
McNeil, 32, and her husband collect loose change in a jar to help make monthly payments on their credit card.

Jowharah McNeil

Strategy: Put spare change to work.
Advice: Cut back, use cash.

I was laid off for 18 months and had two credit cards to pay off, so I had to learn to be creative. My husband and I have been trying out a cash-only spending system and we're only allowed to spend $40 a week per person on non-necessities. That means once the cash is gone, it's gone -- no more spending.

While doing this strict new budget, we noticed we had a lot of loose change everywhere -- in our cars, leftover from doing laundry -- so we started collecting all the change we could find and putting it in a jar by the door. Every month, we would use whatever money is in the jar to make payments on one of the credit cards. The minimum payment is only $39, but we usually paid an extra $50 or $60 using the coins we collected so that we can get it totally paid off as soon as possible.

Since we started collecting the coins about six months ago, we've already paid more than $560 of the $1,000 balance on the card, so this is really working for us.


Courtesy: Brian Leigh
Leigh, 29, learned how to cook -- and ate broccoli every day of the week -- to save money and work his way out of debt.

Brian Leigh

Strategy: Track your expenses
Advice: Don't limit yourself too much, or you will give up.

I was able to pay off $22,000 of my $35,000 in credit card debt over the past 24 months just by looking really closely at where I was spending my money.

Being young, I made foolish mistakes with my credit cards, so when I started really wanting to knock out my debt, the biggest thing for me was tracking my expenses. I started by adding up how much I had been spending on meals and found out I was spending almost $55 a week just on lunch at work.

After that, I sat down, got a little notebook and started tracking every single thing I spent money on. I did that for a couple months, and then I came up with a payment plan. After overestimating how little I could live on the first month, I decided to take small steps.

I readjusted my allowance until it worked with my lifestyle. I started to bring my lunch to work four days a week, I shopped for groceries for one week and would then eat only leftovers during the weekend. I learned how to cook and found foods -- like broccoli -- that I can use in multiple meals so I don't have to waste anything.

To make sure my money goes where I need it to go, I set up two checking accounts and two savings accounts. I deposit $250 into the first checking account every two weeks --when I get my paycheck -- to use for everyday expenses. When it runs out, I don't go out.

I put another $250 into the first savings account as an emergency fund. Every five paychecks, I remove $1,000 from this account and apply it toward my credit card debt. I deposit $100 into the second savings account every paycheck. This account is used for long term goals, like a down payment on a house or a big vacation I want to take. Everything else gets deposited into my second checking account, and my bills and rent are automatically paid out of this account. Those automatic payments include an extra $1,000 toward my non-credit card debt -- like my student loans and car loans -- every month.


Courtesy: Jaime Tardy
Tardy, 28, whittled down $70,000 of debt in less than two years by getting on a strict budget.

Jaime Tardy

Strategy: Budget!
Advice: Save, save, save before you quit your day job.

A couple years ago, I decided I wanted to have a baby and quit my job. But there was a problem. My husband and I were in debt, and I made two-thirds of our household income. So I couldn't just quit.

I started out by sitting down and adding up all our debt -- which ended up being around $70,000. The first thing I thought was, 'Wow, we really need to start getting rid of this. We should sell our car right away.'

After some prodding, my husband got on board too. We sold his car and were able to immediately get rid of $19,000 of our total debt. After that, we knew we were totally doing this.

Craigslist and eBay became our best friends, and we sold everything from a kayak to a weight bench and a computer monitor.

My husband did some website design jobs on the side to make some extra money, and we printed out a budget each month so we knew exactly how much we could spend and what we would be spending it on.

We saved on gas costs by limiting the amount of driving we did, and we put ourselves on a grocery budget of $300 a month. On top of that, we cut out cable, lowered our phone bill as much as humanly possible and switched our car insurance twice in one year to find lower rates.

By the time I quit my job for good -- which was less than two years after I started the budget -- we had paid off $70,000 in debt and put $23,000 in the bank as an emergency fund.

Friday, October 29, 2010

Snuker 23/10/2010.

Bolt yang 'garang' pada set pertama dan meraih kemenangan.... dlm 40point ajak n a sahak kena titik...

Black cuba memberi tentangan di mana beliau juga berjaya meraih kemenangan...

Ajak yg 'lambat panas'....

Gaya SauQ bolt yg menawan...

Black biasanya memberi alasan 'penat' jika kalah....

Aduh, abg ajak amik gmbr mesti kabur... bolt amik cun jer...

gambar yg menunjukkan 'kepakaran' bolt dalam teknik snap pic....

kabur lagi...


Gaya ala2 Jimmy 'Black' sehingga terpaksa mengangkat sebelah kakinya... (kes malas amik Q la ni...)

thousand miles journey

ehem.. jus want to add bout circle of influence (COI) wrote by Ytc.. yeap, its true his idea bout COI and in conjuction with COI there is another fundamental aspects that got to be considered; i.e circle of responsibilty (COR). COR always comes first and latter will overlapped with it. These two elements interwoven into each other and the fine clear boundary/lines always difficult to gauge. Wealth.. power... times... health...knowledge... ideas always comes together with responsibilty the more we got the bigger ressponsility to bear upon. so.. at the end of the day we got to ask ourself what is/are our responsility/es? the ultimatum is.. we are the one who knew bout our responsibities! err.. by the way, andak.. how the progres of our nex meeting?... responsibility...responsibilty...

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Circle of Influence


Circle of Influence- things I can do to improve situation
Circle of concern - things I have no direct control

Assalamualaikum

1. Thanks Abang MB for your good writings. I think you should write more because you have talents and your writing style is simply great! I still remember once you said , we always think to change other people. Why not we look at ourself first and start to change from there. How true it is!

2. We go to work everyday and try so hard to change our staff. We get back home and try hard to change our wife and our children. We try to change our siblings. We try to change our neighbour, our community and so on and so forth. The list will never end. At the end of the day we feel so tired and upset. Eventually we found that we have no control over other people..

3. Only one person left to us to change. Ourself! Can we change this one person? Can we control him or her?

4. A beggar meet a succesful and merciful man at his office and ask for money. The successful man said that he can help the beggar that time but at the same time he want him to meet a great man who can really help the beggar forever. The beggar was astonished and being led to a small room with a huge mirror. He saw nobody and ask where is the great man? The successul man show the mirror and told the beggar only that man can help him forever! He gave the money to the beggar to buy some new cloth and food. That really touch the beggar and after three years he was changed to a successful businessman..

5. Steven Covey says -work within your circle of influence, not your cirle of concern. Your circle of influence will become bigger and bigger. How true it is! So friend, lets do it. Lets work on our circle of influence. It could be only ourselves right now! doesn't matter, give it a try and see whether Steven Covey tell us the truth or not. I bet he is. Don't tell me that you don't have circle of inluence at all! (actually many people don't have so they work on the circle of concern)

Abdul Aziz

Thousand miles journey

ehem... my good friend once said to me life is just like boomerang (he is aussie) whatever you throw it will come bac to u. how true it is.. dunno.. u got to be a skilled boomerang man to make it turning 360 to u ... therefore in order to be a skilled thrower u got to practice.. he.. he.. as wiseman says practice makes perfect. on top of that.. once u r a skilled thrower u might get extra if u hit the target correctly.. now the question are.. do u have a bommerang/s n do u have a target/s. i was touched by backpacker move last nite.. watching him working alone doin his haircut saloon.. unfortunately i came with my baby whom already slept in the car.. if not i wouldnt mind givin him hand. backpacker move to start a business is a wise act. come tahasian.. let get ourselves boomerang/s and start lookin for a target/s. and working together is might.. together we complement each other and compensate weaknesses if any. so i strongly suggest ipoi, bolt or u.black to complement backpacker. last weeks i've met with a boy... maybe around 17/18 years old. i took him from PLPP (disabled institute in bangi) to Warta bangi. the fare is rm 6 n to my antonishment he pay me rm7 and i asked him why.. pakcik service is the best amongst other taxi in bangi.. i didnt do nothing.. just talked along the way and makes some silly jokes.. that all.. even oku willingly to pay extra with good service. remember backpacker... good service is priceless..

Thousand miles journey

ehem.. few years back when i was in Canbera there was an old man in his 80's who often came to college with his old car bringing cookies and hot choc drinks for all student. he will comes every weekend and served us n the best part is... its free. so it becomes a routine for us seeing this old man and i did asked him once why he gave free cookies and drinks to us. he said.. he love watching young boys and girls eating.. coz he can't eat much anymore. he will greet each of us and smile.. and i cant forget his smile until now.. it is smile that u know came from a sincere heart n love. he didnt expect anything for return.. sometimes i spent few minutes talking to him whilst enjoyin my hot choc and great variety of cookies (always had full of plate).. n i noticed this old man will talked lengthy to any kid n the way he speaks u can sensed his enthuasism in his husky old voice. its been 17 yrs since my departure with this great man.. maybe hes not around anymore in Canberrra but he always in my heart....

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Food For Thought


Assalamualaikum

1. What is the most difficult thing to do? Make money? Find good job? Lead people? Find second wife? Yes, these are all difficult but I think the most difficult thing to do is to do good thing either big or small consistently..

2. Few days ago I came across news about one bank pay a 10% increase to its staff. Wow! at first glance it looks a lot of money but after a deliberate read, I found it is just for clerical. Their salary are about RM 1200 (USD 400) and 10% increase is another additional RM 120. While it is no doubt a good move by the bank, it makes me wonder how these people are surviving. Aren't we much much better than them? We got double, tripple, quaddruple and so on every month (I don't know the next word)..

3. Thank you Abang MB for posting your writing here. It remind me that you are following this blog which I thought you didn't. That encourage me to write more..

4. There is a story about a man who stay at home just with his son. For some reason his wife was not at home. It was raining outside so the man can't do outdoor activity with his son. He took a newspaper and before he read he prepare an activity for his son so that he will not disturb him. The man cut a world map from an old magazine into tiny pieces and gave the jigsaw puzzle to his son to solve. To his suprise, the boy came back to him in a few minutes with the solved puzzle. The man asked how did the son solve the puzzle? The boy simply answer.."easy dad, at the back of the map, there is a picture of a man. If the man is right, the world will be allright!"

5. Few days ago, I a have a drink with friends. A friend insist to pay for us and we ask why? He said he has not enough money and then we say don't pay. He said, because of he do not have enough money that he has to pay!

And god knows better..

thousand miles journey

ehem.. everyday is a good day.. and today i am trying hard to spare few minutes of my super precious times to say hello again to tahasian.. n hopefully this may rejuvenate our hard working ytc. guess everyone do recognised his timeless effort to steer taahas toward betterment n welldone. ytc effort has awakened most of tahasian if not everybody in some way,, n pls continue to lead taahas. in my opinion taahas has potential to move forward and expanded in a lot of aspect,, be it spiritually, socially and offcourse financially (he.. he.. ytc may think sceptical bout this,, pay ur contribution without failed) but at the end of the day we make progression, it may a bit slow and clumsy with lots of fumble here n there but it still a progress. a simple rule of physic tell once we reached up it will be a down hill trip which offcourse easier.. now braces yourselves (me too) let support ytc (contribution ler pa lagi). i do admit few times i was a bit off the track n lost focus.. not justifying my action just to share.. challenges in doin things for each and everyone is definitely different. at the moment i think we need to give another kick in taahas n maybe a meeting (attended by everyone) most needed to boost up our faded morale.. come on support ytc and taahas,, and extra milage needed from U.. (me too).. Andak could u pls organise and arrange for ur nex meeting.. tq everybody..

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Kurban



Assalamualaikum

Sedikit tazkirah dari Ustaz di tempat saya semalam:

Maksud Aidil Adha- Kembali mendekatkan diri kepada Allah..

Hukum Kurban
:
1. Mazhab Hanafi- wajib
2. Mazhab Shafii/ Maliki/ Hambali - Sunat Muakkad bagi yang mampu

Maksud mampu

Ada 8 level- Level 1 mampu seekor unta untuk setiap anggota keluarga............ level 7 adalah mampu untuk kurban satu bahagian lembu/ kerbau utuk seiisi keluarga. Level 8 mampu+s (gurau ustaz)

Level 7 ni adalah minima untuk kebanyakan orang. Adakah anda mampu? 3 dalil/ test mampu kata ustaz:

1. Kalau ada kuali terbalik di rumah(Astro) maknanya mampu.

2. Kalau ada kereta maknanya mampu

3. Kalau hisap rokok maknanya mampu

Tambah ustaz lagi, mungkin selama ini kita jarang buat Kurban sebab tu banyak masalah timbul seperti kereta rosak, anak-anak tak menjadi, rumah masuk pencuri dll. Wallahualam

Tadi saya dah masuk nama, masih ada kosong lagi so cepat2lah hubungi saya sebab tinggal 4 nama sahaja. Kebanyakan surau dah tutup pendaftaran. Surau yang saya ambil ni, surau kecil di tepi jalan. Ramai yang sembahyang adalah orang luar, mungkin sebab tu kurang sambutan untuk ibadah Kurban. Sudah ada 3 nama, harap2 boleh dapat 4 lagi untuk cukupkan 7 bahagian. Jika anda masuk di surau ini, maka saya percaya ini adalah lebih utama dari tempat lain yang sudah ada banyak lembu untuk di korbankan kerana dapat menggembirakan penduduk di sini. Satu bahagian RM 350.

Wassalam..

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Still in progress..





Izz Hair Cut is still in progress. Can be considered as 70% ready.. Canopy, mirror, machine, razor, cloth and the latest, barber chair are all collected for the shop grand opening. The only things that i still in progress to buy is the basic equipment of the business nature, "barber scissor & comb". :)

Ironically, my 1st business day will be on 1st November 2010. That is Monday which is the 1st day of a week.. And be my 1st customer!!!

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Last Message From Chairman

Assalamualaikum

Saya meletak jawatan sebagai pengerusi Taahas berkuat-kuasa serta merta. Sila pilih pengerusi baru anda. Semoga dapat menjalankan tugas dengan lebih berkesan dan memperbaiki kelemahan2 yang ada. Terimakasih kepada sokongan selama ini..

Sebab utama meletak jawatan adalah kegagalan saya meyakinkan kebanyakan ahli supaya memberi sumbangan tetap kepada tabung. Oleh itu, tanpa kewangan banyak perkara yang kita boleh jalankan tidak dapat dilaksanakan. Walaupun begitu, ada juga perkara2 yang berjaya dibuat seperti sukan, majlis tazkirah, kenduri-kendara dsb

Buat kali terakhir saya menyeru ahli supaya berkorban sedikit dengan memberi sumbangan tetap. Walaupun susah, ia seumpama memakan obat yang mana walaupun pahit harus ditelan untuk kebaikan. Saya juga meminta agar pengerusi baru nanti diberi sepenuh sokongan terutamanya pada apa2 yang telah diputuskan bersama.

Saidina Ali pernah memberi 1 dinar, kemudian dalam perjalanan pulang beliau menerima 9 dinar (saya tidak ingat sebabnya samada hadiah etc..). Lalu beliau bertanya di mana lagi satu dinar? Ternyata, si penyampai telah menyorok 1 dinar untuk dirinya. Orang itu bertanya Saidina Ali bagaimana beliau tahu dia menyorok 1 dinar. Saidina Ali pun menjawab bahawa satu kebaikan dibalas oleh sepuluh oleh Allah s.w.t..!

Allah s.w.t juga menjamin di dalam Al-Quran bahawa sesiapa yang menafkahkan duit di jalan Allah, maka dia tidak akan jatuh papa kedana. Jaminan siapakah yang lebih baik dari jaminan Allah?

Saya juga memohon maaf atas segala kelemahan dan kekurangan semasa menerajui persatuan ini. Walaupun meletak jawatan, blog ini tetap saya terajui yang mana ia adalah satu legasi yang berjaya saya kira..

Wasssalam..

Friday, October 15, 2010

Assalamualaikum

Bolt just take the house. Why, because..



I have a plan to set-up an office..



..with a big television complete with sophisticated audio system..


There we can drink fruit juices and..



..watch football games!!

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Rumah terbaru bolt nk sewa - 300 sebulan



Rmh yang jalan bahagia tu x jadi sewa kot. ni la umah abg asri yg nak disewakan. Dari dulu masa arwah bapak abg asri ada (bekas polis) sewa 300 sampai sekarang. Abg asri cakap mmg dia xnak naikkan sebab arwah cakap 300 pun dah cukup... maybe rmh yg bolt booking sekarang ni akan cancel (400 sbln)...

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

IZZ HAIR CUT

IZZ HAIR CUT- CUSTOM WILL. CUSTOM CUT. CUSTOM FASHION. EVERYONE HAVE THEIR OWN STYLE

I attracted to the above custom idea. However, to make customer easier to choose their style, here are some suggestions. For sure Backpacker can deliver..



Beckham style 1- Short and neat..



Youngster can choose this style..Beckham during early days..



Beckham3 - the older Beckham..



Beckham 4- smart and stylish..




Beckham 5- Looks elegant..

Other styles also can be considered:



Style for baby with Ramos..



Style for kid. Shauki and Naufal may suit this well..



Bolt can choose this style so that he can monitor his staff all the time..



This style is free of charge..



Skin head for those who have less and less hair..



I don't recommend this but if you insist, Backpacker can deliver for mmm RM 20?



There is still some balance of Uncle Black white paint, so maybe Backpacker can use some to color the hair..


Now, time to be more serious. I like to suggest a few thing:


1. Besides cutting hair at Mom's house, Backpacker can also offer service to cut hair at customer own place. Offcourse with some additional charge let say RM2. I'm sure many people will book you because a lot of them are ashame to come to our house..This will be come a real custom just like that old days!

2. Don't just cut hair. Add some neck/head and back massage. This what diferentiate one barber with others..

3. Courtesy. Most people stick to same barber for years because of this
Good luck!

pst: would you like if I make it compulsory to Taahas member to use your service?

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Akan Dibuka...


Kedai gunting beralamat di Lot 8568, akan dibuka tidak lama lagi.. Sesiapa yang nak bergunting rambut dialu-alukan datang bagi menyokong kedai ini nanti. Nantikan kemunculannya..

Usahawan kecil..

10.10.10, sejarah tercipta apabila usahawan kecil taahas mula menjinakkan diri dengan alam perniagaan. Hanis, selaku ceo tidak menoleh kebelakang lagi apabila tapak kedai dibayar dengan duit raya beliau. Aizat yang sememangnya sebagai rakan niaga sejak awal lagi mengatakan persetujuan untuk membuat 'join venture' manakala Taufik (anak abg zaidi), selaku operation manager tidak kekok menjalankan tugas dengan jayanya..



Monday, October 11, 2010

Open house at Kaklong's and Abang MB's house.

Assalamualaikum

Few pictures I able to take during open house at kaklong's and Abang MB house last month..


Moms at Kaklong's house



Firdaus..


Can be seen in the picture- Bolt, Maklang, Insyirah, Hazwa, Firdaus, Iffat, Aina etc..



Writer at the back of Abang MB's house



Backpacker and Abang MB. In the middle is Abang MB's brother in law..



Delicious chicken barbeque provided by Abang MB..



Tuan Hj Shukor with VIP guests Midah and family..



Wassalam..