Financial Goals for Fall 2009 – Update

 I had several personal finance goals for this fall semester and here’s how I fared on them.

Goals:

• Goal #1: Correct my social security earnings statement
• Goal #2: Open a Health Savings Account
• Goal #3: Start a personal finance blog
• Goal #4: Get a holiday job for my winter break
• Goal #5: Set a budget

 Goal #1: Correct my social security earnings statement

 Issue: What I saw on my paystubs and income tax statements did not correlate with what I was seeing in my social security earnings statement.

 Status: Done but…  

 Comments: I went to the social security office and they went through the paperwork with me and they determined that my earnings statements were correct.  Turns out that my undergraduate college, my previous employer, did not pay take social security out of my paycheck.  Following the social security administration’s suggestion, I emailed the university.  I will have to wait until they open up in spring to follow up on this matter more.  While I was reviewing my records in the office I also came across a short term job I didn’t have any information on.  It was taking notes for a student with disabilities for one semester.  For some reason in my mind I came to believe this was volunteer work but it was paid work.  I need to get some kind of record from the institution for this work as well. 

Goal #2: Open a Health Savings Account

Issue:  A few months ago I became ineligible to be on my parent’s insurance because of my age.  I get a one size fits all and covers virtually nothing insurance through my university.  I needed an alternate way to save for health care expenditures.  The Health Savings Account would be a perfect way to meet the gap. 

 Status:  Ineligible for the HSA

Comments: I knew that one problem with opening a Health Savings Account would be the fact my university student insurance wouldn’t really qualify as a high deductible insurance.  But, still I went to my bank to see if there was any way my university student insurance which has many of the characteristics of a high deductible health insurance would allow me to open up a HSA.  The answer was no. 

 Goal #3: Start a personal finance blog

Issue: I was expecting to land a job with the law firm that I was working for this summer but that did not happen.  With the disappearance of the six figure job I realized that I need to take charge of my finances right now to ensure the kind of financial security I wanted to have. 

 Status:  Started online blog and I am continually posting to it.  This has made me more accountable about my personal finance decisions.  It has also exposed me to 500 and counting spam comments per day.   

 Goal #4: Get a holiday job for my winter break

Issue:  I need money because (1) this year I do not have any parental support for my living expenses and (2) I have a huge spring tuition bill looming because all my outside scholarships were used for my fall tuition bill. 

 Status: In the process of completeing. 

Comments:  I am currently working a holiday job.  The earnings will be just under $1K.  This is really tiny when compared to my living expenses and my tuition bill, however, I am glad that I was able to make some money during the break. 

 Goal #5: Set a budget   

Issue: I am spending much more money than I think I am because there is no monthly budget or record keeping going on. 

 Status: Struggling.

 Comments:  I am currently revisiting several ways to find a budgeting method I would like to try for 2010.  I think using all cash would be the easiest but then I worry about building a credit history.  I will provide an update later on about my budgeting adventures.