Costs of a Luscious Lawn

As Spring has crept up on me and it is time to start working on some outdoor projects. One of the most pressing is the dirt and weed patch that is lovingly called my back yard. It is a mess and far from the fun and functional space I need.

To address the problem I've started with a little research. Starting with no clue about cultivating a grassy yard I have learned that in my part of the country there are two options: burmuda or fescue. Burmuda grows like a weed and is very tolerant of the hot sunny climate and better suited to lower amounts of watering. On the downside, burmuda is totally brown 5 months out of the year and never the soft carpet of green I would ideally grow. Fescue on the other hand is an attractive green color year round and can be made to flourish. Its weakness is that it is best suited to shade and requires very regular watering.

Fescue depends so much on regular watering that the local garden center recommended it only if we were willing to install a sprinkler system and run it 4+ days a week. My frugality, moderate as it may be, prevents me from ever seriously considering a sprinkler system or signing up for massive water bills just for the sake of a better shade of green. After facing water restrictions from drought last summer I am also weary to be so wasteful. Thus, I feel I am left with burmuda as my only real option for my yard.

Now I also have to determine how I want to approach "installing" the grass (I'm an engineer, not a gardener). The two basic options are to seed the lawn or buy sod. With each choice there are a number of secondary choices.

Surface seeding involves tilling the whole yard and adding lime and compost. As another option, I could seed the yard with a special "plug" planting device. What should I do about aeration? On the upside, seed is relatively inexpensive, ~$150 would cover the whole yard. Unfortunately each step in the process requires buying extra products and renting equipment that are costly instead. Finally, none of this comes with any guarantee of results.

If I choose to sod the yard there are is a different slate of challenges. The largest of which is the upfront cost of the sod which would run a minimum of $720 even if I choose to install it myself. Self installation of sod is again without a guarantee of results, but it has a benefit of far fewer complications and no special equipment required.

I've also considered putting the whole process in the hands of an expert. The companies I have called will charge about $40 a month for application of an assortment of fertilizers and weed killers. Lime application is $33 once per year. Profession seeding or sodding of the back yard would run over $1,000 for either option, but seeding is cheaper and will condition the soil in addition to just adding grass.

For now I'm stuck in decision paralysis. None of the available options really meet my budget constraints or my original idea of a luscious green yard all year round. I am currently leaning toward buying sod and installing it myself. It would serve as a trade off for me to provide the labor but pay extra to simplify and streamline the process. I am open to all comments and suggestions. How much is a gorgeous lawn worth and what route would you take to get it?

[ Read More ]

House Lust

This weekend we had some great weather, and so we spent a few hours yesterday afternoon gawking at the pretty houses. I nearly went into architecture, and even though I did not choose it as my career, I still draw floor plans and elevations as a hobby. There are dozens of open houses all over the area and if something really gets our attention we will stop and take a look.

Yesterday we drove through several neighborhoods where prices ranged from $280-500k. Of course in those price ranges we found a lot to like about the houses. One in particular really stood out and I immediately started running the numbers in my head. Could I ever afford it?

In our area basic housing will run around $80 per square foot. That will get you a house that is a little older (built in the 50's and 60's) and may need some touch ups but is in generally good shape. For $100 per square foot (the range for our house), you can get a mint condition house with some moderate upgrades. In the $115-125 per square foot price point you will find upgrades like granite counter tops, well manicured lawns, and real wood floors.

Our next house would ideally have four bedrooms and an office. In the perfect world there would be a basement or bonus room that would serve as the playroom for the (still hypothetical) kids. We can probably meet our bare minimum requirements for $280k but once we pile on a few items from our wish list it is more realistically a $350,000+ price tag. However, we don't plan to buy a house or move until our family has grown and will need more space.

Thus, cruising for a house is in some ways similar to going to the mall "just to look," but the key difference is that thankfully it isn't possible to simply plunk down the Visa and make an impulse purchase. There have been a few times that if it were that easy I may have been smitten enough to reach for my wallet.

I really enjoy these casual browsing sessions. It is great to learn more about the latest trends and get ideas for our own home. These dream homes also give me motivation to do more outside my day job to move toward achieving the dream. However, it can be frustrating to when I realize that it would take a massive windfall to make the "ideal house" fit our budget. I recommend spending an inexpensive afternoon taking stock of the local housing options but be sure to leave the pen at home. It isn't inexpensive recreation if you go off and buy a house!

[ Read More ]

Frugality Making a Come Back?

While reading through my long list of online news sources I found an interesting article that I felt merited some further analysis and discussion.  The article Why America Has Too Many Stores from Slate.com talks about overbuilding and dropping consumer spending in the retail sector.  In real dollars, after adjusting for inflation, sales were down over 2007 for the first time in years.  At the same time, strip malls and shopping plazas have sprouted up all over the cityscape (and Main Street USA too).

I can certainly see this trend in our neck of the woods.  My wife started working a part time retail job at a brand new upscale development when it opened back in December.  This complex has about 60 high end stores like Lucky Jeans, J.Crew, and Anthropologie.  While visiting my in-laws over the weekend we noticed that a new collection of big box stores anchored by a Super Target and Circuit City that popped up a few miles from their house too.  There were also several other large retail projects along the inter-state that we drove past during our trip which have all been completed in the last two and half years since I started regularly driving the route to their house.  I'm sure that something has to give, either the consumer gives in to the temptation or there will be a massive overstock of retail space. 

Aside from making me reluctant to sink any cash into commercial or retail focused REITs, the ultimate take away from the piece was a question of whether frugality might be due for a resurgence.   The popularity of personal finance blogs and the host of books rail against consumerism makes me think there may be something of a sea change coming in the spending habits of many Americans.  The Freegan movement seems to be an extreme anti-consumerism response that even seems to be gaining ground (and press coverage). 

The article seems to doubt the staying power of the trend in reduced retail buying stating, "The eleva­tion of frugality into a virtue seems likely to last about as long as modern recessions do—about eight months."  What struck me most about this quote is the idea of frugality as a virtue which certainly fits with the current trend I've seen in the blog-o-sphere.  The Boy Scouts (I'm an  Eagle Scout) may have something with the inclusion of "Thrifty" in the Scout Law.  I fully support the spreading frugality and thrift and indeed elevating it to the level of a virtue.

While I don't see a sweeping change that will fundamentally change the wider economy, an eight month breather seems too conservative an estimate of the impact of these changes.  If an additional 10% of the population increased their cash savings rate (which is near zero) up to 10% it would decrease GDP by as much as $93.8 billion a year.  That is only 0.7% of the total economy but it isn't a trivial sum either.  The survivors of the Depression were fundamentally changed for a lifetime, and while I certainly don't want to see that type of suffering ever again, I hope that some of Gen X and Gen Y can permanently incorporate frugality into our lifestyle.

As always, comments are welcomed.      

[ Read More ]

Rural Living Headaches

When I bought a house back in May '07 I didn't really think of the location as rural. I am only 8 miles from work and 2 miles from the nearest convenience store. It takes about 10 minutes to get to the main commercial district with a Wal Mart, Target, Best Buy and all the usual big box stores. The same 10 minute drive can put you at the door of at least 30 eateries which cover most of the major world cuisines and every chain restaurant in the book. Our neighborhood is just outside the city limits so we are blessed with slightly lower property taxes, but still close civilization. However, I have found a few problems with our out of town location.

The first snag is that our water and sewer bill is higher than it is for city dwellers because we do not get these utilities from the municipal source. Instead we are a part of a community water coop. The rates are not exorbitant but they are about 40% higher, which makes for an extra $18 per month expense. I have also found that a monthly visit from the pest control service has been a necessary expense. In the city I never paid to have the exterminator on call, but just a little outside the city limits the regular visits from a large mouse, mole, snake, and bug population reminds us regularly of the not-too-distant history of our property as a cotton field. This amounts to an extra $35 per month bill that I failed to plan for when considering the costs of the new house.

The final, and most painful, added cost of our semi-rural dwelling is the complexity of digital services. Cable TV, internet, and telephone service are years behind what was available at all of my previous homes. The only phone service is old fashion land line from Ma Bell (at $40 per month with Caller ID and Call Waiting). The only television options come from the two satellite providers: DirectTV and EchoStar (Dish Network). We had been promised by the builder that the neighborhood would be wired for cable TV (with one provider available), but that has yet to materialize. I spent the first two months we lived in the new house making daily calls to the local cable installers to find out when service could be installed. Each day I got a different answer so I decided they did not truly want my business and picked the Dish ($81 per month including HD Service and Sports Package).

Next on the list is internet service. It is such a huge mess that could be its an entire post on its own. To make a long story short, AT&T does not offer DSL at the moment. The cable company will one day offer service, but for now it suffers from the same problem as cable TV service so all I get is the runaround. The satellite companies do not offer a very compelling product at the moment. Finally, a local company, sensing this market opening, offered a 900 mHz wireless solution.

I decided to give the local company a shot with wireless and was able to negotiate a reasonable price of $40 (plus tax) all inclusive. Normally there are high start up costs to buy equipment or an equipment rental fee for this type of product, but I worked my way up the chain and got them waived. After installing equipment in the attic and running a new piece of cable through the wall I was all set to surf the web.

Now I have telephone, TV, and internet from three different vendors; each sending me a monthly bill. If you add all of those costs up, I spend $165.00 each month for my technology needs. That is more than any of my other utilities (except natural gas during the winter). At my apartment I spent $99 a month for more channels, more bandwidth, and more features. Ugh.

Now, to make matters worse, since Dec 31 my internet connection has been down about 85% of the time. My wireless internet company had a series of equipment failures and network interruptions that has made it a complete crap shoot as to whether the internet would work or not. This is the reason I'd never go into the ISP business. Reliability is important for these services and so far my provider has gotten a failing grade. This month I've often had to scurry off to the library to try and manage my eBay auctions and post to Aspire 2 Wealth.

This poor quality of service has doubled my turn around time for shipping eBay items (which may result in the dreaded negative feedback) and forced me to cut back on my blogging too. Who knows, there may have even been a few loyal readers who got bored waiting for a new blog post and dropped me from their RSS feed. I can't imagine living, much less running a business, in the third world where I may or may not have electricity from day to day, and reliable internet connections are rare (if they exist at all). I didn't think I would have this type of experience only a stone throw away from the city limits. The whole thing has been maddening!

I'm sorry the posts have been less frequent lately, but in this case there is also a useful reminder about the consequences of rural services. Learn from my mistake and look into these types of things a little better than taking the word of a developer that, "of course the neighborhood will have cable and high speed" when you are in the market from a new home.

Please be sure to check out the archives and check out the rest of what Aspire 2 Wealth has to offer during this time of intermittent posting. Thanks for reading; wish me luck.

[ Read More ]

Blog Roundup - Adfecto's Sick Edition

I've been sick all week. It started with some sniffles on Sunday and by Tuesday morning I couldn't get myself out of bed. I spent two days of sick leave from work (Tuesday and Wednesday) but today I had to drag myself into the office. I don't really feel up to writing anything new and original but I have spent a good deal of time reading my long list of favorite blogs (while drinking gallons of hot tea).

Here are some of the posts that caught my interest the most:

J.D. at Get Rich Slowly wrote about The Value of a College Education. I completely agree with his thoughts. When I sat down to write a post about my money decisions, I immediately knew that my educational choices were far and away my best. I got a BA in Computer Engineering and then took a job with an employer that paid for me to get a MS in Software Engineering. To get here it is/was a lot of hard work, long nights, and Red Bull but it has paid off. This path is really only for those who enjoyed taking apart electronics when they were kids, begged for Legos and erector sets for Christmas, and would rather learn C++ than Spanish. My total bill for education was near $100k but 2.5 years out of school I’ve made back every penny.

Free Money Finance added a helpful post about How I Paid Off My Mortgage. I can only imagine what it would be like to be totally debt free. The debate of paying off a mortgage early versus investing is explicitly left out of the discussion, but reading the post made me question my current plan to hold a mortgage up until right before I retire. Right now it seems like it would be nearly impossible to have the type of house I want, with enough room for a family, in the right neighborhood, and so on for an amount I could pay in cash.

Lastly, Plonkee Monkey wrote a great set of posts about Planning for Retirement: Buy-to-Let vs Pensions. This analysis (for those in the American market) compares the overall retirement income produced from rental property compared with investing in stocks and bonds. While the numbers and assumptions differ from what I estimate for my local market, the conclusion ends up being the same. Rental real estate is a valid way to invest your money and CAN beat the stock market. However, it is not for me! Renting out homes and apartments requires a high initial investment, high risk, poor diversification, and worst of all... a LOT of work. I've mulled over the decision to become a landlord dozens of times and every time I decide that the payoff just isn't worth it. You should still check out the articles yourself and see if it could work for you.

Now I am going to drink one last mug of tea and get to bed. Hopefully I will shake this germ and be back to my old self soon.

[ Read More ]