Home Sweet Home

Moving always takes more out of me than I think it will. It takes more time and more energy than I budget for the experience.

Packed and ready to go…

Ten days ago, I received the keys for my condo. Since then, my life has been a whirlwind of activity. The morning after I got the keys, I recruited help to move my stuff from my apartment to my new home. Friends like Adam Baker and Becca Borawski did an awesome job of hauling heavy boxes (full of books) and heavy furniture down four floors and then up four floors. I’d only planned on five hours for the move but it took eight. (And I didn’t get everything done that I’d planned.)

Becca, Baker, and Kim helping with the move…

Kim — who was fantastic at filling in the gaps during Saturday’s move — then helped me unpack boxes on Sunday. We also took a trip to Ikea to pick up a few pieces of furniture. By the end of the weekend, we had a functional kitchen and living room, plus a mattress on the floor of the bedroom.

The first week in the new place felt a little bit like being in college again…

All last week, I worked on the condo. I continued to unpack boxes. Friends helped me pick up odd pieces of furniture here and there. On Tuesday night, my cousin Nick helped me move and install a washer and dryer. Almost. The dryer turned out to be more of a challenge than we’d anticipated. In fact, it’s still not completely functional (though I hope it’ll be usable by the end of today).

As Monday turned to Tuesday turned to Wednesday turned to Thursday, I raced to have my place clean and ready for a romantic Valentine’s dinner. Fortunately, Kim’s expectations were low. She wanted something simple, and that’s what she got. I ran out of time to have everything ready, so we ate our steak and salad at the bar.

The living room is now mostly finished…

Over the weekend, Kim continued to help me unpack boxes and put together furniture. Now here it is on Monday morning, and I’m still not completely moved in. The kitchen, living room, master bedroom, and master bedroom are finished, which is comforting. But the laundry room still doesn’t work (and I’m running out of clean clothes), the office isn’t complete (I need to print some stuff but can’t find my spare toner cartridge), and the back bedroom is filled with boxes of books. Plus, I still have a bunch of stuff at Kris’s place that I need to move.

The bedroom in a usable state. Still need to decorate, though.

I’m content, though. Even though things are still in disarray, my new condo feels like home. I love the condo itself, and I love the location. I’ve already hosted more people here in one week than I did during a year of living in the apartment.

On Friday morning, Kim and I strolled in the sunshine down the multi-use trail that’s right outside my door. We walked to the wildlife sanctuary, then up the hill to the next neighborhood over. We stopped at the grocery store and the hardware store. She stopped to pick up lunch at the Thai place. We talked about our plans for the future.

Living here is going to be fun!

How to Travel the World (Without Spending a Lot of Money)

This is a guest post from Matt Kepnes, who writes about travel and more at Nomadic Matt. His advice has been featured in The New York Times, CNN, The Guardian UK, Lifehacker, Budget Travel, BBC, and Yahoo! Finance among others. Kepnes is the author of the just-published How to Travel the World on $50 a Day.

When I first stumbled across Get Rich Slowly, I figured J.D. didn’t travel much. Or if he did, he didn’t mention it often on the site.

But as we’ve gotten to know each other, I’ve been excited to discover that he travels frequently. He’s hiked the Inca Trail, spent time in Turkey, and I hear he’s making big plans for a European trip with his girlfriend at the end of March.

As a travel writer and someone whose personal mission is to get others to travel more, I’m excited. Seeing people travel makes me smile.

Crossing the 4950-meter pass near Salcantay

J.D., crossing a pass near Salcantay, Peru

Blinded by Marketing

Since I write about travel, I field a lot of questions about the practicality of seeing the world. People always tell me, “I want to travel more, but I can’t afford it. It’s too expensive.” But you know what? It’s not.

Forget what you’ve read in magazines and seen on TV. Travel can be very inexpensive. The reason you believe it’s unaffordable is because of marketing. Giant resorts have advertising budgets to match; small hotels do not. If all you’ve ever heard of is posh resorts, that’s what you’re going to believe travel is about. It’s hard to unlearn a lifetime of mass marketing.

Discouraged by the perceived cost, many people don’t travel. But if you really stop to think about your destinations, you can see they don’t have to be expensive. After all, locals don’t hundreds each day to live at your desired destination. (Just as you don’t spent tons of money to live your everyday life.)

Just like me, J.D. and thousands of others have found that when you make traveling a priority, instead of being discouraged by prices, you can work around them. In doing so, you get to see behind the curtain and discover travel isn’t expensive.

How to Make Travel Affordable

What are your priorities in life? Maybe it’s travel, maybe it’s gardening. Whatever your priorities, don’t you do everything in your power to fulfill those desires? You cut out expenses in other areas of your life, rearrange your schedule, research the hell out of it, and do whatever it takes to make your dreams happen. You make your dreams happen.

That kind of prioritizing is what happens when people want to travel more. (J.D. would call this conscious spending.)

“Well,” you might say. “That’s easier said than done, Matt. Flights and everything still cost money.”

You’re right. Even if travel is your highest priority, without money and a plan, it’ll never happen. To make that dream come true more quickly, here are five financial tips to make your next trip happen sooner.

Separate needs from wants
Before you travel, you’re going to need to save. Nothing in life is free. There are many ways to cut expenses, but one thing that really helped me was separating my wants from my needs. A need is my electric bill; a want is Starbucks. By categorizing my expenses, I could cut out the unnecessary expenditures and really watch my travel fund grow. If I didn’t need it, I didn’t spend money on it. Before I knew it, I’d saved enough money to travel.

A reader of mine recently saved over $14,000 while working a minimum wage job as a fry cook. If he can do that, so can you.

Think outside the box
Want to visit Europe but can’t afford Paris or Italy? Head to Eastern Europe, where prices are cheaper. Want a tast of the tropics but Fiji’s too far and Costa Rica’s too touristy? Head to Nicaragua, which has beautiful weather and lower prices. Visit Cambodia instead of Thailand, or see South Korea instead of Japan.

There are always cheaper and safer alternatives to the world’s top travel destinations. We think of the big names first because they’re always talked about; there are just as many great places out there that you haven’t heard of and don’t have the crowds.

Game the system
Travel hacking is the best way to make luxury trips affordable. Travel brands offer so many ways to gain loyalty points that you can easily rack up tens of thousands without ever having to travel. This is an oft-discussed method of traveling but with good reason: It works extremely well.

If you really want to make your next trip happen sooner, get a travel-related credit card, sign up for a frequent flier and hotel loyalty system, and accumulate points like there’s no tomorrow. Moreover, don’t forget to sign up for newsletters so you can find out when there is an offer of 1000 points for taking a survey. Good resources for finding the latest point deals are:

J.D.’s note: Matt mentioned that I’ll soon be traveling to Europe, and he’s right. One way I’m going to keep costs down is by booking my flights using air miles I acquired by applying for a credit card two years ago. Another way is by using Airbnb to book lodging.

Think local
Travel doesn’t always need to be to some far off and exotic destination. Travel, to me, is about getting outside your comfort zone and exploring what you’ve never seen before. That could mean heading to Fiji or visiting the state next door.

If you don’t have a lot of time, driving somewhere for the weekend can give you a travel fix and still allow you to see something new. The U.S. is such a diverse country geographically that you don’t have to go far to feel like you’re somewhere entirely new.

Depend on the kindness of strangers
There are many hospitality websites that help travelers find free places to stay, as well as free guided tours around their destination. The most common are:

Couchsurfing is probably the most popular, but each of these websites connects you with locals who will give you a free place to stay. If you’re not quite comfortable with that, you can still use the sites to arrange meet-ups and plan social activities with locals.

Staying a while longer in one place? Try house sitting. Have a home? Swap it with someone in the destination you are going to visit! Both methods allow you to eliminate accommodation expenses and save more money.

Final Destination

Traveling is about goals. Like everything else in life, without a good plan, you’ll never reach your goals. My hope is that you can see there are many ways around the “high prices” of travel. It’s easier than you think to make travel happen. These five tips alone can cut hundreds of dollars from your trip — and they’re just a start.

I used to work an entry level job but I prioritized travel and made it happen. J.D. makes travel happen. Every year, millions of others make it happen. Now, I want you to take these tips and make it happen too!

House Hunting, part two: Finding a Place

It’s going to be an exciting and busy week for me.

Several weeks ago, I mentioned that I was looking to buy a new place to live. After a year of living in an apartment, I had a good idea of the place I wanted to find. Plus, the Portland real estate market seemed to have hit bottom — and had even begun to climb.

Throughout the fall, I worked with my real-estate agent, Andi (a former Get Rich Slowly reader). While she and I focused on finding a property that appealed to me, I struggled to find financing. Because interest rates were so low, I wanted to obtain a mortgage.

Ultimately, I gave up the idea of financing a home purchase. Despite the fact that I had ample cash in savings, no bank would give me a loan. I didn’t have enough income to qualify. If I wanted to buy, I’d have to pay cash. It took some time, but eventually I realized I was willing to do so.

Feels Like Home

During my first three months of house hunting, I’d seen one place that really appealed to me (but it sold in 24 hours, and while I was on the road), and had failed to find financing. It was frustrating.

After Christmas break, Kim and I spent a Sunday with Andi looking at condos in northwest Portland. The following week, Andi and I found a few more to explore. There were a couple I liked, but I didn’t fall in love with anything.

On my last day in Houston, I woke to find a listing I liked: a condo in a building where I’d already seen one unit. The first unit had appealed to me, but Andi and Kim both noted that it was directly underneath one of Portland’s major bridges, a bridge currently undergoing construction — and scheduled to be under construction for the next two years. “That’d be a deal-breaker if I were buying the place,” Kim said.

The new place was on the opposite side of the building. Plus, it was on the top floor. Plus, it was a little bigger. “I like this condo,” I told my host in Houston. “I’ll have to look at it when I get back to Portland.”

The real issue was that I’d mentally decided that I was only willing to spend $300,000. When I thought I could get financing, my budget was $400,000, but because I’d have to pay in cash, I’d mentally adjusted my price range. The new place was listed for $329,000. I decided to take a look anyhow.

The condo felt right almost immediately. Though staged in a plain and simple manner, it felt like home. I loved the view of downtown Portland (distant though it was) and the view of the river. I liked the layout. I liked certain features in the kitchen and bathroom. Most of all, there was something about the energy of the place that just felt right to me. “Let’s make an offer,” I told Andi.

Making an Offer

We spent a day trying to decide on a figure. I felt like $329,000 was a little too high. Plus, I’m a frugal fellow. We decided to submit a purchase price of $310,000.

As we were drafting our offer, we got word that somebody else was making a bid. “Crap,” I said. “What do we do?”

“That’s up to you,” Andi told me. “But in a competitive situation, you don’t want to be seen as lowballing.” In the end, we offered $325,000.

Our offer was refused.

Andi called me back with the news. “The sellers want ‘best and final’ offers by noon tomorrow,” she said.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“It means they have at least two of you bidding on the place. Maybe more. And they want you to give them their best price now.”

I spent that evening doing a ton of research.

How much did other units in the building sell for?
What about other properties in the neighborhood?
What were prices like for other condos in other parts of Portland?
What could $325,000 buy me in a nice part of town? A lousy part of town?
What about $350,000?

I called Kim and talked things out with her. I also called my friend Mike, who owns investment properties in town, and asked his opinion. Then I sat down and worked out numbers. How much was I willing to pay for this place? What sort of difference did it make that I was paying cash instead of financing? (When you pay cash for a property, you’re essentially shifting your investment from one asset class to another. That’s a very important distinction.)

Ultimately, I decided I was willing to pay $342,000, so that’s what I offered.

My offer was accepted.

Failed Negotiations

From there, things got a little interesting. The home inspection was mostly glowing. We did not perform an appraisal because the sellers balked at that requirement when we submitted the offer. After we’d combed through the reports and documents, we found a handful of things that bugged us. (Plus, we were cranky about some sleight-of-hand regarding a storage unit.)

As the deadline for my decision approached last week, we took everything we knew about the property into account and reduced our offer to $336,000. The sellers refused to budge. They exercised a “take it or leave it attitude”. I asked Andi what that meant.

“We believe it means that the other offer (or offers) the sellers received were very near your offer,” she told me. “They don’t care if you back out because they have a backup offer that’s just as good. In fact, I think it’s likely that the backup offer may have been better. In any event, it’s almost certainly at least $336,000.”

In true J.D. fashion, I agonized over what to do. I could afford $342,000 instead of $329,000. My research indicated that the condo was worth the higher price. Plus, there was at least one other offer that supported that valuation, as well. Still, it bugged me to have to pay a premium for the place.

In the end, I elected to stick to my guns. I loved the condo, and I especially loved the location. I agreed to pay the $342,000.

Closing the Deal

On Tuesday, I’ll sign the documents for the purchase of the condo. On Friday, I should take possession.

It’s all very exciting, but it’s also a little scary. After months of moving in slow motion, the final part of the process happened at warp speed. “You don’t seem that excited about your new place,” Kim told me last Thursday. I am excited, but I’m also overwhelmed. I don’t feel like I’ve had time to process everything. I’ve done a lot of second-guessing myself.

But I also realize that if this doesn’t work out, it’s not a $342,000 mistake. The money hasn’t evaporated. It’s simply been shifted from stocks (which seem to be high right now) to real estate (which seems to be low right now). If there’s any mistake here, it’s on the order of $5000 or $10,000, not $342,000. (That’s still a lot of money, but not an obscene amount.) Besides, I’m certain there’s another buyer out there who’s willing to pay $336,000 for the place, and that gives me comfort.