Well hell yeah no kidding.. If I had the cash socked away somewhere I would pay all my bills, 2 cars and motorcycle off.. Obviously that would be nice but things being as they are I am just a working stiff and I have to be financed..I can afford the payments and I am building what I can for retirement. But mostly, I live for today. I have no wife or kids so Im not leaving a dam thing for anybody.

 

My kids are doing well. My dad is leaving me something when he goes. From what I hear, that should cover my retirement, but it's never enough.

 

i hear you loud and clear, dallastx. somehow it never seems like there's enough.

i'd consider myserf pretty fortunate. being only 25, i've been contributing to my 401K at work for as long as i've been eligible and i pay down my student loan (which compared to many of my peers, mine are pretty small) as much as i can. that combined with a car payment (d@mn beater died 3 months before graduation[:@]), it doesn't leave me a whole lot extra to spend on my scoot. by all accounts, i live well, just not well enough to have that brand new RKC.....

well, there's always '08 i guess....

 

Ordinarily I always pay loans off early . Hell I paid my house off in 9 years , I was driving a 16 yr car when I did it .
Retirement savings I look at a little differently . If you don't start now when will you and also you lose the power of compounding that only time will give you .
One thing you could do is to start your own self directed Roth IRA .
Its very easy to set it up , you can domost all on line if you want .
Then have monthly contributions taken out of your bank account to fund it ( dollar cost averaging ) .
Heres a good company to deal with http://www.vanguard.com/VGApp/hnw/CorporatePortal

 

One shouldn't ask for opinions if he doesn't want to hear the good with the bad.

 

AGREED

And as for what you had to say, High Gear, you're right on my wavelength. Opening upRoth is exactly what I was planning to do, as soon as the FED gets off its a$$ and sends out my taxrefund.... [&:]

 

Usually Car loans or a bike loan will have a lot lower instrest rate than your typical creditcard... pay off your cards before any auto loan/bike loan.

 

In this day and age, if you only have a car and motorcycle payment you ARE rich! So many people are maxed out on cards and 2nd, 3rd, mortgages, and have personal loans all over the place.
I used to have to have a new truck every 3-4 years but I'm now driving a '97 Chevy that I like just fine. I still have a modest house payment that I pay extra on principle every month and add to my retirement accounts each month with a bank draw.
So I did borrow for my bike through my home equity line but the interest is below 8% and I can pay a little or a lot depending on how business is that month.
First things first, take care of your family and future and then get a toy or two.

 

Damn! 70 months I only made 1 payment.

 

You bring up a good point, I don't know if I should be"insensitive" or sensitive to other folks' financial circumstances, now I'moverly sensitive due to the fact that I just retired. Ihave so many friends andrelatives that have "lived life for today" in this wonderful world of credit, nowhave aged, arehaving some health and job problems and will never be able to retire. Now they need andexpect help but yetwhen they really needed help managing their money, they got offended.Maybe it's time to change andbe insensitive.