Both English Major and Krystal have tackled two of my biggest financial fears in the past 24 hours, which has brought them to the forefront of my mind. Which is, after all, not a bad place for them; the more I think about “worst case” scenarios, the harder I work to prepare for them.
English Major wrote about how her mother’s identity has been stolen. I’ll admit: I’ve always flirted with danger here. Until August, I was just throwing away everything, including those preapproved credit card offers. I knew I needed to get a shredder, but I let the fear hover just at the periphery of my life. Since I’ve gotten a shredder, though, I’ve become obsessed with shredding everything, even airplane boarding passes, which have no more than my name and which flight/where I went.
English Major is right, though, that everything I do might not be enough. The best thing I can do is control what I can, and let the rest go, a hard feat to do.
Krystal, meanwhile, continues to amaze and surprise me. She’s facing my biggest fear: being let go. Since I’ve been carrying a balance on my cards, I’ve become more and more terrified that I’ll be fired. There doesn’t seem to be much chance of this; I’ve been praised quite a bit from senior staff, including our CEO. Still, having little savings and lots of debt seems to make me paranoid. You never know…
Again, Krystal’s handling it much better than I could, looking forward and keeping a positive attitude. She’s made me even more determined to buckle down and get my cards paid off ASAP.
Did you know you can freeze your credit and people can’t open new accounts in your name? I do that and it makes me feel much better. I mean, it’s not a cure-all (nothing is), but it makes it a lot harder for identity thieves. My identity has been stolen before so I know first-hand that you can recover from it. You made an excellent point–you just gotta do your best to prepare for whatever crap might happen and then let go of it.
That said, I worry about being fired sometimes too–even though I think it’s unlikely. I still keep my resume up to date and look at job postings all the time. Isn’t that crazy?!
I’m also really afraid of losing my job. Krystal’s recent post has made me really want to build up my emergency fund.
Some credit cards offer insurance where, if you become unemployed, they will pay the minimum balance for you. I don’t know how much it costs, but I’m sure it’s not a good deal! Still, if you’re very concerned, the peace of mind may be worth it.
Ms. M&P–I had thought about it. In NYS, anyone can freeze their credit, which is great. (Not all states have this option for everyone; check your state Dept. of Consumer Affairs website.) Unfortunately, it then costs $5 everytime that you want to lift the freeze, or put the freeze back on after it’s been temporarily lifted (unless you’re a documented victim of ID theft, in which case it’s free). I haven’t yet made up my mind. On one hand, I love the idea of being able keep my credit on lockdown. On the other, I worry about having to pay each time I want to get a mortgage or some other type of credit. And who knows when/how much they’ll raise the fee? Still mulling it over…
SavingDiva–I know, me too! I’m trying to resist the temptation to put more than the $100/month I put towards my EF. I need to focus on paying off debt more, which I know, but it’s still so tempting to bump up savings instead.
Strange Bird–You’re right that peace of mind is most important; unfortunately, I think the CC insurance would rob me of tht instead of providing it. They really overcharge for something that is probably a pretty remote chance of occurance. It’s probably better for me to just continue to (slowly) build the EF.
Thanks for the great tips, ladies!
[...] 9th, 2007 by gildedbutterfly Ok, so if I wasn’t freaked out enough about Krystal losing her job, two of my coworkers were just fired. Yep, that’s the [...]