Not All Money is the Same

If you have been following me on Twitter you’d know that I attended a Cold Play concert earlier this week – Monday night to be exact. There’s something really cool about going out on a weekday, especially because I had to take-off from work much earlier than I would normally have left and we had the in-laws baby sit the kids for us. However the topic of this post is not the fun that my wife and I had – although the show was a blast – the topic of this post is the fact that the value of money changes with context.

You know for a fact that everything you can buy at a concert is going to be overpriced to a ridiculous degree, however I did not bat an eye when I paid $13 for a diet coke and some garlic fries. A glass of beer? $9. Really, really crappy pizza? $8 please. No problem at all sir, here’s the cash. However, I sometimes take minutes to figure out whether I should spend 99 cents on a cool iPhone application or to buy a new song. Why is that? It’s all about the context in which I am asked to spend the money. This is not a rational thing, after all, money is money regardless of how you spend it. What changes is my mindset. When I go out, or go on vacation my mission is to have a good time – I come prepared to spend the money. I throw frugality to the wind and laugh in the face of waste. Stupid? Yeah, maybe, but it’s a fact.

But there is some good news – on the way out of the concert we each got a free Cold Play CD. Very cool. My wife gave hers to the in-laws as a thank you gift and then quickly adopted mine. Justice.

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Thinking of Buying a House

My wife and I are thinking of buying a house. We are both in our late thirties and have never owned our home. I don't believe that a house is a good investment, and since we didn't know for sure we were going to be staying in California, we were never in a rush to buy a house. Now that our kids are growing up and our rented place is getting too small for our needs, we are seriously thinking about getting our own place.

Buying a house in our town is out of the question. There is no way we can afford to buy here - at least, there is no way we can afford to buy anything that could be considered decent. We have started to look in towns that are somewhat more affordable, and this weekend we went to several open houses, a few of which seemed very nice and were within our budget.

I think there are a couple of good reasons to buy a house at this point in time. For one, real estate prices have come down substantially - although not in our town. Mortgage rates are reasonable (check out this calculator), the government is offering some great tax incentives for buying and, perhaps most importantly, I think that in the coming years we will face some inflation - meaning that mortgage debt may diminish in real value as the value of money decreases.

Nevertheless, the decision is not clear cut for us. There is one major factor acting against us: employment. My wife is currently not employed, and getting a new position may take many months. In addition, my own company is not the perfect image of stability. I work for a start-up, and while my company is doing well, you never know how things will work out when you depend on outside funding to keep your business going.

We're going to take it nice and slow. We'll look for something we really like that fits our budget, educate ourselves on what it means to buy and own a house, and make sure we have the right advisers to assist us. If the stars align, we may even own a house by the end of the year.

I like the sound of that. :-)

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Hiring in a Down Market: a Personal Perspective

My company is one of those rare beasts: a corporation that is hiring in the middle of this nasty downturn. Yes, there are jobs out there even in the middle of the recession. This puts us in the enviable position of being able to hire top notch people being released by other companies. Last week I started looking for a part time marketing contractor to join my team - I did not have to advertise the position, I merely had to reach out to my network, and within a day I received over 50 e-mail applications. Here are some of my random thoughts regarding this whole episode:

No Advertising - note that I did not advertise my open position. If you were looking for it on Monster or any of the other job sites you were out of luck. To know about this position you had to have been told by someone who heard about it from me. Once again, the critical nature of networking is demonstrated.

Unqualified Applicants - even though I avoided the job sites, expressly to avoid a flood of e-mails from unqualified applicants, at least 50% of the applications I received were from unqualified people. Either they were in completely different professions but wanted to take a wild shot, or they lived in another state (even though I expressly stated this was an on site position for local candidates only). Folks like that waste my time and theirs. It's very easy for me to hit the delete key, it's harder for them to write a cover letter.

Calling Helps - as I mentioned I received many applications, and didn't have a chance to read all of them in detail. However, four of the applicants called me on the phone and left me voicemail. I called back three of them. At first, I was irritated to get the calls, but a well targeted and thought out message got me to give these candidates' applications a more through review. I invited one to interview in person.

SOME, Calling Helps - some people make mistakes when trying to get a job. When one guy called, I was actually at my desk and happened to pick up the phone. This person greeted me with a "Hi Shadox" (well, he actually used my first name), and waited for me to respond. This immediately got on my nerves. You have to understand that every executive in this country gets many, many calls a day from vendors trying to sell you anything you can think of. If you got me over the phone, you have about 5 seconds to get my attention and make your case (and that's on a good day). Someone who calls me by my first name and waits to receive a happy greeting back (who I don't already know), is in for some hostile treatment. I told the guy to e-mail me his resume, but I didn't give it a second glance. If you do take the risky move of calling the hiring manager out of the blue, be sure you have a very concise and clear pitch if you do happen to get him or her over the phone. And for God's sake, be polite.

Watch What You Write - I am hiring a marketing person. Here's the worst mistake a marketing person can make in a job application: spelling errors. Is this the level of attention I can expect from this person when he writes copy for my marketing materials? That's simply not acceptable and it's not a recoverable error for this type of position. Now, if I were hiring a mechanic, maybe it's not a big deal, but a marketing person? That person will be looking for a job for a little while longer.

Here's another one: you are interviewing for a marketing position but your rambling cover letter is a full length document. You just told me all I needed to know. If you can't pitch yourself coherently, how will you pitch my company?

Show Me, Don't Tell Me - talk is really cheap. If you are looking for a position in which you can demonstrate your proficiency in your very application, do so. Folks that sent me samples of their work immediately got a call from me (that is, if their work was half way decent). That's the difference between talking about what you do, and showing me that you can do it well.

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Good Service is Alive at Netflix!

Everyone is talking about how customer service is horrible wherever you look these days and it pretty much is - just look at my recent experiences with airlines and credit cards, others have problems with moving companies and don't even bring up the topic of hospitals around me. Well, it turns out there's a shining ray of hope. Last weekend I had a a good customer service experience and from an American company no less. That company is Netflix.

Yes, Netflix, that company that sends you DVDs in the mail. We find their service is great value for money and while we have been members for over 5 years, with the exception of one lost disc and one broken disc we've never had any service issues. In each of those rare cases, the problem was rectified with a brief and painless visit to the Netflix website.

Well, last weekend I ran into a little bit of a problem getting an instant movie stream to work on my laptop (the company let's you watch their online movie collection, free of charge, as part of your regular subscription). I called the company's customer service number to ask for some help, fully expecting the horrible customer service experience we have all come to expect from American companies. No such thing. The experience was positively awesome.

First of all, finding the customer service number was a breeze. The website also told me the expected wait time (under 1 minute). I called the number expecting a crappy voice menu that would take forever to navigate through. Again, no such thing. A human picked up within seconds, with no sign of a voice menu. How unexpected and how wonderful! But wait, there's so much more!

The customer service agent on the other end of the line had an American accent! Wow. Americans working a customer service line? The conversation was pleasant, the customer agent helpful, they answered all my questions and even provided some answers to questions I didn't ask. At one point my Internet router was acting up and I wasn't getting an Internet connection, so I asked the agent if I could call back in a few minutes. She proceeded to explain that they were there 24x7... not 8 to 5 EST, not work days, 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. An American company... can you believe it?

After my Internet service got back online I called Netflix' service line again, and again was answered in a matter of seconds by a live American human, who proceeded to make quick work of my problem, while at the same time not reading from ANY script (or at least not seeming to read from any script). He was intelligent, informed and pleasant.

Well it looks like there is still hope for customer service in America. Netflix: I was already a fan, but now I am a bigger one. You have made a loyal customer happy and more loyal. Hey look, you even got this free advertising post from a cynical ol' blogger like me...

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One Line Answers to Personal Finance Questions

Every once in a while I go through the search terms that people use to get to Money and Such. Most are typical personal finance terms such as 401K or investing in stocks, but some are really good questions while others are truly bizarre. When the mood strikes - and it just did - I like to take some of these search terms and give one line answers in response. Not all the answers below are what you would call serious. Hopefully you can figure out which ones are which...

Here goes:

"Do you pay money for old furniture?" - Some people pay LOTS of money, especially if the furniture is REALLY old. They call them "antiques"... go figure.

"How safe is the stock market?" - It's not, but it's probably your best shot at a decent return over the long term (as in DECADES).

"Why is money worst?" - Sprechen ze english?

"When is the best time to quit a job?" - Tuesdays after tea time are generally considered appropriate. Wednesdays between 2 AM and 4 AM are generally frowned upon.

"Should executive salaries be capped?" - No, executive salaries should not be capped. Only populist law makers consider this a smart move.

"Saving is bad" - Definitely. In Bizarro world! Oh, hold on, are we talking about endangered species here?

"My assistant is making more money than me. How can I make more?" - Seriously? I would say you have a good case for asking for a raise...

"Is this a good time to re-balance my 401k?" - There's no such thing as a good or bad time, just be sure you re-balance according to a predefined schedule and don't time the market.

"Is the iPhone worth the monthly bill?" - HELL YA! It's the best phone I ever had.

"How much should I waste in rent?" - As little as possible...

"Sentence to ask for raise" - "Could I have more money, please?"

"Can money buy happiness?" - Some people think so.

"Do I need an automatic re-balance in my 401K?" - you don't need it, you can re-balance manually, but automatic is nicer. It's the memory thing, you see.

"Working in a law firm sucks" - Oh, yes it does. From experience. I also find that working in a law firm tends to put you in contact with a lot of difficult people.

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