Adulting 101

Figuring out the adult world one step at a time.

[freshoutofcollege]

Credit Score

Ahhh, the dreaded word. The thing that only exists in the United States (as far as I’m aware). The thing that will literally stop you from doing anything at all ever in your adult life. It’s sucks, it’s annoying, it takes time. But let’s start here.

My credit score started with my student loans, I’m sure it was awful before my car loan, but to be honest I didn’t look at it until after I bought my first car. I got a loan for 4,000 and made monthly payments. This greatly increased my credit score.

You don’t have to buy a car, though. Just get a credit card. I know, the scary card that could ruin your life. Don’t let it! Treat it like a debit card. By things with the credit card and then pay your bill twice a month with your debit card. This means you have to be very responsible with budgeting and assessing your bank account so that you can keep your debt under what you already have.

If you don’t like that idea, put a subscription on the credit card. Do you have Hulu? HBO? Apple Music? Put that on the credit card and schedule payments for the debit card the day after the subscription charges your credit account. This will slowly build up credit and get you moving toward the right place.

[freshoutofcollege]

Grocery Shopping (No, You Don’t Need That Many Cheez-its)

Let’s talk about grocery shopping. It’s something we all do, or should be doing. It’s time to stop spending so much money on fast food. It’s bad for your weight, it’s bad for your health, and most importantly- it’s bad for your wallet.

Before you leave the house, eat some food! Eat lunch, eat a snack, drink a lot of water; fill that stomach up! The worst thing to do is shop on an empty stomach. That’s when you pick up the extra cereal and the pizza rolls and Doritos... the list goes on and on.

Secondly, make a list. Go around the kitchen. What do you have? What don’t you have? Things like milk, bread, sandwich supplies, condiments, butter, rice. These are things you want to have on hand all the time, like spices.

Meal plan, meal plan, meal plan!!! God will you spend so much money just getting random ingredients and thinking of what you might be able to make them into later. Sit down on Pinterest or whatever your method of researching recipes is and search for 3 to 4 meals a week. You will have left overs and these can fill the days that you aren’t cooking. Also, if you’re interested, look up batch cooking. It involves cooking a couple different meals with the same ingredients and you do it all on one day so that the rest of your week you are set with dinners.

Am I telling you you can’t snack? God no, I’m the queen of snacks. Get some popcorn kernels and some olive oil. A small base layer of olive oil and 3 kernels, wait for them to pop, add however much popcorn you want into the pot, and bam you’ve got yourself a healthy snack. Salt, pepper, and butter can add to the taste if you so desire.

Remember when we talked about budgeting? Set a budget for groceries so that you don’t go over the top by picking out cinnamon rolls and 30 yogurts that you probably won’t eat. Also, don’t get a giant bag of celery if you’re not going to eat it. That’s four dollars down the drain that could have been spent elsewhere.

If you’re really on a tight budget, water is all you need guys. Pretend like it’s the only drink. If someone questions it later? You’re trying to be healthy. They don’t need to know all your business and it’s a decent excuse.

In addition to the water, if you do want to go out and grab, say, Chick-fil-A; get your entree by itself and then some water. I mean, if you really want those fries then go for it, but I know I’m not the only one who can’t eat a whole meal in one sitting. Fries get cold. Entrees by themselves are much more affordable and you’re really not missing out. It saves you a lot of money and if you’re consistently skipping sodas and juice, you’ll get to a point where you don’t even want it (I promise, it’s a thing).

Okay, I could go on and on about shopping and budgeting. I’ll leave it here for now. Of course, if you have any questions, drop them in my inbox and I’ll reply for all to see.

[freshoutofcollege]

Budgeting

This is not an ad.

Let’s face it, you’ve been living in a dorm for the past however many years, surviving off of cafeteria pizza and the occasional midnight Taco Bell excursion. Oh, and beer. If you haven’t been running around like a ninja turtle and have actually been supporting yourself for a few years, good on you. This could still help you, but if you have it figured out, by all means drop some helpful tips in the comments.

You may have saved up a bunch of money in order to pay bills while you get settled at work, or maybe you’re having your fiancé pay for now and then you’ll switch once you get your first real paycheck. Either way, or anything in between, you probably had a lot more disposable income in college. Now you have renters insurance, car insurance, rent, electric bill, Internet bill, gas, groceries, and maybe much more. How do you keep your head straight and not spend too much? Well, I found something that works for me, so hopefully it will work for you too.

The Go Girl Budget Planner. A simple, small notebook with monthly spreads, debt trackers, saving trackers, monthly budgets, monthly expense trackers, STICKERS, and more. I think I got mine from Amazon for about $8 and I got it shipped next day with prime.

My journey in budgeting is still very new. I am writing everything down that my fiancé and I purchase for the month (minus his fun purchases, plus my fun purchases) to get a good idea of how much our cost of living is for the month. I did not plan a budget for this month because honestly, I have no idea how much were going to need to spend in groceries and what the cheapest market is around us. It’s all a learning experience. Once this month ends, I will pull everything together to create the budget for next month. The budget planner I use makes that very easy and quite possibly enjoyable, especially with the stickers.

If I have any advise to lend at this point, it’s get a place to keep track of exactly how much you’re spending and check it DAILY. You may not realize how often you get coffee or a coke and how much that adds up by the end of the week, much less the end of the month.

Also, check out Mint from Intuit. Does that second word sound familiar? It’s because they also own Turbo Tax. Mint will link to your bank account (once you give them permission) and categorize all of your spending so that you have an idea about how much you’re spending on what. Also, it creates budgets for you depending on your monthly income. It is very, very helpful in not only keeping track of your finances, but also giving advice. Also, *cough, cough*, it’s completely free.

[freshoutofcollege]

Apartment Hunting

My god, apartment hunting. If it is new, you may be excited, and that’s great! But just a fair warning, it may be a bit irritating as you find that some apartments are real, and some can be scams.

Maybe all of the areas I have looked at are abnomal, but I’ve lived in apartments in over 4 states, all of which were rather similar. The apartment inspo that you may see on Tumblr seems incredibly unrealistic to me. I have never come across an absolutely massive apartment with walls made of glass and a kitchen bigger than my own bedroom, but for some reason that is what is exhibited on Tumblr as inspiration for decoration.

The apartment my fiancé and I have found is a two bedroom with two floors, no one is above or below us. They are listed as apartments but it is more similar to a townhouse. Two bedrooms, 1.5 bath, a kitchen, living room, and patio area. There is also a washer and dryer hookup which seems to be way more common than an actual, in unit washer and dryer.

We looked over several homes and apartments before coming across ours. We’ve seen basement dungeons and high rise studios. Beautiful properties and horrifying. One thing I would say is don’t be afraid to rent a house, it’ll give you more space and more flexibility with animals. We settled for an apartment at first, but are planning on buying a home once our lease is up.

When looking for an apartment, understand what you need. Okay, you make $4k a month, but do you really want to spend 25% of that on rent? If you don’t have to? No, probably not. Now I understand the rent prices vary GREATLY depending on location. I’ve lived in an area where average rent for a 2 bedroom apartment is 1.4k per month not including utilities. Now I’m moving to an area where my total monthly apartment costs don’t go over $900. Just because you make a good amount, doesn’t mean you need to spend it all on rent. Now, if you want to splurge now, that’s all you. Saving now may help you start a retirement account and have more money for the future- but it all depends on what you want in life.

Know what space you need. Do you need a dog park? Do you need a washer and dryer? Would it be really annoying for you to wash your clothes at 3 AM in a laundromat because you work night shift? Or maybe impossible because of operating hours? Think about how your job affects your home life. Also think about what is around you. Do you mind driving 20 miles to the nearest grocery store or do you want to be 5 miles away from the nearest Walmart?

All in all, take inventory of what you want in life and look for a place that meets as much of your needs as possible. Understand what you can pay for versus what would make you struggle from paycheck to paycheck. If you have questions, don’t be afraid to reach out to the apartment complex, they’re more than likely to work with you because they want residents in their apartments.

[freshoutofcollege]

Car Insurance

This is not an ad.

Car insurance. I was on my dad’s car insurance all throughout college because I was lucky enough to have that covered for me, but now it’s time to get my own. Car insurance took me longer than renter’s insurance.

Car insurance is VERY individualized, it takes into account your car, age, how long you’ve had a license, your driving history, and more. My fiancé uses the same car insurance as his renter’s insurance, but his driving record is dirty so it would have dragged me down if I put him on my policy or he put me on his.

Again to google for research, I looked at seven different companies in order to decide which one worked best for me. The one I landed on was Progressive.

Progressive offered me $18 and change for the first month and $50 and change for every month following until December of 2020. It may not be the lowest you can get, but it was the lowest rate I found for myself. It was easy to fill out all of the information that was required to provide a quote and getting the quote was easy. Everything was online, no dealing with people on the phone. You can opt for Snapshot which may reduce your original rate, but I did not because I know that on my local interstate, going the speed limit will get you squashed.

There is, of course, an app that you can see your insurance on, make changes to your policy, and get help if need be.

Again, it may not be the best out there, but it came up as the best for me. Remember to do your research and compare quotes before settling on one provider.

[lifehacksthatwork]

Say it louder for those at the back 

[awed-frog]

For all my fellow oversharers out there.

[freshoutofcollege]

Renter’s Insurance

This is not an AD.

Once my fiancé and I found our apartment, we reviewed the lease which stated the complex required renter’s insurance. Totally normal, but I didn’t have any in college and my fiancé couldn’t add me to his because we aren’t legally married yet. So naturally, I went straight to google and started searching for insurance.

According to Millenial Money, Lemonade was rated the best overall. My fiancé used USAA, which is a great company, but he was paying more for his insurance than I paid for mine through Lemonade. My policy covers:

Personal Property $20,000

Portable Electronics $3,000

Loss of Use $6,000

Personal Liability $100,000

Medical Costs for Others $1,000

The overview of what’s covered is explained very clearly and includes: fire and smoke, bad weather, crime and vandalism, liability, and water damage.

Not included in my policy, but available to add are earth quakes, high risk dogs, and flood.

My base rate was $7.25 for all of the above. I am able to add coverage if needed, but what is listed is all that is required for my apartment. I was also able to add my fiancé for an additional $1.67 a month, making our total for renter’s insurance $8.92 per month for both of us.

Also, not that it is at all important, but the app and design are all really aesthetically pleasing, so it makes it a more enjoyable experience instead of looking at boring old adult colors.

What I love about Lemonade is that everything was explained crystally clear and in simple language that made everything easy to understand, it asked me questions about my living situation which made the plan more personalized to myself and the app makes it really easy to make changes and view my policy whenever need be.

Of course, there are many insurance companies and maybe another works better for you, but for me, I am glad I found Lemonade because I really enjoy it.

[freshoutofcollege]

Hello!

I’m R. Fresh out of college with a BSN and a whole lot in front of me. I don’t know if young adult communities are on here, or if there’s such a thing as an “apartmentblr” or whatever you might call it, but I haven’t been able to find one. So I figured I would create a blog to share my journey in case anyone else was looking for help, too.

I live with my fiancé, soon to be hubby, in a two bedroom apartment that we just found. I work night shift as a Registered Nurse and I will be going back eventually for my MSN. Whatever your degree or job, I’m sure we can relate on some things.

Whether it’s filling out a W4, apartment hunting, looking for insurance of any kind, or something else related to adulting- it’ll be on here. If it’s not, feel free to send me a message and ask about a topic!

Thanks for visiting, I hope at least one of my posts helps you out!

[freshoutofcollege]

Kitchen Inspo

All images from google.