A mid-June Update

Well well.  June has been a great month so far and I don’t mind if I say it.

I’ve almost broken even on my Amazon Arbitrage, ( for more info see here) and I have a feeling that once September rolls around I’ll be on my way to making a little profit.

I have had one wonderful guest at my house already on Airbnb and am getting ready for another one to check in tomorrow!  That means I’ll clear around $800 from this gig so far… not too shabby!

I have also found out there is a home sharing group inside Airbnb between members and get this, I’m already setting up a swap for June or July of next year for a lovely little apartment in Switzerland!  I know it’s a ways from my original destination, but the goal here is to get out and travel and this is a great start!  We will see if this solidifies or not.

I have been thoroughly enjoying my job at Nanna’s Tea Shop. It’s a lot of fun to drink tea, socialize with customers, and help out a great woman, all the while making a little extra cash.  As you know this money will go towards the Roth IRA so I will hopefully be set up for my yearly contribution when the time comes.

Writing has proven elusive but I am getting back into the swing of things and have decided to begin a 250 goal.  250 words every day.  It sounds paltry to me, who when I do sit down can knock out 2k at a time.  The issue is sitting down every day.  Sitting down when I just want to sleep.  Sitting down when all I want to do is drink a beer and watch the telly.  Every day write.  That’s a page a day.  Hopefully I’ll write more but 250 words every day.

Finally I may have sourced a great price for a cheap ticket to London, which means I’ll save my mileage points for something else.  We are talking $300 from Vegas to Manchester.  The same day on BA.com and United.com tickets from Vegas to Manchester are going for around $1300! I will reveal my source once I get my ticket.

So with that I am going to sign-off and get back to the busy work day before my busy evening of sourcing product for Amazon and getting the house ready for the next airbnb guest.

Oh!  And writing 250 words.  Yes this post is writing but it’s not getting my books any farther along…

Cheers for now!

Kim

 

March Re-cap!

Well it’s been another stunner of a month on book sales with a total of 6 books sold for around $12 in royalties.  Not exactly the amount I was looking for at the beginning of my journey so I could be in trouble.

Now for the good news!  I found out I had almost enough frequent flier miles to head to London round trip on United so that takes my amount to save down by $2,000!  Now this cuts out that great layover in Iceland but perhaps I can work something out there.  Or just head over during my time with Ryan or Easy Jet.

I am working on getting the rest of the miles but even if I have to purchase the rest this will only cost around $160.  I can handle that.

I have also found out that as a member of WAGGGS or World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, I can stay at Pax lodge in London for the first few weeks for a very nice low price, cutting down on my costs a bit more.

I also began a little experiment with this amazing Fulfilled By Amazon and just sent in my first shipment, so we will see how this goes.  I will post more later, but if this takes off, I might be able to do this instead of a part-time job.  Even at my slowest time, which is now as I learn the system, I am making about $10 and hour which is what I would make at any part-time job.  Once this starts to go up I might be really bringing in some cash.

I also managed to stick an extra $100 towards the Credit card debt.  Once the April payment goes through I will have only 3121.51 to pay off, which, if I keep at $700/month, can be paid off by mid August or, if I add one hundred in to pay $800/ month, I could have it paid off by the beginning of August, so that would be $5,600 saved up by the time I left for London.

Without the airfare cost and a savings of around $300 on hostels I am well on my way to having half saved up.

This month I am going to work hard on getting my place up for rent on Airbnb, since I will be gone at the beginning of May, more on that in a second, get three new books out, and work on trying for two more shipments to Amazon, which will make an additional estimated $200 total.

Busy lady here!

Three books Kim!?  Are you crazy!  Not really… I have two that are over half way finished and edited, and one that is all done, save it’s cover, which is being polished off by a pro as we speak!

The loft is almost ready to receive guests, just needs some privacy curtains and a fresh coat of paint, and then walla I’ll list that on AirBNB.

Finally the Amazon Shipments will hopefully get easier as I continue to practice so I feel I’ll be able to accomplish these in 15 hours total instead of 10 hours each, as the last one took, bringing my hourly wage up by a bit.

I am also taking part in Camp Nanowrimo and have vowed to get the first episode of Her Holiday written so that will be ready for edits at the beginning of May before I head off to vacation.

Hold on Kim, vacation!  You are trying to save money for next year!!!

I know but this was too good to pass up.  Mom and Dad have a time share in Cancun, Mexico and they also had air miles expiring so they bought me a round trip ticket!  I’m spoiled, what can I say?  They will also pay for most food and activities, read super spoiled, so I am having a lovely vacation almost free of charge.  I see those middle fingers sticking up people!

So, next time I will highlight how I began my journey of this FBA through Amazon and then perhaps talk about getting the loft ready for guests!

Chow for now!

Kim Kennedy

And now, the money portion of our master scheme…

Today we are going to talk about finances and what I am going to have to do to get to my goal in May of 2015!

I want to live in London or abroad for three months from May 1st to August 1^st.

I figure this little exercise is going to cost me the astronomical price of:

$13,500!

That’s $4500 a month!  It sounds daunting.  Especially when you add in this little factor:

As of today, I am $4621.00 in credit card debt.  So that actually means that from March 1^st 2014 to May 1^st of 2015 I will need to save up

$18,121.00. 

or

$1,200 a month!

Now hold on Kim, how did you come up with this stunningly large amount?  Follow.

$2000 for RT airfare. I can get a sweet deal with Icelandic Air with a direct flight from Denver to Iceland, with a stop-over, Iceland to Vienna with a stop-over, then Vienna to London for $1000.  Not bad since I am going on this trip to see more of the world and I have never seen Vienna or Iceland.  I figure a return flight from London to Denver in August will run $1000, being as that is peak season.

$4650 for rent and hostels. I will be staying in hostels in Iceland, Vienna, and five days in London at $50 a day.  That’s $50 x 13 days=$650 or

$50 a night in Reykjavik for May 2^nd-6^th= $200.00

$50 a night in Vienna for May 6^th-10^th= $200.00

Hostel in London before finding place to live $50 a night from 10-15^th = $250.00

I suppose I was spoiled when I lived in London at University as my house was in Bloomsbury and my school was in Marylebone, two of the poshest neighborhoods in London.  I loved my twenty-minute walk to school, the British museum being 2 blocks away (!) and a lovely vibrant neighborhood to belong to. Plus, the rest of London only a few tube stops away!  I was in heaven!

I want this again as an adult, as a writer, and I will be willing to pay for it.  I am willing to share a space as I think having someone local will help me find friends and community faster.  Therefore I am anticipating the rent will be $2400-$4000 for the two months I will need a home or $1200-$2000 a month.  It sounds exorbitant but London is one of the most expensive cities in the world and I don’t want a 40 minute tube ride just to see it every day.  I will be in the heart of it!

I’m so doing this exact pose when I get there.

$2,500 for food, transportation, and entertainment or $1000 a month.   This includes one theatre show and a trip to a restaurant every other week.  I am going for the culture as well so I will spend money on these things. This would also be where any household items would come out of such as linens, personal care etc.

$1000 for trips to Europe for the weekend, etc.  This will include flights, hostels, entertainment, etc.  Do keep in mind that air and train travel in Europe is cheaper than the US.  Think Ryanair and Easy Jet!   I figure I will most likely want to head to France, Germany, perhaps the Nederlands.  Maybe a trip to Ireland, although that is the next place I want to live abroad so perhaps this will have to wait.

$500 I am going to need an emergency fund in case of unforeseen costs, injuries, (knock on wood) price of tea in China goes up. Etc.

$300 to rent a mobile phone with limited local/International calls.  This will come to $100 a month.

This brings the grand total to:

$10,950.  Let’s round this up to

$11,0000.

Tack on that $4,621.00 credit card bill and we are at 15,621.00.

So where does that extra money come from?  All those things I still have to pay for back at home.

$250 Electricity for the 2.5 months,

$630 for 3 months of HOA at $210.00 a month.  Note no house payment.  The house is paid off.  Lucky witch, I know.

$828.00 for the car payment at $276.00 a month.

$450 health insurance at $150 a month.

$2158 total at home expenses. $2200 rounded up.

$15,621 plus $2,200= $17,821 round-up and we have

$18,000 

So how in the hell is a single girl government worker going to save up $18,000 in the next 15 months while still trying to live a semi normal life?

I’m so glad you asked:

My plan.

I am going to put from March 1^st onwards, $700 towards my credit card.  This means that nasty little debt of $4261.00 is paid off by September.

So from October to April or 7 months putting away that $700 I will have $4900 saved up, so let’s round that to $5000.

Hurrah have housing paid of plus flight over!

That leaves only

$13,000 left to make in the next fifteen months or, $866 a month.  Obviously this is a little more than a part time job can make and I don’t think I’m up for a $1000 a month raise any time soon.  So how in the heck am I going to get this money???

No I’m not going to strip!  I would do anything for London, but I won’t do that.  Thanks Meatloaf!

Besides I am trying to become a full-time writer and live by my pen by the time I take off, so I obviously need to be writing!!!

This is where my dirty little secret is revealed to you lovely blog readers, and that is my other blog!  Mwa ha ha ha ha!  Well, more specifically my moonlight adventures away from this blog and the government.

I, Kimberly Kennedy, am a romance writer!!!  Yes, you can either sigh or throw tomatoes at the screen but I write Romances.  In fact I have two books out on Amazon and have had a presence online since August of 2013.  So I have made boatloads of money at this little enterprise right? Yeah, wrong.  Last year I made, wait for it….$10.35 on my writing!  How much did I spend on said writing?  Uh a lot.  Which is where some of my credit card debt came from.  Those writer conferences and editors are not cheap people!

Now this sounds dismal.  I only made in four months 10 bucks!?  Yeah.  But wait!  I have made since I brought out my second book in January, $25.60!  Ooooh!  So in a months’ time I will most likely make $30!  Now this is super exciting for me as my hard work in something I love actually makes me money!  But is it raining cash?  Nora Roberts I am not, yet.

So I have projected out my very modest earnings for the next 15 months, thinking that I will come out with 5 projects between then and now or 7 projects total.  I won’t bore you with the details on how I came up with these projections, plus a girl has to have some secrets but I think I will have a total of $3000 made May of 2015.  Now this is modest and very cautious, perhaps I could make more.  After all that’s only 6,100 books sold over 15 months or 400 books a month.  Considering the highest month of sales was 11 books, it’s harder than it looks!

My point here is that’s an additional $3000 income.  (Yes I took taxes out already you Dad accountant types.)

So now we are only down to…

$10,000!  Oh holy cow…

What next in my money making schemes?  Ah ha!  Air BnB to the rescue!  If you don’t know what AirBnb is and you are a traveler type, run, don’t walk to their website at Airbnb.com.  Not only can you find great deals on extra rooms in people’s houses, or entire homes for that matter, you can also rent our your own rooms!

I have a sweet home.  It’s lovely.  I also have a guest bedroom.  It’s also lovely.  My house is close to Denver and Denver International Airport.  I think I could rent it out.  I think $65 a night would be reasonable.  I think I could rent it out around 7 nights a month on average.

$65 x 7/nights rented a month= $455 a month x April/April so 12= $5460

BAMM! Let’s add in one more night and get that to $5500.  Oh!  Income taxes damn it! And airbnb takes a cut.  Crap, I didn’t think about that.  OK let’s make it 8 night a month. New total=$6240.  I hope they don’t take too much of a cut, will read into this more later but hopefully this will bring us back to $5500.

So let’s do our math again:

$10,000- $5500=

$4500!

Not too shabby.  Let’s think about more writing now.  I want to do travel writing as I take off into the wild blue yonder, so I need to be established by then.  Therefore I need to get article writing, like now!  So if we say one article a month, average of $40 an article that comes to $600.  Take taxes out as well as freebies to establish myself and we are at $500!

Hey hey kids, down to

$4000.

Now we need to get down to the nitty-gritty.  Sell some crap!  I won’t need it while I am gone and I really don’t need them now.  So clothes= $120 CD’s and Dvd’s= $100 Television= $200, various other odds and ends: $100.  That’s a total of= $520

Now we are down to

$3480

OK so let’s get a part-time job then.  Fine!  We will go with a $10 x 12 hours a week x 4 weeks= $480 or $400 after taxes.  If I do this 10 months out of those 15 months, that 4,000!

Ding, Ding Ding Ding Ding!!!!  I am at my goal!!!!  Somebody give that kid a prize. 

Now just to be a spoil sport and have my little inner dad voice come in, I will most likely need some money to cushion me when I get home.

There’s an extra $500 from the part time job.

Four travel articles a month while I am gone: $480.

Renting my joint out for the time I am gone at $800/month= $2400.

Books sold while I am in England= $600

Perhaps a little cash from the blog for ad sense and Amazon’s Affiliate program?  Sure why not, add in $200.

We have waiting for me when I get back:

$ 4180.00.

This is a good plan!

This also involves me living VERY frugally.  See below:

Right now I have $2300 take home pay.

Car 276 + HOA 210 + Electricity 100+ Internet 48 + Insurance home/car + 100 + 700 credit card + Gym 30= $1434

$2300 – 1464= $870 left over a month.

I have $1,200 in the bank for emergency funds. I believe my expenses for the next year in writing are going to come to $3000.  $3000/10= $300 month for writing.

$870– 300= $570 left over for food, gas, parking, drinking, activities etc.

What? I always wear couture whilst riding the Tube.

That’s $140.00 wk.  $30 out for parking and gas $110.00 for food, drink, books, clothes, etc. once I take out $20 restaurant a week $90. $10/wk books. $80 left for food for the week.  $10 beer $70/wk for food.

I think the lesson here is sacrifice today for your dreams of tomorrow!  Also your book sales better pick up and you better hope you can re-sell some of those travel articles.  Right.  Good plans.

Next time: What a dream London trip would look like if I suddenly shot up above Nora Roberts on the best seller list.  (Hey I know people who have done it.  One of them is taking her whole family over to London for 6 months.  Nice!)

(All photos ripped from pinterest.com. It’s yours and you want it down? Just let me know.)

A thought on Dream Thieves…

Pinterest.com

It was a cold, frigid, morning as my father drove me to work in his trusty, reliable little red truck.  I had stayed with him and mom over the weekend, spending time with the people I love, and watching the team I love, the Broncos, get their backsides handed to them in the Super Bowl.

“So you said you don’t like your job, honey?”  My father is nothing if not a serious, down to the ground, nose to the grinder, kind of guy.  He does not have a creative bone in his body.  This is fine; it’s not who he is.  He is the amazing man that has stood by mom and I through thick and thin.  He is the sturdy backbone of the family.  He just doesn’t understand the need to create.   I suppose I can understand when the only thing you really created in your life was spread sheets.

 “No, its not that I don’t like my job.  It’s fine.  I just can’t imagine doing this for the next 35 years of my life.”

I will not be sharing my dreams with him this time around.

He cannot see what I see, or understand the need to create.  He understands safe and sound and protected.  He does not have an imagination like me, and I feel bad for him.  I finally understand after years of thinking I wasn’t enough, that I just don’t have certain qualities he does, and he doesn’t have certain traits I possess.

“Well you won’t be doing what you are doing, you will be moving up the ladder, getting a good solid position.  I think after five years with the state you can start buying years for your pension.  You could retire by 60 if you play your cards right.”  To a 66 year old that retired at 64 this probably sounds like an amazing idea.  I wanted to slit my wrists.  Great only 29 more years to go!

“Well, yeah great.”  I swallow and look out the car window at the icy roads and all the cars we are passing by in the HOV lane.  All those people going to work, trudging through the 9-5, driving back home.  Hoping to retire by 60.

“Or I could have a runaway best seller and make a million dollars this year.” 

Dad sniffs.  To him it sounds as likely as him fronting a rock band, or me, suddenly becoming an astronaut.  I know this is the logical answer, the normal, safe, expected, response to what I have just said.  “Yeah, right.”  He sniffs again and I remind myself why I’m not sharing my idea of running away from it all in just 16 months.  I’m a little upset at him now.  I don’t laugh at him when he tells me he spent ten bucks on the lottery that week.  Or any other week, or every week of his life. I think my chances are a lot better than the lottery.  I have control of my writing and how hard I work.  He has no control over those spinning balls.

“Just so you know Dad, the second I hit a million dollars, I’m out.”  This was my goal before I came up with my new plan and frankly, if I hit it earlier, I’d be on my way to freedom sooner than next May.

“Yeah, maybe a million per month.”  Excuse me!?!  Don’t get me wrong, it is just as possible to make a million a month as it is to make my first million, I’m sure I read the numbers behind that somewhere but really?  He wants me making $12 million a year before I retire from my current job?!  Now who’s the out in space dreamer???  When was the last time he made a million in one month, one year, ONE FREAKING DECADE!?!

“Uh, no.  A million dollars made.  On all the books, one book, film rights, I don’t care, I’m walking away.”

“Honey you would blow all that money in like, five days!  You can’t walk away until you are making that over and over.”

Now I’m just floored, and more than a little pissed off.  He notices and changed the subject.

Now that I have had time to think this ridiculous claim over again I realize that he not only insulted me, he insulted my mother and himself as well.  They raised me so carefully, safely, to be so overly cautious, its to the point that I have no faith in my own abilities, or the confidence a normal 31 year old should have.  Just stick to the tried and true, straight and narrow, don’t try anything crazy, don’t do anything but go to college, get a good job, and work until you retire, saving up money for your golden years.

So what in the hell makes my father suddenly think that if I found a seven figure amount in my bank account, I would turn into MC Hammer and blow it on Hummers and Yachts?  Not that you can buy a yacht for a million…

This would not happen.  Instead, my normal, practical voice inside my head, that sounds amazingly like my fathers, would step in and say, “You need to keep this in the bank.  Find someone to invest it reasonably.  Then go back to work.”  My mom’s little voice would then step in and say, “Good job honey, treat yourself with something nice, maybe a trip, you love to travel.  Nothing too expensive…  Oh and talk to your father about how you should save that money up.  Don’t tell anyone at work, they won’t look at you the same.”

I wonder, if I even had my own voice inside my head?  What it would say?

Well I do know the first thing it would say… I’m free!  And look, you really are good at writing!  And to all those other voices inside my head that told me I could never do it, kiss off and look at all those Benjamins in my bank!  Now how are we going to break this to my very nice boss.  Ooh!  Take her out to a super fancy lunch and then tell her the news.  That will be fun.  Then tell that poor sour puss in the cubicle down the way that every terrible thing that has ever happened to her is entirely her fault for nailing herself to the martyr cross of suffering.

http://scrapbook-melissah.blogspot.com/ A gorgeous blog, you should go!

I would then take out my good friends for a night on the town, or perhaps a nice dinner in my house with Dom Perignon.  Always celebrate the big leagues with Dom, this has been my goal since I found out what the stuff was from a Bond movie when I was 13!

Then the voice in my head would say, OK start packing for vacation, pay off the credit card and the car, then make an appointment with a financial advisor to move 90% of that money out of grasp.

The 980,000 thousand you will have left after your celebratory trip and the interest off of the money that will be in the bank, you will be able to live for a good few years doing exactly what you want.  And hey if you made a million, then most likely you are going to keep earning good money on those books.  Yeah, you are good to go.  Oh!  Take another $10k out for a charity you believe in.  And put a good five in Joe’s college fund.

OK so perhaps Dad was onto something when he said I would blow it in a few days.  Yes, I would blow 20k in a week, but really is investing in a good charity, my good friends, and my darling nephew “blowing it”?

Who knows I might ask Dad what he would do with a bonus 20k to see what he says.  If it’s at all creative, I’ll be sure to make it happen for him.  And mom can have 20k too, just for being so cute.

I wake up from my day dream to look at my cube, with a picture of Joe and my panda family that lives on the desk.  There is no harm in dreaming big.  There is nothing wrong with having big goals.  There is everything wrong with listening to my father and giving up before I have even tried.  I just need to find a way over these next months to let my own voice inside my head talk more than his.

Don’t let any one steal your dreams.

Good plan.

Where I declare my main goal in life and explain the why behind it and this blog.

You all know the feeling.  Trapped, stuck, and stalled.  You most likely sit in a four walled prison with short walls that allows you to see the tops of heads of other people, perhaps hear them, but never really get to interact with these fellow inmates.  On and on it goes, 8 hours a day, 40 hours a week,  until you can’t wait for the weekend to sleep, or drink, or party away that feeling of routine from the last five days.

The joke is on you however as you realize the weekend has become just another routine.  Nothing changes, everything runs as though it’s on a treadmill, take step, take another, then ten more. Get up, go to work, work hard, go home, sleep.  Same, same, same.

Then, once or twice a year, something different, something you look forward to for months at a time, appears on the horizon like a brave new dawn, the ultimate escape, the vacation!  Or as I like to call it, a holiday.

Used by my dear British friends across the pond, I feel like the word holiday makes sense. By the time your vacation comes around, it can begin to feel like Christmas or the 4^th of July.  It’s a great change-up, an adventure in your otherwise day-in-and-day-out humdrum life. A celebration of freedom, doled out in one to two-week portions.  But is this enough freedom?

Sure it takes you away from it all for a bit, and while you don’t want to come back to your real life, you do.  For a while you come back lighter, slightly happier, even less stressed as you fall back into the routine, all the while struggling to grasp those fond memories from your journeys elsewhere.

Inevitably, however, that trapped feeling comes back to rear its’ rather plain, boring head, causing those happy memories and thoughts to stray further from your mind.  You scramble to look at the pictures, the souvenirs, you talk with those that have been there before or are going again, and yet, even your memories get to the point that you would need another plane ticket to fully revisit those blissful visions in your mind.

This is our lives, where the biggest vacation we can expect is five to ten days paid leave, if you even get that.  These days are subject to approval and certain months, and always encouraged to not be taken all at once.  Let’s not even get started on what happens to those holiday hours if you get serious illness for more than your allotted sick time!

Most people in the United States, where I am writing from, squeeze in a three-day weekend here and there, perhaps a week-long family extravaganza annually, is all that we are allowed.  Once or twice in a lifetime we get that rare opportunity for a truly special getaway of two weeks, maybe even a MONTH!!!  Insert canned ooohs! and Ahhhs! here.  We should feel grateful, thankful that we even get this much time away from the chains that lock us to our aging CPU units in beige offices, lit by unflattering fluorescent tubes.

Do you know what I think of this situation?

I find it utterly INTOLERABLE! 

My name is Kim Kennedy and this is my journey to get out of the system!  Free myself to travel freely, work where I want, and most importantly make a living the way I want to make a living! By my pen!  It’s a simple formula really, writing+my quirky imagination=What I want to do more than anything else in the world.

What will the map for this journey look like? Oh it’s a long drawn out road with random plot twists and detours along the way but in the end I have a set date where I arrive at the X-marks-the-spot on the treasure map! What is this date, the set finish line to my goals?

May Day 2015!

This is a perfect date for my dreams to become reality.  May Day, which has roots in the Celtic celebration of Beltane, is celebrated on the 1^st of May every year to usher in the arrival of spring.  I choose this very special day as my own day of freedom because I will literally ‘spring’ from my cubicle cave to sail off into the sun set on a three-month holiday!

A quick note needs to be inserted here that I am self-confessed, self-improvement book junkie!  I read all those books with subjects ranging in everything from The Secret to manifestation techniques, increased productivity, self-confidence, secrets in business, you name it I’ve read it.  And all of these books say one thing; If you want something to happen you must state what you want and give yourself a deadline for when this is going to come into your life.

So here we go…

I want to be a full-time writer; free to travel and work from wherever and whenever I want, by May Day 2015.

Wow!  That’s harder to do than it looks, and I have a sneaking suspicion this goal is going to be even harder to accomplish as well.

So in conclusion, what is this blog for?  To help me on my journey, to perhaps inspire others to follow their dreams, maybe travel more, perhaps to chronicle not only my scramble to the top, but also my triumphs and tribulations along the way.  In the words of the great Mr. Rogers and in the spirit of a global community both online and in the real wide and vast world, Won’t you be my neighbor?

Cheers for now!

-Kim Kennedy

all photos from Pinterest.com