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Hidden Costs Of Home Ownership

September 28, 2022 Earlier last month we posted about having to fix our dishwasher, and considering we bought our suite of appliances at roughly the same time – in hindsight, the fact that our refrigerator surprised us with an issue this last week shouldn’t have been much of a surprise at all. Each time we went to open the fridge door it looked like a rave was going on inside – with the lights flashing on and off constantly. Armed with confidence and fresh off successfully fixing our dishwasher I was positive this was going to be a quick and easy resolution. Unfortunately, this one is turning out to be more difficult than I had hoped. Initially I took out the LED light board that was causing the issue – and that was pretty easy and straightforward. The only downside is that by taking out that light – it caused all the other lights in the fridge section to stop working, so we no lights in the fridge until its fixed. From there I went online with my model number to search for a replacement part. This is where the issue lies – the fridge we have is a GE fridge, but it happens to be a model that was specifically made for Home Depot, not one of their “standard” models, so I am having a difficult time locating parts. And as chance would have it the standard model counterpart – of which parts are readily available – uses a different LED light board than ours.  I was able to find one distributor that would sell me the LED light board for our fridge, but they only way they can sell it is as part of an assembly with the shelf module that the board, which happens to be about 10x the cost. I currently have a few more inquiries into other distributors and will keep scouring the internet for the next couple days to see if I can find a better price, or just the LED light board – but may just have to bite the bullet this week so we can have working lights in our fridge again. The silver lining in all of this is that it’s another pretty easy fix once I can locate the part, and even if we have to spend a little more than ideal to get the part it’s still better than having to shop (and pay for) a new refrigerator. Here's to hoping that our remaining kitchen appliances make it through the rest of the year unscathed. You might also be interested in As the year comes to a close, so does Season 14 of Project Money. In preparation for writing our final blog post we reflected over what has occurred over the last 6 months and the strides our family has made. Below, in no particular order, are a few of the highlights from our journey: In the last week we had to take Robin’s car, a 2019 VW Atlas, in for a couple of recall notices we had received. Nothing completely out of the ordinary and wouldn’t have any out-of-pocket costs – so it wasn’t something that we had put much thought or effort into – outside of scheduling the appointment. Unfortunately, what we anticipated being a ~1 hour visit ended up being 5+ hours and spurred a larger discussion. One of the topics we had mentioned in our posts from earlier this year was an employee stock purchase plan offered by Robin’s employer. We have never participated in any stock purchase plans before through our employers but being a bit more vigilant as part of Project Money, we decided to give the program further consideration. Being part of Project Money has pushed our family to take a more active role in managing our finances, necessitating weekly conversations that have spurred growth from both educational and fiscal perspectives. One of the topics we had discussed was micro investing, investing small sums of money in fractional shares of stock or ETFs. With Thanksgiving behind us, the countdown to Christmas has “officially” begin. This year, as part of our Project Money journey, we have been planning to approach things a bit differently when it comes to our holiday budgeting. I had been putting this off for a few weeks/months now, optimistic that Fall might stretch on a little bit longer – but this past week’s winter weather brought with it a reality check, it’s time to replace the tires on my vehicle. I’ve just started to research pricing at local tire shops and trying to narrow down which tire choices will be the best value – both in related to cost and performance in wet/winter weather. I’ve also been checking some of the retail stores, Costco in particular. Over the last few weeks, we have been working to refocus, and get back to some of the basics as we start to head into the end of year holiday season. Over the past few weeks and months, I had seen several news reports about I Bonds, usually with a corresponding endorsement of their attractiveness as an investment in today’s market. I’ll be honest, my only experience with bonds was a savings bond that I received as a child – and I can remember waiting for what seemed like an eternity until I (and the bond) were old enough to cash in. After that I haven’t given them much thought until the past couple weeks. We have reached the point of the year where we have one foot firmly planted into heating season and thought we would reflect on what energy saving tips we have used previously and are currently using to help reduce our bills. 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