Beating Broke

Help Your Teen’s Business Grow with Facebook

March 4, 2019 By MelissaB Leave a Comment

Often, teens want to make money without the commitment of a part-time job that may require them to work more hours than they can handle while also attending school and keeping up with homework. Or, they may want to work for themselves, doing what they love or participating in sports, doing schoolwork, and searching for scholarships. There are many reasons why a teen may not want a traditional part-time job as a cashier or a fast food employee.

Historically, these types of kids would rely on babysitting or lawn mowing jobs. If they were particularly resourceful, they may try to start their own Etsy store. However, the time to start an Etsy store, market it, create products, maintain customer relations, and ship out items can be intense. Many teens don’t have time for that.

Luckily, teens can now use the power of social media to grow their own business and make money quickly on the timeline they set.

Selling What People Want on Facebook

Grow on Facebook — Grow Your Teen’s Business on Facebook

For instance, a young woman in our homeschool group needed to raise $2,000 for an upcoming mission trip she wanted to attend. She offered to make cinnamon rolls ($20 for a 9×13 pan) and fudge ($8/lb.) for Valentine’s Day. She shared on her own Facebook page, and her mom shared on her Facebook page. Their family and friends quickly responded by placing orders over the next week. Within two weeks, she had made the money that she needed, and she had happy customers who had homemade sweet treats for Valentine’s Day.

Another teen in our group makes balloon animals. She offered to make balloon flamingos attached to a container of chocolate for Valentine’s Day for $8. She got over 25 orders and made a nice profit.

Recently, her mom set up a Facebook business page for her daughter to promote her business. This young lady, who is still not even in high school, routinely is hired to make balloons at children’s birthday parties. Now she has a page to promote her work by showing the balloon styles she can make and showing examples of what she does at parties. This job can grow into a nice part-time income, especially when she is in high school and college.

Business Can Jump From Facebook to Friends’ Friends

While Facebook may be a great way for teens to start their business, it also gives them much needed exposure. For instance, when the young lady above is working at a birthday party for a friend her mom has on Facebook, other moms at the party will ask about her services. These women have no connection to her or her mom, but the magic of word-of-mouth referrals has begun. Between Facebook and word-of-mouth referrals, she will likely keep very busy.

We’ve all heard the stories of teens who become YouTube celebrities and make thousands of dollars. That likely won’t happen with the majority of kids.

However, thanks to social media, your child can grow a nice part-time business, especially if they advertise a product or skill that people want to their and their parents’ Facebook page, where people already know and trust them.

Do you have an entrepreneurial teenager? If so, how do you help support their endeavors? How do they usually find their clients?

Haggling or No Haggling When Buying a Car?

January 28, 2019 By MelissaB 4 Comments

Recently, for the first time in 12 years, my husband and I found ourselves in the market for a car. My husband hates negotiating, so the chore of haggling for a car fell on me. I had the misguided notion that the Internet would make price negotiation easier, but that assumption was wrong. Instead, I found that negotiating the price of a car is harder now than it was 12 years ago.

There is definitely something to be said for car dealerships like CarMax that tote a no haggle price. But which is better? Haggling with traditional dealerships or going with a dealership that doesn’t play games?

For us, the answer was the latter.

We started our car search ready to haggle and get a good deal. Instead, all we got was frustration!

The Frustration of Haggling

Haggle or no Haggle when buying a car? — Should You Haggle for a Car?

We religiously searched the Internet to find cars in our price range. We found one, called to confirm it was still there, and then made the 45 minute drive only to find out it had been sold. I doubt if it was even there when we called, honestly.

Next, we went to another dealership, this time two hours away, to snag a good deal that we found online. However, unbeknownst to us, the dealer had an advertised Internet price, but below it, he had a disclaimer—plus dealer fees and extras. Well, the dealer fees and extras ended up being $2,700 more than the advertised price.

Still, we wanted the car, so we tried to negotiate, but they would not budge much. After a few rounds of haggling, they were only willing to knock $1,500 off the dealer fees and extras, which would have had us paying $1,200 extra beyond the Internet advertised price plus the fees for the plates, taxes, etc. No thanks. Of course, once we drove home, they called us and were willing to negotiate some more. They still wouldn’t agree to the price we wanted, and we didn’t want to drive two hours again to get the car.

By this time, we were fed up with our car search and the sales people’s tactics.

No Haggle Dealerships

Back we went to the Internet. A week later we found a car that was a good deal. We called that dealership and asked the important questions:

Is the car still available?

Do you take any extra fees on to the advertised Internet price?

Yes, the car was available, and no, there were no additional fees.

We loved the car, and after our weeks of searching, we knew it was a good deal. The salesman almost immediately offered us an additional $600 off the advertised price, but he wouldn’t negotiate after that. That put the car right in our price range, and we happily took it.

If you like to haggle, that might be the right technique for you. However, I found the process this time to be very frustrating.

I’d much rather give my business to a dealership that prices the car appropriately (we checked this before we actually saw the car by checking the Blue Book price) and that doesn’t play number games.

Have you bought a car recently? Did you haggle, or do you prefer to use a dealership that doesn’t play games?

The Importance of Fixing Things Sooner Rather than Later

January 10, 2019 By MelissaB 2 Comments

A few years ago, my brakes started making noise whenever I pushed the brake pedal. I procrastinated quite a while before I took the car into the shop because I didn’t have the money for the repair. However, because I waited so long, the brakes had worn down to the rotors, so my repair was much more expensive than it would have been had I come in right away.

But Wait! I Hadn’t Learned the Lesson Yet!

You would think I’d have learned my lesson, but no, I haven’t.

We own a minivan that is 11.5 years old and has 167,000 miles on it. A while ago, one of the back sliding door handles broke, so we could no longer use it from the outside. No worries. We simply herded all the kids in through the other side door. Was it a pain? Just a little bit, but we didn’t want to spend $200 to $300 on a door handle repair when we had so many other pressing expenses.

But, then the other sliding door broke. The wire coil started to fray, so we couldn’t open the door. The repair for the outer wire coil? A cool $900 to $1,000. Ouch.

So, we started opening the driver’s side door and reaching around to open the side door with the outside broken handle by using the inside handle. By now, we were starting to feel a bit, um, special, I’ll say, because of our unusual way to open the door. Still, we put off the repair because we had other expenses like a $210 garage door repair and a $90 air conditioning tune up along with a $900 deposit for braces for our son.

All was okay until the inside door handle broke. Now, the only way the kids can get in and out of the car is through the front doors. The special meter has gone up enormously, and even the kids are talking about how embarrassed the are to get in and out of the car. Now that the repair is inevitable, I called the shop to find out the repair will likely be $400 to $500 because they’ll have to remove the door and replace both the inside and outside door handle.

Lesson learned. When a repair is needed, make the repair. If you don’t, you’ll likely end up paying more in the future.

How to Get the Money Together

If your budget is tight like ours is, there are ways to get the money together to make a smaller repair immediately so you don’t have to pay more for a larger repair later:

Raid your emergency fund. This is the easiest. If you have an emergency fund, use the money and then rebuild the emergency fund as quickly as possible.

Have a pantry challenge for a week. We spend approximately $150 to $200 a week for groceries. By taking just one week to eat only what we have in the house and not going to the grocery store, we could have had the money for the handle repair before it got worse. Lesson learned.

Sell stuff. Everyone has stuff around the house that they don’t need or don’t use. Sell things at second hand stores, sports resale stores, or eBay or Facebook. You’ll be surprised how quickly the money will add up.

Do you procrastinate on repairs because your budget is tight? If so, like us, has that rationale ended up costing you more money?