The rate is only good for balances of 0-49,999 dollars, above that it’s 1%.  And then you have to “qualify” during each statement cycle.  The qualifications?  Get electronic statements, have an automatic deposit, and make at least 12 charges on your debit card.  Miss any one of those?  Interest is 0.10% for that statement.  Ouch.  That’s a lot of loose ends to keep track of, especially on an account that charges you $3 per check after the first three per month. 

If you had 10K to put in this account, you’d make an extra 150 a year above keeping it in HSBC Direct.  But you have to make 12 charges per month, how easy would it be to justify buying one more thing?  If you can keep your charges to your normal purchases, and you normally have a direct deposit and use your debit card a lot, this is a great account.  You could miss the 12 charges a couple times a year and still beat HSBC. 

But how long is the account likely to stay at 4.55%?  The woman in new accounts at the bank couldn’t give any promises (they never do) but did say they intended the interest rate to stay above the interest for the CDs.  I’m still thinking about it.  I use a rewards card for my purchases, so I need to figure out what I’ll lose in rewards (and holding my money an extra month) compared to what I’d gain in interest.   If I used a debit card all the time and had closer to that 50K limit, I’d be more likely to do it. 

Health: Okay.  I’ve gotten my checkup, my cholesterol is good, and I’m getting enough protien and fiber.  But I’m not exercising or loosing weight.

Financial: Good.  I’m living within my means and saving.  Other than investments in the market (401k) my networth is trending up.  I’m contributing the amount I set in January to my retirement funds.  It’s on autopilot since I haven’t changed jobs.  Which brings me to…

New Job:  Fail.  I’ve got some things I need to do to even get to “okay”.  Obviously “good” would be actually having a new job.

Finishing House: Okay.  I’ve got a plumber in doing work, and the first set of inspections are done.  I’ve made some decisions that need to be made to proceed with several projects.  But I haven’t gotten as far as I wanted to.

Secondary Income: Fail.  I haven’t been posting regularly.  I haven’t looked into a couple of other things I meant to look at.  I did finally set up the Amazon associates link, so if you click on a book in the sidebar (and then buy it) I’ll get a tiny cut of the total.  But I have to reccomend buying books used (even though I don’t get a cut of that), so I suspect that won’t be a major source of income.

It’s a site that sells term papers and such.  Check them out and see what you think. It’s quick and easy to sign up, and then they bill you a fee per month ($29.95) until you cancel. I like the idea of setting up something that will produce a stream of income, and the monthly charge is a pretty good idea. I’m not in school anymore (nor in a business where I need to write any sort of position paper) so the site itself isn’t that useful to me, but it’s a really good idea. I didn’t join so I can’t vouch for the quality of any of the papers.

If you do join, come back and leave a comment about the site so we’ll know it’s worth it.  I wonder if they pay for nicely written papers.

So overall it was a bust.  On half of my loans I lost more than 80% of the principal.  On one I got the principal back and made about 2% interest (for less than a year).  Only 1/3 of my loans are paying on time/as agreed, and it’s not really the ones I expected. 

I might be bad at choosing loans, and if I’d had a larger “porfolio” the loss of a few loans might have still left me in the black, but I’m not ready to put any more cash into it.  So far I’m looking at a net loss of about 36% (and that assumes that my two current borrowers stay current for the next two years!).  That doesn’t count the “opportunity cost” (the interest I could have made on the money by putting it into a savings account) which probably pushes it up another 4-5%.

I think my first task needs to be figuring out where my money is (post Netbank disaster) and what I am going to need money for in the near (<3yrs) future.  Not too sure since my job situation is kinda fluid these days. 

This is the first day of the rest of your life.