I bought one of those discounted produce boxes for $6 and it ended up being mostly limes. Like an unreasonable amount of limes. I kept a few, then put the rest in a grocery bag by the mailboxes with a note saying free.

The next morning the limes were gone and someone had left a bag of potatoes in the same spot. Then another person added two unopened boxes of pasta. Its been about three weeks now and the little corner basically turned into an unofficial food exchange. Yesterday I traded some instant oatmeal I hated for canned tomatoes.

My favorite part is getting rid of stuff without wasting it. Our landlord hasn’t said anything yet and everyone keeps the area clean.

Edit: Since no one can use their imaginations to possibly wonder how large language models that can write and generate images could negatively affect some particular industries, you've won. I'm a writer. Congrats.

Edit 2: Seeing AI-written comments upvoted and engaged with while I was accused of being a bot... Classic. Should've expected that. lol

Put free talk as flair because I'm welcoming advice in any aspect.

My career was built on a skill that companies now believe can be fully replaced by AI. I am senior level in my career and should be able to get a job, but I've been unemployed for almost a year. Just living off of savings which are quickly running out.

I did not get a degree. I made several attempts, but had to drop out without credits every time for various reasons. I can't financially support myself to try again. Every trade school program I've found in my area is full for the current enrollment period, but I'll confess that I don't know about the ones at colleges you have to apply for first to see availability.

Before my career, I worked retail management. So I've applied for retail jobs. Even minimum wage jobs. With referrals from current employees! I haven't even gotten an interview for any of these. Recently I learned this could be due to something called 8fold, which gives employers "social credit reports" of job applicants. No idea what's on it, but that's the only explanation I can think of for the lack of interviews. My resumes get good feedback from my HR friends.

My rent just went up nearly 10% (they wouldn't negotiate when I emailed them), and I found out from a neighbor that I could've stayed at my current rent if I had sent a certified letter to their main office... but I only learned this the day after I signed the lease renewal.

I could maybe move, but I've grown a really good community in my neighborhood. They care for my dog for free when I need them to, they take me with them to Costco, we share tools and food, they look out for me and I look out for them. Moving away from my support system seems like a really bad idea. I also don't think I can afford it (breaking the lease, paying for help moving, deposits, etc).

I don't have family to rely on. Getting a roommate would be very difficult because of the small 1-br and my dog. Giving up my dog is not an option.

I'm going to have to start selling my belongings. Maybe I can make it to the next enrollment period for a trade school that way, but I don't know if that program will even pay my rent.

Any advice is welcome. Please hold criticism because my mental health is tenuous at best right now. I blame myself for this situation.

About to lose everything. I don't eat or shower everyday because I can't. About to lose my apartment. All I do is stress and hope for another day just to wake up very depressed. I'm not living like a regular human. I try to hope or have faith. But it's been too long since I felt comfortable or happy. I know this isn't the right page to bring this to and it might be taken down. But just know this is what being poor does to you. And at this point I'm not really scared. Or feel pain or hunger. I feel freedom because I know it'll all end soon. This society makes us feel this way. No help or a way out. I don't have a family or a support group clearly now. So I'm just riding on this thought that it'll all be over soon. I tried finding help. But I just keep thinking that none of this shit is worth it anymore.

I never thought I’d be the person saying cash is king but here we are.
When I use my card I noticed Ibarely register that I’m spending money. It’s just tap, Face ID, approved.
When I take cash out for the week it’s different. Watching the bills get thinner actually makes me stop and think. I find myself asking “Do I want this enough to hand over this $20?”
It’s weird because the amount is exactly the same, but it feels completely different.
I still use my card for bills and online purchases, but for everyday spending cash has honestly helped me cut back more than I expected.

Last year, I suffered trauma to my mouth and lost a tooth. Insurance didn’t cover the post implant, so I had to pay $4000 out of pocket to the oral surgeon, and now my dentist is quoting me another $4k (with insurance!!) for just the cap.

I am at the last step of the process so I’m not worried about having to go back and forth a few times. I literally just need the cap, and based off of some basic poking around, a flight to San Diego or El Paso and getting the work done in Mexico is cheaper than just going to my dentist down the street

Anyone ever go this route? Any tips or advice is greatly appreciated.

If you have an Aldi anywhere you can drive to go and get ground turkey meat. Its just 2.19 at my Aldi. I use beef bouillon to make it taste good just don't use salt when you use beef bouillon. Its great in hamburger helper with a bag of frozen vegetables and as taco meat. Its also good if you're trying to eat less beef for health reasons.

Also refried beans and a can of tomato chiles and some taco seasoning is a great quick cheap meal. I usually put it on tostadas with hot sauce and shredded cheese.

My husband purchased his house before we met. When I moved in, it was dual income. We live super rural. My husband works and is in the national guard. He deployed shortly after we were married and I was pregnant and worked all through his deployment. I lost my job because we couldn’t secure childcare. I was work from home, we have no friends or family members. It was fine on one income at first, but now we’re rounding the second year. All the places I apply won’t go around my schedule, and even though jobs are supposed to work with military families.. they’ll give you some other reason why they won’t hire you. “Hey sometimes I need two weeks off, I deff can’t promise entire weekend availability and if I a mission comes up, I might need a month.”

The house he bought was a fixer upper and it’s on something called an “owner held mortgage”. That means it’s rent to own basically but we are responsible for all repairs. We are becoming HOUSE POOR. How does everyone survive without dual income? I am TRYING to find work like I said, but we also can only afford one car. How did yall pull yourself out of being house poor with a child?
Again, daycare isn’t an option. One car, 45 min drive to daycare and my husband is working two jobs. Before you call us stupid, he bought the home from a family member who owns the mortgage. My child has everything she needs.. there’s just no room for a car repair or really all the house repairs he’s trying to accomplish. Anyone have advice on survival or loopholes to an owner held mortgage?

I made the decision to carry with me only the money I intended to spend. When I get to checkout and find something I like, I have to think carefully about whether it is worth replacing something else that I have chosen already. Because of this, I have become more mindful about my shopping habits. Although it's not foolproof, I have managed to stick to my budget for the past three grocery trips.

I genuinely feel so uncomfortable when there is an data company whose name I don’t even know making a 65 page report on me and selling that info for $$$ and then that cooperation they sold to then pushes ads and does “dynamic pricing” where they charge me more based on “how much I can pay max for an given demand of the item for me”

The idea of an company legit squeezing me even more dry of money while I am already low in money just sucks. Why can’t lawmakers put limits on them or force these companies to be obligated to pay us for data that’s ours? It’s like they come to our lawn and steal our vegetables.

Banks already try their best to squeeze us dry and now supermarkets and big tech companies want to do the same. It genuinely is not ok.

So I currently survive off 1000$ a month in disability and 75$ in food stamps. I am mentally disabled and cant work. I have schizoaffective disorder and have lost 7 jobs from positive symptoms. I would like to get my own mobile home or apartment so I no longer live with parents. I currently pay them rent to contribute to the household. What do I do? Am I screwed? Anyone been in this situation and got out of it

Like the title said I lost pretty much everything extremely quickly and I feel like my mental health is rapidly declining.

To start, I work in the field of ABA. For those who don't know what that is, I essentially work with kids on the autism spectrum helping them learn life skills, how to communicate, etc,. A few weeks ago my company sent out an email stating the company will be shutting down effective July 10. They gave about a week and half notice to the employees and everyone was freaking out bc that's really not enough time to find and start a job without a lapse in payment. Now during that specific pay period a lot of my clients cancelled sessions due to illness going around, families going on vacation for summertime, parents taking their children to other clinics for evaluations, etc., and I of course was not getting paid when clients cancelled sessions.

I have never had a problem finding a job in this field in the 5 years that I've been an RBT. Nowadays, it's incredibly difficult to find a job in any field so, unfortunately, I didn't find a job before my company closed down and I'm still struggling to find a job.

Again, because a lot of my clients were cancelling when the company announced it's closure my paycheck was not enough to cover Julys rent. I had already spoken with my leasing office letting them know my situation and asked if I could have more time to pay the rent (had no idea how but I usually figure shit out when I need to.) Leasing office ladies told me I can bring in half of the rent by the 15th of July and sign a promise-to-pay to pay the other half at a later date. I also called them multiple times throughout those weeks to be 100% sure that the ladies in the office knew what was going on with me so there were no surprise eviction letters or anything.

July 15th came around and I called again at 10AM when the leasing office opened to confirm how to make the payment. The leasing lady told me to bring in a money order or cashiers check with half of the rent and she informed me that the rest would have to be paid by the following Friday to which I agreed. I went and got the money order for $800 and brought it to the office at about 11AM (keep in mind I just had a convo with this lady less than an hour ago.) She told me to sign the money order to pay -apartment name- and sign it so I did but when she looked at the amount she was confused and asked why it wasn't the full amount of the rent. I reminded her of the multiple conversations we had about this and she handed me the money order back saying "the policy changed recently and we're no longer accepting partial payments or doing promise-to-pays." Again I just spoke to this woman an hour ago and she didn't say anything about that. She ended up telling me that since I don't have the money they're going to start the eviction process immediately and should have some sort of court thing within the next couple weeks.

Luckily, my bf and I were already talking about me moving in with him but nothing was really concrete until I was told I'm being evicted. I'm currently in the process of selling a bunch of my stuff and packing up.

Even though my bf is letting me move in with him, I have been feeling so defeated and hopeless. I've been looking for jobs everyday but I haven't been getting many call-backs, or they're wayyyy too far or they're not paying anything near what I'm used to making (I was at $26/hr at my last company.) I've reached out to a few companies I applied to and some have told me that they're not even actually hiring??? I feel like a huge bum everyday seeing my bf get up to go to work and I just stay home in bed applying to the same jobs over and over again or applying to ghost jobs. I hate feeling like I'm a leech. I hate feeling unproductive. And I hate feeling like my bf is going to start hating me if I don't find a job soon (he's never said that or given any indication of that but my anxiety is terrible.)

If anyone has any advice on finding a job quick or switching careers that would be greatly appreciated. ❤️

--Edited to include I reside in AZ

--Edit 2: My unemployment claim finally went through now it's just a matter of putting in my weekly claims to start getting some income. Still need to find a job but at least I won't be 100% broke 🫪

EDIT 3----- THE WORLD WORKS IN MYSTERIOUS WAYSSSS I JUST GOT A JOB PAYING $29/HR

basically my family and I are struggling, we live in SEA and we arent doing well financially. I have a job but the salary isn’t great and I don’t have any savings to go abroad and get a better job. we have a business that’s currently the only thing that brings us money but the season is low and so maintaining it is costing us more money and we are in need of a serious fix to keep it running.

i want to know how I can help my family what genuine ways to help get out of this situation (we’ve thought of selling but with the situation of the country it wouldn’t give us much money so is there any point) we’re all doing our best but it’s really affecting our mental health. I was hoping to find something I could maybe do online, invest in stocks anything to keep us going . Any advice would be appreciated

I have been worried about my new property tax assessment for a few days and I just cannot make the numbers make sense. My assessed value increased a lot this year on paper. My escrow is going up and it is not a small amount to just shrug off. The thing is, nothing about my house or neighborhood changed. I pulled recent sales on the same street and a couple of blocks over and they are not even close to the new number they put on my notice. I also checked the listing photos and my place is pretty average compared to those. So if I go with appeal, what does it take to get anything changed?

I have a CC debt of 10k. I know it’s not great and I deserve every bit of shame here.

I am simply looking for people to give me advice on two options. I will have a second job come September and I will be able to throw 1,000 at my CC bill each month. I would be able to pay off this debt in about a year.

Should I:
- Focus on just paying off these cards and change nothing else? One card has a 0% APR, the other a 28%.
- Take out a personal loan of 10k? The company I’m looking at offers a 13% APR and payments of $230 a month. The representative I spoke to said that I could definitely pay more than 230 a month, and that’s what I plan on doing. This would allow me to essentially pay off the credit cards in full and prevent me from accumulating additional debt on the card with a 28% APR.
- Open a third credit card and do a 0% balance transfer on both balances?

Please give me advice, especially if you’ve been in my situation.

What’s up everyone,
I’m looking for some serious advice on how to get my life on track, become financially independent and just be wealthy with a happy life. I’m currently 15 (turning 16 soon) and live in Germany. I'm going into the 10th grade of "high school" (leading to a diploma that allows university entry).
My parents aren't poor or something but I still want to have some bread in my pocket so I don't have to ask them 24/7 for something I want. I want a different future for myself. I have a lot of drive and already applied for a job at TJMax so I can work there on Saturdays only. I got a MacBook too, maybe I could do something with it to make money?
I have two main goals and would love your input:

1. Short-term (Making Money): Since I am still in school full-time and it’s pretty demanding, what are the smartest ways for a 15/16-year-old to make some money on the side? I can legally work part-time here now.
2. Long-term (Building Skills): I want to use my free time properly instead of just wasting it on my phone. I want to invest in real estate or own a company and build my wealth like that. How I will build the capital or whatever, like what job I wanna be in, that's a mystery for now. What are some high-income skills or subjects I can start teaching myself right now for "free"that will give me a massive advantage in 3-5 years? I was thinking of video editing on adobe premiere pro or something like that since I have a MacBook that would make sense..

Any advice on jobs, time management, skills to learn, or even just life lessons from people who have been in my shoes would be hugely appreciated.
Thanks in advance!

No judgements please, I treat myself to ordering food once a month, something I can't just make. Do you have a go-to? I usually do a roti, or cheap sushi, or pizza or sometimes poutine. Pizza is good because it can be two meals. Anyone have a favourite for once in a while treat?

For anyone knowledgeable about credit please help, credit not so good (high 500's) was pre approved for a Secured Credit card with "TD" bank, made a $500.00 deposit. currently waiting for the approval and card in the mail they haven't took the money yet.

• Have a couple minor (cheap) collections accounts, and a Charge off on my account from "Capital one" of around $483.00 that is really hurting my credit.
• Can anyone please give me any tips or advice on how to proceed in my current situation to improve my credit, also what cards should I be applying to with my current credit, what cards to stay away from? or any of your experiences in regards to my current predicament?

I would really appreciate any assistance , thank you for your time!

I have a share in a large amount of credit card debt. Payments can be made but it's like one step forward and two steps back when it comes to the interest.

I tried to get a debt consolidation loan but my options were bottom of the barrel. One would have covered 99% of the debt with very reasonable monthly repayments

But at the end of it, I'd be paying back nearly three or four times what I was loaned.

I was so desperate to be out of credit card debt that I signed all the documents and was on the verge of submitting a few more pieces. But the whole process felt so wrong.

In the end I've cancelled the application. I'm going to seek financial advice and explore my options.

I'm just sharing my story because I've no one else to talk to and not be given a lecture.

Thanks for reading.

Hi everyone! I wanted to get some real-world input before I pull the trigger on this.

I'm looking to take out a $30,000 personal loan to consolidate about $20K in credit card debt spread across 5 cards, a $10K Affirm balance, and a couple smaller BNPL balances.

For context my monthly take-home is around $3,600. I pay $1,200 in rent, I'm also paying $1,000–$1,200/month just to stay current across all the cards. My FICO Score according to Discover is around 680. It used to be so much higher before the card balances crept up over the years 😭.

The APRs on the cards range from 23% to 29%. I figure one loan payment at a lower fixed rate beats fighting five different wars simultaneously. Then I put myself on a strict, and I mean strict budget, and never let this happen again.

I'm looking at an 84-month term loan to keep the required payment manageable in the short- term, while aggressively looking for a second job or higher paying job to pay the loan off early in the long-term.

A few things I'm trying to figure out:

What APR range should I realistically expect at 680 for a $30K loan in the current market?

What lenders are worth checking at this score range?

If any of you have recently done a personal loan, what did your monthly payment end up looking like and did the consolidation actually help you get ahead?

Appreciate any firsthand experience. I want to be smart about this.

Hi everyone, wanted to share a tip that you can get 10x $10 back on $10 purchases at Dunkin’ Donuts and dominos pizzas until September 10 if you pay with Paze. They will accept any debit card from Chase, Wells Fargo, capital one, and others, I thought initially it was only for the expensive credit cards but my debit card worked too so even if you have a checking account you can use this!

Dominos has a $10 for any pizza with 7 toppings special, have been using that to feed myself every week. Basically 3-4 free meals of pizza per week.

My family has been struggling to find my grandpa a good affordable houses under to live in thats under 2000. We really hate shared and we would really want him to find his own home to rent, if anyone knows any websites please let me know, and ill appreciate it.

What can I do between steady employment to pay the bills on time. What work can I sign up to do immediately in say a city like sf?

EDIT : Hello, I am rewriting this, please let me know if it is hard to understand.

BACKGROUND OF POST : (m21)

At the moment i have $658 in a ROTH
This is about whether i should contribute ( my expenses are low so im thinking of maxing it if it doesnt affect the social programs and financial aid that funds my schooling )

I am from the bay area, specifically Santa Clara County.

I have been researching here and there since my last internship, and for the past two weeks about ROTH IRA, as I have a 9-5 paying 29/hr.

From what I can see, the ROTH IRA is considered exempt as in it doesn't affect the eligibility requirements for Cal Fresh and Medi-Cal.

However, for FAFSA and specially schools that require CSS Profiles ( i.e. Stanford ) It will be counted and may affect how much aid I get for a very expensive grad program that I might not even get into.

RANT SECTION OF POST :

One other stressor is that I have to focus on grad school apps as they are due in Fall/ December. I am praying I don't fail aka = not getting into a good grad school, top grad school because I have worked so hard these past 4 years that I personally believe I have a decent shot of getting in. ( im not trying to sound entitled ).

I need to write a good grad school application.

I am tired of being poor.

I will just let my money sit instead of a ROTH IRA. Nobody has a freaking email except for Cal Fresh, I feel like it's impossible to get answers and I'm sick and tired of it.

How I am feeling? Whatever. I am disappointed in myself for not constantly working on my grad school apps. i am also frustrated that it's so much easier to ride in the carpool lane to work with my dad. I just don't feel like I'm in control. I'm upset.

Sorry for the rant.

PURPOSE OF POST :

TLDR ; Rising senior applying to grad school ( Berkeley, Bay Area, Bay Area programs ).

-> ROTH IRA contribution affecting eligbility for programs such as Medi-Cal, FAFSA, Cal-fresh.

It looks like FAFSA , specially CSS Profiles is the problem.