Catching up with... Lazy Man and Money

Posted by DebtKid :: April 5, 2008 @ 1:11 am

You recently wrote about saving up for a tank. I love tanks as much as the next guy, but would a tank really be a wise investment?

A friend challenged me six weeks ago to write something different and eye-catching. I have to admit that I can only read about Roth IRAs so many times before my eyes glaze over and I think, "I get it already." I decided to take the most outlandish "investment" idea and try to make a convincing argument for it. I was going to publish it on a normal Friday just for fun, but April Fools was too perfect to resist. For those that missed the post, read budgeting for a tank and let me know if it sounds like a bad "investment."

Each month, you report your "Alternative" Income. Do you have a real job, or is Lazy Man too lazy for that?

I had a real job until October of last year. The previous two years before that, I found that I was under-utilized as the software engineer. I wasn't valued for my business ideas - just by the amount of code that I could churn out. I realized that the "thinkers" (business development people) earned more money and got to go on great dinners with clients. The "doers" (software engineers) earned about 60-75% as much and were stuck working late hours and coming in on the weekends when the servers went down. It simply wasn't a life that I wanted for the next 35 years or more.

Lazy Man and Money gives me an opportunity to develop business skills like networking, marketing, and negotiation while taking advantage of my software engineering skills I already have. In fact I have a whole list of ways personal finance blogging has helped me. In the past month, I've taken a part time job consulting rather than developing software. It's something that I might do more of in the future as I become more of a "thinker."

I think it's great that your wife makes more than you. What do you think?

I'm all for it. We'd be in some serious financial trouble if she made less than me. (I'd simply go back to software engineering.)

On a serious note, before me, she dated some men that were very uncomfortable with her making more money than them. She bought a cheaper car than the one she really wanted because she didn't want to scare them off. If I can be even more serious for a minute, it does get more difficult when there's a large earnings gap. I don't think it's necessarily gender-based as many people would expect. Sometimes I think, "Does she think that I'm living it up all day when she's at work? What else can she think when she comes home and everything is exactly the same way she left it?" It's an insecurity that I'm working on because I don't think she really feels that way.

You don't really seem that Lazy. You've got a great finance blog going, lots of subscribers...tell the truth, are you really Lazy? What's the inspiration behind the LazyManandMoney name?

I'm Lazy in some areas, but not so much in others. I easily spend 50-60 hours a week on Lazy Man and Money and Lazy Man and Health. There's a lot more behind the scenes that you don't see - interacting with other bloggers, commenting on people's sites, reading about better ways to write, reading about new things in blogging - it never ends.

The inspiration behind the Lazy name comes from my lack of desire to do repetitive household chores. For instance, I would come home drape my coat over the couch instead of hanging it up in a closet because I'm just going to go back out in twelve hours. The other reason I took the name is that I wanted to explore easier ways to make money such as using compound interest to your advantage rather than working until you are 87.

What made you start blogging about your finances?

I read about Boston Gal's Open Wallet in a copy of Business Week while at the dentist's office. When I got a computer later on, I checked it out and it fascinated me that someone else would be so open with her finances. I got instantly hooked. I figured that since no one else is writing about this stuff, I could do it and share all the knowledge I have. I later found out that hundreds and maybe thousands of other people are writing their personal finances - I just didn't know it.

Jim Cramer or Suze Orman? Coke or Pepsi?

Cramer by a landslide. I think Judge Judy Suze Orman loses to just about every personal finance guru I can think of - except Dave Ramsey. If my choice was to listen to either of those two, I would probably rather be in $100,000 of debt. I know they are very popular and many people find a lot of value in what they say - there are just some things about them that clash with me personally.

Diet Coke is a solid choice because you can get it anywhere. Pepsi One is a better overall drink though. Sam's Choice Diet Soda from Wal-Mart usually wins because it's 67 cents a two-liter - 33% off of what I usually pay for the other two.

What are your thoughts on the future of peer-to-peer lending?

Hmmm, a couple of tough questions and then you serve me up this cream puff question - I can't figure you out. I wrote an article on that just last week. It's one of the few innovative areas in personal finance so I write about it quite often. I think more people should look at P2P lending as a way to diversify their investments. We've seen stock market and real estate bubbles in the last ten years. We might be in a commodity bubble now as oil, gold, and food prices have sky rocketed due to the falling dollar. The more "bubbles" I see, the more I realize the value of diversifying your investments and P2P seems to be an entirely new asset class. That said, I think people should be cautious with P2P lending - it's very, very new and we don't have an indicator of what the returns might be over the long-term.

What's one thing you could share with us that you've never shared with your readers? (Family friendly of course!)

Well the last four words got rid of all the juicy stuff I was going to write. I struggled to come up with a single thing, since I'm very open on my site. However, once I did, I came up with five:

1. The readers don't really know how much I want to help them. I see people paying high interest on their credit cards and keeping money in low-interest checking accounts and my stomach twists in knots.
2. The readers don't know how excited I get when they leave a thoughtful comment on my site. I do a little dance when someone actually sends me an e-mail. It's pretty funny. I should put it up on YouTube.
3. The readers don't know how I struggle choosing between A) writing about ideas that are unique to me and B) writing about basic ways to get out of debt and/or build wealth.
4. The readers don't know that I have someone very close to me who struggles with a huge amount of debt. I think about how my advice might turn that person's life around, but I'm paralyzed by the thought of a debt intervention. One thing that I've learned is that you can't force someone to take control of his/her finances if he/she is not ready to.
5. Sometimes I like to break the rules. Giving five answers to this question is proof of that.