Boston Gal's Open Wallet

I am so glad I found this blog. You are such a better role model. Of course, she ever got her act together she'd probably be out of a job.

 

Please stop beating up on MP for her house misstep! It's very repetitive to read and it's also very condescending. You should be proud of your financial health, and you are setting a good example for your readers, but MP is human and she makes mistakes. That doesn't make her concerns over heating oil any less pertinent.

 

Agreed on both counts.

I get ranting and venting. In my opinion, it's o.k. to complain sometimes. But on the other hand, complaining without solutions doesn't really strike me as something worthy of the N.Y. Times (though I could be wrong as standards keep dropping).

Sure, prices are up, but now's the time to be coming up with alternatives -- like not trying to heat the entire house steamy hot. While we don't have to worry about heating as much here in Florida, I spent much of last winter adding on extra clothing layers. I cuddled up on the couch with an electric blanket instead of turning the heat on when it was just me. And when my husband and I hit the sack, we turned on an electric mattress pad so that we could keep the thermostat lower.

But more to your question, some investments are worth it, some aren't. That's why it's important to do the math. Our programmable thermostat paid for itself in a few months even though we got one with lots of bells and whistles. Replacing all our windows would be much harder to justify because that would be very expensive. However, we're looking into adding film to them that will help. Since we're remodeling our back room (an unfortunate necessity), we're looking forward to putting in good insulation which should make a difference as the original construction didn't have any whatsoever (and there's even light coming through the concrete block walls).

 

preach on BG! MP should have known that gas was going to be $1000 more this winter, and should have signed the oil contract @ $2.50 like other customers of Blueox Corp.

 

I have to agree with Anonymous 4:37. You really seem to jump at the chance to engage in a nice round of Schadenfreude whenever MP writes a story for the NYT. You seem to miss the fact that she's writing about a topic that has many people extremely worried. Her writing and reporting in this article are very good. She's establishing a pretty strong career for herself here (she's now writing for the NYT on a regular basis, for god's sake). As far as MP's worries are concerned, my family is in far better financial condition than MP's, but we're worried too. Natural gas prices are set to increase by about 50% this coming winter where we are in SW Ohio. Our old house needs new storm windows and add'l insulation (solar panels...are you kiddding me?), but we'd also like to add a porch and extra landscaping in our backyard this summer. We contribute to our retirement funds aggressively. We have plenty of money in savings. We have no credit card or auto debt. We do have two kids, so we HAVE to prioritize. We may be in better shape than MP, but I sure can sympathize. So to sum up...lay off MP!

 

This is your blog.

 

Keep it up BG. Whenever I see an MP article I check your blog to see what you have to say.

She lost all financial sense when she purchased that second home and then was stupid enough to blab to her audience about her idiotic decision. Oil prices have been rising for the last few years (just as gas prices have gone from 2.00 - 3.00 - 4.00 a gallon).

She bought a drafty old barn of a home and now has to wake up to the fact that her and her husband's retirement savings will be sent to the local oil man to heat that barn instead of being sent to Vanguard. I am sure her son will thank her for that big old home when he is supporting her.

God help her if that husband divorces her.

 

I think MP is a pretty easy target & a worthy one. She just doesn't learn her lessons & appears to not want to.
Why can't she turn her fantasies toward making her family stable & comfortable instead of "more, more, more." Stable & comfortable is a lot better than making your child freeze because you gotta have "it." Answer: because she's greedy & spoiled. Only greedy, spoiled people continually lust after things they simply should not buy.
Really...her columns are pathetic whining. If she wants "things" so bad, she should go work two jobs or more so she can have it all.
To sum up, quit whining MP & grow up!

 

Please stop beating up on MP for her house misstep! It's very repetitive to read and it's also very condescending. You should be proud of your financial health, and you are setting a good example for your readers, but MP is human and she makes mistakes. That doesn't make her concerns over heating oil any less pertinent.


I completely disagree. It's crucial to repeatedly put Dunleavey in context because she always does her best to obscure her context.

 

Please don't stop analyzing her less than smooth moves.

 

Ha! Don't apologize for beating MP's dead house horse! My gosh, the woman writes about finances for a living and she is a financial nitwit.

 

Keep up the Dunleavey watch, Boston Gal. What drives me insane about Dunleavey isn't that she makes mistakes, but that she doesn't acknowledge her mistakes as such. She casts them as perfectly reasonable decisions, and only the economy is to blame for her financial uncertainty.

 

I stopped reading her long ago because she didn't have any useful information. One would think that spilling one's financial life to the world would bring about some accountability. Guess I was wrong.

I love your summaries, so keep the updates coming.

 

Me thinks y'all aren't giving Ms. Dunleavy enough credit. She can't be all ditz and fluff as she makes herself to be - I mean, she's a personal finance writer for the NYT and MSN and has a book out, for gods sakes.

My personal take is that the personal finance arena is stuffed to the gills with people who are exactly what BG is - financially sound and savvy. Dunleavey has managed to carve out a niche for herself: she appeals to vast majority of Americans who try to save but are constantly derailed by the lure of the American spending zeitgeist, AND she appeals to the schedenfraude of those who have their houses in order. For all we know, she could in fact be completely debt free and raking in the cash as people like BG and us commentators keep making her more and more famous.

 

BG keep on with MP watch and updates. I look forward to your comments about her. She is an absolute train wreck. Her choices have lead her down this route.

 

I think it's perfectly reasonable to keep pointing out that a lot of what MPD is fretting about is a direct consequence of her stretching the family budget to buy a large old home on a whim.

 

Wow .. This is really a split group. I see her decision to buy a 2nd home as something of her own design. She did it, but now they have to figure a way to determine the best way to move forward. If you see a furnace that is costing you an arm and a leg to use every year, and you only foresee for the next X years that it is not going to get any better, you have to fix the problems. If it is drafty, caulk, insulate, etc. If your furnace is old, replace it. I mean a new furnace costs a few thousand dollars and they are a ton more efficient than those 10 years ago. You get all of that money back in less spending. If a furnace costs $3k to install (brand new, gas furnace, 98% efficiency, etc) and you have a 75% (10 year old oil furnace) then you can make back the costs quickly. Lets take a look.



Assuming a 75% oil furnace, with $2950 at an average cost of $3.24. That is 910.5 gallons of heating oil. Multiply that by 138500 BTU per gallon and add in a factor of 75% efficiency and you get that 94,578,187.5 BTUs of energy were used to heat her home (31,526,062.5 BTUs were lost to inefficency). If she had an 85% efficiency furnace, she would have spent $2603 on her oil costs.



If you look at the other choices, we can see where this comes back to help. The same 94,578,187.5 BTUs to heat her home, for a gas furnace at 95% efficiency, uses 1030 BTU per Cubic foot of gas. The avg price of natural gas in upstate New York last winter was $15.15 per 1000 cubic feet. That means it would have used 96.65 cf of gas or $1,464.3 to heat her home with gas. For straight electric heat. It costs 1KwH to get 3413 BTU (which are 100% efficient). So, that means that it is 27,711.2 kWh used to heat her home. Again, upstate New York's costs for electricity is $0.104 per kWh giving us a grand total of $2,882 to use electricity to heat her home.



I can go on with heat pumps, etc. however you get my point. If she bit the bullet and got a gas furnace ($3k installed), she would save $1485.7 in one winter (at $3.24 a gallon oil prices). She has already locked in her prices for next year at $4.14, so that means at the same rate, of usage, it would save $2305.14 in just one winter.

Seems pretty obvious to me.

 

I dunno... MP seems to continually think she can outsmart life, & it never works out for her. As a marketer, I think she remains a writer for these outlets because she is so hopeless, stupid, & easy to identify with for people that keep struggling to get it together (& fail.) Financial soap opera anyone?
If you want something decent on finances, besides the fine Ms. Boston Gal, go read John Bogle or Murkiel. I guess she's the cotton candy of finance. I do hope she gets it together...sort of pathetic.

 

I never bothered to read up on MP Dunleavey, but I googled her, and read some of her past articles. She's hopeless.

How a financial nitwit got to be a columnist for the NYT is beyond me.

Keep her honest. Keep up the good work.