Elizabeth Newlin – Arizona Real Estate Agent

Yep, that’s right, we’ve hit a milestone: Gray is officially a terrible two. Want to know how I can tell? He’s spent all day today so far trying to figure out what activities will make me the craziest (I can actually see the little wheels turning in his head). Here are the ones that have been most successful:

1. Pushing his high chair over to the kitchen bulletin board so that he can climb up and pull tacks out and bring them to me.

2. Poking the cat until the cat scratched him.

3. Coloring on the wood floor with a green crayon while I was on the phone with a client.

4. Taking off his diaper and screaming bloody murder when I put him in timeout for coloring on the floor.

5. Biting himself.

6. Biting me.

7. Unlatching his seatbelt while I’m driving.

8. Trying to put a metal screw in a power outlet (I’m pretty sure this one was a bluff, he was waiting for me to walk into the
room to move the screw toward the outlet).

9. Chasing me around the house with his toy lawn mower (which sounds like a real lawn mower) while I was on the phone with my manager.

10. Throwing the grilled cheese sandwich I made him on the ground at lunch.

And oh my lord it’s only noon. Shoot me.

Have I mentioned that I have a new listing? No? I totally do!

Check this baby out:

It’s a 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath in West Chandler (Rural and Chandler Blvd., just South of Intel). It’s one of those houses that had the faulty plastic piping that leaked and was replaced with copper piping under a lawsuit a few years back. It also has decent sized bedrooms and a nice grassy back yard. We are asking $268,000. Call me if you want to see it!

I did something dumb a week or so ago. It was real dumb. So dumb, in fact, that I’m a little afraid if I tell you this story you’ll lose all faith in my intelligence and my ability to protect you along the danger-ridden road of real estate transactions.

I’m going to tell you anyway, however. I’m going to tell you about this dumb thing I did and all of the steps I’ve had to take to cure it so that you can learn from my mistake. Maybe you will think I’m a moron, but at least you won’t fall into the same trap I did.

So you know how I’m on my 10-year high school reunion committee? Well I’m actually kind of the treasurer of the committee. I opened the bank account we’ve been collecting the money in and am the one all the checks have been sent to. I also opened a Paypal account so people could pay online if they want.

The reunion is in less than a month, so we have almost $13,000 in the bank account in my name waiting to be paid out to our venue. Last week I got an email from Paypal asking that I update my account info to ensure that no unsecured third party was able to access it without my approval. Big words and statements crafted by legal types tend to lull me into a compliant coma, so I clicked on the link provided at the bottom of the email and proceeded to enter my Paypal recipient address, the password, my name and personal address, oh and just for kicks, the bank card number, expiration date, pin and verification number associated with the account. Yep, I did that, and then two days later when I got a similar email, I thought only to myself, “Wow, Paypal is really taking lots of steps to insure that my account isn’t being broken in to,” and entered the info AGAIN.

So some of you Mensa members out there might see where this one is going. It turns out that those emails I was getting weren’t actually from Paypal. Even though they had the cute little Paypal logo and even a ‘Case Reference Number’ and tons of legal jargon, they were part of what’s called a ‘phishing’ scheme. And I’m what we like to refer to as batter-fried halibut tacos, freshly caught in waters of the world wide web. I didn’t even figure out this was the case until I mentioned that I had been ‘updating’ my Paypal account to my scheme savvy husband, who immediately freaked out, both because of the possibility of lost money, and also because he had married a woman so stupid as to get caught by something like that. Let me tell you that was not a fun night. Not only did he give me an earful about how shocked he was that I didn’t know that, but I got the same reaction and speech from my parents.

Anyway, the point of all of this is it’s very important to know one thing:

NEVER EVER click on a link from your bank or lending institution and enter account or other personal info. If you think your bank is requesting updated info, type in the site on the address bar and see if it still requests it, or better yet, call them.

I changed my password to Paypal immediately and called and canceled the bank card and had it marked stolen. I also went into the bank and put a Secret Password on to all of my accounts so that no one can access them without knowing that my favorite Doodlebop is Moe (Darn it! Now I have to change it!). We were lucky, no money was stolen. I talked to another gal at my office a couple of days later, though, and she said she had a similar thing happen to her with her Wells Fargo account a year ago. Her account was wiped out the next day.

So make sure you’re smarter than I am. If you ever get a letter like this, don’t be a dope and give them all your information:

Dear Sir,

PayPal is committed to maintaining a safe environment for its community of
buyers and sellers. To protect the security of your account, PayPal employs
some of the most advanced security systems in the world and our anti-fraud
teams regularly screen the PayPal system for unusual activity.

Recently, our Account Review Team identified some unusual activity in your
account. In accordance with PayPal’s User Agreement and to ensure that your
account has not been compromised, access to your account was limited. Your
account access will remain limited until this issue has been resolved. This
is a fraud prevention measure meant to ensure that your account is not
compromised.

In order to secure your account and quickly restore full access, we may
require some specific information from you for the following reason:

We would like to ensure that your account was not accessed by an
unauthorized third party. Because protecting the security of your account
is our primary concern, we have limited access to sensitive PayPal account
features. We understand that this may be an inconvenience but please
understand that this temporary limitation is for your protection.

Case ID Number: PP-046-631-789
We encourage you to log in and restore full access as soon as possible.
Should access to your account remain limited for an extended period of
time, it may result in further limitations on the use of your account or
may result in eventual account closure.

Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter. Please understand that
this is a security measure meant to help protect you and your account. We
apologize for any inconvenience.

To keep your account active, click here:

http://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/gen/accounts-outside

Sincerely,
PayPal Account Review Department

PayPal Email ID PP576

(Looks so legitimate, right? I know, you totally would have done it too, huh? Thanks for making me feel better.)

So we’re trying something new this weekend: No TV and no Internet before 8 PM. We have a lot to accomplish around the house (master bath remodel is almost done, and next in line are the backyard and kitchen…) and Jason and I both tend to be easily distracted by mindless surfing of both the web and TV.

I consider the experiment a total success already. It was a little weird this morning to get up and make breakfast with the kids underfoot in the kitchen instead of distracted by SpongeBob, but also a little nice. I think we genuinely had richer ‘family time’ all day because of this, plus, I got more cleaning and reorganization done and Jason is this close to completing the bathroom. It’s definitely an adjustment, though. I usually read CNN.com while I brush my teeth, and I must admit, by 7:15 PM I was exhausted and trying to figure out how I was going to get through the next 45 minutes without passing out on the couch and staring at the blank TV. What can I say, I’m addicted to my Prime-time down time and the withdrawal symptoms are harsh.

Anyway, one of our non-plugged in activities today was Ben’s first soccer game of the season. This year we went with the AYSO league that’s right next to our house and it’s a huge improvement to the one we did last year. We are members of The Lizards:

The coach is energetic and knowledgeable and the kids are super cute. Four of them are quite talented. Ben’s… well… Ben’s a newbie. He just hasn’t had much coaching at this sport and wasn’t born with a foot that just knows how to kick, like some kids are. Suffice it to say that he’s not a World Cup Pro yet. We’re not ruling it out for 2020, but right now he’s still in the early stages.

For instance, before the game started, the kids were lined up on the field waiting for the ref to blow the whistle to begin the game. We were up against The Killer Bees. The kids were ready, the coach was poised, the parents were on the edge of their seats. All of a sudden, Ben starts running in circles. It becomes apparent that he is being chased by a large bug:

The ref finally runs over and swats the bug away before blowing the starting whistle. My dad, sitting next to me remarked, “It seems unfair that the other team is using actual insects in their defense.”

Sadly, Ben’s only other contact with the ball during the game came when the ball was kicked so close to him he almost couldn’t avoid kicking it. He bravely stepped up to the challenge, swung his leg back and let it fly… his shoe that is. The poor kid’s shoe catapulted off his foot and up over his head and landed about 10 feet behind him. Jason and I really need to take quite a bit of responsibility in this one. We had a discussion before the game about which shoes he should wear: the ones with little traction that fit well, or the ones that were a bit big but could grip the earth a bit better. Obviously we made the wrong call.

So that’s the Newlin Saturday in a nutshell. I’m off to watch some TV. Woo hoo!

I took a class yesterday on credit. It was taught by Patrick Ritchie, author of The Credit Road Map, and Pulitzer Prize for Nonfiction Nominee. He is an animated man; passionate about a seemingly unexciting subject. It was a great class and I recommend taking the opportunity to hear him speak if you get it. The title company who set up the class did a drawing midway through the class for a copy of his book and I won. So I will let you know what he’s like in prose vs. person.

Anyway, I want to pass on a few nuggets of interesting info about credit I picked up:

1. Opening department store credit cards can ding your credit, but so can closing them. Your best bet is to stick with what you’ve got.

2. 1-888-5-OPT-OUT is the number to call to have your name taken off of lists to be sent preapproved credit card offers. It’s not a flawless system, however. If you opt out using your first and last name, they can still send you offers with your middle initial included.

3. To keep your credit at a maximum number, you never want to charge more than 50% of your limit on to any one credit card. You also don’t want to charge more than 80% on your home equity line of credit.

4. www.annualcreditreport.com is where you go to get your free annual credit report. This will not give you a credit score. If you want that you’ll have to pay for it.

5. Even though your accounts may charge you a fee for being ‘late’ a few days on your payment, they cannot report that you are actually late until 30 days after the due date. So it might cost you $30, but at least getting that check in the mail a few days late won’t cost you 30 credit points.

6. 720 is what you want your credit score to be. This will allow you the best rates and programs for loans. There is no financial advantage to having a credit score higher than this, but if you shoot for 800, when something small inevitably goes wrong and drops you down 40 points or so, you’re still in a range that will allow you the best products.

If you have any specific credit questions, you can email the author and instructor at patrick@thecreditroadmap.com.