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  • In a hurry and won't listen

    I took a phone call from a customer. He was in a hurry (aren't they always) and just wanted the short answers to everything. He "doesn't do computers" so that makes everything more difficult, according to him. While we were talking, it filtered into my brain that I had had a very similar conversation with this customer some time ago. Looking back through some old paperwork, I see that it was actually last October.

    SC: What would it take for me to build up my credit? Take out a loan?
    Me: One of the ways is to take out a small loan and pay it back on time.
    SC: So if I borrowed $1000, walked out of the bank, then turned around and paid it back right away, that would give me a credit score so I could take out a home loan?
    Me: Well, it would be better to pay it back according to the schedule, to show good payment history.
    SC: So there's no way you could give me a home loan today?
    Me: Maybe if you could get a cosigner.
    SC: My wife is divorcing me, and I need to pay her so I can keep the house.
    Me: If you’re still married, your spouse would have to sign the mortgage. (Minnesota is a community property state.)
    SC: She’s divorcing me. She’s not going to sign anything. (This is about where it clicked that I’d talked to this guy before about his wife divorcing him. Apparently it’s been a very long process.)
    Me: That does make it complicated. If you have the completed divorce paperwork that shows you get the house, then she won't need to sign.
    SC: I won't have that until I pay her off for the house.
    Me: Usually these things happen at the same time. You can tell whoever's preparing the divorce papers that you're working with us to get a loan.
    SC: Ok. But I don't have a credit score.
    Me: If you don't have any credit at all...
    SC: I don't.
    Me: Then you'll probably need a cosigner - a family member or friend - it doesn't have to be your spouse - who's willing to sign off on the loan documents.
    SC: Do we have to come in at the same time?
    Me: Not necessarily. In fact, for the application, since you don't do computers, you could pick one up here at the bank and then you can each fill out your portion of the application and return it. Then we'll pull credit for both of you and look at your income and debts together.
    SC: I want to know what rates are like.
    Me: <goes over rates and terms>
    SC: Can you tell me what's in my accounts? Savings and checking?
    Me: Sure. Your balance in savings is $xx,xxx.xx and checking is $x,xxx.xx.
    SC: That's less in savings that I had last I checked. Did my wife make a withdrawal?
    Me: <pulls up image of withdrawal> Yes, she withdrew $xx,xxx.xx (about half of what was in the account) and got a money order.
    SC: <makes upset words>
    Me: If you don't want her to be able to withdraw from either of these accounts, you'll have to open new accounts in just your name and close these accounts.
    SC: <makes noncommittal sounds>

    We wrapped up after that. I remember from our last conversation that he wanted to prevent his wife from taking money out of his checking and savings. Looking back through paperwork, I see that I actually typed up new documents for new checking and savings accounts for him, but he never signed them. So they never got on the system.

    It's a tough situation, but he has options. He just needs to follow through. And actually take the time needed to complete them, rather than rushing me through incomplete explanations.

    We'll see how long it takes him to follow through on any of this.
    "I look at the stars. It's a clear night and the Milky Way seems so near. That's where I'll be going soon. "We are all star stuff." I suddenly remember Delenn's line from Joe's script. Not a bad prospect. I am not afraid. In the meantime, let me close my eyes and sense the beauty around me. And take that breath under the dark sky full of stars. Breathe in. Breathe out. That's all."
    -Mira Furlan

  • #2
    Lazy

    He is getting the results of being lazy, and the more he puts off things, the more his wife will collect/control.

    When my mom died I needed to move all the money from our joint accounts (4 of them) to one account so the lawyers could find out the total and only needed to write single checks for the people who inherited the money.

    It took only a single day to do the paperwork, and all the money was transferred by the next morning. In other words, no bother at all.

    Comment


    • #3
      Mr. In-a-hurry came in today to take care of his checking and savings accounts. He still seemed convinced that opening a credit card and using it just once was going to show enough credit history to get a home equity loan.

      Then while we were looking at his account history to see which automatic payments he'd need to change over to his new account, we discovered that he and his wife already have a joint credit card that she's made payments to using the joint checking account. All above-board, as far as I can tell. And that should mean he already has credit so his worries about building up credit before he takes out a home equity loan seems to be moot. Assuming his soon-to-be ex-wife was making payments on time, of course.

      He also chose not to close the joint checking account, despite my warnings that she could continue to take funds out of it. He said he wanted her to be able to keep paying household expenses out of it for the next month or so while she's still living there. I get that everyone has their own view, but it seems odd that someone would want to continue living with their ex while they're getting divorced.

      He also wanted my opinion of whether his income was enough to live on. I tried to give a "everyone's situation is different" answer, but he didn't like that. He said something like he just wants to live simply or something. I was kind of tuned out at that point, since he's making more as a retiree than I am as a 20+ year banker.

      I got through setting up his new accounts and applying for a credit card for him as fast as I could, and it still took over an hour. All while he grumbled that he was a simple man who didn't understand internet lingo or how to use a cell phone. I couldn't wait to get him gone.
      "I look at the stars. It's a clear night and the Milky Way seems so near. That's where I'll be going soon. "We are all star stuff." I suddenly remember Delenn's line from Joe's script. Not a bad prospect. I am not afraid. In the meantime, let me close my eyes and sense the beauty around me. And take that breath under the dark sky full of stars. Breathe in. Breathe out. That's all."
      -Mira Furlan

      Comment


      • #4
        Quoth Ghel View Post
        He said something like he just wants to live simply or something.
        Poor fellow. One can live on little money, but there's nothing simple about it. I would imagine (never having had a lot of money myself) it's even more difficult when one has had some wealth and needs to pare back. I listen to the angst of colleagues who claim they wish to give up cable TV. The struggle is real.

        Comment


        • #5
          Quoth workerbee222 View Post
          Poor fellow. One can live on little money, but there's nothing simple about it. I would imagine (never having had a lot of money myself) it's even more difficult when one has had some wealth and needs to pare back. I listen to the angst of colleagues who claim they wish to give up cable TV. The struggle is real.


          The last time I watched television regularly ... Hill Street Blues was still running. And I mean original shows, not reruns. I don't even own a television anymore.

          I have some perspective on money because my maternal grandfather used to tell me stories about life during the Great Depression. Fuck, compared to what they went through, I'm one of the 1% right now. And my income, at the moment, consists of early Canada Pension and my part-time cashier's job (it will get a boost this fall when I hit 65 and start collecting Old Age Security as well).
          Customer service: More efficient than a Dementor's kiss
          ~ Mr Hero

          Comment


          • #6
            I'll be honest, the only reason I own a TV at all is because I use it as my computer monitor ~ it does the job well enough for me I haven't had cable for nearly a decade, and I've found I haven't really missed it. Plenty of online alternatives.
            "For a musician, the SNES sound engine is like using Crayola Crayons. Nobuo Uematsu used Crayola Crayons to paint the Sistine Chapel." - Jeremy Jahns (re: "Dancing Mad")
            "The difference between an amateur and a master is that the master has failed way more times." - JoCat
            "Thinking is difficult, therefore let the herd pronounce judgment!" ~ Carl Jung
            "There's burning bridges, and then there's the lake just to fill it with gasoline." - Wiccy, reddit
            "Retail is a cruel master, and could very well be the most educational time of many people's lives, in its own twisted way." - me
            "Love keeps her in the air when she oughta fall down...tell you she's hurtin' 'fore she keens...makes her a home." - Capt. Malcolm Reynolds, "Serenity" (2005)
            Acts of Gord – Read it, Learn it, Love it!
            "Our psychic powers only work if the customer has a mind to read." - me

            Comment


            • #7
              Being cableless

              I get free cable where live now, but before I sold my house I figured out that a Direct-TV antenna costs me the same as three months of cable.

              So I go rid of the cable, put the antenna on my roof and found I only missed the SciFy channel, News, regular programs and more important TVO and PBS were available without paying a cent more.

              PS. The SciFy channel has gone down hill a lot, I don't miss it now.

              Comment


              • #8
                If I had had cable when it happened, I would have dumped SciFi the moment they formally changed their name to "SyFy" and their spokes-executive actually wondered aloud why people would expect to find science fiction programming on their network.
                "For a musician, the SNES sound engine is like using Crayola Crayons. Nobuo Uematsu used Crayola Crayons to paint the Sistine Chapel." - Jeremy Jahns (re: "Dancing Mad")
                "The difference between an amateur and a master is that the master has failed way more times." - JoCat
                "Thinking is difficult, therefore let the herd pronounce judgment!" ~ Carl Jung
                "There's burning bridges, and then there's the lake just to fill it with gasoline." - Wiccy, reddit
                "Retail is a cruel master, and could very well be the most educational time of many people's lives, in its own twisted way." - me
                "Love keeps her in the air when she oughta fall down...tell you she's hurtin' 'fore she keens...makes her a home." - Capt. Malcolm Reynolds, "Serenity" (2005)
                Acts of Gord – Read it, Learn it, Love it!
                "Our psychic powers only work if the customer has a mind to read." - me

                Comment


                • #9
                  Haven't had cable in well over a decade, and don't really miss it. We have an antenna that we use to pick up PBS, and that's about it. We do watch streaming content over our DSL. But even before we got into that, the antenna brought us just about everything we wanted to watch.

                  One exception: When we go on vacation and stay in a hotel, the TV there is always tuned to HGTV when we're in the room (and awake). I think if we actually had cable, my wife would be glued to that station permanently....
                  “There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged.
                  One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world.
                  The other, of course, involves orcs." -- John Rogers

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Quoth earl colby pottinger View Post
                    He is getting the results of being lazy, and the more he puts off things, the more his wife will collect/control.
                    I don't think it's "being lazy", I think he's depressed. He's not actually "in a hurry", but he's not sure how long he can maintain the level of energy/interest that handling this is going to require.

                    And while getting divorced is pretty depressing by itself (essentially the same as handling a death, where the person who died is "us"), ... I'm reminded of a great quote from John Green: "In a bout of depression that at the time I thought was caused by, but in retrospect was probably the cause of, our breakup."
                    He probably has been having problems for a while.

                    Lazy is pretty easy to overcome: doing the thing takes the same amount of energy whenever you finally stop putting it off. Depression stacks, with each passing day that you didn't handle things giving you one more reason to hate yourself thus making it that much harder to do ... anything.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Quoth SpyOne View Post
                      Lazy is pretty easy to overcome: doing the thing takes the same amount of energy whenever you finally stop putting it off. Depression stacks, with each passing day that you didn't handle things giving you one more reason to hate yourself thus making it that much harder to do ... anything.
                      Man friend is a fine person, but doesn't *get* depression.

                      "Why are you sad?"

                      Well, if there was a specific reason, loss of job, death of a loved one, *that's* sad, or specifically, grieving. Depression is a fickle mistress, coming and going on it's own schedule, often with little relation to the events of one's life.

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