Screw you Escrow!

Total Trade Count: 207,307
Total Foil Count: 3,750

Today we are celebrating the fact that I have been able to remove Escrow from my Mortgage.  When you buy a house you get a mortgage.  In that mortgage they have this thing called escrow.  Escrow consists of PMI, Taxes, and Insurance for the property (at least where I live).  So in the end your mortgage consists the principle payment, the interest you need to pay for the privilege of having a mortgage, and this escrow account.

Escrow will get added to your mortgage automatically if you do not put 20% or more down for the down payment.  You will also get charged PMI.  PMI is like an additional payment to the mortgage company because they know you do not have a 20% down payment, so they are "trying to protect" themselves from something besides being able to take your home if you do not pay.

The way Escrow works is, you get to pay PMI to the mortgage company but you also need to pay your home owner insurance and property taxes through the mortgage company as well.  Home owner insurance is paid out 1 time a year and it is a pretty big number.   Then property taxes is also another large number that gets paid out 2 times a year.  All three of those payments will come out of your Escrow account, and the mortgage folks are glad to do that for you.  And since you paid less than 20% as a down payment, you need to use them to pay those.

A lot of people think that is just an awesome thing for them to do for you.  Not only will you just pay the mortgage, but they will also pay your other bills for you?!  But like I mentioned in my last blog, it is all about the small moves that you can get ahead.  Those cash back rewards and interest payments by buying things from a savings account using interest free financing, but paying it off slowly while you have the full payment in savings gaining interest is what I am talking about.  This is just another small move to take.

So by removing Escrow from my mortgage, then all I will be paying is the principle payment along with the interest payment.  Next, I take all that money that I would have paid to my mortgage for the Escrow account and I put that into savings.  Since the insurance gets paid out once a year, and the taxes will get paid out twice, that leaves a lot of months to be gaining interest while I wait to pay those bills.  This is just another small steps in making more money for family in trying to secure my financial future, and money to use to buy Magic cards.

I am not sure how much I will be making on that saving account, but it will increase the total amount of my savings account, which is also leverage to be able to make the quick moves that I am trying to do in order to take advantage of some situations from time to time.

I know, some people might think it to be silly to put that kind of stress on yourself, and have to worry about more things in life, but those are the small little moves that get you ahead in life.  It is the same reason I really love getting 0.019 shares from a Dividend Reinvestment off of some stocks that I own that I get to reinvest back into my position with the knowledge that I will get 0.020 shares the next quarter.

I might go into this at some time, but to prove my point a little bit more back in 2008 I started down the path of DRIP investing and in that year I made $538.83 for free off the Dividends.  Last year that DRIP ended up being $6,924.25 for free.  I know that seems silly, and who really cares, but in my eyes I made almost $7000 for doing nothing but buying some shares of stock that pay a dividend and let them sit there and reinvest that dividend back into itself for free.

It is all about those little steps.

My hope is that with all these little steps I will be able to take my investments and put them into more dividend paying stocks along with stashing some of them into Municipal Bonds and try and live as tax free as I can.  But I can get into that in a later blog, this one is about the Escrow account.

So to celebrate I decided to make a little investment into War of the Spark.

I am just going to come out and say it now, this set is going to be just like Kaladesh and Aether Revolt.  Like Ixalan or Eldritch Moon.  I am going to take a little bit of cash and invest it into some sealed product.

Here is the first batch of boxes I picked up, and I have some more that should be coming in as soon as my FLGS can get them in, but I am going to say that this set is going to be one of those sets that people look back on with a smile.  It will be one that they wish they can find a box to buy for drafting or collecting.  This is going to be another Dominaria.  People will want to experience this set well after they stop printing it.  I almost want to say that WoTC are going to stop the print on this set early just to mess with the investors.  We will see, but I am marking this down as one of my Spec's and going to pick up a bunch.

I can see the value not only in the rare cards, but the uncommon and common cards.  And like Ixalan, this set has some good land cards, and everyone needs land cards.  I have some high hopes for this set to make a lasting impression with future players, and it will retain value moving forward, and I can make a little cash with this investment in this sealed product.

Now I am still only going to open a Mythic Edition box if I can get it, and 1 of my Bundles, following the plan to keep the least amount of extra cards around, and finishing up the playset after rotation.  I figure this set will be opened a lot, and there will be a very large inventory out there to piece together my sets in 2 years.

I almost want to pick up more of these for some stupid reason, just cause I think they will be the last of their kind since there are not going to be anymore sparks.

I think the BaB promo is not too shabby either, and could be a good EDH card.

I also stopped by another LGS the other day and picked up these for a really good price.  $0.50 a piece and I can't pass that up.

I got some trades in as well, so throwing them up for the ledger, but almost done with my Guild Kit land sets.

And then three more Player Promos.  These have slowed down a bit, and now they are only trickling in, but I hope to get them complete soon.

So that is it.  Just had to share my thoughts on the Escrow accounts, and how I am making small moves to reach my financial goals.  It is just another step up those long stairs in the hopes to be able to retire at some point, and only focus on things I enjoy.

Debt

Total Trade Count: 207,496
Total Foil Count: 3,762

I am big into budgeting.  I have been keeping a steady budget since 2003.  I keep track of everything I spend, all my bills, all my debt, everything financial.  There have been adjustments for the last 16 years as I have grown.  At first it was a pretty simple budget with my bills, my income, and what very little I saved.

I would say that keeping a budget was the most important step in my financial career.

It gave me the insight of what I was spending my money on, or better put what I was wasting my money on.  Have you ever just wondered what you spend our paychecks on?  Like, you make so much an hour and pay your bills on time, but for some reason you never really have enough every couple of weeks.  Well that is where I was.

Being 27 and not really having much to my name, I just wondered how people were able to save for retirement, or a house, or a new car.  Emergency fund?!  It just did not make that much sense to me.  I was able to do the things I wanted to do, and I was saving my 10% a month for retirement, but I never really thought I was getting ahead in life.

I have been saving since I was a working 17 year old because of what my father told me.  When I started working I asked my father if he could go back in time, what would he do differently.  His answer was that he would save more at a younger age, and then he showed me a spreadsheet on how compound interest works.  Over time the money you saved could grow, and you could basically make money on the money you have saved, and not even need a job.  Of course this peeked my interest and I started my financial education.

He had bought me a couple of Motley Fool books, and I took a slight interest in this whole financial independence world but at 17 how much could I really do.  I took in what I could, started a simple budget that I never kept up with, and started to save 10% of my gross income.  Once I hit 18 I put that money into a RothIRA and let it be.  Back then you could only start a RothIRA at age 18, and it did not matter if you had taxable income, while now if you can just prove you made the money through employment you can start depositing money into a RothIRA at any age.

You would think that there was some correlation that the first years I started to try and keep a budget was when I stopped playing Magic the Gathering, but I still blame Everquest for leaving Magic the Gathering.  That is another story.

Fast forward 10 years and I was still working and saving, but I was not anywhere close to owning my own home.  My father and I purchased a townhome together, but that was mainly for him.  I had the credit, and he had the cash, so we decided to just buy something together since the place we were renting kept raising prices.

And yes, I lived with my father until I was 25.  And yes, the main reason I moved out was because who wants to bring home a girl when you still live with your parents.  I had to grow up at some point.

After a little while I got into corporate America and started to make "the real money", but I still could not make ends meet.  I was maintaining a credit card balance throughout the year, and was stuck in the rotating swipe and payoff cycle.  I was basically living on the credit card because I was out spending my income.  I tricked myself into thinking that I was living a life style that I could actually afford.

So I started the budget in 2003, and it really showed me where my money was going.  I had a credit card with a $5000 balance, and I was paying around $200 a month to the bill.  Then I saw that I was being charged $103 in interest for that $5000 balance.  So that means, the $200 I was sending in for payment, more than half of it was going to pay the credit card company for the pleasure of swiping the card making them fees, and the other less than $100 was going to pay off the $5000 balance.

I literally slapped myself in the face with my own hand.

I was just throwing away money every month, and I figured out why I could not make ends meet.  I still remember to this day calling all my credit card companies and asking them to lower my interest rate that I was paying.  Most of them did end up lowering the rate, but there were some cards that wouldn't.  Those were the ones I transferred my balances out of to the ones that did lower my interest rate, and I ended up cancelling the cards.

I know, you should not cancel the cards, but I was upset so I did something rash.  But really the right thing to do in the credit card game is to pay off the card and try and keep them around as long as you can.  That will only help your credit history, and maintaining an available credit balance for longer.  We will get into that game at some point too.

So yeah, in 2003 was when I started my journey to get debt free.  I started that year with $10,389.20 in debt, and I did not become debt free until Sept 2005 just in time to move into my new condo and put on some more debt!

From that point on I was very aware of playing the credit card game.  At every point I would attempt to buy everything interest free, and I would only finance something if I could get an interest free credit card or loan.  Outside of buying a car or home, my goal was to not pay any interest.  I was also very aware of what interest rates were on any type of credit I owned.

Enter my newest purchase.

I have an Amazon credit card and with that comes 12 months of interest free financing if the item is over $499.  With having good credit you do get some perks.  So if I end up paying off this box of Mercadian Masques in 12 months, I will not have to pay the interest that is being charged during the 12 month period.  All interest is deferred.  This means I am paying some god awful rate, and every month that interest balance gets higher, and at the 12 month mark if I have not paid off this purchase I will have to pay what ever is left on the balance and the interest gets added onto that balance.

So why did I just go on about my budgeting history and paying off debt?

Well being able to come to this purchase without having any credit card debt, and having the funds to pay off the purchase at any point, I can take advantage of the interest free financing option and get what I want without having to pay more than what the price is.  The trick is to not fall into the trap of not paying it off before your interest free period ends.

Not having a cloud of payments that need to be paid every month is where you want to be.  You want to make the money you have working for you, and not the other way around.  Do not think about it like you can afford the $80 a month payment to avoid paying interest.  Try and look at buying things with the aspect of being able to pay for things outright, but choosing not too because that money is sitting in a savings account making you money.

Then find interest free ways of buying things so that you are afforded time to pay off the things you want slowly while gaining interest in the savings accounts, and then paying them off.  That way instead of paying $800 for a box of magic cards, you really only end up spending $750 because of the 12 months you made $50 in interest in that saving account.

I know that seems silly, and it is only $50.  But if you end up using a cash back credit card, and you make 1.5% cash back from your purchases, that is an additional $12 you will have made, and it will bring your purchase price down to $738.

And if you do all your purchases with this in mind, things start to add up real quick.  For instance, I have been able to do this for a while now, and in 2018 I was able to make $1569.52 in cash back rewards and interest on my savings accounts.  That is a bit more than $50.

My wife actually got mad at me because I would not let her buy things with cash.  She wanted to run the spending budget account with envelops of cash rather than use the cash back credit card.  I then showed her that we would be losing around $1000 in cash back rewards, and she changed her mind.

Being able to come at purchases with this in mind frees you up a lot.  Now I am not able to just go out and buy everything I want, but I am able to take advantage of purchases when they do come up because of this.  I already have the money sitting in a savings account making me money, which is a huge deterrent to spending money in itself, but then having the options to buying things in this manner is also freeing.

Instead of charging $800 to a credit card that charges 24% and paying well over the $800 purchase price in the end, I am able to leverage what I already have built up to get ahead $1 at a time.

It has been a very long road to get here, and I am talking about 16 years.  I still have my home debt, and I am trying to save up enough money to buy my next car without getting a loan, but that is all apart of the game.  Now I do not live pinching pennies, but saving where I can to make these small increases in personal wealth has afforded me the ability to leverage my past financial history with future purchases, and come out ahead so I can continue this cycle.  I am no longer stuck in the cycle of living on a credit card and making the minimum payment.

This is just a small look inside of how I try and deal with buying MTG products.  Here are some more updates on things that have come in.  And again, I hope to be writing more like this.

This fine trade came in, and the complete sets of Player Rewards Promo cards is getting close to complete.  Thank you CardSphere!

I stopped up at a LGS near the house to see if they picked up anything, but this is all I could find.  Not sure on the Isolate, but it can never hurt picking up things that cost 1 mana to get rid of things.

Went up to my old stomping grounds Mead Hall Games and I was able to get closer to my UMA set and the Box Topper set.  I swear if they come out with another Box Topper type set with Modern Horizons I am going to just quit.

That same day I headed up to my FLGS Lodestone Coffee & Games.  I finally finished my Battlebond playset of first prints, and was able to snag some UMA and UMB Box Toppers.  I really wanted to see if I could pre-order War of the Spark and Challenger deck, but they pointed me to their website.

And since I was out and about I decided to head up to the Source Comics and Games to see if they had anything, but all I could find were some lovely packs.  I KNOW!  I could have picked up a box of Nemesis for what I paid for these, but yeah I wanted to impulse buy something.

This was another trade that came in from Canada, and it was also on CardSphere.  I think I only need like 6 more and I am done!

So fast forward a week and I just picked up these at the LGS near the house.  I did end up trying to buy them at Lodestone, but they do not pre-order these things, and when I went up there they did not even have them in stock!  No idea what is going on, but sure wish they would just let me pre-order everything.  What a waste of time going up there, or was it?

Since I was already up there looking for Challenger decks, I might as well try and see what they did have in.  I recently found out that this card came in 6 different flavor texts.  So of course I am trying to get a playset of them all.  With these adds, now I think I just need to pick up the rarest of the prints.

And BAM!  Picked this up to finish up my playsets of these wonderful dual lands.  I did go for 3 playsets of each, and it might end up being too many, but I can really see these going up in price so it was somewhat of an investment.

So there we go, some info on budgeting, saving, credit cards, and the such.  I hope you enjoyed it, and like I said I am going to try and write more like this instead of just posting what I picked up.

Thanks for reading!

Thoughts

Total Trade Count: 207,629
Total Foil Count: 3,765

I am going to start to try and talk about my life more in these blogs, just so I have something to talk about.  I just don't see the value of just posting the cards in my collection without something interesting to talk about.  I mean, some people might want to just look at cards in my collection, but I need to make this more interesting.  The one purpose of this blog is to provide a running ledger of my collection, but I really need to have something to talk about in these blogs.

So today going to talk about goals.  Let's review my Magic the Gathering Goals.

1: Playset of every Standard Released Set from The Dark and up
2: A Single set of AAL and all supplementary sets
3: Complete Sealed Booster Box from Revised and up
4: Sealed product collection of all supplementary releases
5: Bucket List ABU complete sets Sealed product of more rare sets
6: Get rid of all my extra cards, and add the least amount to my bulk

I have OCD and I work best off of lists, so I tend to make lists of everything I want to do and that gives me some control and purpose of my days.  It allows me to gain control of what I NEED to do, and I can stay focused on those lists.  There is an added bonus to getting something done, but really it is a way for me to get up and move throughout my day knowing what I need to get done.

In my MTG life I have been able to complete #1, #2, and #4, while getting really close to #3.  I do not expect to get to #5 until after I retire.  And #6 we are in the middle of right now.

But with that I need more than just MTG lists in my life.  I maintain multiple spreadsheets to gauge my retirement, and also a daily budget.  I keep track of everything.  I mean everything!  It has helped me in knowing what I can spend, and what goals I can accomplish without stressing myself out.  I know that I can pay for my child's schooling, as well as be able to buy groceries every week.

I would say that my budget has lead me to be able to be comfortable with having a child.  There is no way to really plan for a baby, or to really be ready for a baby, but there were somethings that I did in order to make life less stressful for me.  My wife could care less about the planning of everything, but I needed to take responsibility for how I was going to be after the baby came, and there were steps I needed to take in order to get there.  I would also like to add that my freaking out still happened, but I would hope that it was to a minimum.  I mean, my wife is still with me, so it has not been so bad that she could not stick around.

But one thing I needed to do was get rid of all our debt.  That was pretty much my main goal before thinking about having a baby.  I came from a broken home, and financials were the main cause for the break, so I wanted to be able to provide my wife and baby the comfort of not having to worry about the day to day costs of living.  It also allowed me to have the flexibility of moving money from savings to spending without too much worry.

I save a lot.

One thing that I did not expect is the change of priorities.  I am not talking about saving, or budgeting, but the well being and health of myself.  I am an older first time father and some would say that I was not in horrible shape, but I was not healthy.  Having my son was a nice wake up call for myself, and I set a goal of running in a marathon by the time he turned 1.

Fast forward to his first birthday and I was no where near being able to finish a 10K, but it did set me on a path to getting more healthy.  I can now run a 5K without any real struggle, and I am working toward being able to finish a marathon at some point.  I really do think that everything started to change when we had our child.  At the beginning of the year, on New Years Day I decided to attempt to get a perfect year with consideration of my Apple Watch.

Rewind a bit, when my wife told me we were pregnant I went out and bought an Apple Watch.  The thought was to really use this new toy in getting in shape so that I can be around to see my grandchildren.  Time went on and I was able to finish that 5K, but I was very stop and go with working out.  I found it to be very difficult to maintain a workout schedule due to injury and straight up being out of shape.  I kept trying to find a schedule to working out that worked, but it was pretty difficult to maintain anything.

So, back on New Years Day I looked at my wife and said I was going to get a perfect year with my Apple Watch, and really make it a goal rather than just working out a couple times a week.  On the Apple Watch you get three rings that you can accomplish every day.

Move Calories burned
Exercise Minutes
Stand Goal

The watch will keep track of all your calories burned, but the move ones are more important because you are actually moving.  Then you need to exercise for at least 30 minutes each day, and stand for 1 minute each our for 12 hours a day.  Easy right!

I could do that, those are 3 very easy goals.

At first the rings were closed pretty easy, but now that I am 3 months and 6 days into it, my watch keeps pushing that limit to see if it can break me.  I swear that now that it sees all the completed days of rings being closed it is trying to see if I am really up to the challenge.  I really think that with the daily goals, I will be able to make the prefect year, but the stupid watch throws these monthly goals in there.

The Monthly goals started off pretty innocent, but now that the watch thinks I am in pretty good shape it is trying to kill me.  Now I have no real goal of getting a perfect year with all the monthly goals, but fuck you if I am not going to try.  Like the January goal was to hit my Move goal 20 times in the month.  Then February was to exercise for 830 minutes for the whole month.  March hit me a little in the face with closing all my rings, which was not that hard because I was trying to do that anyway.  Then fuck you April showed up.

This was not the kick ass April O'Neil from TMNT, oh no.  This was "so you want to get a perfect year?" asshole April.  I am so scared of this goal that I almost do not want to finish it because of what next month is going to look like.  In April I need to burn at least 28,100 calories.  That is 937 calories a day.  Right now, my Move Ring goal is 770 a day, and I can average around 850 a day.  This means I need to work out more that 80 more calories a day in order to hit this goal.

I know it does not sound like a lot, and I am thinking that next year around this time I will be laughing at that tiny goal, but it is good to have these goals to better my life.

Taking my OCD and using it in my favor.  Creating these lists to maintain my life and being about to workout different ways of thinking of things in order to make my life a little easier.  It might be more to do, or more work that needs to be put into maintaining all these lists, but it is bringing my better purpose in my life.

Without the lists of MTG cards I needed I would have not found a better way to spend money, and I would not take so serious budgeting.  Without my wife and child I am not sure I would be out of debt.  Without the thought of needing to grow old for my family I would not be on this path of staying healthy.

I still do get hit with those dark days, and it is impossible to take me away from my computer because things are not lining up.  Or I spend countless hours looking for a single thing because it was not where it was supposed to be.  But all in all I have been able to maintain my life through these lists, and if those are in good standing I can look at enjoying more of the life we are building for my son, and really enjoy life the way people should.

Goals are a good thing, and I think everyone should try and set some for themselves.

Here are some more of those Player Rewards Promos that came in.  I love CardSphere!

Nice little pick up here!

I am really getting close to getting all these lands, and I am surprised that there is not more of a demand for these.

And these stupid Planeswalker deck cards.  I seriously hope they cancel these decks after War of the Spark.  I am really starting to hate this product.  Just cause they have new printed standard cards, I am trying to get playset of them, and it really sucks.

So yeah, I am hoping to share a bit more of things that I am going through, and tie it to MTG collecting.  Hopefully next post it will be spicy with a new purchase, and how I got there.

Sold my Collection

April's Fools!

Yeah, I did not sell my collection, but I had to do some type of April Fools joke.  I was going to put in my notice at work, but that would have been going to far.

Total Trade Count: 207,674
Total Foil Count: 3,765

I have been getting some of the new cards in the mail, so I thought I would put a new post up.  It is nothing crazy, just some basic lands from the Guild Kits and some Player Rewards Promos.

Here are a ton of the basic lands from the Guild Kits.  As of the writing of this blog, I only need 13 more basic lands from 3 different Guild Kits.

Got these two, and I have to say my favorite is the Disenchant, just cause I am old school.

Then there are these two, but I could care less about them.  Just happy to add them to the collection.

I think the art on this one is a bit out there, but another nice add.

This one came in with a little bit more damage, but I did not want to complain about it.

This one was a bit cool to get, not going to lie.  It is a nice to have this in the collection.

I dont care what anyone else says, I love this card.  I have an Unlimited playset, and I just love them.  I used to play a Red / Blue vintage deck, and this card was just great.  I know the prices have come down a lot since there are so many other direct damage cards out there now, but back in the day, this was a big deal.  Serra Angel in one shot!

These are the posts that annoy me the most.  I just hate putting up pictures of cards that come in, as it makes me feel like I am just bragging but who could really brag about these cards.

Bonus Money!

Total Trade Count: 207,765
Total Foil Count: 3,766

So this always happens.  I say I am done and I don't want to write anything, and then something happens where I want to write about it.

Around this time of the year I get my bonus from work, and since I do work an ass ton my wife expects me to spend a little extra when that bonus comes in for all the hard work I do put in to provide for my family.  This year it is a lot less than other years, just because we have a baby and I need to put money away for him, but I did end up getting some stuff.

In the last blog I wrote about trying to pick up an Urza's Destiny box from Wizard's Cupboard, but since they wanted a cashiers check and would not take my credit card, they cancelled the purchase.  This was pretty upsetting because I cashed out my CardSphere balance to pay for the purchase, and I had already paid the withdraw fee before Wizard Cupboard told me the sale was cancelled.

What that means, I took out $3300 from my CardSphere balance and had to pay a 10% withdraw fee for their service.  That service, that I am glad to pay for, is a website that you can see what MTG cards other members are looking for, and if you have them the site will match you up so that you can get paid for those cards they are looking for.  Peer to Peer trading is what I think they call it.  So when you send cards you get a cash balance of what those cards are worth, and you can build that balance up to $10k.

You can withdraw that balance anytime you wish by paying 10% of anything you are taking out of your balance.  So what I do is send out all the cards that I do not need for my collection, build up my balance, and get the cards and sealed product I am looking for.

My plan was to keep building that balance up until I got to $10k, but seeing that this website had a box I needed for sale, I thought it would be a great time to pick up the higher priced boxes I was looking for.  Enter Wizard Cupboard and what they cancelled...

So yeah I was a little upset, and what do I do when I am upset?  That's right!  I buy stuff anyway!

Card Kingdom had these boxes up for sale, and they were around $250 each so I figured why the fuck not.  I was already sad, so at least these will make be feel a little better.  Now I am done with the really really old boxes, and the Champions of Kamigawa block.  I still have the really expensive boxes like The Dark and such, but those are bucket list type items that I do not think I will ever buy.

And then I was like, fuck it more!  Let's go see what is at the LGS, I have money in my pocket that is burning a hole.  What did I find, that's right... promo cards that I do not even collect.  Ok, but come on, Teferi's Protection and Noble Hierarch?  I am a WUG player, so they just fit perfectly.

Box Toppers!  I still need 20 more, but I am halfway done!  I also like to buy these at the FLGS Lodestone because it helps support them, and keep them open, so I will always accept paying a higher price there.

And these...  SO....  I did not know how many I actually had in my collection, and I just love this card for EDH, so I just grabbed all of them.  But when I came back home I saw that I already had 9 of them, and I still have 3 sealed sets of the Commander decks, so I really don't need anymore of them.  But now I have all that I might need and more.

And these.  These are the Battlebond cards I need for my complete playset of first print cards.  I still need 3 more cards, but this gets me really close to being done.  Funny thing is, right after I picked these up I have been reading a lot of stuff on Reddit that the price of Battlebond is going up.  Score 1 for me!

And while I was at Lodestone, the greatest FLGS in the world, I saw they had the guild kit decks, but they were missing WG and BU.  I was looking to get a complete set for the collection, but I did not want a partial set, so I went home to see if I could pick up Selesnya and Dimir before I grabbed the rest at my FLGS.  eBay had some crazy prices for those two decks, and it looks like Selesnya had some really good reprints, so the price was pretty inflated.  Amazon on the other hand had complete sealed sets of guild kits under $100, so I just snagged one of each and called it a day!

But as I was up at my FLGS we were talking about why I even wanted them since it was all reprints, and that reminded me that all I really wanted were the lands!  But with the sealed sets, I did not want to crack them just for the lands, so I went onto CardSphere and added 5 of each, from each deck to my Want list.  Hopefully those will be coming soon in the mail.

While I was there, I thought I would just go for it and add all the Player Promo cards I wanted.  These are promo cards I wanted, because I like the full art.  I should be posting more of these that come in.  I already have a bunch on the receiving list, waiting to open.

And through all that, I finally bought something on Facebook.  I have been a member of some of the Magic the Gathering groups on Facebook, but just been silently watching to action from the back.  I saw one seller post this box for $1750 and figured, "Why the hell not?!"

I really hate buying things for the first time on any site, and I was pretty sheepish about spending so much money on Facebook.  Luckily this was a seasoned seller, and actually had a website he sold from.  He was posting on Facebook for a lower price than what he had on his website, so I can only think he was just trying to move the box.

The payment went through PayPal and he sent me all the pictures I was asking for.  A week later, it showed up in my PO Box, and I am very close to getting all the sealed booster boxes I am looking for!  So yeah, I am now thinking I will not need to sell my Revised Booster boxes, and I can just pick up everything I need on Facebook.  I hate Facebook, but if I can get what I am looking for, then let's go!

So I hope to have some updates, and I will keep sending out more trades.  I am just not sure how much I will be posting here, but I will try and keep up with what is going on.

Booster Boxes needed:
7th Edition
Fifth Dawn
Mercadian Masques
Nemesis
Prophecy
Coldsnap
Urza's Destiny

Bucket List
The Dark
Portal
Starter 1999

Highly doubt:
Unlimited
Arabian Nights
Antiquities
Legends

How is it going?

Total Trade Count: 207,944
Total Foil Count: 3,773

It has been over a month since my last post, and I am hitting another 2015 where I just don't care to do anything dealing with MTG again.  I keep sending out trades on CardSphere, but I really just don't care.  Ok that is not totally true, I did cash out most of my balance on CS in order to purchase an Urza's Destiny booster box from the Wizards Cupboard site.  Unfortunately that fell through because they required a cashiers check and would not accept my credit card.

So that put me is an off mood.

Not just cause I did not get the box, but I cashed out my balance before I maxed out the CS total.  I really wanted to break that and get an e-mail from Ted saying I needed to pull money out and I was freaking them out.

So instead I went to Card Kingdom, switched my support from MTA Cast to Command Zone because of reasons, and picked up a Homelands and a Saviors of Kamigawa booster box.  I figured I would get some type of satisfaction for pulling that money out.  I know, it is not even close to the amount needed for an Urza's box, but that is all I could find.  Don't worry, I went out and refreshed my stamp supply for more trades.

At some point I am going to have to put an order with BCW for top loaders too, but let's wait a bit for that.

But yeah, just bored.  WoTC has been changing things up so much, that I am just put off.  They are putting out expensive products now, and keeping up with them is just becoming tiresome.  Also, I am on my new budget where I am trying to not add to my bulk so that puts me in a position where I need to wait for rotation to pick anything up, so I am really just sitting around waiting for the new releases to pick up the sealed product I need.

Having to wait the two years before I pick up any singles is killing me.  I mean I do need to head up to the FLGS and see if they can fill out my Battlebond and UMA needs, but that is not the same.  I do miss cracking packs, and the excitement that comes with that event, but I like seeing that total trade count go down more and more.

Also, with the new MTG budget, I am finding a lot of new things to spend my money on.  If you can't tell, I am a huge budget guy.  I have spreadsheets galore.  My main budget plans out my financial life all the way to 2036 when I retire.  I have been doing a lot of research on tax planing for retirement, and trying to figure out what my retirement number is going to be.

Since I am not buying booster boxes, I have been picking up more dividend paying stocks and planning my attack on the bond market.

So yeah, I have even been thinking about just calling it and then focusing on the stuff I still need and be done with it.  Just stop picking up new product after War of the Spark and call it good.  Finish out the Booster box and Fat pack needs and wait to see if my son even likes Magic the Gathering.

But yeah, I broke 208,000 cards and just wanted to send an update.  The blog might slow to a crawl for a while as I just try and figure out what I want to do.

Ravnica Allegiance Update

Total Trade Count: 208,503
Total Foil Count: 3,792

Total Cards Needed Count: 917

It has been a while since I have updated the blog, and it is getting harder and harder to keep writing the blog.  The simple updates just seem tedious and I am trying to find some more meat for the blogs.  I guess I just don't want to put out content that says, "Look at me, I shipped out 100 more cards..."

As I think of what else to share on here, I thought I would post what I got with the new set that was released.

So, Ravnica Allegiance just came out, and I am starting my new budget rules.  This means I am only picking up 2 Booster Boxes, 2 Bundles, and the Planeswalker decks.  I am only going to be opening up the Bundle because I like the boxes they come in.  I can also get a spin down life counter, and that basic land pack.

It is pretty amazing that they are switching it up a bit.  They are not putting any basic lands in the packs, and WoTC has replaced them with Gates.  So I was only able to get the basic lands from that land pack.  In that land pack, they also added a single foil of each land, so that was pretty cool.  They have also just release a single art for each land, which is really odd and makes me worry a bit.  I just like to see all the different art for the basic lands, but it also makes me wonder if we will see a spike in basic land if they are making it even more difficult to get.

When the set got released, I ran up to my LGS and picked up my pre-order, and then only opened the Bundle.  I am keeping the other Bundle for the collection, one Booster Box will go into the collection, and the other Booster Box goes into the "Trade Later" pile.  I was really hoping to hear something about the Mythic Edition boxes, and I did not want to open a Booster Boxes up if they were going to release another round of the Mythic Edition ones.

Remember, I am trying to get rid of all my extra cards, and I want to avoid adding more cards that I no longer need to my inventory.  My thought was to pick up the Booster Boxes at the LGS for the collection, and then get the Mythic Edition box to open because of those special foiled out cards that I would be cracking packs for anyway.  Lucky for me, they did another release of this product!

There are a ton of Vlogs on YouTube about what happened the first time Hasbro tried to sell their product on their online toy store, and you can also find a bunch of videos on what happened when they moved it off to the Hasbro eBay store, so you can go out and see all that info for yourself.  I am just happy I could get this product, and was able to get them at MSRP.  There is some signs that the value of this set will be less than that, but we have never really cared about that with the entire collection in mind.

And so for the content of this Blog, I opened 1 Bundle and 1 Mythic Edition Booster Box for my set.  That is a total of 34 packs.  10 from the Bundle, and 24 from the ME box.  All in all it is going to be an add of 624 cards total.

360 cards for the ME Box
150 cards for the Bundle packs
80 cards for the land pack
34 cards for the tokens from all the packs.

I ended up getting 581 cards for the collection, 10 foil cards, and 19 cards in the bulk pile.  There were also 14 cards that were put into the Mythic Edition set with 8 Foil Planeswalker cards and 6 tokens.

The important part in all this is that we only got 10 cards that we did not need with opening those 34 packs.

Now, for the interesting part, I am going to need to get 586 cards to finish out my playset, and that adds up to needing $989.23.

Mythic: $512.45
Rare: $403.72
Uncommon: $55.16
Common: $13.53

The pricing is all being taken on Feb 4th, 2019, and as we all know that after rotation the prices drop.  What we are trying to prove out here is that in buying the sealed product we need, and only opening the products we are looking for things we need out of those specific products, we will be able to save close to $500 each release.

Booster Boxes: $240.00 for 2 boxes
Bundles: $77.40 for 2 Bundles
Planeswalker Decks: $32.24 for one of each
ME Booster Boxes: $537.60 for 2 boxes

Thus far we have spent $887.23 on sealed product and have only cracked $307.50 worth of product in order to get our sets that has netted us $583.15 worth of cards we do not have to worry about.  Remember that we only cracked the ME Box for the special Planeswalker cards and that set alone is around $376.56 at this point in time.

So that means, right now we are in the green when it comes to costs.  The sealed product will be kept that way, so in the long run it will only increase in value.  I do understand that my cost basis for the sealed product is not very low at all, but being able to buy them at my LGS keeps that place in business, and I can continue to have a place I trust to play and buy things from.  And in the long game, that $30.00 I could have saved per box from an online retailer is just not worth it to me right now.  I do know that if I were to still buy in bulk, and try and pick up more sealed boxes, my LGS would cut me a better deal.  But now, I am only picking up 2 sealed Booster Boxes, and they need to make their margins.

I know, you are all saying if I just bought a Booster Box from an online retailer and cracked all those packs, I would be sitting pretty close to where I am at right now with the RNA set, and it would have only cost me $90.  But that is where you are wrong.  I would not have a complete set of the Mythic Edition card and tokens, and I would be looking to have to spend over $300 to acquire all those cards.  That would have put me closer to $400 for the same amount of product for the sets.  This way, I am sitting where I am at now, and I have sealed product left over for the collection.

If you look at the fact that I used to spend close to $1040 for 10 Booster Boxes, and 4 Bundles, and after cracking all the packs I would still need close to $400 worth of rares to finish the set.  I would also be left with close to 2500 cards I would need to get rid of.  It was a never ending cycle of buying new product, increasing cards to my bulk inventory, and still needing to spend more money for more cards to get to where I needed to be.

This way, I am only picking up sealed product that I need for the collection, and then having to go out and pick up the cards I need rather than being left with a bunch of stuff I don't need.  I have found the chase to find the cards is worth more than just buying an ass ton of crap and still having to chase after cards I need.  And hopefully I get to save some money.

So right now, as it sits I need $989.23 worth of cards in order to finish out my playset.  That is 586 more cards.  Let's just wait to see what that dollar amount is in 2 years, and in the meantime I will be saving up that amount so that I can just send my LGS a list of cards I am looking for so they can fill it out with as much as they have.

Also, with CardSphere I plan to pick up a bunch of stuff with the trading balance that I keep building up to with getting rid of that bulk stuff that I have sitting around.

The best number out of it all is that we only added 19 cards into the bulk pile.