Has the Economy Crisis hit you yet?? If so, how hard??

I am just an average guy. I owe Bills... Bills... Bills... the things that most people pay for. House payment, Property taxes, insurance for everything including health, lights, water, gas, food, repairs, loans, etc. I was just told that my job is giving me a pay cut of $2.00 on the hour for the weekly paid employees on the floor. This will for sure cut down on my hobby of cars and trucks. I want to say that I am very glad and grateful to still have a job and bring home a paycheck even though it is $80.00 a week shorter than I had planned on bringing home. I guess I am saying that at my age which is very very close to 52 years old, I always imagined me being a little further along in life than just staying the same or falling behind in my lifestyle. We do not do anything as far as enterainment like going to movies or eating out unless we have coupons and it is cheap. I guess now we will cut that out too with my shorter check. Is anyone else out there feeling my pain? I thought about doing Comedy **** for extra money but I am really just too tired to try. It seems that the CEO's are getting everything nowadays even if the businesses they run all fail and go under. Thanks for reading this as I am just venting a little before I lose my interenet service. Good Luck to You All!!!

 

I am seeing the effect on the hobby, I've have a 32 sedan for sale for almost 2 months , I'm not giving it away, but a year ago it would have been gone in a week.

 

You are going to see much more bartering on cars and parts. Lots more.

 

I agree with Rudy......it is a REAL good time to buy old cars/parts. I have been trying to sell some stuff also, and it looks like my stuff is going back in the barn for a couple of years.

Chris Nelson
Kansas

 

I tried to sell 348 W Motor Parts - had to break even to get floor space in the G-rage. One note is that you do not see people carrying parts at the car shows, no new parts no swap meet parts. I saw Swap Meet guys trading and so forth, but few customers. ..............I guess break even is pretty good today.

Many prices are soft,EBAY, stuff is not selling to good, you see items being re-listed, so the seller played everyone by re-bidding with a buddy it to save giving it away.

 

More folks than not are screwed. I'm one of them.

 

I thought we were doing tech week?

 

i cant sell my hot rod... havent tried, but i know i wouldnt get what i need or want for it.. its a ****ty time to make deals, GREAT to buy though!

 

I'm in oil and gas, doing better than ever.

 

As much as I like the cars from the depression era, I never thought I'd actually experience for myself.

 

The price of gas affects me a lot more than what's happening on Wall Street. I can get money if I need it and my credit union is in great shape because they never got involved in subprime loans. In Washington they are a bunch of crooks but I'll ***ure you the cons***uents won't vote them out. Nancy Polosi and most of the California crowd. Harry Reid, Chuck Shumer, Barney Frank & Chris Dodd will be in power forever and they should be in jail!

 

Well I see it didn't take long for a genius to ruin this thread

 

What he said.

 

i fear i'm about to feel the pinch, as it were, i hope not, but if work doesn't pick up soon, times are gonna be tight [although, we are busier than most in the area- car dealership]

 

I'm in the fortunate crowd that still has a job. I actually started picking up more sandblasting gigs recently to put in my "just in case" account...

In way of hot rodding... what hot rodding??? LOL... I just don't want to spend all my money on hot rodding then lose my job and have to sht can everything for nothing to hold me over.... i'm just ordering tiny little trinkets and parts for my junk to help keep my sanity. I'm forcing myself to learn new skills too... instead of paying someone else to do it for me (which was always pretty rare). My projects definately get more foresight than they used to. I'm also doing more of the monotonous manual labor stuff to them, instead of buying shiny things and bolting on fun stuff.

 

Yup.
If the real estate market were still good, I'd be living in Maryville, TN.

Jay

 

It's hit me real hard. I thought I did everything right. When I turned 65 a little over a year ago, I converted all of my retirement ***ets from Stocks to Bonds. Wrongo; the bonds are going into the toilet too, since the prices they bring are now based on their market value (which is depressed because the ins***utions holding them have to sell them at what is now market price, which is far lower than what they are really worth). The real estate I hold for investment purposes (all purchased before 2002 and all waterfront) has gone into the toilet because of real do***ented fraud on the part of Real Estate Development firms (in concert with phoney appraisers and loan officers). I blame the current administartion and the Gingrich neo-cons who controlled congress from 1994 through 2006 for this disaster because of their amazing penchant for de-regulation.

Also, all of the stuff I squirelled away as insurance (comlete running flatheads, Rocket Oldsmobiles, early Chrysler hemis) are now worth little. (I bought them because I love them, and I thought that in the right amout of time, everyone else would realize what they were worth.)

Bail-out? I've got a better idea; have the government send me 50% of my mortgage payment every month, and I will make the complete payment to the mortgage company. That way, I will benefit and so will they, because they will not have to foreclose on me and they'll get their entire monthly payment. I'm not kidding, I have a prime mortgage (seasoned 6 years) ready to default because I lost my job. Now it's just the sub-prime; wait until the prime mortgages start to default. Are we having fun yet?

You can delete this entry, since I am done ranting now and feel a lot better. Whew.

 

Up until last week things were very busy here. Then the phone stopped ringing. We have work to hold us over for a few months a few big builds but it isn't like it was last year.
Josh

 

I sold houses until last month when not only did sales go completely to ****,the company with our lease doubled the cost so we had to shut down......so the Pie Wagon is going a little slower,face it housing has ****ed for 9 months......now trying to find a gig that pays worth a ****!

 

Tubman,

I hope things improve for you brother. Stories like yours make me really thankful for the little bit that I have. Best of luck to you and I hope you're able to make something work for you and your family.

 

My pay went up 5 bucks an hour last year and I'm am not paying down any debt faster. Been spending less money but basics like food and gas have gobbled up any increase I got. I didn't think it was legal for an employer to just reduce your payscale?

 

Yup !!! Hit hard !!! but still lookin' for a recently stalled "Shadow Rod" or 33/34 Chevy inliner project.....Heck, while I'm still dreamin' make it a near done car....Somebody said "bartering"....Gee, I remember that being a lot of fun....Lotta good fellership 'n all....I'm really concerned that this Economic thing isn't going to stop this time....

 

Yeah, i work at Carmax and they just laid off 600 people today company wide. 13 at my store alone.

 

I guess we all are going to start feeling it.I have a roof over my head and the family is fed,and I still have my garage.But I'm feeling it too.

 

ok, to the guy above... the math is wrong, TOTALLY wrong... it would be $425 a person in total if you do math the right way

ps - if you think we dont need the 700billion plan, watch and pay more attention tot he market, this is not a simple market correction issue... im in the business, i can tell ya.. this effects you a LOT more than if we divided the money out.. the same people taht complain now would be crying 6 months from now when they lose their job, or cant get creidt for a new car, etc... people just dont learn enough, they judge too fast..

 

check the math on your email forwards before posting them.

85 billion divided by 200 million is $425---------not $425,000

 

Times are bad thats for sure. Guys that I know that buy and sell street rods are sitting on a lot of inventory. In the past year I've had four cars for sale. I sold two but ended up tradeing for the other two. When cash is tight guys will trade stuff they have for stuff they want. Guys selling new parts and new finished cars are goona be hurting for a long time. Too bad.

 

well where to start...my dad and myself run a auto repair shop here on the florida west coast,we own the building and 1 acre of property and have been in this location for 19+ years..my pop started the business in 1970 and he just can't put down his wrenches..it's been the worst year yet,some days we just sit and wait for the phone to ring..nobody here in fl has any money to spend on there cars,fuel prices,taxes,insurance,home bills..hell even food has gone through the roof!!! when is it going to stop??
as for the shop we will survive..i hope.... the snow birds will be back soon and i hope they have $ to spend,there are shops closing all over the state and new car dealers closing too
i hope this great country of ours pulls through these hard times...rooster

 

Funny this popped up today!

I work for my father's auto repair shop. We've gone from bringing in 16-20 cars a day to about 3. For the sake of helping pop's make payroll and me be able to retain a job I took a $4/hr cut. He can't lose the employees and knows I'll stick around for the most part to help with the business.

Having to consider either a second job, or jump ship to keep a roof over my families heads, or **** it up, tighten the belt to the last notch, and hope for the best and the business takes a turn for the better, reaping the rewards later, for toughing it out.

 

last year i sold 297 cars,i have not sold one since january.glad i have a second job.