Saturday, October 23, 2010
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Stayin' Alive
Soon, very soon, we'll have a roof over our heads, but we've still got to overcome obstacles. We may be in a town without a shelter or mission, there may be no room at the inn (especially in the winter) or we may need an ID and/or a negative TB test card to get into a homeless shelter..
So at this point we're still camping out. There are still assets we can add to our Homeless Portfolios that can enhance our quality of life. Lets take them in order.
We're never going to get anywhere if we can't bathe. It's going to hurt our health, offend others and make the diligent homeless look (and smell) bad. Fortunately, a large (but not too large) city offers us lots of options.
Salvation Army posts may offer even non-residents a quick shower. So might homeless services offices or St. Vincent De Paul centers.
If we can scrape together a couple of bucks, our local YMCA is a good place to look for showers. If we are veterans, we may be able to take a shower at a drop-in facility near us.
Several of the agencies listed above, as well as many churches, have clothing closets where the homeless can get fresh, clean clothes, and several of these centers offer free laundry facilities. If we can't find free washers and dryers, we're going to have to save up enough to wash our clothing at a laundromat.
And taking care of our teeth is vital to our overall health. Any homeless support and assistance center will have toothbrushes and other toiletries. Cleanliness is a vital creed as we accumulate these quality of life assets,
By now we are really sick of being homeless. There's little light at the end of our tunnels. If we stick to the principles of our Homeless Portfolios, we will return to self-support more safely and quickly.
Don't lose hope!
So at this point we're still camping out. There are still assets we can add to our Homeless Portfolios that can enhance our quality of life. Lets take them in order.
We're never going to get anywhere if we can't bathe. It's going to hurt our health, offend others and make the diligent homeless look (and smell) bad. Fortunately, a large (but not too large) city offers us lots of options.
Salvation Army posts may offer even non-residents a quick shower. So might homeless services offices or St. Vincent De Paul centers.
If we can scrape together a couple of bucks, our local YMCA is a good place to look for showers. If we are veterans, we may be able to take a shower at a drop-in facility near us.
Several of the agencies listed above, as well as many churches, have clothing closets where the homeless can get fresh, clean clothes, and several of these centers offer free laundry facilities. If we can't find free washers and dryers, we're going to have to save up enough to wash our clothing at a laundromat.
And taking care of our teeth is vital to our overall health. Any homeless support and assistance center will have toothbrushes and other toiletries. Cleanliness is a vital creed as we accumulate these quality of life assets,
By now we are really sick of being homeless. There's little light at the end of our tunnels. If we stick to the principles of our Homeless Portfolios, we will return to self-support more safely and quickly.
Don't lose hope!
Saturday, October 9, 2010
It's our special birthday week!
So we're taking the day off.
This afternoon the University of Arizona Wildcats host the Oregon State Beavers in a big Pac-10 football matchup. The Cats are ranked 9th in the nation, their first time cracking the top ten in 12 years. Your friends here at The Homeless Portfolio are fortunate enough to have scored tickets to the game. Who'd have thought that even remotely possible during our years of homelessness ? God we love Pac-10 football...
Enjoy your weekend...
This afternoon the University of Arizona Wildcats host the Oregon State Beavers in a big Pac-10 football matchup. The Cats are ranked 9th in the nation, their first time cracking the top ten in 12 years. Your friends here at The Homeless Portfolio are fortunate enough to have scored tickets to the game. Who'd have thought that even remotely possible during our years of homelessness ? God we love Pac-10 football...
Enjoy your weekend...
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Coming up this weekend!
We'll steer back toward expanding our money smarts by applying some basic investment terms to our real-world Homeless Portfolios. Now that we've got a few bucks, how do we spend them? Some answers this weekend...
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Canning
"Canning" is a street term for collecting aluminum cans and turning them in for cash. The problem is that, in most states, we get very little reward for our hard, smelly work.
The first thing we need is a plastic garbage bag. If we have a buck we can get them at any dollar store.
Now we need a plan. First, we'll start our regular canning by five in the morning. Last night's empty cans and bottles may already be sitting on the curb.. Grab 'em...but be careful to never trespass on private property. We're going to have to look in and dig into trash cans to reap our reward. Next we'll hit the "collegetown" area. Remember, college towns are the best when it comes to providing services to the homeless. Fraternity houses are manna from heaven. Talk to the guys who live there...they may well save up their cans and bottles for you. In 4-5 hours we should be able to collect 100 cans, and use the proceeds to add important assets to our Homeless Portfolios.
Now we need to take our goodies to an aluminum recycling facility. In states without bottle and can deposits we're only going to make about 60 cents per pound, meaning our 100 cans (33 cans/pound) will earn us $1.80.
Contrast that with states which pay us five cents per can. That money comes from a deposit already paid by the purchaser. In Oregon, for example, those 100 cans will net us $4.80, a 266% better return than in by-the-pound states. "Return" simply means profit, or the amount of money we make. Look at any aluminum can and it will tell you whether there is a deposit law in your state.
So now we need to use this new asset, money, to enhance our Homeless Portfolios. Canning is not a positive long-term effort, but it can fill the gaps. Next week we'll talk about how we should spend our money to improve our lives.
The first thing we need is a plastic garbage bag. If we have a buck we can get them at any dollar store.
Now we need a plan. First, we'll start our regular canning by five in the morning. Last night's empty cans and bottles may already be sitting on the curb.. Grab 'em...but be careful to never trespass on private property. We're going to have to look in and dig into trash cans to reap our reward. Next we'll hit the "collegetown" area. Remember, college towns are the best when it comes to providing services to the homeless. Fraternity houses are manna from heaven. Talk to the guys who live there...they may well save up their cans and bottles for you. In 4-5 hours we should be able to collect 100 cans, and use the proceeds to add important assets to our Homeless Portfolios.
Now we need to take our goodies to an aluminum recycling facility. In states without bottle and can deposits we're only going to make about 60 cents per pound, meaning our 100 cans (33 cans/pound) will earn us $1.80.
Contrast that with states which pay us five cents per can. That money comes from a deposit already paid by the purchaser. In Oregon, for example, those 100 cans will net us $4.80, a 266% better return than in by-the-pound states. "Return" simply means profit, or the amount of money we make. Look at any aluminum can and it will tell you whether there is a deposit law in your state.
So now we need to use this new asset, money, to enhance our Homeless Portfolios. Canning is not a positive long-term effort, but it can fill the gaps. Next week we'll talk about how we should spend our money to improve our lives.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Coming up this weekend!
We'll lighten things up this weekend. We've added our basic means of survival to our Homeless Portfolios. Now let's use this transition period to add money, a key asset, to our Portfolios. It's called "canning;" collecting aluminum cans and cashing them out at recycling stations. Some states will pay us five cents per can, meaning a few hours of canning can earn us 10 bucks or more. All you need to know about "canning," coming up in this weekend's edition of The Homeless Portfolio.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Hangin' Out
Hopefully we've gotten a full night's sleep, because we'll be on the move all day.
A list of things to do during the day is, in essence, an asset for our Homeless Portfolios. Planning is a key to progress. It's more complicated than you might think.
Challenge 1: We're going to have to carry all of our physical assets with us all day. Leaving our blankets, sleeping bags or coats at our sleeping site pretty much guarantees our assets will be stolen. We'll talk about scoring a backpack or piece of luggage in just a bit.
Challenge 2: Loitering is a crime. Unless we're in a public space we can be ticketed, which is a big setback for our Homeless Portfolios.
This is why we want to live in a farily big city, with a population of at least 250,000 residents. We'll stick out like a sore thumb in a small town, and there will be fewer services for us.
So where do we go during the daytime?
Well, parks are attractive because they are public spaces. Everyone is welcome. Don't forget that we'll need to adhere to the park's curfew. But how does hanging out in a park advance our Homeless Portfolios? It doesn't, of course. We will stay on track, which means we'll be active during the day.
We can loiter at a bus bench, but that is equally counter-productive.
If we can hustle up enough money for a day pass on the local bus service, we've got a place to go in extreme weather.
Good-sized cities will have drop-in availability at non-profit agencies. The Salvation Army and the St. Vincent DePaul Society often offer meals, and they frequently have clothing, cold weather supplies and toiletries. Backpacks and small luggage too. Many thrift stores are operated for and by charities. Most will do what they can to help us.
Other non-profits in large cities may well offer these things too, as well as shelter from the elements. To find these agencies we'll either talk to some of the fellow local homeless, check a phone book or go online.
How on earth can we, the destitute, go online? The key is the best possible place we can spend our daytime hours: public libraries. This subject is so important...the best possible asset for our Homeless Portfolios at this juncture is online time. This is so crucial we'll spend an entire chapter talking about libraries and the Internet.
Wandering around can be productive in small, unpredictable ways. If we look, we'll find change on the ground everywhere. Be patient. We can find other assets as well.
But ongoing income is our goal. One-time money won't get us off the streets for good. If we blow the money on a motel room, drugs or alcohol then we're not ready to develop our Homeless Portfolios. See you when you bottom out again.
Let's say we find someone's purse or wallet in a public space. What do we do?
We never, ever, ever take someone's personal effects. ID's, credit cards or pictures of their kids. We're going to turn in the wallet or purse to the closest business, and tell them where we found the item. We're doing a fine thing for that wallet's or purse's owner. Doing good deeds is essential as we fill our Homeless Portfolios. It speeds up the process.
But what if we find money inside? What do we do?
The Home Portfolio NEVER encourages illegal acts of any kind.
But, hell, at this point we're homeless, probably hungry and still sleeping outside! Who could blame us for keepng the money? As mentioned earlier, we've done this person a great service by returning their personal effects. Those things are more important than money for most people. Secondly, people stupid enough to lose their wallets and purses deserve to be punished for their stupidity, in the opinion of your friends here at The Homeless Portfolio.
So we won't go any further than this: Who could really blame a homeless person for keeping the cash? Not us.
Don't forget that we need to remain physically close to the nearest sources of food, water and a bathroom.
Libraries and social service agencies are the superior places to "hang out" in the daytime. We'll tell you everything you need to know about using the resources at your nearest public library to generate the most important asset we can accumulate at this point...
Internet access
A list of things to do during the day is, in essence, an asset for our Homeless Portfolios. Planning is a key to progress. It's more complicated than you might think.
Challenge 1: We're going to have to carry all of our physical assets with us all day. Leaving our blankets, sleeping bags or coats at our sleeping site pretty much guarantees our assets will be stolen. We'll talk about scoring a backpack or piece of luggage in just a bit.
Challenge 2: Loitering is a crime. Unless we're in a public space we can be ticketed, which is a big setback for our Homeless Portfolios.
This is why we want to live in a farily big city, with a population of at least 250,000 residents. We'll stick out like a sore thumb in a small town, and there will be fewer services for us.
So where do we go during the daytime?
Well, parks are attractive because they are public spaces. Everyone is welcome. Don't forget that we'll need to adhere to the park's curfew. But how does hanging out in a park advance our Homeless Portfolios? It doesn't, of course. We will stay on track, which means we'll be active during the day.
We can loiter at a bus bench, but that is equally counter-productive.
If we can hustle up enough money for a day pass on the local bus service, we've got a place to go in extreme weather.
Good-sized cities will have drop-in availability at non-profit agencies. The Salvation Army and the St. Vincent DePaul Society often offer meals, and they frequently have clothing, cold weather supplies and toiletries. Backpacks and small luggage too. Many thrift stores are operated for and by charities. Most will do what they can to help us.
Other non-profits in large cities may well offer these things too, as well as shelter from the elements. To find these agencies we'll either talk to some of the fellow local homeless, check a phone book or go online.
How on earth can we, the destitute, go online? The key is the best possible place we can spend our daytime hours: public libraries. This subject is so important...the best possible asset for our Homeless Portfolios at this juncture is online time. This is so crucial we'll spend an entire chapter talking about libraries and the Internet.
Wandering around can be productive in small, unpredictable ways. If we look, we'll find change on the ground everywhere. Be patient. We can find other assets as well.
But ongoing income is our goal. One-time money won't get us off the streets for good. If we blow the money on a motel room, drugs or alcohol then we're not ready to develop our Homeless Portfolios. See you when you bottom out again.
Let's say we find someone's purse or wallet in a public space. What do we do?
We never, ever, ever take someone's personal effects. ID's, credit cards or pictures of their kids. We're going to turn in the wallet or purse to the closest business, and tell them where we found the item. We're doing a fine thing for that wallet's or purse's owner. Doing good deeds is essential as we fill our Homeless Portfolios. It speeds up the process.
But what if we find money inside? What do we do?
The Home Portfolio NEVER encourages illegal acts of any kind.
But, hell, at this point we're homeless, probably hungry and still sleeping outside! Who could blame us for keepng the money? As mentioned earlier, we've done this person a great service by returning their personal effects. Those things are more important than money for most people. Secondly, people stupid enough to lose their wallets and purses deserve to be punished for their stupidity, in the opinion of your friends here at The Homeless Portfolio.
So we won't go any further than this: Who could really blame a homeless person for keeping the cash? Not us.
Don't forget that we need to remain physically close to the nearest sources of food, water and a bathroom.
Libraries and social service agencies are the superior places to "hang out" in the daytime. We'll tell you everything you need to know about using the resources at your nearest public library to generate the most important asset we can accumulate at this point...
Internet access
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