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We're spending it foolishly on rent, other bills

Many are using their stimulus checks to pay bills

Date published: 6/12/2008

BY CATHY JETT

Dennis Silver envisioned spending his stimulus check on a vacation in Florida.

Then reality set in for the Spotsylvania County tax preparer, who now has to pay about $70 to fill up his Toyota Avalon.

"I've got to spend that money wisely," said Silver, who has scratched his trip and plans to use the check to pay his rent. "I can't blow it."

Silver, who also inventories stock for area businesses in the off season, isn't alone. Of the 78 people who responded to an informal fredericks burg.com poll, 40 said they planned to use their stimulus checks to make mortgage payments, pay down credit card debt or cover other necessities, such as car insurance and rent.

Of the other respondents, 12 said they were socking the money away for future expenses such as a new roof, real estate taxes or retirement.

"I'm saving for a rainy day," wrote one, " and it looks like it's gonna pour."

Seven respondents said the money would go toward necessities such as outfitting their children for high school or vaccinating their pets, six said they'd splurge on such things as a laptop or HDTV, and five said they were using it to take a vacation.

"We're taking a trip to the beach to escape, if only for a week, the stresses and realities of everyday life," one wrote anonymously.

The remaining nine checked "other," saying they were going to use the money to do everything from buying tickets to James Monroe High School's football games to helping to pay for a wedding to replacing their old, broken-down heater and air conditioner with a more efficient system than they'd planned to buy.

Those figures are in line with findings by The Associated Press, which asked a group of more than two dozen consumers from diverse walks of life to track their rebate spending. Participants said they didn't rush out on a shopping spree, even though the Bush Administration intends that money as a shot in the arm to an ailing economy.

Instead, they were more like David Hensley, a material manager at Masco Builder Cabinet Group in Culpeper, who told The Free Lance-Star that he and his wife are using their stimulus check to help pay medical bills.


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Date published: 6/12/2008


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Big Pay (posted by GoodgrlNow56 , June 12, 2008 7:27 am)   
For me this stimulus payment was almost like a regular refund from all the times I owed IRS. It came in handy! Bush gave us something going in, Bush is giving up something leaving out. Thanks but boy would I like to get an interest free loan from him!

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