I have been neither crafty nor cheap this week. In fact, the amount of pajamas I've been wearing probably isn't classy.
This weather has got me in a major funk. Yesterday was raining (for about the 100th day in a row, literally, it was 40 degrees) so Bear and I headed out to replace his cloth diapers. I ended up spending $111. Hubs was livid! He said I had just bought diapers and that this certainly wasn't cost effective anymore.
Then I told him that I sold the other diapers, and a few other things to cover the cost of the new diapers.
Then he was okay with it.
So maybe that was sort of frugal. Instead of just blowing money and saying "charge it" I actually took the time and made the money first. I am $15 short, however I have one more thing to sell, for $15.
Yesterday finally cleared up so I took up our new mower and got to work. The grass was about 8" tall and (probably to the joyful screams of our neighbor) I finally had a chance to mow. Unfortunately it looks terrible because the ground is so saturated that the mower left "ruts" in the lawn and I didn't finish it. I only had an hour and we have about 2.5 acres to mow. I did the side next to our neighbor who takes very good care of his lawn so it would look better.
Our ground is so wet here that when you step on the driveway (it's gravel) water oozes out. The ditches on either side of the road are almost full to the top and some roads are flooded over.
Thank the Lord with joyful praise that there isn't a cloud in the sky today. However, the next nice day we're supposed to have is next Sunday. Not this Sunday, May 8, NEXT Sunday.
It's got me in such a funk. It's such a pain to get out of the house, yet sitting in the house when it's dark and damp gets me depressed. I just want some sunshine and some warmth. Despite the cloudless sky, it's 40 degrees out, and we still have frost.
Where did spring go? Can someone please go find it and bring it back?!
Showing posts with label debt. Show all posts
Showing posts with label debt. Show all posts
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Friday, April 15, 2011
Friday Debt Beatdown #2
Mortgage Debt.
Ugh. I got a punch to the stomach today. I was delving through our credit report (which you should check at least once a year by the way, it's free at annualcreditreport.com) and saw that we owe 99% of our mortgage.
Meaning, we have 1% equity.
Blech. However our credit card debt is dwindling. I cannot wait to pay it off. CANNOT!!! I get all giddy inside thinking of no more credit card bills coming in, no more paying interest for using money we don't have.
We are still in Stage 1 of our Debt Beatdown. Getting rid of credit card bills. We have about $1000 left, the one credit card balance we had, hadn't cleared our propane bill and it was about $500 more than we anticipated. So we'll just keep knocking it down.
Do you have debt? If so, what is your debt beatdown plan? I'd love to hear how others are doing it!
Ugh. I got a punch to the stomach today. I was delving through our credit report (which you should check at least once a year by the way, it's free at annualcreditreport.com) and saw that we owe 99% of our mortgage.
Meaning, we have 1% equity.
Blech. However our credit card debt is dwindling. I cannot wait to pay it off. CANNOT!!! I get all giddy inside thinking of no more credit card bills coming in, no more paying interest for using money we don't have.
We are still in Stage 1 of our Debt Beatdown. Getting rid of credit card bills. We have about $1000 left, the one credit card balance we had, hadn't cleared our propane bill and it was about $500 more than we anticipated. So we'll just keep knocking it down.
Do you have debt? If so, what is your debt beatdown plan? I'd love to hear how others are doing it!
Friday, April 1, 2011
Friday Debt Beatdown
Debt is a very serious issue in America. And unfortunately Hubs and I contribute to it. We bought a house and a car well within our means. However our house needed quite a bit of fixing up and then we were pregnant and the baby needed a tub and a room to sleep in.
We have credit card debt. We have multiple credit cards with debt. We decided to throw things up a little and do our own debt beatdown.
1) Never use the grace period on a mortgage or car loan. Or you will be trying to make 2 payments in the same month.
2) Pay off the credit card with the highest APR and pay minimums on all others and the mortgage and car payment.
3) Balance transfer all other credit cards onto the one that now has a balance of $0. We did this because we had a 0% balance transfer for 12 months offer. After that it will be 25.99% but we're confident we can pay it off within a year. Our other credit cards have interest of 26.99% and 17.99%. The balance transfer had a fee of 3% so the fee was much less than paying interest for another year. We now have one credit card with a balance and 0% interest. Our tax return will pay this credit card off (this balance includes our last tank of propane because we didn't plan on winter lasting so long and needing another fill).
4) We have medical debt. Bear spent 9 days in the NICU, I had an epidural, Hubs and I had surgery in December, Bear has been to the ER 3 times this year. Also our insurance switched in January (we had hit our out of pocket max last year with the NICU stay) so we now have to pay all our copays and coinsurance again. Bear sees at minimum 3 specialists (3*35=$105) every 3 months. Add to that the plague and winter illnesses (our PCP has a $20 copay), and the ER copays (3*100=$300) and medical bills add up quickly. The good thing about medical bills is that they don't accrue interest, they're not on your credit, and,as long as you make an honest attempt to pay, they cannot send you to collections. However, it's still debt so that is our step after credit cards.
5) We have a car loan and a mortgage left. We owe more on our house than it is currently worth. Not much about $6000 but that it still the wrong way to have debt. Also, our car is not very new and since we still have a loan on it we have to keep a low deductible and extra insurance on it. It costs us more every month in insurance and we estimated that over the time of the loan this will be more than the vehicle is worth in the end. We also only have 1 months of expenses in savings.
a) contribute to our savings accounts to add an additional 5 months of expenses.
b) try to cut our food budget and send the increased savings to our car loan
c) after step a is complete send extra money to the car loan and put food savings towards mortgage.
d) once we have no loan we plan to send our extra money towards our mortgage and to put $100
a month in a rainy day fund. We want to take a family vacation.
Paying off debt takes a lot of effort and self control. We have been working on this for the past 3 years. We have payed off about $30000 worth of debt and I get so angry at ourselves for all the money we've wasted in interest, fees, time and effort.
Our goal is to be debt free and to own our house. Once our house is paid off we will work on college funds. With Bear being as "needy" as he is we have decided to put off making plans for expanding our family until he is 5. So we have 4 years to perfect our spending before we even discuss our next move.
Maybe now that it's April we'll finally have nice weather and I can do my favorite activity!!!
We have credit card debt. We have multiple credit cards with debt. We decided to throw things up a little and do our own debt beatdown.
1) Never use the grace period on a mortgage or car loan. Or you will be trying to make 2 payments in the same month.
2) Pay off the credit card with the highest APR and pay minimums on all others and the mortgage and car payment.
3) Balance transfer all other credit cards onto the one that now has a balance of $0. We did this because we had a 0% balance transfer for 12 months offer. After that it will be 25.99% but we're confident we can pay it off within a year. Our other credit cards have interest of 26.99% and 17.99%. The balance transfer had a fee of 3% so the fee was much less than paying interest for another year. We now have one credit card with a balance and 0% interest. Our tax return will pay this credit card off (this balance includes our last tank of propane because we didn't plan on winter lasting so long and needing another fill).
4) We have medical debt. Bear spent 9 days in the NICU, I had an epidural, Hubs and I had surgery in December, Bear has been to the ER 3 times this year. Also our insurance switched in January (we had hit our out of pocket max last year with the NICU stay) so we now have to pay all our copays and coinsurance again. Bear sees at minimum 3 specialists (3*35=$105) every 3 months. Add to that the plague and winter illnesses (our PCP has a $20 copay), and the ER copays (3*100=$300) and medical bills add up quickly. The good thing about medical bills is that they don't accrue interest, they're not on your credit, and,as long as you make an honest attempt to pay, they cannot send you to collections. However, it's still debt so that is our step after credit cards.
5) We have a car loan and a mortgage left. We owe more on our house than it is currently worth. Not much about $6000 but that it still the wrong way to have debt. Also, our car is not very new and since we still have a loan on it we have to keep a low deductible and extra insurance on it. It costs us more every month in insurance and we estimated that over the time of the loan this will be more than the vehicle is worth in the end. We also only have 1 months of expenses in savings.
a) contribute to our savings accounts to add an additional 5 months of expenses.
b) try to cut our food budget and send the increased savings to our car loan
c) after step a is complete send extra money to the car loan and put food savings towards mortgage.
d) once we have no loan we plan to send our extra money towards our mortgage and to put $100
a month in a rainy day fund. We want to take a family vacation.
Paying off debt takes a lot of effort and self control. We have been working on this for the past 3 years. We have payed off about $30000 worth of debt and I get so angry at ourselves for all the money we've wasted in interest, fees, time and effort.
Our goal is to be debt free and to own our house. Once our house is paid off we will work on college funds. With Bear being as "needy" as he is we have decided to put off making plans for expanding our family until he is 5. So we have 4 years to perfect our spending before we even discuss our next move.
Maybe now that it's April we'll finally have nice weather and I can do my favorite activity!!!
We have an electric dryer so having an outdoor clothesline is the easiest way to cut our budget. We see a savings of about $4-$8/month in our electric bill when we are able to hang the laundry outside. I do at least one load of laundry a day (Bear is a refluxer/spitter upper/vomiter and a drool bucket) and it really adds up quick!
Thursday, March 31, 2011
In like a Lion...
Whoever wrote that old saying of "March comes in like a Lion and goes out like a Lamb" really needs to get a new animal picture book.
March is going out like a Tyrannosaurus Rex. We got snow. The road and driveway were COVERED last night but I guess they plowed and salted. The lighting is horrible because it's that dreary and overcast outside. And yes, our garbage can is still there from yesterday.
Hubs, Bear, and I all got the Plague this past week. I'm still coughing (my chest feels like a baby rattle) but Hubs and Bear seem to be on the mend.
I'm still working on my knitting WIP. Slow and steady win the race. Right? Right?! Slow and steady. The tutorial has already bound off their 8" long washcloth and started a new one using the Purl stitch. Mine knit is about 3" long (and that's being generous). I just don't seem to have the rhythm down.
April is going to be a month of accountability. With the Plague there was lots of whining and moaning and "I'm too tired to cook" (with a huge draw on the oo of cook). There was lots of restaurant meals totally blowing our food budget. We even went out for pancakes. Seriously??!!! Pancakes cost like $1 to make for both of us and we blew about $11 going out to the local grocery store. Our one grocery store chain has restaurants in it. Sit down, full service restaurants. Does anyone else have these?
I'm still working on our "How our home runs" Binders. I managed to get the section pages started and a few labels put on. But the insides are mostly blank. Our bills have run amok for right the moment. We forgot about the electric bill. But thanks to some quick consigning of outgrown baby clothes and hand me down gear we didn't use, we paid it in plenty of time. Our taxes are complete and we're awaiting an ample tax refund to help us be credit card debt free. Slow and steady wins the race.
Hopefully a few more days and I'll finally be back to me.
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