Making Progress

We have made a lot of progress lately (especially since the last post in JANUARY!)

We've paid off a few more CC's, SOLD OUR CAR! Bought a paid-for minivan, and are on our way to becoming home owners.

DR says that you shouldn't buy a house until you have a FFEF, etc (I'll write out the list later), but we just feel like it's time. And thankfully, interest rates are low, we're going to be staying put for several years, and we qualify for a VA loan, so we don't need a down payment (I don't recommend going this route - but we really feel that it is the right time for us).

We're going to buy small - probably under $180k, and we will do a 15 year fixed, with a payment no greater than 25% of our take-home pay.

We can't wait! And debt freedom is just around the corner!!

Still on the Bandwagon… moving slowly

I am writing to let everyone know that we are still on the bandwagon. Things are going slowly right now (thanks to our Thanksgiving trip to UT – which we paid for with cash we had been saving up – and Christmas gifts, which were also paid for in cash!)

So, since we’ve been using up all our cash on the holidays, we haven’t had much to snowball. January is going to be somewhat lean as well as we catch up after the holidays (not that we are behind, but we did put some savings goals on hold – such as car tags, car service, etc to save more money for Christmas so we could make sure we paid cash!).

We’re still budgeting, still using cash only (we’re getting better and better at NOT using the debit card… for ANYTHING).

We’re still feeling great about our financial future!

Another One Bites the Dust

We have paid off Debt #2 and HALF of Debt #3 – this debt snowball thing is rolling faster than we thought it would! Well, we have been blessed with a few nice snowflakes recently, but getting out of debt is FUN!!!

We have finally paid of the medical bills that have been lurking around in the closet since DS2 was born!! Holy cow! And the bill was never that big, anyway – we just kept paying on it because $34 a month was easier than paying $1300 in one chunk… yeah. You don’t have to tell me that is stupid math. I know. I have a degree in math. I also have a degree in D.U.M.B. Geez.

Well, that’s one down, about 8 more to go!! 8-o Next on the list, American Excess – which has been brought down from about $725 to around $325. It should be gone in about three paychecks.

We’re getting out of debt, baby!!

Chase Bites the Dust!

We have officially paid off our first credit card! About $500 of stupid tax paid!

Let it Snow Let it Snow Let it Snow

Well, mine and DH's birthdays are coming up (DH's birthday is the day after mine) and we have budgeted $200 for our birthday. That will include gifts, going out (if we want to), etc. We also have finally bought a digital camera to replace the one I broke a few months ago. Even with birthday and the digital camera purchase, we still have $200 to throw at our smallest debt, which should keep us on track for our Oct 1 kill date for our smallest debt. I can't WAIT!

We have been really good at not spending on unnessesary things. We are managing our money and telling it where to go, so we always still have money at the end of the month.

Now I find myself wondering where all this money is coming from instead of wondering where all our money went!

The Dentist Still Takes Cash

I had my wisdom teeth surgery about two weeks ago and I paid cash. I mean cold hard cash. In 20s. I probably could have either paid with 50s or 100 dollar bills, but I just wanted to be dramatic. So there I sat, counting out 20s. The office lady asked if I had exact change. I almost did. My bill came to $488.30 and I had $490.30 So she had to go across the street to get change for my ten.

It was pretty fabulous. I wonder when the last time was they had someone pay in cold hard cash.

There's just something satisfying about laying out those bills - maybe it was mostly the fact that it was budgeted, and this wisdom teeth wasn't going to come back in a credit card bill at the end of the month, and I didn't have to "finance" with the dr's office.

The borrower is servent to the lender, and I am not going to enslave myself!

an update

Baby Step 2 is in full swing. Well, as full as we can get it. We're still in the process of funding my wisdom teeth surgery. That and I made a $56.50 mistake in my checkbook balancing. That wouldn't be a big deal, except that $100 is about all we can squeeze out of our budget after bills and only $50 a month in blow money. I keep reading about people who budget $100-$200 for blow money each month and I laugh to myself. We really are barely are making ends meet. But by golly those ends are meeting!

It's a great feeling to have a working budget and to be able to pay CASH for things like wisdom teeth surgery. And on top of that, we should be getting our dislocation allowance soon (that's another $2500). We're going to use part of it to put up a fence in the backyard so the Little Guy can run around semi-unsupervised in the backyard. The rest we'll throw into our debt snowball, we'll probably knock out one small debt, and then throw the rest on the motorcycle loan. That will free up another $65 a month for the snowball. Hooah!

Once car registration and wisdom teeth surgery are paid for next month, I'll update again with how our budget is doing... Wish us luck.