I’m not going to cry. I let it all go this month. Our net worth decreased. Our debt payoff percentage backslid. I didn’t post a single time this month to the blog. Marketing our townhouse for sale took a back seat to the increasing chaos for me at work. I freely spent hundreds of dollars on Christmas presents at Veteran’s Day and Black Friday sales (but I was saving money!). And I actively chose to *NOT* pay off all of the credit cards in full (we need cash to pay bills…
Category: Debt
Net Worth & Debt Payoff Progress through 10/31/16
We emerge from October 2016 bruised and bloodied, like the zombies of Halloween. This month was brutal! Have you ever noticed how when you start to track something, it starts creeeeeping along? I’ll spare you the suspense: we are at 1.86% paid down. That’s -0.08% less than last month. While on one hand, it feels stagnant, I’m trying to see it as Staying Afloat. Here’s what went down. Our real estate contract expired October 5, so I went into full-realty mode to market our two properties myself. (You…
Net Worth & Debt Payoff through 9/30/2016
Let’s just call this month a big fat “How NOT to Use Credit Cards.” Have you seen pins like the one on the right in your Pinterest feed? Beware, advertisers hire wily copywriters to separate you from your money. Even though this pin says transferring a balance is ingenious, and even though I did exactly what it says, I have to disagree with the “ingenious” part. No, I’d have to say it’s the slippery slope of managing your credit. Let me tell you why: You’ve just opened yet ANOTHER credit card. Welcome…
Net Worth & Debt Payoff Update thru 8/31/16
Do you ever feel like you’re not making progress with your debt? This month, I’ve felt like I was treading water with our finances. But after digging deeper into the numbers, I can see that we are still improving. It’s small, but it’s in the right direction. We increased our debt payoff from 1.47% to 1.58% in a month when we took a one week family vacation (paid cash!). See the details in the chart below. So, what did we do this month to attack our debt? One. I opened a…
Know What it Costs to Get Rid of Disgusting Head Lice?
So last week, my daycare called to inform me that I needed to come get my 19 month old kid immediately because he has head lice and he can’t come back until 24 hours after we get rid of it. Imagine your toddler, who rarely travels outside of his daycare-to-home loop, whose only visitor to our house in a month has been Grandma, has freaking head lice! I’m screaming inside my head. EWW! Get rid of it! I didn’t notice my son scratching this morning, so I thought, this must be a mistake. We just…
Net Worth & Debt Payoff Progress through July 31, 2016
So, I’m thrilled to tell you this: We have paid off 1.47% of our debt! We have reached a full percentage point GONE. When we do this ten times, it’s 14.7% gone. I’m celebrating this small win for the following reasons: We finally STARTED tracking our money. We committed to getting out of debt completely. For each of three months, I have seen our debt decrease. I want to encourage you in your debt recovery journey. No debt load is too big to overcome. And every reduction in debt counts. You bring about what…
How to Build a Budget in 7 Easy Steps
Want to take a sweet trip to Venice to ride a gondola guided by a singing gondolier in traditional Italian garb in five years? Maybe you want to retire a millionaire long before you hit minimum retirement age? Want to adopt a child in four years, but $20,000 is a lot of money and you don’t know where you are going to come up with it? Have you visualized yourself at the exact moment you are out of debt? What does it feel like? What does it smell like? All of…
How to Get on With Life When You’re in Debt
Let’s talk Debt for a minute. Dirty, Dirty Debt. Debt makes you feel all kinds of negative things– shame, fear, anger, hopelessness, guilt, regret. You just wish it was gone, over, paid in full. Every day seems like a struggle just to make ends meet. Every day you regret buying that two-seater that will be taking your fun-money for the next six years. It’s going to take 6 months to pay this diamond off, two years to pay off that credit card, five years to pay that medical debt. I feel you. I’ll be…
Net Worth & Debt Payoff Progress – June 30, 2016
Oh, June. June. June, June, June. So glad you’re gone. I’m reminded of those “Black Eyed Peas” lyrics, “Let’s get ignorant. Let’s get hectic,” except it wasn’t nearly as fun as they suggest. I knew I shouldn’t have told you how much life sucked there for a minute, because you know what? After I hit “post,” lousy things kept happening: Prime example: While I was investigating an on-the-job accident, I dropped my phone, shattering the screen. I put packing tape on it to keep the shards from falling out. It’s not an…
Debt Ruining Your Life? Why High School’s Responsible
We demand that school teaches our children about sex and driving and argue how to explain the beginning of the universe. Why don’t we have a class in high school that teaches basic personal finance? I’m not talking about economics. Even if it’s an elective, I believe we need a class at least available to students who want to learn how to manage money in a responsible way. We need to teach them how to avoid the consequences that result from bad money management. This course could change the courses…