I realized a few weeks ago that there are only two more preschool tuition payments due for this school year! I have to pay tuition in March and April for April and May's school days. Then we won't have another preschool tuition payment due until September when Jamison starts preschool. Anya will be in kindergarten this fall so no more preschool payments for her.
This break in payments couldn't have come at a better time! We could sure use that room in our budget, especially during the unpaid portion of my maternity leave. That's $172/month that I can stick right in the emergency fund! Or use for necessities or whatever else comes up those months.
Another good thing? Jamison will be going to preschool two days a week this fall since he just turned three while Anya was going three days a week to prepare for kindergarten. The two day a week option is ~$130/month so when we do start paying again, it will be less than we're paying now!
Card of Choice
Chuck received his Discover card and has used it for gas to make sure it's active and working. I paid the Citibank credit card bill on Thursday so it's balance should be zero. I think we're ready this week to call and opt out of the $60 annual fee cardmember agreement change. It's now on this week's to-do list.
Speaking of credit cards I think long term we're going to use the Chase credit card as our card of choice. Right now we'll stick with Discover because we already have over half the amount needed ($50) in rewards and want to cash those out. When we do though we'll probably switch to using the Chase card instead. Both give us 1% cash back and both cash out at $50 in rewards but we have ~$6000 more in credit on the Chase account. One of the components of your credit score is percentage of credit used. Even though we'll be paying off our credit cards in full each month, if we use the Chase card the percentage of credit used will always be lower than with the Discover.
Anyway, that's the plan right now. Subject to change of course! (Like if one card is offering 2-5% cash back on gas purchases or grocery purchases or something like that - then we'll switch back and forth depending on promotions at the time.)
Speaking of credit cards I think long term we're going to use the Chase credit card as our card of choice. Right now we'll stick with Discover because we already have over half the amount needed ($50) in rewards and want to cash those out. When we do though we'll probably switch to using the Chase card instead. Both give us 1% cash back and both cash out at $50 in rewards but we have ~$6000 more in credit on the Chase account. One of the components of your credit score is percentage of credit used. Even though we'll be paying off our credit cards in full each month, if we use the Chase card the percentage of credit used will always be lower than with the Discover.
Anyway, that's the plan right now. Subject to change of course! (Like if one card is offering 2-5% cash back on gas purchases or grocery purchases or something like that - then we'll switch back and forth depending on promotions at the time.)
Unemployment and a Job
Last week was Chuck's first week at his new tutoring job. The hours are very low right now (only 5.5 hours last week) and his hourly pay is two-thirds of what his old pay was. But it's a job and for that we're grateful. Bonus - Chuck doesn't mind the work and maybe even actually kind of likes it!
Last night Chuck went online to apply for unemployment benefits for last week. We were unsure how having a part time job would affect them. If you remember, his weekly benefit was $244 plus $25 from the federal economic stimulus package for a total of $269 weekly. Chuck fully disclosed his new earnings and his benefits were re-calculated. For last week he received $209 plus $25 from the federal economic stimulus package! We were very surprised he would still receive that much! Or any!
He received another client (student) this week so his hours this week will be approximately 10.5 hours instead of 5.5. We'll have to see next week how that affects his unemployment benefits. We'll, of course, disclose everything but seeing as how he is making so much less than before (less hours and less pay) we're hoping he's still eligible for something.
Last night Chuck went online to apply for unemployment benefits for last week. We were unsure how having a part time job would affect them. If you remember, his weekly benefit was $244 plus $25 from the federal economic stimulus package for a total of $269 weekly. Chuck fully disclosed his new earnings and his benefits were re-calculated. For last week he received $209 plus $25 from the federal economic stimulus package! We were very surprised he would still receive that much! Or any!
He received another client (student) this week so his hours this week will be approximately 10.5 hours instead of 5.5. We'll have to see next week how that affects his unemployment benefits. We'll, of course, disclose everything but seeing as how he is making so much less than before (less hours and less pay) we're hoping he's still eligible for something.
Diet Changes
Monday I received word that I failed my three hour glucose tolerance test. I've officially been diagnosed with gestational diabetes. I didn't have any problems passing the one hour test with my first two pregnancies so this has thrown me for a loop. I go in Thursday to see a diabetic counselor, receive a meal plan, learn how to test my blood and ask any questions I have. While this is a manageable pregnancy complication, I'd rather not have it. Of course. Why am I telling you this on my financial blog? Because I'm worried what the meal plan is going to do to our grocery budget. We've been eating more pasta lately because, well, it's inexpensive and quick and easy to make. I'll have to take the meal plan I'm given and figure out how to purchase the ingredients in the most frugal way. It's easy and inexpensive to have granola bars in the house for a quick snack. They're also loaded with sugar (even when I always buy the 25% less sugar variety) so I'm sure I'll have to replace those with something else. So, that's worry number one. Meal plan = budget fail.
My second worry is Thursday's consultation is at my local hospital, where I was referred from my doctor. In order to attend the counseling session, I have to go to patient registration first. The last time I had to go to patient registration? For my ultrasound. I'm worried this consultation is going to cost me my $150 hospital co-pay. I'm really not happy about that. I wish it could be treated as an office visit instead with a $30 co-pay if a co-pay is going to be required. At least this expense, whatever it turns out to be, can be paid for by our HSA. The ultrasound, if you remember, could not. It's either our HSA or our savings because I can't squeeze $150 out of our budget next month. But, I'll do anything for a healthy pregnancy and baby so if it costs me $150 for the nutritional counseling, then so be it.
My second worry is Thursday's consultation is at my local hospital, where I was referred from my doctor. In order to attend the counseling session, I have to go to patient registration first. The last time I had to go to patient registration? For my ultrasound. I'm worried this consultation is going to cost me my $150 hospital co-pay. I'm really not happy about that. I wish it could be treated as an office visit instead with a $30 co-pay if a co-pay is going to be required. At least this expense, whatever it turns out to be, can be paid for by our HSA. The ultrasound, if you remember, could not. It's either our HSA or our savings because I can't squeeze $150 out of our budget next month. But, I'll do anything for a healthy pregnancy and baby so if it costs me $150 for the nutritional counseling, then so be it.
Kid Time
Saturday, after seeing we had a little money left in our budget for this month Chuck and I decided to have some one-on-one kid time on Saturday. But seeing as how we had a little money left, we had to be a bit frugal too.
I took Anya to a movie matinee. She's been wanting to see "The Princess and the Frog" for months. We shared a popcorn and a pop and she was so excited. It was fun to spend some time with just her. It was $21 for the two of us to see the movie and have some snacks. That's still expensive if you ask me but she was so excited to go to the movie theater rather than renting it at home. She always likes to play "movie theater" at home when watching a movie. We have to turn off all the lights and make popcorn.
For their fun Chuck and Jamison went to the Mall of America to the Lego Store. There's a free play area in the back where they were going to spend some time. Unfortunately the mall was insanely busy on Saturday so they didn't stay very long. Instead they stopped at Target on the way home and purchased a $6 red tow truck Lego toy for Jamison and came home and put it together. Jamison had been requesting a red truck so that worked out pretty well. Those two love Legos. Anya does too. I don't mind buying Lego toys. They spark creativity and enhance problem solving skills!
I took Anya to a movie matinee. She's been wanting to see "The Princess and the Frog" for months. We shared a popcorn and a pop and she was so excited. It was fun to spend some time with just her. It was $21 for the two of us to see the movie and have some snacks. That's still expensive if you ask me but she was so excited to go to the movie theater rather than renting it at home. She always likes to play "movie theater" at home when watching a movie. We have to turn off all the lights and make popcorn.
For their fun Chuck and Jamison went to the Mall of America to the Lego Store. There's a free play area in the back where they were going to spend some time. Unfortunately the mall was insanely busy on Saturday so they didn't stay very long. Instead they stopped at Target on the way home and purchased a $6 red tow truck Lego toy for Jamison and came home and put it together. Jamison had been requesting a red truck so that worked out pretty well. Those two love Legos. Anya does too. I don't mind buying Lego toys. They spark creativity and enhance problem solving skills!
Baby Preparations
Today was baby prep day. I'll be 31 weeks pregnant on Tuesday and we took the opportunity today to re-arrange the kids' rooms. They will now share a room with bunk beds while the third bedroom will be the nursery. We were very fortunate to have everything we needed for this re-arrangement. The twin sized bunk beds with two matching dressers are from my dad. It was the bedroom set that my sister and I used when we were kids. My dad gave them to us when we needed to transition Anya from the toddler bed so baby Jamison could use it as a crib again. We have a 3-in-1 crib that transitions to toddler bed and then to full size bed. This will come in handy again in a few years when he baby is ready to transition to a twin sized bed. The boys can share the bunk beds and Anya can use the crib turned into a full sized bed.
So, all we needed to do to get ready for this baby was re-arrange some furniture. We didn't need to buy anything! Well, we bought that $10 comforter for Jamison but otherwise we had twin sized bedding (also given to us by my Dad and my aunt and uncle when they no longer needed kid bedding in their houses) for Jamison and obviously we have crib bedding for the baby. I'm feeling more prepared for the baby now. Just need to wash the itty bitty baby clothes and get the bucket infant car seat out of the basement and cleaned up. I'll have to buy some diapers and a special going home from the hospital outfit and then we'll be pretty much set!
So, all we needed to do to get ready for this baby was re-arrange some furniture. We didn't need to buy anything! Well, we bought that $10 comforter for Jamison but otherwise we had twin sized bedding (also given to us by my Dad and my aunt and uncle when they no longer needed kid bedding in their houses) for Jamison and obviously we have crib bedding for the baby. I'm feeling more prepared for the baby now. Just need to wash the itty bitty baby clothes and get the bucket infant car seat out of the basement and cleaned up. I'll have to buy some diapers and a special going home from the hospital outfit and then we'll be pretty much set!
GM Flex Card
My HSBC GM Card is the card that we’ll use the least. We just cashed out all of our points on the card to get over $800 off the negotiated purchase price of our truck. Now though we have absolutely no plans to purchase another vehicle for several years. And if we did, I don’t know that it would be a GM product. But, this is my oldest card so I don’t want to close the account either.
When I went online this week to check on the account I saw that they have a new card available. It’s called the GM Flex Card. You can use it to earn 3% towards a new GM vehicle purchase. Or you can use it to earn 1% cash back like our other cards. The only downside is you have to accumulate $100 before you can cash out rewards as compared to the $50 limit on our other cards. There is no annual fee for the card. I think I’ll put it on my to do list to switch my basic GM card account to this one next week!
When I went online this week to check on the account I saw that they have a new card available. It’s called the GM Flex Card. You can use it to earn 3% towards a new GM vehicle purchase. Or you can use it to earn 1% cash back like our other cards. The only downside is you have to accumulate $100 before you can cash out rewards as compared to the $50 limit on our other cards. There is no annual fee for the card. I think I’ll put it on my to do list to switch my basic GM card account to this one next week!
Want Item #6 - Trying to Win It!
Number six on our list of wants is an iPod Touch for me. I'd love to have one. We don't have any smart phones or any other fun electronic gadgets (not counting the GPS) but we also don't need any either. Pure want. But it's a want, nonetheless.
So, I'm trying to win one! Did you know that this week is Engineer's Week? What? You're not celebrating? We are at my work, although in a scaled down way from previous years. One fun thing my company is doing is sending out a trivia question each day of the week and you have to search our online digital tech library for the answer. When you get the answer you e-mail it to the appropriate place and cross your fingers. They are giving a way an 8GB iPod Touch each day and an additional 32GB model at the end of the week. Yes, my chances of winning are slim to none but I've entered each day this week and I really hope to win the 32GB model!
So, I'm trying to win one! Did you know that this week is Engineer's Week? What? You're not celebrating? We are at my work, although in a scaled down way from previous years. One fun thing my company is doing is sending out a trivia question each day of the week and you have to search our online digital tech library for the answer. When you get the answer you e-mail it to the appropriate place and cross your fingers. They are giving a way an 8GB iPod Touch each day and an additional 32GB model at the end of the week. Yes, my chances of winning are slim to none but I've entered each day this week and I really hope to win the 32GB model!
No Annual Fee For Us, ThankYouVeryMuch
Now that I've "fessed up" about our credit card usage, I have more to talk about! Along with carefully tracking our credit card spending, I'm also carefully tracking our credit card rewards. Because hey, if we're going to use them, we want to make sure we take advantage of the rewards they offer too! Right now we have four credit cards: Citibank (Chuck), Discover (me), Chase (me) and HSBC GM Card (me). All our credit cards offer cash back bonuses except for the GM Card which rewards in money off a new GM vehicle. Long term we plan on using one card only so we can earn rewards faster. For now, Chuck is using his Citibank and I've been using my Discover because we already had rewards balances on those cards. Chuck has $14 in rewards on his card and I have $25 in rewards on mine. But neither of us can request a rewards check until the balances are $50 or higher. We were going to switch to one card after we had cashed out our rewards on these two.
Saturday we received a letter from Citibank that April 1st they're changing the rules (terms and conditions) for the card. Starting then, they're going to charge a $60 annual fee. Once we hit $2400 in spending on the card during the year they'll refund us the $60 annual fee. Chuck and I both said "Hell to the no!" I called Saturday and added Chuck to my Discover account. That card should be coming in the next week. I'm also going to call Chase and have him added to that card as well. Then, when we receive those cards and confirm they work, we're "opting out" of his Citibank account and closing it. We are not paying an annual fee for a credit card. If any of the other three cards we have start charging us an annual fee then we'll opt out of those accounts too.
Saturday we received a letter from Citibank that April 1st they're changing the rules (terms and conditions) for the card. Starting then, they're going to charge a $60 annual fee. Once we hit $2400 in spending on the card during the year they'll refund us the $60 annual fee. Chuck and I both said "Hell to the no!" I called Saturday and added Chuck to my Discover account. That card should be coming in the next week. I'm also going to call Chase and have him added to that card as well. Then, when we receive those cards and confirm they work, we're "opting out" of his Citibank account and closing it. We are not paying an annual fee for a credit card. If any of the other three cards we have start charging us an annual fee then we'll opt out of those accounts too.
Yeah, About That
Remember when I said that I wasn't ready to go to using credit cards for daily purchases? That we'd stick with our check card and revisit the topic later? Well...that didn't happen. You see, now that our income is coming from my paychecks only we have to be very careful with our cash flow. I get paid every other Friday. And while my paycheck is healthy at $2114 net, we have some big bills to pay at the beginning of every month, namely our $1775 mortgage payment due on the 1st and our $440 truck payment due on the 6th. There are other bills also due in the first half of the month as well. So, my first paycheck of each month has to cover more bills than it can! ($1775 + $440 = $2215 which is greater than $2114!) My second paycheck of the month is then used to pay all other bills and our discretionary spending. I said that I was saving some money from our January budget to cover some of those cash flow issues. Unfortunately, even that wasn't enough to cover bills due plus gas, groceries, diapers, etc. for the first part of February. So, out came the credit cards.
Now, don't worry! I received a paycheck on the 12th and all credit cards were paid for the purchases we made this month to date. I will continue to monitor the cards on a weekly (or more often) basis and will pay them off each month (or more often) to ensure we do not incur any finance charges. But they have become an important asset to us to manage our cash flow!
Now, don't worry! I received a paycheck on the 12th and all credit cards were paid for the purchases we made this month to date. I will continue to monitor the cards on a weekly (or more often) basis and will pay them off each month (or more often) to ensure we do not incur any finance charges. But they have become an important asset to us to manage our cash flow!
Adjusting my Adjustable Rate Mortgage
One of the many money items worrying me this year is our adjustable rate mortgage. (Yes, I know - a stupid move to take on an ARM in 2005 - hindsight = 20/20 and all.) Our 5/1 ARM resets on September 1st, 2010. Right now our mortgage interest rate is 5.125%. Because this has been stressing me out (I'm a worrier - it's what I do), I dug out our mortgage papers to try and find out exactly what will happen to us on September 1st, 2010. One fact to note - our interest rate can only change once per year so every September 1st our interest rate could change...until we can get this house re-financed to a fixed rate mortgage.
Anyway, what I found excited me, but I'm not sure I'm reading and calculating this correctly and I'm hoping you can help me figure this out.
OK, here comes the legalese:
I found this Money Rates page at the Wall Street Journal website. Here it says the latest One Year Libor Rate is 0.8500 (that would be the one year rate mentioned in the legalese, right?). The 52 week high was 2.29750 and the 52 week low was 0.83750. If I add 2.25 to 0.8500 I get 3.1%. If I round that to the nearest one eighth percentage point I would round up to 3.125%.
Could that be right? Am I calculating and using the correct figures? If so, our interest rate could drop from 5.125% to 3.125%! I'll be monitoring this LIBOR rate to see how much it changes in the next few months.
45 days out from September 1st is July 18th. I'm sure in June and July I'll be keeping an extra close eye on the LIBOR rate to see what our new interest rate should be and comparing that to what our mortgage company tells us. Even if it goes up to the high from the last year (2.29750) then adding 2.25 to that gives me a 4.5% (rounded down) interest rate.
We just might luck out this year with a lower interest rate!
Anyway, what I found excited me, but I'm not sure I'm reading and calculating this correctly and I'm hoping you can help me figure this out.
OK, here comes the legalese:
- The Index - Beginning with the first Change Date (9/1/2010), my interest rate will be based on an Index. The "Index" is the one-year London Interbank Offered Rate ("LIBOR") which is the average of interbank offered rates for one-year U.S. dollar-denominated deposits in the London market, as published in The Wall Street Journal. The most recent Index figure available as of the date 45 days before each Change Date (9/1/2010) is called the "Current Index."
- Calculation of Changes - Before each Change Date, the Note Holder will calculate my new interest rate by adding 2.25% to the Current Index. The Note Holder will then round the result of this addition to the nearest one-eighth of one percentage point (0.125%). Subject to the limits stated in Section 4(D) below, this rounded amount will be my new interest rate until the next Change Date.
- Limits on Interest Rate Changes (4(D)) - The interest rate I am required to pay at the first Change Date will not be greater than 10.125% or less than 2.25%. Thereafter, my interest rate will never be increased or decreased on any single Change Date by more than 2 percentage points from the rate of interest I have been paying the preceding 12 months.
I found this Money Rates page at the Wall Street Journal website. Here it says the latest One Year Libor Rate is 0.8500 (that would be the one year rate mentioned in the legalese, right?). The 52 week high was 2.29750 and the 52 week low was 0.83750. If I add 2.25 to 0.8500 I get 3.1%. If I round that to the nearest one eighth percentage point I would round up to 3.125%.
Could that be right? Am I calculating and using the correct figures? If so, our interest rate could drop from 5.125% to 3.125%! I'll be monitoring this LIBOR rate to see how much it changes in the next few months.
45 days out from September 1st is July 18th. I'm sure in June and July I'll be keeping an extra close eye on the LIBOR rate to see what our new interest rate should be and comparing that to what our mortgage company tells us. Even if it goes up to the high from the last year (2.29750) then adding 2.25 to that gives me a 4.5% (rounded down) interest rate.
We just might luck out this year with a lower interest rate!
Preliminary Tax Bill
Last night I finished our 2009 taxes using TurboTax online. According to the calculations we're going to owe just over $400 this year between federal and state. We're getting money back from federal and paying in to the state. This is the first year I've done our taxes so I've asked Chuck, who's done them in the past, to review everything for us. Most likely there won't be any big changes.
In the past we could have cash flowed that amount by putting less into savings. I have to stop dwelling on the past though. With our current budget, we can't cash flow over $400 in a month. So, we're going to have to use our emergency savings to pay our tax bill this year. I'm still working on snowflakes and that will help but we're going to have to dip into it a little bit. Argh! With only putting in $100 each month (not counting snowflakes) it hurts to have to take $400 out.
In the past we could have cash flowed that amount by putting less into savings. I have to stop dwelling on the past though. With our current budget, we can't cash flow over $400 in a month. So, we're going to have to use our emergency savings to pay our tax bill this year. I'm still working on snowflakes and that will help but we're going to have to dip into it a little bit. Argh! With only putting in $100 each month (not counting snowflakes) it hurts to have to take $400 out.
Doing More With Less
It's been a slow week for posting. A big meeting at work plus Jamison's birthday had me pretty busy this week. Today we had his birthday party. It was a great day spent with family at our house. Usually I go to our favorite cake provider's website (a local grocery store chain that does great cakes) and I let the kids pick out which cake they want. The 1/4 sheet cake costs $25.95. They're terrifically decorated and they taste great.
This year that was definitely out of the budget. So we bought a chocolate cake mix and made a cake at home. The kids each got to crack an egg into the bowl. Chuck found a yummy homemade frosting recipe and I whipped (literally) that up this morning. And then I got out my little cake decorating supplies (a couple squeeze bottles with a few different tips) and piped a blue edge around the cake. Then I melted some chocolate chips and used those to make train tracks across the cake and a tree trunk. Green frosting was used to write Happy Birthday and to make the rest of a tree. Then Jamison got the train from his Thomas the Train cake from last year (a plastic train that he's played with ever since) and he smashed that down on the train track. He requested a train cake so we made him a train cake. He loved it. Both kids liked licking the beaters from the frosting. Our family all thought the cake was delicious.
We spent a lot less money this year on a cake, but my son still had a terrific birthday with a cake he adored. Sometimes you can do more with less.
This year that was definitely out of the budget. So we bought a chocolate cake mix and made a cake at home. The kids each got to crack an egg into the bowl. Chuck found a yummy homemade frosting recipe and I whipped (literally) that up this morning. And then I got out my little cake decorating supplies (a couple squeeze bottles with a few different tips) and piped a blue edge around the cake. Then I melted some chocolate chips and used those to make train tracks across the cake and a tree trunk. Green frosting was used to write Happy Birthday and to make the rest of a tree. Then Jamison got the train from his Thomas the Train cake from last year (a plastic train that he's played with ever since) and he smashed that down on the train track. He requested a train cake so we made him a train cake. He loved it. Both kids liked licking the beaters from the frosting. Our family all thought the cake was delicious.
We spent a lot less money this year on a cake, but my son still had a terrific birthday with a cake he adored. Sometimes you can do more with less.
2010 Goals Review - January Edition
In order to keep our 2010 goals front and center, I'm going to add a monthly goal review to the other monthly reports I do (Budget Recap and Month End). Out of sight, out of mind is not a good way to reach your goals! So, what were our 2010 goals and how are we doing against them? Let's take a look:
- Keep emergency fund above $6000. January Result? It's now at over $6700. Check!
- Stay under budget each month this year. January Result? We were $565 under budget due to not moving all the emergency fund savings over to INGDirect yet. I don't think that really counts but we were $17 under in our spending categories. Check!
- Save all Chuck's unemployment benefits for tuition money. January Result? Every last cent has been transferred to the Tuition savings account at INGDirect. Check!
- Always have at least $250 in short term savings. January Result? The account sits at over $600 right now! Check!
- Save at least $100 each month into our emergency fund. January Result? $250 from monthly budget and $150 in snowflakes added to account in January. Check!
- All extra money (snowflakes) goes to the emergency fund. January Result? All $150 in snowflakes was transferred to the emergency fund. Check!
- Money going to other savings accounts must be done only after the $100 goes into the emergency fund each month. January Result? Money only went to the emergency fund in January. I will be moving $100 of the "extra" to the Christmas savings this month but, as the goal states, that decision was made only after there was at least $100 moved to the emergency fund. Check!
- Post at least 15 times here. January Result? According to the Archives over there to the right I posted 22 times in January. That is my second highest month on record with only January 2008 having more posts (24). Check!
January 2010 Month End
One twelfth of 2010 is done. Time sure does fly! As I reported yesterday, we did OK in January. Hopefully we can keep our chins up and work through these leaner times together, making smart decisions and still able to make make progress towards our goals. Here's how January ended:
Debts:
Truck Loan: $29,923.40 (-$440.05) - I just checked Kelley Blue Book and our truck could sell to a private party in our area for up to $33K in excellent condition (which it is) because it also has pretty low miles (only 4800 at five months old). If it was in fair condition? $29.9K. We have no intention of selling our truck. But it's nice to know that we could sell it today and not lose a ton of money on it. Sometimes you need reassurance that if everything fell apart, you'd still be OK, ya know? (Of course my motorcycle would be the first to go if we were in dire straits - it's worth a couple grand at least and I rarely get a chance to ride it.)
Savings:
Emergency Fund: $6,776.34 (+406.96) - A modest increase this month. There's more to transfer as I said yesterday but this is what I was able to move over this month. There's over $150 in snowflakes in that amount. That's great for one month! By the end of February we should be over $7000. I am so grateful for that! Oh, and I like receiving almost $7 in interest too.
Short Term Savings: $633.91 (+100.01) - This is the standard $50 budget contribution plus the $50 from my dad. Oh, and one penny of interest, heh. We'll keep plugging away for a couple more months and then we should be able to buy that new TV. Even though I'm excited to upgrade our TV (our last TV purchase was at least 8 years ago and that TV now has a yellow spot in the upper right quadrant), I'll also be sad to see such a large chunk of money leave at one time. I'm in a hoarding stage right now. I'm worried about maternity leave and money in general and I don't want to spend large chunks! I have to continually remind myself that we can live on this new budget. It just takes some discipline to live within our means now. I'm not used to that and have had a couple pity parties in the last few days.
Travel Fund: $274.53 (+0.29) - Poor little travel fund. Oh how I wish I could build this up and travel to a beach destination. It doesn't help that my friends just got back from Puerto Vallarta where they bought new timeshares. See? Pity party. We will travel again. We just have to wait our turn. Oh, and those timeshares are financed...
Christmas Savings: $158.38 (+0.17) - Neglected. But not for long! I'll add $100 to it this month as I said yesterday. Then we'll be 1/3 of the way to our December 2010 goal of $750. That will make me feel a little bit better. I'll have to stick money here when I can this year.
Basement Finishing Fund: $402.12 (+0.43) - And this sad little fund is the lowest man on the totem pole. There will be no money going to this account for a very long time. I'll just keep adding the tiny amount of interest it earns each month.
Tuition Fund: $1,884.15 (+1,346.06) - This account is growing nicely. Those regular $269/week benefits are adding up. Chuck applied for last week's check today and as soon as that clears our account in a day or two I'll move that over here too. Tuition is going to be expensive so we need to save every penny we can into this account.
Our truck loan went down and all our savings accounts went up. And that, right there, is the very definition of a successful month. We're going in the right direction, even if we are crawling along instead of sprinting.
Debts:
Truck Loan: $29,923.40 (-$440.05) - I just checked Kelley Blue Book and our truck could sell to a private party in our area for up to $33K in excellent condition (which it is) because it also has pretty low miles (only 4800 at five months old). If it was in fair condition? $29.9K. We have no intention of selling our truck. But it's nice to know that we could sell it today and not lose a ton of money on it. Sometimes you need reassurance that if everything fell apart, you'd still be OK, ya know? (Of course my motorcycle would be the first to go if we were in dire straits - it's worth a couple grand at least and I rarely get a chance to ride it.)
Savings:
Emergency Fund: $6,776.34 (+406.96) - A modest increase this month. There's more to transfer as I said yesterday but this is what I was able to move over this month. There's over $150 in snowflakes in that amount. That's great for one month! By the end of February we should be over $7000. I am so grateful for that! Oh, and I like receiving almost $7 in interest too.
Short Term Savings: $633.91 (+100.01) - This is the standard $50 budget contribution plus the $50 from my dad. Oh, and one penny of interest, heh. We'll keep plugging away for a couple more months and then we should be able to buy that new TV. Even though I'm excited to upgrade our TV (our last TV purchase was at least 8 years ago and that TV now has a yellow spot in the upper right quadrant), I'll also be sad to see such a large chunk of money leave at one time. I'm in a hoarding stage right now. I'm worried about maternity leave and money in general and I don't want to spend large chunks! I have to continually remind myself that we can live on this new budget. It just takes some discipline to live within our means now. I'm not used to that and have had a couple pity parties in the last few days.
Travel Fund: $274.53 (+0.29) - Poor little travel fund. Oh how I wish I could build this up and travel to a beach destination. It doesn't help that my friends just got back from Puerto Vallarta where they bought new timeshares. See? Pity party. We will travel again. We just have to wait our turn. Oh, and those timeshares are financed...
Christmas Savings: $158.38 (+0.17) - Neglected. But not for long! I'll add $100 to it this month as I said yesterday. Then we'll be 1/3 of the way to our December 2010 goal of $750. That will make me feel a little bit better. I'll have to stick money here when I can this year.
Basement Finishing Fund: $402.12 (+0.43) - And this sad little fund is the lowest man on the totem pole. There will be no money going to this account for a very long time. I'll just keep adding the tiny amount of interest it earns each month.
Tuition Fund: $1,884.15 (+1,346.06) - This account is growing nicely. Those regular $269/week benefits are adding up. Chuck applied for last week's check today and as soon as that clears our account in a day or two I'll move that over here too. Tuition is going to be expensive so we need to save every penny we can into this account.
Our truck loan went down and all our savings accounts went up. And that, right there, is the very definition of a successful month. We're going in the right direction, even if we are crawling along instead of sprinting.
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