As I look back on this month, I realize how little impact money is having on our lives these days.
It may seem ridiculous to say that when we’re in the midst of Project Money; but hear me out. We sold a car and experienced the thrill of eliminating a car payment. That felt great, but now, two weeks later, I barely even think about that car anymore; we’re doing just fine without it. On the flip side, we also spent over $800 in repairs on another car this month. Although writing that check really stung, now, a week later, it’s also not something I’m dwelling on. Our lives are full of joy and stress, love and anxiety, and none of those feelings were caused by money.
This past week I wanted to revolt against Project Money. We’ve beaten our budget, pinched our pennies, and sold what’s worth selling. Now how about a little excitement? It only makes sense to ignore these feelings and stay home and shred credit cards. Instead of dolling out dollars, I took a middle school volleyball coaching position. Practice is right after school, and then I pick up the kids, head home and feed the little buggers. This has helped curb those feelings and avoid any free time where I might wander into an auto parts store or the hardware store to buy something cool that I might need.
Now that we’ve been in the Project Money competition for a while, we’ve gotten pretty used to following our budget and keeping a sharp eye open for financial opportunities. Most of our friends and family know that we’re doing this; so in a way, the contest has become another one of the routine things we track and comment on: “How are the kids? Fine. How’s work? Busy. How’s Project Money? Good. Not to downplay the exciting moments; every month we’ve come up with a way to boost our income and have selected at least one budget area to try to reduce. But, there’s not something new to report every single day, and in some small way, the contest is just another ongoing facet of our lives (although I bet that will change in December). I suppose that means that we are internalizing the steps we’re taking to manage our finances – they are becoming habits (yay!), and therefore less noteworthy.
One of the things we are working on is finding that happy balance of when enough is enough; whether its work or play or spending our hard-earned money. Our lives are so busy already, that we try hard not to take on additional tasks that add more stress than pleasure. Sometimes we have opportunities for extra income: Paul may teach a class for Phoenix, I can travel for work and make a little extra doing so, and now, Paul’s school is looking for a middle school volleyball coach. The extra check would be nice, but what about the time commitment?
Along those lines, we followed through on the decision to sell our nicest, newest, and most expensive car. Until today, we had four licensed and insured vehicles. Now we sold the one that still had a payment on it, and voila - in one neat step, we eliminated that debt; got a little extra money out of it that we can put directly to additional debt reduction; and as a bonus, saved the annual registration fee, and the car insurance premium renewal, which were both due this month. The relief from the eliminated obligations put a smile on my face.
I am really in the groove with Project Money this month. I feel like I spent the first 3 months battling Paul to spend less, less, LESS!!! He was, don’t get me wrong, I just wanted more! Also, overcoming a decade of record keeping where the only rule was “don’t throw it away” (but I hope I never need to find it again), took awhile.
Hats off to coach Scott who assured us he had seen worse (where???) and suppressing what must have been a strong urge to roll his eyes and throw up his hands. He kept at us to organize our bills, account for every dollar, and predict future earning and spending – making us ultimately accountable for digging ourselves out, and reaching our goals. Finally, his support and patience is paying off. We’ve got our current expenditures under a magnifying glass, we’ve reviewed our income-to-spending ratio, and we can pretty much tell you where any extra income is going to go for the next couple of years.
When we met with Scott, our coach, last week, it became clear that we are moving past the “damage control” phase of working with our finances and into the goal setting phase. Last month, Scott asked us to prioritize our short term and long term financial goals. We picked our top three of each and, after lengthy debate and negotiation, presented the list. Now, we’re looking at the difference between our monthly incomes vs. expenses and figuring out how much, on average, we have left over each month to pay down debt and/or put towards our goals. This way, we’ll be able to determine about how long it will take us to reach each of our goals.
It feels like we went from hot and humid straight to cold. We’ve pulled out the kids’ pants and jackets and are trying to get them back into the routine of wearing shoes and socks instead of sandals. We went shopping today to pick up some warmer clothes; Abby gets lots of hand me downs from her cousins (all girls), but Chris badly needed some well fitting, warmer outfits.
Not much happened in our household, financially, this week. Instead, this week was all about our hearts. We sadly lost our cat, Oscar, to a car accident. We would gladly have used our emergency fund to save her, had it been possible. And Paul stood by his father, as the remainder of his uncle’s (his father’s brother’s) possessions were auctioned off in Iowa Saturday. A time for grieving and healing, where standing by family trumps worries about gasoline and hotel costs.
Big steps this week! Thanks to Scott, we’ve set some savings goals and looked at our bank balances, deciding to pay off another card. Scott’s helping us prioritize our spending goals and develop tools to work towards saving the amount we’ll need when those events come around. We decided to sell our Chrysler Pacifica even though we love it, but we have two serviceable vehicles, so we made the decision to let this one go – eliminating 30 more months of car payments! We even know the new owners, so we know it’s going to a good home.
As much as I love rebuilding, washing, showing and owning cars, I’m beginning to hate Heike’s Intrepid. All four corners have nice new pads and rotors, new ball joints, new control arms, a new timing belt with water pump, and a new brake booster. Thank goodness I have a great mechanic with excellent rates and an account at the local auto parts store! On the flip side, the amount of money we’ve spent is well worth it. If we had a new car with payments, the money we spent on repairs would have been gone in two months. Heike and I have seriously considered selling our Pacifica. It’s the one car we owe money on and why pay for a car when I have three others paid for and insured?
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