Slow and Steady

It has been five months since my last post, and I have learned something in this time -- getting out of debt is a process. It is something you have to be patient with because you will be much better off in the end.

While slow, the last few months have been very fruitful. I was blessed with getting a new job that along with a significant pay increase allows me to work from home 100% of the time, letting me help out if the kids are sick. The new job has also freed Terra up to do volunteer work at a local charity that helps families that are struggling (just like we were a few years ago). Sure, she doesn't have an income to help us get out of debt faster, but she's playing a key role in helping families getting back on their feet, and that is much more important than shortening our timetable slightly :).

Doing our cash-only Christmas this year slowed the snowball down, but it is always nice starting the new year off w/o any extra debt :). Now that the new year has started, I've kicked things into high gear again. I'm about $800 away from paying my car off (which makes it really tempting to just take all the money I can one month and pay it off). So, in a few months, I'll have two paid for cars and lots of $$ back in my pocket -- all to knock out the next debt which is sitting around $2800. By year's end, I should have this one and possibly the next one paid off, freeing up an additional $500 or so in cash flow. I have to say, it feels good getting traction on this stuff :). Just keep at it, and you'll hit your goals.

Fun With Stimulus

I just got my first paycheck containing our tax cuts. Yes ladies and gets, I'm now the proud recipient of a whopping $33 more dollars a paycheck. Seriously? That's almost not worth the effort of updating Quicken and re-doing budgets. But hey, I'll take what I can get considering how we are going to be screwed later with other hidden taxes.

Things have been a bit rough around the house lately. We still have medical bills trickling in, so my monthly budget is still getting beat down. That, coupled with Terra not working anymore has made things tough. The extra $33 helps, but still doesn't mitigate the problem, just makes it a bit less of a problem.

I've actually been trying a lot harder these days to pick up side work, and finally landed a decent one last night. It involved making a co-op website for 2-4 companies so I think it will probably be a pretty stable gig worth a decent amount of billable hours. I'm going to be billing it out in chunks to hopefully help with the cash flow nightmare I keep getting caught in.

I did realize last night that I probably need to look into quarterly taxes now as well. Before, my side stuff really didn't amount to much and when I turned it in, I was never penalized. This job though, could be worth enough that I might get fined if I don't turn in some sort of taxes on it. I haven't ever had to do something like this before, so I'm not quite sure where to turn. Looks like it may be time to consult one of Dave's ELPs to figure out what to do :).

Anyhow, that's what we've been doing lately -- treading water. My main problem now is time. Working full time, and doing this side stuff is very taxing. I still have some other projects I want to do, but they won't necessarily be bringing in a lot of cash right away. Gotta concentrate my efforts on what will pay the most, even though they aren't on the top of my "this would be cool/fun" list.

Negotiation Works Wonders

Today I actually accomplished something pretty nifty. I had two separate bills come in from a hospital a month apart. I had set up 3 month payments on the first bill before the second came in (and was three times the first). I managed to get them to combine the two bills AND reset the three months for the new amount. Also, the way it sounded, I could have pushed the payments off a month if I really needed to.

One other minor accomplishment of late was getting the Bank of America to reset my payment date of a loan so that it was in the end of the month. Our bills were WAY too front-loaded on the month to be comfortable (had the budget right, but cashflow was never there). It will take a couple billing cycles to change (a complete crock), but at least they changed it.

The moral of the story? It never hurts to ask I guess. I never really did this sort of thing before because I think I was a bit ashamed to ask for help. The more I'm dealing with this stuff, the more I'm wanting to ask for terms to be different and things of that nature.

Tis the Season

With the holidays approaching, some of you may be thinking ahead to all of the fun things you are going to buy, or perhaps the credit card bills you will be left with after things are over. Being a tech junkie myself, I've been greatly tempted by some of the gadget Black Friday deals. So far, I've been able to show some restraint, and my plan for the shopping season should help me continue that trend.

I've decided to do a wholly cash Christmas this year. Sure, it won't be quite as extravagant as previous years, but I'll also not have any after Christmas buyers remorse when those bills start to show up. For friends and family, we are going to do a very small card/candy type of deal saving the bulk of the money for the girls. We're even not really doing anything for each other this year either (our iPhones were our present this year). Although, I am hoping that we'll get enough cash from family for me to go buy a toy of my own :).

We did pretty much the same thing last year and people in the family didn't really complain about it (which is the common fear I hear from people). This year, we actually have a higher budget due to the full year of planning.

Here's to a cash only Christmas and continuing on the debt snowball! Just think of what I'll be able to do next year!