making progress
Newsflash: I don’t have to get everything done in one day. Just a tiny bit everyday is better than a whole lot all in one day. My checkbook is balanced. The household online bill pay is mostly set up. The little details are starting to come together, and when I get them out of the way, I can focus more on the big picture – paycheck calculators, federal withholding, loan balance killing, credit score guarding…
I feel much better than I did the other day. I don’t have any more time than I had, I’m just using the time I do have more wisely (and procrastinating less).
management
So… I haven’t done anything but spend money since my last few posts. No budget, no checkbook balancing, nothing. I’ve been so busy! This is going to be harder than I thought…
Apparently time management is as important to money management as money management.
I have to make the time to manage the money, or it’s just like letting a lawn go crazy without ever trimming it. I’m feeling like my “money lawn” is looking really chaotic right now. It’s a new year, and I have new priorities that need to be taken care of. I can’t just let things go wild around here. I am the CFO of the household. If I don’t pay attention, and Mister Ant is trusting me to keep up with our business, then things can go bad. Really bad.
I got a call from my aunt today about refinancing her mortgage – she had a question about how it might work. I could tell from our conversation that she is the CFO of her household, too. She asked a really good question about the bank’s motivation for offering the refinance: “What’s in it for them?” I was inspired by the thought and care that she is putting into finding out whether the refinance makes sense for her family.
I’m going to get to work. I’ll do a little bit right now, and the full monty over the weekend.
glad to be able to give
I gave to the Haiti relief effort. I hope you give too. I tried giving by text – “Haiti” to 90999 – to the American Red Cross. Seems to have worked just fine. You can give more than once, if you want. I find that I have the best of intentions sometimes, but life distracts me from giving. This time, it was as simple as sending a text. I’m glad to be able to give.
watch out for the drugstore
I didn’t realize how liberal I had become about spending my money until I had a hard time talking myself out of the drugstore last night. I only went in for one thing I needed, and the next thing I know, I was actually browsing all over the store. And then something in my head said, Sis, look at what you are doing. Get what you came for, and get the heck outta here! Can I tell you, it was SO HARD! Reining it in was so much easier when I was a) broke, or b) emotionally invested in a goal.
I gotta get my emotions back into this!
algebra?
Mister Ant and I are putting our finances together. For us, that means checking our credit reports, figuring out how a joint account could benefit us, and working together on debt reduction (mostly student loans and the mortgage) and savings for long-term goals. I actually had to do some algebra! We now know what percentage from our respective checks is enough to take care of household expenses. It’s a different dollar amount for each of us, because we have different salaries, but it’s the same percentage, so neither of us gets burdened more than the other – or in other words, a fifth is a fifth, a quarter is a quarter, or a third is a third for either of us. Our percentage is 32%. This means that 1/3 of our collective net monthly income pays all the household bills, so if each of us put 32% of our income in a joint account, it would cover things like the mortgage, household incidentals, utilities, entertainment, etc. This would leave us with 2/3 of our net monthly income to divvy up for savings, debt reduction, and a spending allowance.
That’s just the beginning, though. We should also have to figure out a percentage for joint savings goals, once we nail down a joint debt reduction plan. The days of splitting bills like roommates are over. Soon, our joint checking account will be paying our bills, instead of one of us reimbursing the other for their share of paid bills. But this takes a while, with all the other things we’re busy with to distract us. There’s lots of scribbling, and lots of communicating. But it will all be worth it. Our opinion is that money should be the last thing we have to worry or argue about as a married couple if we’re proactive and smart about our money management.
Mister Ant is happy I’m blogging again. He wanted me to tell you guys Hi!
*sigh* happy new year
Oh the horror!
The triumphant spirit I had this time last year has given way to contrition this year. If I don’t want to feel like this in 2011, some things are going to have to change.
I made a deal with myself that I could keep my head in the sand until the end of December. I allowed myself to turn a blind eye to the hard numbers, buy whatever Christmas presents I wanted, eat lunch out if I felt like it, ignore contributing to my retirement account or my stock purchases, ignore my debt reduction goals… I did all of that. I am done with that. This has been such a mediocre year! I feel like I haven’t moved forward and like I’ve abandoned my goals.
I’ve been so busy with my new work hours and other activities, and I used that as an excuse to slack off on my diligence with checking the numbers and blogging about my progress or the lack thereof. I even finished 2009 with credit card debt because of a house improvement and a very expensive engagement gift I wanted to buy.
Which brings me to my newest motivation – marriage and babies are only as imminent as my (our) ability to handle our money correctly and progressively. I have a renewed commitment to debt reduction. The credit card debt will be gone by the end of the month. The medical bills will be gone by June. The car note will be gone by June 2011, and only because we have to save for our ceremony, since we will not incur debt for it. by June 2011 – mark my words – my only debt will be the mortgage and the student loans, provided the Lord helps us to avoid emergencies.
Regarding savings, I have found that it’s harder to keep the money I save. This year, I wound up spending what I saved so that I can avoid using credit cards and avoid raiding the savings I had already. I’m not completely uncomfortable with this, but I would like to increase my savings. So, I’m counting on the 7.6% raise I got at the end of the year and the 401K program at work, which kicks in for me in a few months, to help me feel like I’m making saving progress.
My challenges to debt reduction and savings will be home decorations (we’ve made improvements/repairs but hardly any decorations) and the wedding ceremony. I hope to do everything for the cheapest prices we can get, and I’m willing to compromise on those things in order to achieve the goals I want. I have to use better time management and abandon my excuses if I want to do that! So here goes…
Oh and one more thing, I told myself that I would only update the value of my home once a year, so there it is. My actual net worth progress has been kind of stagnant, and the bump seen this month is due primarily to the increase in the market value of the house (which I listed conservatively last year).
