In June, we paid off another credit card! Whoo Hooo!
Here is where we are in our "Baby Steps"
1. Emergency fund - DONE! August 2007
2. Debt Snowball - working, scheduled to complete by January 2010 but we are working HARD to be done before then...hopefully WAY before then!
It does not seem like we have gone far but when you consider where we were in August 2007 when we took our first class, we have made leaps of progress. We are no longer on the brink of bankruptcy and we see a light at the end of the tunnel and feel more hope than ever before!
We are also going to be saving for a van to replace ours when needed. It is getting old but we are hoping to hold off a little longer...after all...it ONLY has 191,000 miles on it! :) I have mixed feelings about replacing it because it has been such a good van with very few mechanical problems but, as with all things in this life...they don't last forever.
We were coordinators for Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University back during the spring and we are happy to announce the beginning of our second class. We learned a lot in our first session and we're excited to get started again and apply what we learned. This will be our second time "teaching" and our third time "in" the class. We will be starting in late August and finish right before Thanksgiving and the holiday shopping season. Please pray with us that this class will make great changes in the lives of the participants.
Showing posts with label Financial Peace. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Financial Peace. Show all posts
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Can You Survive a "Recession?"
There has been a lot of talk about rather we are or are not in an economic recession. I've seen "recession" defined a hundred times and I'm still simply wondering what matter does it really make.
If our country is in a recession and you have planned for lean times. Are you debt free or close to it? Have you planned for lean times with a fully stocked pantry, a little extra cash "just in case," etc.? Do you work your occupation to the best of your ability and make yourself indispensable to your company? Do you know how to live a frugal lifestyle and actually enjoy it? Well, I believe you will be all right rather a recession hits or not.
After all, what can any of us really do about our national economy? Sure, we can buy "American" or "Made in USA" but other than that, we can only pray we choose wise leaders.
Another thing that will help our national economy is to take care of our personal economy. We can take lessons from those who lived during the depression and apply many of those lessons to our daily lives. I do not believe we should wait until the wolf is at the door to decide to prepare...we must expect him and prepare before he comes huffing and puffing. Those who successfully survived the depression and some who even prospered did so by preparing. Let us take lessons from them. Here are some first steps to take:
1. Establish an emergency fund of at least $1000 (for most)
2. Pay off debt...start with the smallest ones first and roll those payments over to the next one. This is consumer debt such as credit cards, gas cards, car loans, etc.....not the house.
3. Save 3-6 months living expenses - this will be easy once the debt is gone.
4. Invest 15% for retirement
5. Set up college funds.
6. Pay off house early.
7. Build wealth and have fun giving some away.
Do these steps sound familiar? These are the tips lined out by Dave Ramsey of Financial Peace University but most importantly, they work!
So don't loose your head and panic because Chicken Little said the sky is falling....simply get an umbrella and wait for the rain....after all, after the rain is the rainbow.
Have a great day!
Mavis D.
If our country is in a recession and you have planned for lean times. Are you debt free or close to it? Have you planned for lean times with a fully stocked pantry, a little extra cash "just in case," etc.? Do you work your occupation to the best of your ability and make yourself indispensable to your company? Do you know how to live a frugal lifestyle and actually enjoy it? Well, I believe you will be all right rather a recession hits or not.
After all, what can any of us really do about our national economy? Sure, we can buy "American" or "Made in USA" but other than that, we can only pray we choose wise leaders.
Another thing that will help our national economy is to take care of our personal economy. We can take lessons from those who lived during the depression and apply many of those lessons to our daily lives. I do not believe we should wait until the wolf is at the door to decide to prepare...we must expect him and prepare before he comes huffing and puffing. Those who successfully survived the depression and some who even prospered did so by preparing. Let us take lessons from them. Here are some first steps to take:
1. Establish an emergency fund of at least $1000 (for most)
2. Pay off debt...start with the smallest ones first and roll those payments over to the next one. This is consumer debt such as credit cards, gas cards, car loans, etc.....not the house.
3. Save 3-6 months living expenses - this will be easy once the debt is gone.
4. Invest 15% for retirement
5. Set up college funds.
6. Pay off house early.
7. Build wealth and have fun giving some away.
Do these steps sound familiar? These are the tips lined out by Dave Ramsey of Financial Peace University but most importantly, they work!
So don't loose your head and panic because Chicken Little said the sky is falling....simply get an umbrella and wait for the rain....after all, after the rain is the rainbow.
Have a great day!
Mavis D.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Financial Peace - April Update
Everything went smoothly this month except for our grocery budget. I can see a few changes in prices in the local grocery stores especially with wheat products and dairy products. I guess everyone is feeling the pinch. We'll have to tighten this a bit more but we also decided to increase our grocery budget by $100. Part of this increase is due to the fact we are eating a lot healthier. I'm really not sure what a family of 6 should be spending on groceries a month. I should research that a bit...we have two adults, two teen boys and two toddlers. Therefore, if you have ideas how to figure it, I'd love to hear it!
Our debt snowball is rolling a long and gaining some snow along the way. We're making some changes to our leftover credit card bills...mostly switching to lower rates. We're also calling our card companies and requesting lower rates because of our great payment history. Most are willing to lower them...those who aren't usually get culled out. I know...Dave says playing with them will get you bit eventually. However, we have switched one balance to a lower rate card and closed the old account...we're pretty diligent about closing accounts. Some companies just do not want to work with you.
Our Baby Step 1 emergency fund is still healthy...no problems have come up to need it and when there was a small problem, we absorbed it through working it out of our budget.
We've decided to put our stimulus package into a savings to replace our family van. We'll add to it over the next few months and try to find a great deal in the fall when prices are generally lower. Right before Christmas is a great time to buy a used vehicle. :)
That's about it for the update. Have you started your journey to Financial Peace?
Have a great day!
Mavis D.
Our debt snowball is rolling a long and gaining some snow along the way. We're making some changes to our leftover credit card bills...mostly switching to lower rates. We're also calling our card companies and requesting lower rates because of our great payment history. Most are willing to lower them...those who aren't usually get culled out. I know...Dave says playing with them will get you bit eventually. However, we have switched one balance to a lower rate card and closed the old account...we're pretty diligent about closing accounts. Some companies just do not want to work with you.
Our Baby Step 1 emergency fund is still healthy...no problems have come up to need it and when there was a small problem, we absorbed it through working it out of our budget.
We've decided to put our stimulus package into a savings to replace our family van. We'll add to it over the next few months and try to find a great deal in the fall when prices are generally lower. Right before Christmas is a great time to buy a used vehicle. :)
That's about it for the update. Have you started your journey to Financial Peace?
Have a great day!
Mavis D.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Financial Peace - March Update
Well, I've been reading a few other blogs and many who are also doing the Dave Ramsey plan are posting updates. I thought it was a great idea so here is my very first update.
We started our Financial Peace adventure in August 2007. With a mortgage, about $30K in credit card bills and student loans, no savings and no budget it wasn't looking good. However, now I can say that we have baby step 1 completed with our $1000 emergency fund in place, a "sinking fund" that is used for those expenses that come around once or twice a year and we are working on paying off debt using the debt snowball. We have STOPPED using credit cards completely and have paid off two of them. We have one more that will be coming off soon and another that will meet it's death with our "Stimulus package" payment. Things are looking better but it will still take us about 2 and a half years to get those things paid off...less when we use our income tax refunds which we plan to do.
How did we do in March? We stayed pretty close to our grocery budget of $550 per month. This includes stuff like cleaning supplies and paper products. It's difficult with a family of seven and I don't always succeed but we do try hard to save money in that area. This is our most difficult area to control.
All of our other budgeted areas, home maintenance, clothing, personal supplies, entertainment we fine...we had money left in the envelopes and we always let that money carry over to the next month. We let it carry over to the next month because many times we'll save up for things this way or we'll not have anything in that area that month but need more the next month. This is especially true for home maintenance and clothing.
Have you started your journey to Financial Peace? It's a great place to be and we're looking forward to our goal of being debt free!
Have a great day!
Mavis D.
We started our Financial Peace adventure in August 2007. With a mortgage, about $30K in credit card bills and student loans, no savings and no budget it wasn't looking good. However, now I can say that we have baby step 1 completed with our $1000 emergency fund in place, a "sinking fund" that is used for those expenses that come around once or twice a year and we are working on paying off debt using the debt snowball. We have STOPPED using credit cards completely and have paid off two of them. We have one more that will be coming off soon and another that will meet it's death with our "Stimulus package" payment. Things are looking better but it will still take us about 2 and a half years to get those things paid off...less when we use our income tax refunds which we plan to do.
How did we do in March? We stayed pretty close to our grocery budget of $550 per month. This includes stuff like cleaning supplies and paper products. It's difficult with a family of seven and I don't always succeed but we do try hard to save money in that area. This is our most difficult area to control.
All of our other budgeted areas, home maintenance, clothing, personal supplies, entertainment we fine...we had money left in the envelopes and we always let that money carry over to the next month. We let it carry over to the next month because many times we'll save up for things this way or we'll not have anything in that area that month but need more the next month. This is especially true for home maintenance and clothing.
Have you started your journey to Financial Peace? It's a great place to be and we're looking forward to our goal of being debt free!
Have a great day!
Mavis D.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Financial Peace
In August of 2007, we were facing some pretty tough decisions concerning our finances. Ok.....it was bad enough that we were considering bankruptcy. We even had an appointment with an attorney. After the meeting, my husband and I talked for quite some time and decided against it. We would take another route and dig ourselves out of the mess we had made with a little help from a guru.
Dave Ramsey entered our lives....he seemed to be popping up everywhere anyway so we figured we'd take the classes. WOW! It has been an amazing ride! We learned so much during those 13 weeks and now it's been 7 months since our first class. We've built an emergency fund, paid off a few of our debts (working on the rest), started saving for those things that only come once a year like taxes and insurance and the future is looking bright. We're so excited about this new way of life that we've become coordinators for Financial Peace University. Oh, we don't get paid for it in money....our payment comes in knowing that we're helping others escape to freedom.
If you haven't checked out Dave's program then go to www.daveramsey.com and read all about it. Check out one of his books from the library and find a class nearby. It will be the best money you've spent in a long time and I'll keep you posted on OUR progress.
Dave Ramsey entered our lives....he seemed to be popping up everywhere anyway so we figured we'd take the classes. WOW! It has been an amazing ride! We learned so much during those 13 weeks and now it's been 7 months since our first class. We've built an emergency fund, paid off a few of our debts (working on the rest), started saving for those things that only come once a year like taxes and insurance and the future is looking bright. We're so excited about this new way of life that we've become coordinators for Financial Peace University. Oh, we don't get paid for it in money....our payment comes in knowing that we're helping others escape to freedom.
If you haven't checked out Dave's program then go to www.daveramsey.com and read all about it. Check out one of his books from the library and find a class nearby. It will be the best money you've spent in a long time and I'll keep you posted on OUR progress.
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