New Year.

Debts to Pay	January 9, 2019
Credit Cards	2,337.81
F	2,592.71
A	3,572.49
C	4,567.19
C. Car Loan	5,611.61
P	5,265.60
P. Car Loan	7,225.59
E	8,419.87
G	8,892.98
Total	50,685.85

Amount Paid Off This Week: $-1773.01
*Current chart shows adjustments for interest, pay downs, and pay offs.*

One of these days, I will be more consistent with how often I share posts. It has been a hectic few months. We have been adjusting to my husband’s new job, I have had a ton of work projects, we have spent a lot of time with our family, and we just got past all the year-end holidays. It’s been a busy season of life for our little crew. We still don’t have a home of our own, although we did buy a small piece of land (with cash!) and broke ground on it a few months ago. It’s been too cold to actually start foundation work, but hopefully we can do that soon.

Our motivation to pay off debts has waned. Between not having major bills associated with owning a home and not being sure how much money we are making each month, we haven’t kept a good eye on our budget. At the risk of being cliché, we decided to start fresh on budgeting during the New Year.

Our new budget is somewhat stressful. My husband and felt it was time to start acting as though we were homeowners and start saving back money as though we were paying bills. What this looks like in our budget is we have lines for mortgage, electric, water, etc and rather than paying them to a company, we pay them to our savings account. The goal is to not only save back money for when we do actually have a home, but to also build our savings account to allow us to put up a larger down payment and improve our debt to income ration. Another perk of doing this is that we will hopefully get into the habit of using our money for our needs first versus our wants.

We may not be able to save back exactly what we budget for these “bills” each month. Our income is a little dicey right now and it may not be feasible for us. But something is better than nothing, and we all have to start somewhere. I’m looking forward to 2019. We are only 9 days in and it is already shaping up to be lovelier than last year. We may have a huge debt load still, but we have a plan. Here’s to accomplishing goals!

--chloe.

Denied.

Debts to Pay	September 5, 2018
Credit Card	1237.42
F	2,752.71
B	0.00
A	3,517.61
C	4,501.79
C. Car Loan	6,502.80
P	5,606.69
P. Car Loan	7,670.00
E	8,329.98
G	8,794.84
Total	48,912.84

Amount Paid Off This Week: $-3439.05
*Current chart shows adjustments for interest, pay downs, and pay offs.*

This week…YIKES.  It was kind of a weird week for us as a family.  First off, I have been on vacation from work since the last week of August, so I’ve been resting and recharging for nearly two weeks.  It was good for my soul and I got to take two different trips during that time, which was even better!  Second, my husband started his new job, and because of this, we had to buy another vehicle.  I could practically hear our savings account groan, but it was a necessity.  Third, we were denied pre-approval for a mortgage loan.  Again, major ouch.  This is what I want to talk about today.

As I mentioned in previous posts and in the above paragraph, my husband started his new job this week.  He is super excited to be selling life insurance and has already done amazingly in his first few days!  But because of the type of work he is doing, he is now technically self-employed.  This has its perks, but in regards to qualifying for major loans (i.e. mortgage loan), we are pretty much marooned.  I’m not sure how it works in other states, but in ours, if you are self-employed, you must have two years’ worth of income in order for banks to even consider looking at giving you financing.  So although my husband will be making a steady income, and most likely more than he made at his previous job, he will not have a W-2 or a paystub to prove he is making this money.

After we found out we were denied for a mortgage loan, we panicked (actually it was just me because my husband never freaks out ever).  We were told that based on my income and our debt load, we would not qualify for anything at all.  Now if I made more money, or we had few debts, it would be a different story.  Mind you, we have plenty of cash in the bank and are able to pay a sizeable down payment.  But those aren’t the numbers that are considered unfortunately.  So we decided to take a hit to our savings and pay off some of our student loans.  We both paid off our loan groups with the highest percent of interest, totaling about $4200 between the two of us.  Huge.  OUCH.

While it made me sick to my stomach to spend that much money in a week, and on paper, it looks like we have nothing to show for it, I know that we will be thankful in the long run to have our student debt paid off faster.  We are exceedingly grateful to have found a wonderful car for my husband that we are able to afford easily.  So if we aren’t able to qualify for a mortgage just yet, at least we have my parents who are still letting us stay with them until we figure life out. 

Life has thrown a lot of curveballs at our little family in the last year and a half.  We’ve had to overcome a lot and grow up more than we could have imagined.  Sure, things are crazy stressful.  But maybe we don’t need a mortgage and other bills right now.  Maybe we just need to focus on saving our money, paying off our debts, and being a family.  And honestly, I’m not sure I would want it any other way right now.

--chloe.