Time for my monthly assessment of our family’s finances. For those of you who are new readers we followed Dave Ramsey’s plan to get out of debt last year. We have completed baby steps’ 1, 2, and 3.
Financial Goals for 2008
Fully Fund Emergency Fund by 2/1/08
Completed on 1/31/08 YIPEE!!!!!
Blessing Others -
10% of our income goes directly into the giving category. I would like to increase that amount so that we would be able to bless others when we have an opportunity.
Fully Fund Orthodontics for Oldest- Completed and paid for the braces last month in CASH!!!!
Begin saving 10% of income into Roth IRA’s and TSP-
Right now I am putting all our extra money into the IRA’s to get them funded quickly, so we are putting about 16% towards our retirement funds right now.
Begin College Funding for Kids-
On hold until we fully fund the IRA’s for this year.
Begin aggressive savings for house and car-
We still are saving for a bigger vehicle. Currently we are only saving $200 a month for a vehicle. I hope to increase this amount after our IRA’s are fully funded.
Funding all of our expenses for the year-
I think I have finally found a balance for these areas. Many categories were severely over-funded, like clothing, haircuts, kids money. I have cut back in these areas and have increased our funding for the Homeschool Convention.
Vacation Funding -
We have saved over $500 for our family vacation. Our goal is $2000, so we are one quarter of the way there.
Cutting Our Expenses-
Since we have no debt and are saving about one third of our income, I feel like our expenses are pretty reasonable right now.
Groceries-
Last month I met our grocery goal! I was under my grocery budget last month thanks to some free food. I have kept our budget at $575 for another month. We are a family of 8 and groceries covers everything from diapers, to paper products, to milk.
Clothing - We have been continually blessed with beautiful hand-me-downs. This month I hope to clean out the kid’s closets and give away or store the clothes that are too small.
Gifts -
I still haven’t figured out how to slash this category. I joked with my friend that I need to start buying everyone’s gifts at CVS. It’s a possibility!
Finding extra sources of income-
Still working on this one….
Can I say again how great it is to be DEBT FREE!
For those of you who are working towards this goal… you can do it! The sacrifices can be great but it is worth it in the end.
Check out Money Saving Mom for more financial check-ups
The Happy Housewife
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
That was very encouraging. We are completely baby step 3 and are VERY excited.
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We are on baby step #2 and now we have shot back to baby step #1 as my wisdom teeth had to be pulled. Slightly discouraging, but our tax refund is coming soon and we will use that to bring us back up to $1000 in the bank for the GOK fund (God Only Knows)!
Congratulations on being debt-free. Did you guys call the Dave Ramsey show and scream “DEBT-FREE!” on air? My oldest son, age 5, can’t wait to do that! He even asked my mom if she was “saving money so she can be debt-free like Dave Ramsey”. How cute is that? My boys both beg to listen to the archives of the show or the CD’s for Financial Peace University. We are training them YOUNG…lol!
Blessings!
Mrs. Q
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We are working on step 2, but have also been making tons of lifestyle adjustments, so I think we’ll continue to see rapid progress in many areas. We decided not to stop the 401K contributions, as the extra is just eaten up in taxes, nor have we cut back on our 15% giving. I admire your ability to feed a family of 8 on that amount. We are not nearly so frugal there, but eat organic and whole foods which are considerably more expensive than processed. I am looking for ways to pare that down, and will continue to work on finding other areas to earn extra or save money. Your testimony is a great encouragement!
TM
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From one FPU grad to another, way to go!!! That is so awesome that you are doing so phenomenally well! You have just re-energized me in this by sharing your success. Thank you! Best of luck in completing your goals; it sounds like you will be paying cash for something else! Congratulations!
http://xboxwife.blogspot.com/
Thanks for the great recipe idea on my blog!
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