Budget. Save. Pay Debt.

In my previous post, I wrote about why Fabian and I started saving and paying off our credit cards.

Now, I am going to write a little about how we did it.

Before Benaiah was born in May 2013, we knew we wanted to have a savings account for emergencies only.  We sold our beater car for $750 and our Motorcycle for $1000. We then became a one car family.  For some reason, $1700 disappeared in the span of 4 months.  I have no idea where this money went. As of right now, I can't think of any emergency that came up for that money to have disappeared. We were spending atrociously and in the end had nothing to show for it. Why do we do this to ourselves?!

I blame it on not budgeting appropriately.

Budget

Getting our budget down took us awhile. In fact, we finally got it down to an art last month. In other words, doing a budget took us 6 months to figure out.   The reasoning behind this is that a third of our income comes from commission. Most beginner budgeters (without commission) take 3 months to whip their budget into shape.  (I will be writing a blog post solely on Budgeting soon.)

We cut the non-nescessities. These included, Netflix, Hulu, gym memberships, eating out, and retail therapy (that was hard).  We cut Starbucks down a lot.  I know what your thinking, "poor Fabian". Stop it right now. Ha!

We severed these above items and got strict on our spending.

Side Note: I've lost almost 20 pounds without a gym. It can be done y'all. 

Running at the park (for free) with the family.
These boys are too amazing.

Save a $1000

In my last blog, I explained a little why savings is so important.  A $1000 should cover most emergencies that come up.  We haven't used our emergency fund since we made it.  Hopefully, it stays that way!

We lived as minimally as possible.  In order to save, we lived in a one bedroom apartment on the third floor with a newborn for 8 months.  I do not recommend this, but our rent was "cheap" and our electric bill was $50 a month. As mentioned above, we had 1 car for 8 months. (That was SO hard.)

Any extra money that came our way we saved it!

I honestly can say how much $1000 will change the way you view life. Peace. Peace. Peace.

Side Note: As recommend per Mr. Ramsey, if you make $20,000 a year, a $500 starter emergency fund is sufficient. 

Save.

Learn the difference between "need" and "want".

Do it people. Stop eating out.  I bet in two months that all the money you spent on eating out equals the amount you could have put in an emergency fund. At least that was our problem.  And we were broke y'all!

Pay Debt

We have paid off $9, 210.

Like above, we budgeted and cut expenses. I am telling you it's all about the budget.  BUDGET.
I graduated from College in December 2014. I used a little bit of my graduation money for some much needed clothes shopping.  The rest of the money was put toward the debt.  Any Christmas money we received, we put it toward the debt.  With our tax return, we purchased a used car and put the rest of the money toward the debt. Are you understanding the picture we painted for ourselves?

We sacrificed and said no.  We do not want to be slaves to any company or government that we owe money to.

Fabian started working extra jobs here and there to pay off more debt.  He did some computer consulting, preaching, and stage design.  Sure, I missed him so much when he was out with the 1 car. I was alone with a baby who didn't seem to stop crying. However, we were and are getting closer and closer to our goal.  Those moments seem so minimal compared to the freedom we are starting to feel.

We started beating the credit cards to the ground. Have you ever looked at your credit card statement and seen the interest rates?! Again, why do we do this to ourselves?! Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. Don't even get me started on car payments... Yikes.  Every time you drive your newer car with car payments, you should just throw money out of the window. Because in all actuality, that's what's happening.  We are wasting money with these dumb car payments.

We still have a car payment.  Shoot me now. We owe $8,400. Our Corolla is worth $8,000.  We've been paying on it for two and a half years. That totals $10,500. So in the end we will pay almost $20,000 for a car that is now worth $8k. Seems legit.  #sarcasm

We now have a paid for 2001 Honda CRV with 150k miles on it. We purchased it for $3900.  Her driver side window doesn't roll down and she has sun damage.  However, she drives better than our 2010 Corolla because she actually belongs to us.

I never feel bad for people with "ghetto" cars. I'm jealous of them because most of the time their car actually belongs to them.

That Corolla will be officially ours in December when we pay it off. We will have the title in hand and be one step closer to freedom.

And then on to the student loans. Right now this totals $36,000. Lawd help us.

This journey isn't easy nor short, but I know it will be worth it.

All my love,
Leah

Have any questions? Use the comment section on my blog, Facebook, or Instagram. I would be glad to answer them. I love hearing feedback from y'all.

Here is a budget form from Dave Ramsey's website. This is what we use to help us keep track of  what we need to budget for.  

https://www.daveramsey.com/media/pdf/fpu_qbudget.pdf

Look for my Budgeting blog next! 


Credit Card Picture from: http://www.quizzle.com/blog/2009/10/10-common-credit-report-credit-score-myths/