Debt Update 12/13

I missed updating last time. Things got somewhat confusing for the end of the year because we were able to change our FSA withholding right at the end to cover some of the extra medical expenses. Since I knew we'd end up carrying some expenses on the credit card I focused on getting rid of the zero interest card instead.

Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card - currently about 2k
Pay off zero interest card #2 1,253
Pay off undergrad 1,745.56
Pay off Bar Loan #1 8,756
Pay off Bar Loan #2 8,747

Here's my end of the year plan:
11/24 - put extra on cc
Enjoy Christmas!

The plan for next year is a little different because our insurance will have a $2,500 deductible, so we'll pay out of pocket for that and then have no co-pays for the rest of the year. We'll have another $2,500 withheld and put into an HSA so that we'll have it saved for 2017 at the start of that year.

Here's my new plan up to May 2016:
1/7 - pay $ for medical expenses, pay down CC
1/21 - pay cash for medical expenses, pay down CC
2/4 - pay 1k on Bar loan
2/18 - pay 1k on Bar loan
3/3 - pay 1k on Bar loan
3/17 - pay 1k on Bar loan, pay 300 on undergrad
3/31 - pay 1k on Bar loan
4/14 - pay 1k on Bar loan
Use tax return to pay off remainder of Bar loan #1!
4/28 do something fun for Stella's birthday!


Expenses to plan for:
Disney - plane and package bought, just need incidentals
Gallbladder surgery co-pay- 250
New tires for van - 200

Debt Update 11/15

I changed up the plan again, but we are still plugging along. We had a modest birthday party for Henry/Open house for people to meet the baby, so spent a little on that. We also bought our plane tickets for Disney because they were pretty cheap. Here's the updated balances:

Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card 662 Paid off but we used this card to purchase plane tix, will have about 1K balance until next paycheck
Pay off zero interest card #2 1,253
Pay off undergrad 1,780
Pay off Bar Loan #1 8,809
Pay off Bar Loan #2 8,800

Here's my continued pay-off plan from now until Christmas:

11/26 - put 1,000 on credit card to pay for Disney plane tickets

12/10 - Pay 1,253 to pay off zero interest card

12/24 - pay off hospital bills and use anything left over to reduce undergrad loan

In other financial minutia, we get to change our fsa withholding after having Willoughby, so we can adjust it to cover all of our extra co-pays and hospital bills with pre-tax dollars.

Debt Update 10/31

We ended up deciding not to put an offer on the second house, but rather wait and see if something better comes along.

In the meantime we are plowing through debt and it couldn't feel better!

Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card 662
Pay off zero interest card #2 2,653
Pay off undergrad 1,824
Pay off Bar Loan #1 8,865
Pay off Bar Loan #2 8,857

Here's my continued pay-off plan from now until Christmas:

11/12 - pay 1,100 on zero interest card
          - put 300 on cc

Use expected check from Greg's old practice (1,600) to pay off remaining balance of zero interest card.

11/26 - put 1,000 on undergrad
          - put 300 on cc

12/10 - buy plane tickets for Disney (1000?)

12/24 - pay off hospital bill (500) and any leftover balances on cc's

House Search and Debt Update 10/15

The first offer we put on a house was rejected and at this point it looks like we were outbid. However, the property has been under contract before and the deal fell through so we're not totally giving up on that house. In the meantime, we're looking at other houses.


Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card 1,542
Pay off zero interest card #2 2,700
Pay off undergrad 1,824
Pay off Bar Loan #1 8,865
Pay off Bar Loan #2 8,857

Here's my continued pay-off plan from now until Christmas:

10/29 - pay 1,000 on card
 find additional savings somewhere else to really pay off cc?

11/12 - pay 1,100 on zero interest card

Use expected check from Greg's old practice (1,600) to pay off remaining balance of zero interest card.

11/26 - put 1,000 on undergrad

12/10 - buy plane tickets for Disney (1000?)

12/24 - pay off hospital bill (500) and any leftover balances on cc's

At this point all we will have on this round one list is about $750 left on my undergrad loan, and just over $17K on our bar loans. If we end up closing on a house around this time, we'd just continue to pay minimum payments on these. If we still don't have a mortgage, the next phase would involve paying off the bar loans, hopefully about 2K/month, with our tax return also going toward the debt reduction. Under this plan we'd be done with the bar loans by June or July 2016.

Debt Update 10/3/15

 We are putting an initial offer on a house!! That said, we're not expecting our first offer to be accepted. Because it's a bank-owned property it will probably take a very long time to find out the offer's been rejected. Still, we are extremely excited and nervous. Anyway, without further ado, here's my update:

Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card 2,259
Pay off zero interest card #2 2,700
Pay off undergrad 1,824
Pay off Bar Loan #1 8,865
Pay off Bar Loan #2 8,857

Here's my continued pay-off plan for October:
10/15 - pay 1,000 on card
10/29 - pay 1,000 on card
Use expected check from Greg's old practice (1,600) to pay off remaining balance and to pay for  our hospital co-pay (500), put remainder of that money toward our plane tickets for our vacation in January.

Debt Update and House Hunting News

Man plans and God laughs. But seriously, it seems like every time I have this money thing figured out, something unexpected comes along to change the plan. My debt pay-off goals have been going well, but we may have to switch gears soon, because we are considering putting an offer on a house much sooner than planned.

Basically, we started looking for a home recently, because we figured by the time we absolutely could no longer fit into our apartment we might be able to find something suitable that we could afford. We were assuming it would take many months to find anything in our budget. Well, lo and behold, we did find a foreclosure in a good location, with some renovation needs that might work. So we had a contractor come in to check out what needs to be done last week, and are now waiting for the bid to decided whether or not to make an offer.

Even after we found the house, we were not thinking about moving this quickly, because we assumed it would take a few months to come up with our down payment, but my family generously offered to help us with the down payment!

We also have a friend who is a mortgage broker, and he made the process of getting approved way simpler than we were expecting. So...

For now my financial goals are the same, but I do think we may have to be flexible if this house works out. For instance, if we end up refinancing after the construction is completed (this has been recommended to us), we would likely fold some of our student loans into the mortgage and have a lower interest rate for them.

For now, here is an update on the debt progress:

Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card 3,180
Pay off zero interest card #2 2700
Pay off undergrad 1,865
Pay off Bar Loan #1 8,934
Pay off Bar Loan #2 8,926

Here's my continued pay-off plan for October:
10/1 - pay 1,000 on card
10/15 - pay 1,000 on card
Use expected check from Greg's old practice (1,600) to pay off remaining balance and to pay for some of our hospital co-pay (500).

Debt Progress 9/7/15

Goal one is met! This week I paid off the first zero interest card. We had a couple of set-backs this month, one being that a friend of mine passed away suddenly and I decided to travel out-of-state for the funeral. While it was hard to have to use a credit card when I'm trying so hard to get rid of them, I also feel like this is why I have a credit card at this point, for the really unexpected stuff. Some day I will have a little savings account to buffer our expenses and won't need them anymore (fingers crossed).

Without further adeiu, here is my updated goals list:

Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card 4000
Pay off zero interest card #2 2700
Pay off undergrad 1900
Pay off Bar Loan #1 9000
Pay off Bar Loan #2 9000

As you can see, my "emergency" credit card did go up this month :( However, with my current plan I may be able to eliminate that next card before the baby gets here! Here's a general plan:
9/17 - pay 1,000 on card
10/1 - pay 1,000 on card
10/15 - pay 1,000 on card
Use expected check from Greg's old practice (1,600) to pay off remaining balance and to pay for our hospital co-pay (500).

I'm really hoping and praying that by Halloween, we will have a beautiful, healthy baby girl, Greg will have passed his next exam, and we will have one more goal crossed off our list!

Budget Breakdown and Debt Confession

I'm putting my budget out here for a couple of reasons. One, I'm very curious about other people's budgets and I love when I find a post that's honest and that includes specific numbers. Two, over the past couple of years I've managed to pay off about 25K in debt, but I don't really have a record of it and I think it will be nice in the future to be able to look back and see how far we've come.

In order to pay down debt our family of 4 (almost 5) is living in a two-bedroom apartment in a house that belongs to my family, which is why you don't see typical housing expenses on here and why we are able to live with one income in a very HCOL area.

Income after taxes:
Bi-weekly paycheck 2,155
Residual payments from law practice conservatively 100/month
Monthly income approximately 4,400

Expenses:

Fixed
Car Payment #1 360
Car Payment #2 300
Ins. 120 (Life, Car, and Renter's)
Bar Loan #1 105
Bar Loan #2 105
Undergrad Loan 100
Netflix 12
Homeschool Website 6
Subtotal 1,100

Variable
Speech Co-pays 80
OT Co-pays 160
Social Skills class 80
Gas 250
Groceries 400
Other 500 (Clothes, eating out, entertainment, unexpected stuff)
Haircuts 25
Subtotal 1,495


Goals for Debt Payoff:
Pay off zero interest card #1 1000
Pay off credit card 3200
Pay off zero interest card #2 2700
Pay off undergrad 2000
Pay off Bar Loan #1 9000
Pay off Bar Loan #2 9000


Debts I Can Live With for Now:
Van 12,000
Car 17,000
Law School Loans 250K? (On income based repayment plan with 25 year cap, will likely never truly pay off until 20 years from now).

Since I last blogged...

- My husband finally had enough of the law, and so we made a plan for him to change careers. He took two actuary exams, did an internship at an insurance company while still running his law practice, and finally accepted a full time position as an analyst. We now have health insurance, a 401(k), and a predictable paycheck every two weeks. - We prayed for a third baby, and I'm two months away from having another sweet baby girl :) At night I think about what to name her. - We took Henry out of state and had him evaluated by a team of child specialists. He was diagnosed with autism. If it was two years ago they would have called it Asperger's, but that's not a thing anymore, so everyone is on the spectrum now. - Over the summer we spent a lot of time finding and going to services for Henry. He does speech, occupational therapy, social skills classes, swimming and therapeutic horseback riding. He took piano lessons for most of the summer but is taking a break now.I would like to find a behavioral therapist next. - Now that we have a steady income, we've been trying to drop debt and save to buy a house. It is depressingly hard for a family with one income to buy a house in NJ. I so wish homeschoolers could opt out of property taxes or at least get a tax break for homeschool stuff. - Greg took and passed a third exam this summer, and decided that he would try for one more this year. The test he is currently studying for is Oct. 30th, exactly one week after I'm scheduled to have a C-section.