20 for 2020 September Check-In Part 2

 

Welcome back to installment 2 of September’s 20 for 2020 update. In my last post I reviewed the first 10 goals of our 20 for 2020. Here’s how we are doing on the last 10…

1.       Open, and use, a Health Savings Account for The Husband’s braces.

Pass: This is done! The Husband’s company loads all the money at once, even though it is only taken from his paycheck each pay period. The braces are paid for in full (we got a 5% discount for paying all at once) and The Husband loaded a little extra money to pay for doctor’s appointments throughout the year! We have used this account for other small co-pays and it has been nice to have the money there and not have to figure it in to our budget. This may be something we continue next year, but at a much lower contribution rate.

 

2.       Increase my 403b contributions by $100 sometime during the year.

No progress here: Still no action on this goal.  Planning to do this in September. September is our open enrollment, so I have to make some changes there anyway. This one took a while, but hopefully this month!

 

3.       Increase The Husband’s 401k contributions by 3% by the end of the year.

Pass: With the arrival of August and The Husband’s work-aversary, we have upped his total 401K contributions this year by 3%. He is very close to maxing out his 401k contributions. Next year should do it and then we can start upping my contributions! Currently, The Husband contributes 16% to his 401K with a 3% match from his company. They also give him 6% profit-sharing on the first paycheck of the year. Next year, his contributions will be maxed out and then we will work towards upping my contributions.

 

4.       Have one billing period where I don’t charge ANYTHING (except autopays) on my credit card.

Fail: For whatever reason, this seems impossible to us! Still struggling to do this and the pandemic and quarantining and social distancing are not helping. By necessity we have had to purchase more online which requires us using a credit card.

 

5.       Have a successful “No-Spend” September.

On-track: We’ll see. Now that September is here, we have started our No-Spend month. With my dad’s illness, last year’s No-Spend September was anything but. We are planning for this year to be better!

 

6.       I want to drink the loose-leaf tea I already have and not buy anymore until I am only down to 3 flavors.

Back-On-Track: I bought loose leaf tea once and have since been drinking what we have. I also “shopped” my mom’s cupboards as she is staying with us and have been drinking some of her flavors, but I didn’t buy any more. This is still the same. We have bought tea bags but no loose tea.

7.       Add all our “subscriptions” to our monthly budget.

Pass: All done! Going forward, all our “subscriptions” or monthly recurring charges are an item line on our monthly budget sheet.

 

8.       Don’t spend any money, out of pocket, on supplies for my classroom. (This does not include lessons I might choose to purchase.)

On-track-ish: This one suddenly got much easier! You don’t need to supply your classroom if you aren’t in it! I have bought some curriculum from Teachers Pay Teachers and I did buy some pens and pencils during Back-to-school shopping just because they were so cheap. As I have no students in my classroom, I clearly didn’t need them. They were an impulse buy… Bad Brunette Getting Out of Debt!

 

9.       Keep current (monthly) with what I owe The Kids.

Pass:  The Kids did some more work for us over the last month and I made sure I tallied up what they were owed and paid them all out! We broke it down into savings, spending, and tithing and I am now current with what I owe them! Same… Doing well here!

10.   Check in on my financial goals monthly.

Fail: This should have been easy but I have massively failed here! I’d like to blame the pandemic for this but I really can’t. It gave me more time, not less!

Overall, I’d give myself a B. I am “passing” on 11 of 20 goals, on track with 3 more, “failing” with only 4 of our goals, and due to the pandemic, 2 have become null and void. I’m feeling pretty good about our overall progress. We still have a long way to go but are improving our overall financial situation.

Overall my successes are in mostly the same categories and so are my failures… Must do better. Must put in more effort!

I can’t stress enough the fact that if we are successful with these goals, we will definitely be creating a firmer financial foundation!

Hoping!

 

I am dying for my credit card statement to close!!!

I’m pretty sure we are going to be under $13000 when it closes, but I obviously won’t know for sure until it closes!

Two more days I think!

It’s so great to be making progress!

20 for 2020 September Check-In Part 1

 One of my intentions for this year is to check in on my 2020 financial goals monthly! Although I am horrible at finances, one thing I have learned over our last 10 years of debt, is that when I pay better attention to our finances, our finances do better...

I still believe that if these 20 financial goals are met, we will drastically improve our financial situation by the end of the year! In all honesty, even if only some of these goals are met, we will be in a better place than we were when this year started. Please wish us luck as we try to do better and be better!

It’s actually been several months since I checked in on my goals… since June I think! Eeeek! I haven’t forgotten about them, I just haven’t blogged. Let’s see where we stand.

 

1.       Get credit card debt below $10000. This has been a monkey on my back for way too long!

Pass-ish: We are making progress. I would say we are on-track-ish. I don’t know if we will make it to under $10000 by the end of the year, but we did decrease our debt. It’s going in the right direction. The last couple months haven’t seen much progress, but we haven’t increased our debt, so I will call it a win.

 

2.       Track our family spending every other month of the year.

Fail: Quite honestly, life threw us several curve balls in the last month so tracking my spending has been the least of my worries. Exactly the same as last time I checked in on my goals! With quarantining and social distancing, tracking our spending has fallen WAY down the list! Our food budget has ballooned! We have nothing to do all day but sit home and eat or try new recipes! I should be tracking this so I know how much we are spending on food, but I’m afraid to look!

 

3.       Increase contributions to envelopes and go “cash only”.

Fail-ish: We have actually met 50% of this goal, but because 50% is an F, I’m giving us a failing grade overall. We did increase envelope contributions, but we did not go cash only. We are still not cash only, but we are paying more in cash and charging less. Working on it… Same as last month. However, again, quarantining has lent itself to online shopping by necessity. Groceries and gas we are still using cash, but right now everything else is credit.

4.       Increase Christmas savings.

Pass: We increased from $200 per month to $300 per month. I still don’t know if it’s enough, but it is an increase of 50%. We are almost done Christmas shopping so I’m feeling optimistic. In August, over a 4 day period, I spent over $800 on Christmas gifts; it was more money than we had in the envelope. I actually had to borrow from our “stimulus” envelope and am paying it back in 4 monthly installments. However, I’m still calling this a win! The bigger test will be when it gets closer to October and November and we see where we are!

 

5.       Church Tithing. My goal is to donate $300 EVERY. SINGLE. MONTH.

Pass: So far so good. We donated $300 in January, February, March, April, May, June, July, and August. (We barely made August. I didn’t send out tithe until August 31, but it was still in August.) We have already budgeted the money for the rest of the year, but we need to follow through, which is not always our strong suit. (It’s very important to us to remember to give even amidst all this struggle because the church still has bills that need to be paid, salaries that need to be paid, and community services that they want to provide.)

 

6.       Pay off car!

PASS: I’m very pleased to say that we paid our last car payment and already received our pink slip! This goal is fully completed and met!

 

7.       Once The Husband’s car is paid off, put $345 payment into savings each month towards a new car fund.

Pass:  So far, so good. In every month since our last payment, I have made sure to deposit the “car payment” into our savings. We are seeing good growth in our savings account!

 

8.       Save $5000 above and beyond my “normal savings” or any car savings.

Pass:  We have met this goal! And continue to add to it! I know our refinance helped but we still met the goal!

9.       Meal plan 8 months out of the year.

Null and void:  Due to a world-wide pandemic, this goal got pushed to the wayside. We have been nothing but home for the last six months so meal planning hasn’t been a priority. I may revisit this goal next year but it all depends on the state of the world, literall.

10.   Assuming I can meet all of the above goals, my last goal would be to increase my savings rate.

Pass: I would actually give us a pass on this because we are putting our regular amount in savings plus working on completing a $5000 challenge, plus we put half of our unexpected money towards savings. We have also increased our long term savings rates by increasing our retirement contributions.

As I think these posts are only going to get longer as the year progresses, I have decided to split them up into two posts. I will publish them during the same week but even half of them are a lot to get through!

 

No Spend Update

 

We spent some money last weekend. Not a ton, but probably more than we should have. The only plus side here being that it was all on food. We spent $10 on donuts, definitely an extra, but we did pay for it out of our food budget for the month, so technically allowed.

As it was Labor Day weekend, we had my sister and her family over for swimming and dinner, so we sent The Kids to the grocery store to pick up some stuff. That added another $26,77 to our tally for the month. That leaves us with $285.66 left to spend out of our $500 budget.

We are not in the danger zone quite yet, but we are inching towards it. We will have to be careful of our spending for the rest of the month to ensure that we have a successful No Spend September.

We are over a third of the way through the month, but we are almost through half of our money for the month. I don't know how successful we are going to be, but we are going to track it and see how it all falls out.

Tomorrow actually brings another Costco trip where we need a lot: milk, fruits and vegetables, eggs, chicken... and that's just what I can think of off the top of my head. 

If we can have $75 left over after our shopping trip, we have a chance of meeting our budget goals, but only if we are diligent!

No Spend September

 Hi again.

I know it's been a while, but I have been busy. Distance learning is no joke! I went back to school in the beginning of August and our district is requiring us to teach from our classroom. I actually like it as there are way fewer distractions and all my "stuff" is in my room. That being said, I am so tired and so busy! Teaching like this is not what I signed up for and a lot of work! Even though I'm in my 15th year of teaching, it feels like it's my first year and I'm having to create and adapt curriculum like never before.

Okay, rant over.

We are doing our No Spend September challenge again. This is technically year 9, but last year wasn't very successful.

A successful No Spend September is one of my 20 for 2020 financial goals. With the whole pandemic thing, some of my goals have totally fallen by the wayside. However, I'm thinking the pandemic might actually help No Spend September because we can't really go anywhere or do anything, so we don't have a lot of opportunities to spend money.

Just as in years past, we are going to try to only buy food, gas, and bills.

Our normal grocery budget is $600, but for the month of September, we try to only spend $500. I know it's not a big difference, but every bit helps.

Because of the face covering requirements due to Covid-19, I am not doing very much shopping. The Husband does almost all of our grocery shopping now. He is not as "frugal" as I am. In September, I tend to stick to the grocery list and he's a little more loosey-goosey. However, the reality is that we will eat whatever food we buy regardless of how much money we spend so it's won't be a waste.

On the first of the month, The Husband mad a trip to Costco. He spend $177.57, a good chunk of our budget for the first of the month, but he did buy 10 gallons of milk and a bunch of fruits and vegetables so we should be pretty good on those fronts for about 10 days or so.

With the pandemic, we have definitely been eating at more more and being more adventurous in our cooking, which often translates to more expensive; but it has been good. Hopefully, for the month of September we will stay on budget and not have to spend too much money on anything!

Wish us luck!

July 2020 Goals Check-In Part 1

One of my intentions for this year is to check in on my 2020 financial goals monthly! Although I am horrible at finances, one thing I have learned over our last 10 years of debt, is that when I pay better attention to our finances, our finances do better...

I skipped June and am super late on July... no reason, just Covid and life. Blah, blah, blah.

I still believe that if these 20 financial goals are met, we will drastically improve our financial situation by the end of the year! In all honesty, even if only some of these goals are met, we will be in a better place than we were when this year started. Please wish us luck as we try to do better and be better!

1.       Get credit card debt below $10000. This has been a monkey on my back for way too long!

Pass: We are making great progress here! Getting a refund for our plane tickets put $3000 towards this goal. I actually think we might make it!

2.       Track our family spending every other month of the year.

Fail: Quite honestly, life threw us several curve balls in the last month so tracking my spending has been the least of my worries. Exactly the same as last month! With quarantining and social distancing, tracking our spending has fallen WAY down the list! In one sense, we aren’t spending much money, but in another, very real sense, online shopping is no joke! Also, our food budget has ballooned! We have nothing to do all day but sit home and eat or try new recipes! I should be tracking this so I know how much we are spending on food, but I’m afraid to look!

3.       Increase contributions to envelopes and go “cash only”.

Fail-ish: We have actually met 50% of this goal, but because 50% is an F, I’m giving us a failing grade overall. We did increase envelope contributions, but we did not go cash only. We are still not cash only, but we are paying more in cash and charging less. Working on it… Same as last month. However, again, quarantining has lent itself to online shopping by necessity. Groceries and gas we are still using cash, but right now everything else is credit.

4.       Increase Christmas savings.

Pass: We increased from $200 per month to $300 per month. I still don’t know if it’s enough, but it is an increase of 50%. We have already bought several Christmas presents and I’m happy the money was there to use. So far we are on track but it’s early times yet. Yes! Same! We are over half way done with our Christmas shopping and still have some money in the envelope. I’m definitely calling this a win! The real test will be when it gets closer to October and November and we see where we are!

5.       Church Tithing. My goal is to donate $300 EVERY. SINGLE. MONTH.

Pass: So far so good. We donated $300 in January, February, and March, April, May and June! We have already budgeted the money for the rest of the year, but we need to follow through, which is not always our strong suit. Also, because of social distancing and “shelter-in-place” rules, this could become more difficult because we aren’t actually attending church. I haven't sent July in yet, but we have the money. (It’s very important to us to remember to give even amidst all this struggle because the church still has bills that need to be paid, salaries that need to be paid, and community services that they want to provide.)

6.       Pay off car!

PASS: I’m very pleased to say that we paid our last car payment and already received our pink slip! This goal is fully completed and met!

7.       Once The Husband’s car is paid off, put $345 payment into savings each month towards a new car fund.

Pass:  So far, so good. In the couple of months since our last payment, I have made sure to deposit the “car payment” into our savings. We are seeing good growth in our savings account!

8.       Save $5000 above and beyond my “normal savings” or any car savings.

PASS: We have saved OVER $5000 of additional savings! And it's only July! Many things helped us reach this goal: refunds received from refinancing the house, a Pinterest savings challenge, and our tax refund! I am so happy and so proud of reaching this goal! We are going to continue with the savings challenge and putting our "car payment" away every month. With the uncertainty of the world today, we need to keep growing our savings account.

9.       Meal plan 8 months out of the year.

Fail: This is a hard fail, but it doesn't bother me. We didn't fail because we didn't plan, we failed because of the Corona virus. Because we were home all the time, the need to plan our meals is gone.

10.   Assuming I can meet all of the above goals, my last goal would be to increase my savings rate.

Pass: I would actually give us a pass on this because we are putting our regular amount in savings plus working on completing a $5000 challenge, plus we put half of our unexpected money towards savings. Thinking good thoughts on this one!

As I think these posts are only going to get longer as the year progresses, I have decided to split them up into two posts. I will publish them during the same week but even half of them are a lot to get through!

Camp Refund

I have some good news and some bad news.

First, the bad news... due to Covid-19, The Kids church camp was cancelled.

The good news... due to church camp being cancelled, we got a $1200 refund.

Back in December, we paid, in full, for our kids to go to church camp. They would actually be there right now. It was $600 for each kid. Every year, we "plan" for our kids to go to church camp but we have never sent them before. Something always kept us from actually committing: dance, vacation, life, etc.

This year, we actually committed to The Kids to go to church camp and it ends up being a no-go.

I'm very sad that they aren't able to go to camp, but I'm very happy for the bump to our savings!

$1200 will go a long way towards improving our savings after several different things depleted it!