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canyoneer posted:Just don't buy them anything. The kids probably won't notice or care. They won't be emotionally wounded because the Doc McStuffins toy doctor kit was bought for them by someone besides you. For toddlers, you can get away with next to nothing. My older daughter (she is 16) is addicted to Pinterest, and she found the coolest gift ever for my younger daughter's 4th birthday. She took a bunch of balloons, put little gifts in them (a dollar, a toy ring, small candies, use your imagination), then blew them up and put them in a giant box. At the party, the little one opened the box, and we dumped it out and let all the kids pop the balloons & collect the gifts. You can't imagine how loud and hilarious and awesome the whole thing was. Even my 70 year old uncle was helping, when the littlest ones were too small to pop a balloon by sitting on it, he'd get it with his pocketknife where they couldn't see. It only cost about $20, and there were 5-6 kids who had a blast for a good 20 minutes, which is about 18 minutes longer than most kids take to open a gift and finish playing with it on Christmas morning. Or make a giant batch of cookies to get them all sugared up. The point is, you don't have to NOT get gifts, if you're willing to get creative.
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Nov 27, 2013 11:15
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OP, I thought this was a really good article on credit score: http://affordanything.com/2013/12/16/will-getting-car-loan-improve-credit-score-heck/
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Dec 19, 2013 14:10
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Knyteguy posted:OK not to be the Goon in the well or anything but I've decided I'm getting this for my PS3 console in August: I don't have time to read back through the thread right now, but I swear I keep seeing a lot of "We will be able to save..." and "we are going to save...." and so on, but how much have you actually saved? And when is the baby due? I would hold off on buying fun stuff for yourself until you have hit some savings goals. For example, if you get the emergency fund up to three months worth of bills & expenses, then splurge. But it looks like you're heading down the zaurg path here of "I will totally straighten my poo poo out, right after I buy this one thing..."
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Jul 16, 2014 23:14
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Knyteguy posted:Buying poo poo like what? I haven't bought anything since we found out my wife is pregnant. In fact I sold about half of my valuable things. Also god forbid I buy one thing for an important hobby of mine (I've now decided on the $130.00 package even) after we save $4500.00 in a month in a half even while moving. I genuinely appreciate the advice here and I consider every single point, but it's important to remember that incremental rewards are an important part of training good habits. So what's wrong with saying "After we have $5000 in the e-fund, I will reward myself with this $200 treat." What I am hearing from you is "Geez guys, I am just buying this one thing, I'm going to be saving up A LOT OF MONEY so get off my back already!" What's wrong with setting stretch goals & rewards for yourself, as opposed to rewarding yourself for planning to reach your goals?
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Jul 18, 2014 15:02
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(seriously they can go for as much as $200,000 that's like half my retirement savings) If I sell my kid's kidney too we're at like $400,000. (I'm obviously just kidding).
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Knyteguy posted:For anyone reading this thread and also maybe trying to learn from my mistakes I just found a cool site with great tips. I've posted this in a few financial threads, but I don't know if anyone besides me does this. Anyway, my husband and I both work 40-50 hour weeks & have 2 kids, and I've learned that the slow cooker is a life saver. I can buy meat in large quantities when I find a sale, spend 2-3 hours on a weekend packaging & freezing it, then all I have to do is yank a bag out of the freezer & dump it in the slow cooker with a few tablespoons of water, and dinner is ready when we get home. For example, at GFS, you can get a good deal on a GIANT pork roast - usually about 10 lbs. I cut it into 4 pieces, put each piece in a gallon-size ziploc, toss some sauce & veggies over it, and presto - 4 dinners already made & in the freezer. (This sauce is amazing on pork roast, by the way: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2008/06/orange-chipotle-ribs-in-crockpot.html). Buy a 10-lb roll of hamburger. Brown half of it with onions, drain, throw in a couple of ziplocs. You can yank out a bag of already browned meat, toss it in the slow cooker with manwich, spaghetti sauce, or taco seasoning - again, 10 minutes in the morning, dinner is made. Take the other half, mix with bread crumbs, eggs & spices, shape into 2-4 meat loaves (I don't know how much you eat or if you'll want leftovers), ziploc & freeze raw. Put a bowl upside-down in the slow cooker, or something else to keep it off the bottom, sit it in there, put a little ketchup or whatever your favorite topping is on it, and leave it on all day. And we haven't even started on the beef roasts! This site has hundreds of slow cooker recipes, and a lot of them are fantastic: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2007/12/alphabetical-listing-of-recipes.html It's very easy to put up 15-20 meals in an afternoon. And if you are smart, you can repurpose your leftovers. Make a plain beef roast today, tomorrow, shred it & make chili or fajitas or barbecue beef sandwiches. Really, the hardest part is the planning. I try to look at what I've already got in the freezer, or what's on sale. I also, about once a year, buy half a cow from a friend of my dad's who has a farm - it's a lot of money to spend at once (about $750-800 depending on size), but we usually pull about 320 or so pounds of beef, already prepped & wrapped & frozen - steaks, ribs, burger, even soup bones. If you live in a rural area, and can have a large freezer dedicated to beef, it's the way to go. I would seriously start doing the freezer-meal thing now. You have NO idea how glad you'll be when the baby gets here that you have a couple dozen already-made dinners in the freezer. Just make sure you remember to turn on the crock pot when you're so sleep-deprived you try to diaper the wrong end.
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Jul 28, 2014 22:43
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Aagar posted:How do you get through all that beef before it gets freezer burn? I love buying meat on sale but at some point I have to stop due to freezer space and how much I think we'll be able to eat within 3 months. It's packaged ridiculously well. The way it works is, we pay the farmer guy (IIRC) $2/lb for the half-cow, and then we pay the butcher $0.50/lb to cut & package it. Each package is in a few layers of super-tight plastic wrap, then white paper & tape on the outside, and it's frozen solid when we pick it up. It generally keeps for about a year. We also share some, sending a few pounds of burger or a couple of roasts home with my mother-in-law or whoever happens to be hanging out here when we're cooking it. It's an awesome deal, because the burger is like the 93% lean stuff, and we get T-bone steaks, ribs, the works, and it's all a straight $2.50/lb. It helps to have a chest freezer that you can dedicate just to beef as well. I have a food-sealing-bag contraption, I don't care much for it. The bags are pretty expensive, especially compared to ziplocs at Costco or somewhere similar, and sometimes the bag doesn't seal and instead sucks the liquid out. Probably just me. I also go through phases, where sometimes I'll stock up a bunch of meals, eat them for a few weeks, get bored, and go for frozen chicken strips or pizza or whatever. But I can't emphasize enough how awesome it is to open a bag, dump it in a slow cooker, and come home to a meal that's already made. Here's another one - a couple of chicken breasts, a can of corn (drained), a can of black beans (rinsed thoroughly & drained) a jar or so of salsa, and a couple of tablespoons of taco seasoning. Toss it in the ziploc & freeze. Slow cook, shred the chicken, and it's the best tacos you've ever had in your life. Easy meals, few ingredients, and it's so much healthier than eating out. Edited to add: Pulled pork is super-easy. My favorite way to do it is toss a pork roast in, cover it with root beer (trust me on this) with an onion cut up in it, let it get to where it's falling apart, drain the root beer, shred, dump your favorite barbecue sauce on it. If the root beer thing is too weird, just put it in water with a half-cup or so of fat-free italian dressing. The vinegar & seasonings in the dressing give it a really good flavor & tenderness. Same deal, cook till shredable, shred, sauce & chow down. April fucked around with this message at 00:07 on Jul 29, 2014 |
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Jul 29, 2014 00:03
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Knyteguy posted:Thanks to both of you. We did most of our August shopping yesterday and we're going to pay ourselves back this Friday. We have about $130.00 to supplement groceries with the rest of the month. Good luck! Also, if you put something in the slow cooker that's frozen, or you do the meat loaf thing, or any situation where there isn't liquid on the bottom of the slow cooker the second you turn it on, put a few tablespoons of water in the bottom - just enough to cover it & keep the temperature even, or the crock part will crack. I forgot to mention that before, and it's kind of important.
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Jul 29, 2014 18:45
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SiGmA_X posted:I was wondering why you said add a few tablespoons of water! Makes sense. I've never slow cooked something that didn't include some non-frozen liquid, but now I know! Here's a really really good vegetarian one. I always just throw everything in the crockpot without measuring, but I think you'll get the idea: Lentils - as much as you want 2-3 of the big (28 oz?) cans of petite diced tomatoes, with juice 1 bigass onion all chopped up A couple of tablespoons of chopped garlic (I use the stuff in the jar - sue me, it's convenient) About a pound or so of carrots, peeled & sliced (if you can find the "carrot chips" on sale, I use them sometimes too) A bag of fresh spinach, rinsed Toss it all in, cover it with enough water to almost reach the top (leave an inch or two, the veggies will sweat as they cook), and squirt it with sriracha till you like it. I always start with just a little bit, let it cook a couple of hours, taste, add more, etc. It's done when the lentils & carrots are soft, you might need to add a little more water. This stuff freezes awesomely, and has a lot of good-for-you stuff in it. drat, now I want to make some.
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Jul 29, 2014 19:14
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SiGmA_X posted:Sounds delicious. I sent it to my gf, we'll pick up things at the next shopping trip! Slice some french bread, and toast it with garlic butter to have on the side.... HEAVEN.
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Jul 29, 2014 20:13
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Hey Knyteguy, how're the frozen meals coming? Find any good recipes?
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Aug 23, 2014 00:01
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a worthy uhh posted:Wait until after the baby is born. You don't know that there won't be more expenses than you're accounting for, and it'd be a lot better to have savings to cover that instead of a slightly smaller debt load. You can live with your car getting repo'd, but what if the hospital repo'd your baby!?!?!? This. This. THISTHISTHIS. You have NO idea how much babies cost until they arrive. None. Zero. Sure, you can plan for some things ("we'll buy a used crib for $50, done!") but you seriously don't know what you're getting into with a new baby until you're into it. Fun example - I had a fairly normal pregnancy, a daughter who was born with zero complications, spent one night in the hospital & was home with her the next day. Fast forward about 6 weeks, we find out she has pretty severe acid reflux, and has to use prescription formula to the tune of $300/month. When babies are involved, you can really only control so much of it.
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Sep 17, 2014 20:17
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Knyteguy posted:If anyone finds my posts incoherent then please speak up if you want clarification. I feel like my posts are long, but I usually address details to the t every single time someone asks about them. Does anyone have a list of Knyte's other "one-time" expenses? Also, if you have to take a vacation in October, why not put the PS4 off till November? Why do two big-ticket unnecessary things in one month?
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Sep 22, 2014 00:45
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Knyteguy posted:I've taken many self-sacrificing steps (not trying to sound pretentious or smug here), and you think that I should just end it here over $500? I'm not giving up unless like slap me forces me to because this thread legit helps. Also: quote:I originally had budgeted $100 extra for the business category for a nice logo for a new website I'm making, but I cut that by $60 for the PS4. That will wait until November. And oh yeah: quote:we don't have a nursery. I was being an unselfish fucker and decided we should move into an apartment too small to save a lot of money before the baby was born. We did that on our own, and it takes a lot to not be miserable with 2 dogs, 3 cats, and too much stuff in 800sq/ft. So if I'm selfish every now and then so be it. So... you are putting off expanding your business, drying your clothes with a fan, and living in a crappy apartment that nobody told you to move into. Obviously, you should be able to buy a PS4 if you want to! You are happy to point out all the sacrifices that you are making. You are complaining loudly about the environment you live in, and justifying buying video games to make up for the misery of something YOU CHOSE. It's not about the PS4, or how long you have wanted it, or how awesome it's going to be trying to play games with a crying baby hanging around. It's about how you set up these situations to justify doing whatever you want to do. Nobody held a gun to your head and told you to buy vehicles that would be underwater for years to come. Nobody said "you should live in a shithole where you'll be miserable". Nobody said "make sure your pregnant wife doesn't waste money on luxuries like dry clothes." Nobody forced you to adopt too many pets for your living space. So I'm sorry, but no, you don't get to play the "but I've sacrificed so much already!" card, when all you've done is make yourself miserable just so that you can come on here, and whine about how miserable you are, and how blowing money on something unnecessary is what's going to keep you sane. You don't see it as a cycle, but it is. And in a few months, you're going to be climbing the walls even more, and looking for something else to buy instead of actually IMPROVING your situation. A PS4 will be fun for a little while, but you'll still be in a cramped space with too many pets, a crying baby, and no clothes dryer. You have goals of having X in savings, which is nice, but you need to figure out what your REAL goals are, and start figure out how to achieve them instead of just going "I want to buy something, ok, I'll buy it! WAAAHHHH I'm still not happy!" So yeah, pat yourself on the back for being unselfish, I guess? And meanwhile, ask yourself, if you had spent an extra $400 in rent to have a space you enjoy being in, how much less would you be spending every month on toys to make yourself feel better.
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Sep 22, 2014 20:05
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Knyteguy posted:I did qualify it with not trying to be pretentious or smug . I don't think it's fair to call my actions selfish either though, at least as a whole. I can't answer the second one, I don't know. It's selfish, because you are saying "I am going to spend money on this expensive thing to make myself feel better" instead of saying "I am going to do X to improve the situation that's making me miserable." For example, the clothes-drying with a fan. What are you going to do when the baby gets a stomach flu, and throws up over many, many pieces of clothing and bedding? Instead of saying "I'm miserable, I need an electronic pacifier to make me feel better!" why not ask yourself WHY you are miserable, and how you can change the sources of your misery instead of just throwing money at more "stuff"? I should point out that you've also stated you have too much stuff already. The pets are a whole other issue. I don't want this to get all PI, and I'm in agreement that when you adopt a pet, it should be for their lifetime, but it doesn't sound like a very good environment for any of you.
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Sep 22, 2014 20:51
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Knyteguy posted:Good points again Veskit thanks. I'll be going over the past couple of days a few times again when I get home, and I'm going to try to draw up a plan. Now you're starting to get closer to the real problem. Having a PS4 won't make your commute any shorter, or your apartment any larger. It might be a temporary stress relief, but believe me, when the new baby comes home, it's not going to help at all. You'll still have all of the other issues, plus, when you get home at the end of the day, your wife is going to be exhausted and overwhelmed and she's going to want you to take the baby for a couple of hours so she can have a meal and a shower, or maybe even a few hours' sleep. You probably won't get to play it at all when you are at your most stressed. ETA: quote:I pretty much understand why I'm miserable/stressed out about some things (I'm happy on a whole). Unfortunately there's no good solution to a lovely place, at least without it costing us a lot of money. I'll try to stop bringing up the living situation. Have you tried to find some compromise on the living space? You really don't see what is happening here - as long as you are unhappy, you're going to keep wasting money on dumb poo poo, and be even more stuck as far as living conditions. So what would it take to fix the real issues? April fucked around with this message at 21:13 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 21:10
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ExtrudeAlongCurve posted:Replace "drastic downgrade" with the myriad of other things you've told the thread you've wanted and you might begin to see why people harp on you for those things you want. It's definitely a pattern that's hard to miss. Knyteguy, what about, instead of saying "I want to have $X in savings by February" you start saying "I want a better home lined up by July" (or whenever your lease is up). I'm not going to touch the whole "don't really care about the baby yet, but dogs need more space" thing, but look at ALL the things that are making you unhappy - the drive, the tiny apartment, the lack of laundry facilities. And start looking at houses or whatever in the area you'd like to be, and figuring out how much it would take to get into one. Don't kneejerk. Don't say "hey, SA said to move, let's go!" But really stop and think and plan for once, for something that will actually improve your life, instead of just letting you escape for a few hours, that you aren't going to get to use nearly as much as you think you will. You have someone willing to give you what? $20,000 to put towards a house? And you'd rather sit in a hole in the wall that's overrun with pets and wet clothes and play a video game? Jesus.
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Sep 22, 2014 21:20
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Knyteguy posted:Erm well I care about the kid of course, that came off wrong. I just can't really think about how that will all work yet. It's too much for my mind to grasp, and I've just never had a lot of baby exposure at all. Very good. Look at that list again. I don't see a PS4 on there anywhere. You are about to be in a HUGELY stressful, emotional, exhausting situation. Your wife is going to be hormonal and physically beaten up. If she is going to be home with the baby, it's going to be a huge adjustment for her. Don't be shocked when you come home from work and she hands you the baby and locks herself in the bedroom to cry and sleep for a few hours. I think the whole problem you're having is that you look at money as the numbers on the spreadsheet, and not the potential it represents. Let me give you an example. For years, my husband has done contract work at high-pressure places in the middle of downtown Pittsburgh. The commute was wretched, the hours were horrific, and the working conditions were batshit insane. During this time, we worked like hell to pay off over $100,000 in debt (student loans, credit cards, mortgage, 2 car payments). Yes, our lives sucked for several years. We bought our house with 0% down at the end of 2006, and we all know what happened just over a year later. We learned a lot of lessons the hard way. The biggest, hardest one is that every thing we chose to buy before poo poo went south was one more option that we didn't have later. This past April, he was offered a more stable, permanent position at a company he really fell in love with. However, it paid about 8k a year less than he had been making. Because we had way fewer bills, he was able to take that job without a second thought. Now... you are talking about "just this once" upping your discretionary budget to $1000, so you can have a vacation and a game console. Or having $500/month to blow on toys. What if you had that $500/month to rent a better place? You see your savings go up, but it's an abstract number, and kind of a lovely one, because you can't enjoy it. What if that money was the down payment on your dream house?
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Sep 22, 2014 22:47
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. It's about $1,100-$1,300 a month for a rental in the area around my work, which is a great neighborhood within walking distance. I was trying to give my wife no commute by moving to the area we did but I think I'd rather her just stay at home, raise the kid, and pick up a skill that isn't working in retail. She's not happy at her job as it is, and my job is pretty secure.
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Knyteguy posted:OK still really want to get back to some people and points that have posted, but I won't have time to address everything until I get off of work. Fellow goons, I think we're seeing a breakthrough here. Knyte, I actually did a little fist pump when I read this post. I don't advise breaking the lease. DO NOT do the thing that you do when you say "hey, that sounds like a good idea!" and do it without any planning or real thought. You need to do a few things first. Are you taking notes? #1 Create a budget that DOES NOT CHANGE. It should include your current bills, some savings, some "fun" money. Live on that budget WITHOUT CHANGING IT for 3 months. #2 Recreate that budget without your wife's income, and with a higher rent. Assume that your rent is $1200 or whatever, and that your wife is bringing home $0. (Any extra will obviously go into savings). Live on that and DO NOT CHANGE IT until your lease is up. If you can do that then congratulations! You can go and move into the kind of place you WANT to be in, without going "oh poo poo we can't afford this" a few months after moving in. It's going to take a poo poo-ton of discipline, but you have got to keep your eyes on the prize. It took us several years but holy gently caress it's so goddamn worth it.
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Sep 22, 2014 23:21
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n8r posted:Funding a child's education is a wonderful gift that fewer and fewer parents are able to afford. Low interest easily available loans are very easy for students to obtain for college. Low interest easily obtainable loans do not exist for your retirement. If you don't want to be a burden on your children and live in near poverty, you want to save for retirement first. College education saving should be pretty far down the list. Knyteguy is nowhere in any position to start doing that. Exactly. It's OK for Knyte to figure out his own finances first. ETA: I was skimming back through this thread and found this from Knyte on 6/11/2014: quote:Hell no dude (squalid hellhole). It's time to give 100% because it's not just the two of us anymore. I think we'll be able to mostly stay on track to getting a house which is half the point of moving into this semi-ghetto (but safe) apartment place. Ideally the kid has to live there for about 5 months until the lease is up, and then we have the car paid off and we're nearly ready for a 30% down payment on a $120,000 house. ETA 2.0: Also, in the beginning of the thread, Knyte only had 1 dog & 3 cats. At what point did the 2nd dog move in? Why in the world would you consider that a good idea?? April fucked around with this message at 00:25 on Sep 23, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 23:52
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Ok - there's a lot of budgeting/tweaking talk in here, but I want to go back to this:quote:Picked up a second dog around the time the thread died in Marchish. She's a hard hyper dog, but we love her. The intention was to provide a companion for our first dog. In that regard it was a successful venture. Once again, Knyte saw a situation (single dog is lonesome) immediately decided on a course of action (need second dog) and ran to the first possible solution (grab available dog now now now) without thinking it through. Knyte, did you take the time to "meet" and hang out with multiple dogs before choosing the difficult one? Did you take into account extra costs for food, medical care, training, etc? Your situation is NEVER going to improve until you stop saying "Ok, I will fix this RIGHT NOW" and start actively thinking and planning. You are 100% in reactionary mode right now. Every single thing that happens (breaking a button) is throwing you off and sending you running for a fix (I'll overspend JUST THIS ONCE) that is sabotaging you long-term. Note* I am not saying, don't buy clothes for work. I'm saying, what if you had the $300 you spent on the secured card on a whim? Would a broken button send you over budget in that case? Also, stop and REALLY think about this. You were going to spend $600 on a PS4, knowing that you only had, what? Three pairs of pants to wear to a job I'm assuming you want to keep? Your priorities are frequently completely out of line with your goals. THIS IS A HUGE PROBLEM. Now, back to budgeting/tweaking talk: DFA & I have a system that works for us and covers most contingencies. In a nutshell, we have several savings accounts that we contribute to monthly, and they are: Car repairs, house repairs/items, Christmas, clothing, vacation/entertainment, car replacement, and emergency/unexpected expenses. THESE ARE ALL THINGS THAT WE KNOW WE NEED AND THAT WILL RECUR. They are also unrelated to day to day spending (groceries, gas, utilities) and not for long-term savings. They are specifically earmarked for those items. We also have personal accounts, and every pay a chunk goes to our personal accounts. We take turns buying groceries out of our "allowance" and we also pay for our own gas out of it, as well as any other unnecessary items - eating out, toys, my lending club notes, and frequently our own clothing. drat kids keep outgrowing their stuff and sucking up all the clothing budget. I like having the multiple accounts, so I know how much I have to spend on x, y, or z. Other people prefer having one account or category that everything goes into, and they just spend it as they need/want. Personally, I think it might be good for Knyte to keep his budget broken down. He still hasn't figured out yet that Christmas comes periodically, and it might be good to plan for that, or that clothes don't last forever, or that cars need oil changes and new brakes every so often. Knyte, I think you're going in the right direction, but you need to go further. It's great to plan to spend the minimum on everything, and put everything into savings but it's also unsustainable if you have to spend your savings every month because you didn't remember that birthdays come every year. I guess what I'm taking forever to say is: what is the purpose of your savings? DFA and I have both short-term (see above) savings, and long-term (Roth IRA, 401k, some CD's we can cash out in a crisis that we don't touch, some other stocks & mutual funds). So - are your savings short-term (something you are planning to spend for a specific purpose in the next few months) or are they long-term (we are going to save up for a house down payment, a solid 10k emergency fund that we'll never touch, etc.)? You need to find a balance between the two. Otherwise you're going to keep putting X into savings for one of your major goals then taking out Y because you didn't plan for the stuff that will happen every month or every few months, and getting frustrated and saying "this isn't working!" because you aren't saving as much as you thought you would at the beginning of the month.
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Sep 23, 2014 10:43
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Uncle Jam posted:What I'm saying is there is a lot more than college. There are a lot of big expenses for kids entering adulthood, you should read LoveMeDead's thread which is a better demo of that than I could ever explain. Also, everything you're experiencing right now. Ordinarily, I would agree, but we are talking about someone who is down to his last surviving pair of pants. I think that learning to budget effectively is far more important right now, not to mention, possibly something better than a college education to give to his children.
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Sep 23, 2014 14:14
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n8r posted:I think this budget looks fine with a few conditions. Can you stick to this budget month after month? At least until the kid is born? Yeah, I wrote all that really early in the morning, and I was having a hard time being concise. Basically - Knyte needs to figure out what he is going to NEED (clothing, car repairs, etc.) and plan for that, and keep it separate from "discretionary", which is just for other unnecessary expenses. The fact that he is planning to buy a PS4 when he and his wife need clothes and shoes is very, very bad. It would be better to have some more line items, and a little less going to savings, than to keep going "oops, guess I went over again!" Also to clarify exactly what his goals are. Finally, I think the majority of the wife's paycheck (like 70%?) is going to their HSA, so only $400 take-home.
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Sep 23, 2014 15:20
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Knyteguy posted:I try not to make promises I may not be able to keep, but I'll say I'll do my best with this budget for the months going forward. I think we've learned some really great strategies and gotten some great insights, and we just need to remember to stay on track. Again I really think that having our discretionary as one big category will help. Plus my own words said it well "It's not just the two of us anymore, so we need to give it 100%." The problem with one big discretionary fund is that you haven't shown yet that you can prioritize effectively. I can very easily see you saying "We'll put this much back for clothes, holidays, car repairs, pet meds, etc., and just lump it all into discretionary", and then in a couple of months saying "Ok, I have two pairs of pants that fit and a chunk in discretionary, time to buy the PS4!" This is where the multiple savings accounts helps. I KNOW that the kids are going to need clothes, and if I didn't have it split out, I could've accidentally spent all the money for school clothes on fixing the shower this past summer. What you really, really, really need to do is go back through the thread and look at all the times you went over budget, and why, and unless it's something idiotic (hundreds of dollars in restaurants), start planning to do it again. Only this time, you have some money set aside for that issue. I mean, if you work in any kind of professional environment, you need clothes that fit decently, aren't stained or torn, and enough of them that you aren't the guy wearing the same pair of pants 3x a week. Ditto on haircuts for both of you. You need reliable transportation. And so on. It's far better to plan to get another pair of pants or a shirt every couple of paychecks, and accept it as necessary for a while, than to constantly beat yourself up over going over budget. And I understand you're going to try to do it on a reduced budget (I'm the one that suggested it!) but the hard truth of life is that just because you have less money doesn't mean your needs disappear. I mean, if you had started putting away just, say, $25-30/month for Christmas in January, how much nicer and less stressful would your holiday be? I know it seems like so much more of a hassle. I maintain a total of about 20 savings accounts (capitalone360, holla!), but it makes my life SO MUCH BETTER when I'm able to say, hey, the little one wore holes in her shoes, or the big kid needs new glasses, or my brake pads are going bad, or the clothes washer died, but look! here's the cash for it!
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Sep 23, 2014 17:03
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gently caress.
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Knyteguy posted:OK well I'm going to spend a little time with my wife so we can think it over. I agree it's kind of been a recurring thing that we haven't been prepared for X expense, which I think is kind of a live and learn situation. However I feel like we've lived and learned enough. See that's the problem. How many things have you already decided will come out of discretionary? Are you budgeting enough for all of them? How will you know "hey, we have enough fun money in discretionary to go out tonight" if discretionary is also covering necessities? Also, yeah, split it with your wife. Maybe she just doesn't want things out loud, because she knows that you place a lot more importance on buying poo poo than she does.
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Sep 23, 2014 19:44
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Knyteguy posted:I said it was a spending failure like two sentences later Congratulations on the good baby news! At the end of the day, that's what is most important. I guess my suggestion is, keep an account for "unexpected necessities" such as car repairs, clothing, medicine, etc. Give yourselves both $X in cash every pay or month or whatever for fun stuff like games or meals out (save up for your PS4 out of that). And maybe one more account for planned expenses, like Christmas, or next summer's vacation, or whatever. This way, when you want something you haven't planned & saved for, you can tell immediately if it's something you can do without touching your "real" savings - emergency fund, house down payment, etc.
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Sep 23, 2014 23:37
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Healthy as can be according to the ultrasound.
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Knyteguy posted:Well, we forecasted what it would be like in a $1,500/mo rental with my wife not working, and $500 a month in baby expenses, and I just don't see that working. Anything out of the ordinary would cause us to go over budget, and I don't think we could save anything. Insurance is the killer here. Jesus tapdancing christ. I give up. You have not proven in any way that you are disciplined enough to stay on budget while your finances COULD be in the best possible shape (cheap apartment, wife is still working). The whole point of not breaking your lease and getting your poo poo sorted out before moving is so that you don't REALLY screw yourself over by moving into a place that you won't be able to afford in six months. But nope, Knyteguy sees something shiny RIGHT GODDAMN NOW!!! You know what? Go ahead, buy the PS4. If you're going to act like a child, might as well have the toys. April on page 29 posted:Don't kneejerk. Don't say "hey, SA said to move, let's go!" But really stop and think and plan for once.
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Sep 24, 2014 10:29
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Knyteguy posted:OK my wife is going to chip in today. She feels confused too and maybe a different perspective would help both you guys, and us. You really, truly, seriously, don't understand why renting a more expensive place before you can stick to a budget in a cheap place is a bad idea, do you? In simple terms, you need to try living as though you already have the more expensive house, and no income from your wife, for several months, WITHOUT OVERSPENDING, and then decide if you can afford it. You can't even do that now. It doesn't matter how much you plan to save, want to save, or how you are going to split the savings - you have yet to show that you can commit to a plan, and make it work. Part of that is lousy planning (for example, planning to never replace clothing again), part of it is that you just don't have any discipline or concept of delayed gratification. Jumping to the more expensive house without even trying to live on the reduced budget just proves my point. Nobody is saying "don't save for a deposit". We are saying "you CAN NOT DO this, even with a deposit, because you have yet to stick to a budget under best-case circumstances." And this whole "I'm confident I can do it" thing is a bad joke at this point.
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Sep 24, 2014 16:52
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Aagar posted:So, this is how I'm seeing it break down (if you move to a new place): This. Live on that budget for at least 3 months, without going over, and then you can say that yes, you can afford the better place.
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Sep 24, 2014 17:58
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Knyteguy posted:All good points. Pets was $300 one month as we needed to get the new one spayed (which a vet savings/pet savings should have covered). The pets thing isn't about sacrificing my well-being, it's about sacrificing their well-being that I care about. I know they're just dumb animals or whatever, but they're our responsibility. It would really help her out while she's taking care of the baby (working or not) if we could just put them out back, and then they could just run around the yard or whatever. Plus I could clean up their poop without having to haul it through the living room. Even in a bag it's terrible. I think that you are now using the pets as an excuse to move sooner, and that you'll keep coming up with reasons. Instead of saying "it would make our lives and budget much easier if we had fewer pets", you are saying "we need to add stress and money to keep the pets." Again - you do these things to yourself, then get upset, and want to spend money you don't have to fix the problem. Also, when have you ever had extra discretionary?
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Sep 24, 2014 18:24
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Knyteguy posted:Cicero: pets are generally only $150 a month. That includes 3 bags of food (which they actually only need about ~2.33/mo), cat food, litter, toys, treats, the works. I grew up in just such a heavy pet family that it's nuts to me to even consider getting rid of one.[\quote] I think you're rewriting history here. I can't remember a single instance when you said "hey, it's the end of the month, we need to spend this extra money so we don't lose it". Instead, without exception, it's been "oopsie, we overspent again!" well before the end of the month.
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Sep 24, 2014 18:52
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Knyteguy posted:OK so this has been thrown out there a couple times (budgeting like my wife isn't working). My wife will probably have 9 weeks off for the baby, and unless she changes her mind then she said she probably wants to live somewhere else rather than stay at home. I imagine she needs to give it more thought though. Probably because you yourself said about 4 pages ago that the plan is for her to stay home and take care of the baby? If she's planning on going back to work, have you looked into childcare expenses in your area?
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Sep 24, 2014 18:59
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Knyteguy posted:Erm well I care about the kid of course, that came off wrong. I just can't really think about how that will all work yet. It's too much for my mind to grasp, and I've just never had a lot of baby exposure at all. Found it.
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Sep 24, 2014 19:13
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Knyteguy posted:Yes. If we went with my sister though we'd probably be looking at about $500.00. Would have to talk with her first though. There's no way she's going to be able to decide now how she's going to feel once the baby comes. It's grossly unfair to expect her to. What we are saying (and have been saying since day 1) is make your plans based on the worst case scenario, income-wise.
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Sep 24, 2014 19:54
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Knyteguy posted:Yes, good point. There's also the vet bills that we're going to start saving for which adds another $50 to it all. Plus the degradation of supplies like cat boxes. They last awhile, but not forever. This completely contradicts this: quote:I'm OK with this if my wife wants to stay home and rear the baby. It sounds like you don't know what you want either, but are willing to put it on her if you're miserable.
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Sep 24, 2014 20:10
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Knyteguy just now posted:Oh. I see why you were saying I'm willing to put it on her if I'm miserable. "Happy" that was a poor choice of word that I posted, and you quoted. I think... "irrespective of what I prefer", would have been a better choice of words. Like I said even in a lovely place I'm overall happy. We're not talking about living in a tin shack here. Knyteguy JUST TWO DAYS AGO posted:I just gotta say holy gently caress I had no idea how much our living situation has been stressing me out. We've lived in pretty awful places the majority of our marriage. I mean we've lived with roommates for close to 3 out of 5 years of our marriage, and that was just absolutely awful. The townhouse was nice and big (maybe too big), but since we knew we were moving out at the end of the lease we just never made it home again after my sister moved out, and it was still bad for animals since there wasn't a yard. This loving place we're in now with an air conditioner that has broken twice (we didn't bother calling a third time), no in-house laundry, no yard, no space, lovely neighbors, no privacy (it goes on)... I can deal with it for now but I think I would break if it meant living here past July. I know my wife feels the same way. Seriously, you are all over the map with what you want and need, and what your goals and plans are. Part of that might be from getting conflicting info here, but I think a large part of it is just you. You keep jumping from one shiny object to the next with no idea of what it is that would genuinely make you content.
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Sep 24, 2014 21:46
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Knyteguy posted:OK, so here's what I think we're going to brew on for the next few days: This is wrong. There's no way to know how EITHER of you will feel until the baby is here. You should not put pressure on your pregnant wife to make this decision right now. What you should be doing is putting together a budget that doesn't include her income, and living on it, so that you are prepared for it if that's what she decides.
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Sep 24, 2014 23:03
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Also, have you guys looked at ACA health coverage with just one income, and a baby? It will be cheaper than it is with just the two of you and two incomes.
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Sep 24, 2014 23:25
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Knyteguy posted:Uh my wife wants to stay at home with the baby, and I've been trying to help her do that while keeping us out of this shithole apartment. You act like I'm the only one that makes decisions in the household. You're framing it like my wife is literally incapable of helping the household to make good decisions, or to even play a part in the decision making process. And she and I just said in this very thread we're open to rehoming the cats. ~*Chiiiiiill out*~. It's just Knyte being Knyte, only this time, instead of a purchase, it's a major life decision that has to happen RIGHT GODDAMN NOW.
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Sep 25, 2014 02:38
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imabanana posted:People get super emotional about their pets. It's understandable. You do realize that the only part of what you wrote that Knyte will read and follow is "rent that house now".
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Sep 25, 2014 10:42
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Knyteguy posted:Wife and I are currently sitting on knocking down the discretionary a little bit, will address that after we've given it more thought. 4 days left to finalize the budget so no big hurry. Knyte: Hey thread, I want to say screw budgeting and rent a bigger place. Thread: No, Knyte, you need to learn to make a budget and stick to it before you take on more than you can handle. Knyte: Oh no, thread, there's a funny smell in a small apartment with 2 people and 5 animals. EJECT!! EJECT!! EJECT!!!
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Sep 26, 2014 23:05
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