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Sure, I should start setting goals for this sort of thing. 2015 was a bad year to be my bank account thanks to a move and a wedding, so I should at least get some of my ambitions in writing. Current standings approximated off the top of my head: -- $7250 in student loan debt (graduated 2010, two combined loans at 5.6 and 6.8% interest, 25:75 distribution between the two) -- $16700 in an auto loan (purchased 2014, 3.1% interest) -- $5000 owed to parents from wedding payments (married this past summer) -- $1800 in miscellaneous debts (credit cards but also an old dental bill?) -- $56k pre-tax salary; also earning essentially an extra paycheck each month from freelance work Goals for the end of 2016, in no particular order: 1. Completely pay off that miscellaneous category. 2. Finally move my 401k from my previous employer over to my new one. 3. Pay 25% of my current student loan debt back into it. Stretch goal of 30%. 4. Cut the money owed to my parents in half. 5. Save up $2000 by next fall. My wife is from Thailand so we are going to do another wedding over there at the end of the year, her parents are covering it but I want to at least pay my own way (this is also why I want to pay my parents back as quickly as I can, since they would be flying out there as well). 6. Start contributing to our joint savings account. We put all of our wedding money gifts into a new savings account but haven't really added to it since. I'd like to put in $100/mo but we'll see what I can spare. 7. Hit at least $650/mo in my current side job. This amount would cover #s 4-6 with a little extra money left over. Things that would be nice to do: 8. Merge back accounts with my wife. 9. Save up for a new computer. My laptop is five years old this month (bought with one of those credit cards I'm still trying to pay off!  ) and really starting to show its age.10. Set up actual budgets for both myself and my wife. 11. Take a trip somewhere. My wife and I skipped out on a honeymoon but we said we would take a trip this coming spring for her birthday to make up for it. Due to her green card application it'll have to be somewhere in the U.S., which should save us some money. 12. Get my wife a job. Getting her out of her postdoc and into a job in her field would nearly double her income, and would free up a lot of breathing room for me to knock down my debts. That might be too ambitious (I even took a couple things off of my initial list) but dammit I'm going to take a real stab at it. I'd say the biggest thing is getting rid of that misc category, having three fewer bills to pay each month would be a boon to both my financial peace of mind and the amount I can put towards some of these larger debts. We are finally all set up in our apartment and not moving or paying for a wedding in 2016, which will leave me some extra money each month to finally get my poo poo in order. Suggestions? I have never done something this comprehensive before, if you couldn't tell. E: Cut some explanatory fluff. C-Euro fucked around with this message at 03:52 on Dec 17, 2015 |
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Dec 15, 2015 01:23
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| # ¿ Apr 29, 2024 13:13 |
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Dead Pressed posted:Budget set up in everydollar. Cash put into envelopes, and all credit cards stashed away. Here we go! Oooh that looks fancy, I tried doing some budget stuff a few years back with Mint.com but never really bothered to keep it updated. Do you use the mobile part of this at all? It had an iPhone app but not an Android one 
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Jan 3, 2016 04:49
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One-month check-in. Original post below, with updates highlighted where relevant- Standings approximated off the top of my head (1/1/16): -- $7250 in student loan debt (graduated 2010, two combined loans at 5.6 and 6.8% interest, 25:75 distribution between the two) -- $16700 in an auto loan (purchased 2014, 3.1% interest) -- $5000 owed to parents from wedding payments (married this past summer) -- $1800 in miscellaneous debts (credit cards but also an old dental bill?) -- $56k pre-tax salary; also earning essentially an extra paycheck each month from freelance work Goals for the end of 2016, in no particular order: 1. Completely pay off that miscellaneous category. - One card down, two to go (one of which is almost done). Dental bill being sent off when next month's freelance money comes through to cushion me (see #7) 2. Finally move my 401k from my previous employer over to my new one. 3. Pay 25% of my current student loan debt back into it. Stretch goal of 30%. - Made my first "on-target" payment ($150) and didn't lose our apartment, so far so good. Should get easier as I close out #1. 4. Cut the money owed to my parents in half. - Parents told me not to feel rushed to pay them back, so I'm starting next month as I put a few hundred into a couch for our apartment (the final thing we really needed to pick up for this place). 5. Save up $2000 by next fall for planned overseas trip Christmas 2016. 6. Start contributing to our joint savings account. - We had a pretty sizeable joint tax return, and elected to put the vast majority of that into said joint savings account including $1200 from me, so I'm going to go ahead and mark this as COMPLETE as my stated goal was $100/mo for the year. 7. Hit at least $650/mo in my current side job. - On the one hand my boss left the company a couple weeks ago so my workload has gone way up and thus my freelance time should theoretically go down. On the other hand this month was by far my most profitable since starting. I'm not counting on keeping that streak up so the target stays at $650/mo, but the money that was going to #6 will now go to #9. Things that would be nice to do: 8. Merge back accounts with my wife. 9. Save up for a new computer. - Wife needs a new one too so we made a pact to take a little money out of our tax return to jump-start our respective laptop funds. Aiming to have the money in hand by May/June and buy it without using any credit. 10. Set up actual budgets for both myself and my wife. - Signed up for Everydollar, played around and got confused. Probably need to read up on how to make an actual budget before having a service (Everydollar, YNAB, whatever) to keep track of it. 11. Take a trip somewhere. - Wife is going home to Thailand for a few weeks in June/July for family stuff and on-the-scene wedding planning (see #5), so she probably won't have time for an actual trip since she's already working 6 days/week to make up for the time she'll be missing. Gonna pencil this one in as NO CONTEST, likely re-visiting in 2017. 12. Get my wife a job. Getting her out of her postdoc and into a job in her field would nearly double her income, and would free up a lot of breathing room for me to knock down my debts.
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Jan 31, 2016 18:38
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IllegallySober posted:End of January update (updates in bold): Crock pot is def the way to go for saving money on food, and also time. I picked up this cookbook a while ago and its recipes are a good balance of cheap and healthy. Also they emulate stuff you can buy at restaurants, so if you like eating out then it's a good one to pull yourself away from that.
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Feb 4, 2016 02:47
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February! Original post below, with updates highlighted where relevant- Standings approximated off the top of my head (1/1/16): -- $7250 in student loan debt (graduated 2010, two combined loans at 5.6 and 6.8% interest, 25:75 distribution between the two) -- $16700 in an auto loan (purchased 2014, 3.1% interest) -- $5000 owed to parents from wedding payments (married this past summer) -- $1800 in miscellaneous debts (credit cards but also an old dental bill?) -- $56k pre-tax salary; also earning essentially an extra paycheck each month from freelance work Goals for the end of 2016, in no particular order: 1. Completely pay off that miscellaneous category. - The good news is that everything except on credit card is paid off. The bad news is that my debit card number got stolen, and without any branches for my bank in the area I had to put a bunch of stuff on said credit card. But now that all my credit card debt in on one card, I only have one payment to keep track of. 2. Finally move my 401k from my previous employer over to my new one. 3. Pay 25% of my current student loan debt back into it. Stretch goal of 30%. - On track 4. Cut the money owed to my parents in half. - On track. New plan is keep putting the money in savings and pay them off in a few big lump sums, instead of monthly. 5. Save up $2000 by next fall for planned overseas trip Christmas 2016. - On track. 7. Hit at least $650/mo in my current side job. - Made less than January but still more than the $650. Next month at my day job will probably be really busy so this might take a hit, wish me luck! Things that would be nice to do: 8. Merge back accounts with my wife. 9. Save up for a new computer. - Found a sweet deal on a pretty nice laptop, and even had enough money to trick it out with extra RAM and an SSD and stay under budget. COMPLETE. 10. Set up actual budgets for both myself and my wife. 12. Get my wife a job.
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Feb 28, 2016 04:13
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March! Not a lot to update, managed to keep on track with all my payment goals despite a hefty vet bill that, while we knew was coming, was way more than we anticipated. If you have a dog, loving start brushing its teeth if you aren't already. Original post. 1. Completely pay off all miscellaneous debt ($1800 at start of year). - Halfway there. 2. Finally move my 401k from my previous employer over to my new one. 3. Pay 25% of my current student loan debt back into it. Stretch goal of 30%. - On track. 4. Cut the money owed to my parents in half. - On track. 5. Save up $2000 by next fall for planned overseas trip Christmas 2016. - On track. 7. Hit at least $650/mo in my current side job. - Had a big push this past week to squeak in just over$1000, which is pretty good for my current duties and pay rate. Things that would be nice to do: 8. Merge back accounts with my wife. 10. Set up actual budgets for both myself and my wife. 12. Get my wife a job. Looking ahead to Q2, April is going to be pretty pivotal. My new boss starts in the middle of the month, which will help me determine whether or not I should stick with this job another year, and could also impact the time I have for my side job. Speaking of which, the company I work for on the side also asked if I wanted to do some more advanced assignments with better payout starting sometime in April, but last time they asked me this I never heard about it again so I'm not holding my breath. If it does pan out though, I stand to make quite a bit more money which will be huge. Lastly, we have to renew our lease by the end of May and might end up moving if our rent goes up enough, which then affects my decision tree re: a new job. Sundae posted:#6 -- Goal: Keep or lose my current day job as best fits monetary and life balance goals. Almost certainly accepting a job offer with ~50-75% raise involved for less work. Awaiting final details from HR. Nice one! 
C-Euro fucked around with this message at 02:47 on Mar 31, 2016 |
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Mar 30, 2016 23:37
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May Update: See April Update. Also, I am still broke at the start of every month despite having already paid off some debts and it loving sucks. I may look for a new job just so I can make more money, which feels so pragmatic as to border on slimy. I made $1100 in my side job for April though, which I think is a record and hopefully I won't have to drop all of that on a surprise expense during the month.
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May 5, 2016 05:08
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Original post. 1. Completely pay off all miscellaneous debt ($1800 at start of year). - On track. 2. Finally move my 401k from my previous employer over to my new one. 3. Pay 25% of my current student loan debt back into it. Stretch goal of 30%. - On track. 4. Cut the money owed to my parents in half. - On track. 5. Save up $2000 by next fall for planned overseas trip Christmas 2016. - Money saved up, mother-in-law is working on getting group rate tickets for everyone coming over so this will be marked complete once the ticket is actually purchased. 7. Hit at least $650/mo in my current side job. - Came up $7 short for May, but in my defense I didn't receive any assignments for a whole week. Hoping that this doesn't become a summer trend since my clients are primarily in academia, but I am at least way over 650/mo average YTD. Things that would be nice to do: 8. Merge back accounts with my wife. 10. Set up actual budgets for both myself and my wife. 12. Get my wife a job. On the bright side, my side job gave me a 30-33% raise (depending on the type of assignment) effective immediately Might re-adjust that monthly side job target, though again my fear is that the summer will be kind of slow.
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Jun 7, 2016 02:12
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Original post. 1. Completely pay off all miscellaneous debt ($1800 at start of year). - On track. 2. Finally move my 401k from my previous employer over to my new one. 3. Pay 25% of my current student loan debt back into it. Stretch goal of 30%. - On track. 4. Cut the money owed to my parents in half. - Skipped my June deposit due to required spending elsewhere, need to set aside $500/mo for the rest of the year (see #7) 5. Save up $2000 by next fall for planned overseas trip Christmas 2016. - Money in the bank. 7. Hit at least $  And am already sniffing $1000 for July thanks to a couple of lucrative and well-timed assignments  Gonna bump this up to $750 as I need to save $500 each month for the rest of the year to hit goal #3.Things that would be nice to do: 8. Merge back accounts with my wife. 10. Set up actual budgets for both myself and my wife. 12. Get my wife a job. 13. NEW GOAL- Apply for one new job a week. - I've been at my current position a little over a year, and I don't like it at all. However, due to the possibility of extended overseas living in the near future I'm torn as to what to do about it. I can stick with a job I dislike to have a better-looking resume and an easier time moving overseas next year, or jump to a job that I might like more and choose between having a bunch of sub-1.5 year job entries on my resume and putting the overseas thing on ice, perhaps permanently. So I'm just going to do a little light job-hunting to keep my resume fresh, and on the off-chance I find something dope.
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Jul 12, 2016 04:32
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| # ¿ Apr 29, 2024 13:13 |
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C-Euro posted:Original post. Haven't bothered to post in a couple months but since then I have- Paid off everything except my car and student loans (#1) Saved up the $2500 I promised my parents for this year (#4) Not only bought the plane ticket for #5, but came in $600 under what I had budgeted Managed to do an overnight getaway with my wife (#11) I even opened up the website for my previous employer's 401k, maybe next time I post I'll have actually moved it into my new one!  Feels good man.
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Sep 19, 2016 00:03
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