Livin Life 13 Weeks At A Time: February Financial Review

2009 Personal Finance Goals

Debt:

Pay off one of adams loans
Biweekly Payments plus Principal on house new goal added 2/09

Spending:

Eat out no more than once a week--we did this great! sometimes we didnt eat out at all during the week. Let me tell you how hard that is without an oven! We went to portland on a roadtrip and did eat out there. We called that our mini vacation and it was worth it!

Use coupons as much as possible

Watch our spending when we come home for good

Buy a washer and dryer for house on sale with coupons! new goal added 2/09

Furnish house with garage sale/thrift store items until we redo the room with no more than $1000 new goal added 2/09

Frugal:

Try to get enough CFL lightbulbs to replace all of the lights when we move in..using coupons of course --got 5 so far on sale at walgreens

Keep entering giveaways for gift cards to home depot for our house won a $5 starbucks card :) not home depot but still made my day

Savings: Save up 6 months of emergency savings currently at: $1791.79

Save up a downpayment on a car brand new Hundia accent or Nissina versa(about $10,000) currently at: $1000.00

Save some of every paycheck for Roth so I can max out next year($5000) new goal added 2/09

So Here we are in February already! We did okay in January I think! I am currently getting all our tax info together because we have to pay someone to do them this year. With living in 5 states, getting married, buying a house and both having a new job every 3 months I dont know what to deduct! I think that it is gonna cost us more than I want to spend, but if I ever pay someone this is the time. Adam found a job since I last updated! He just got his first paycheck yesterday! YAY! So he can now start really paying down the loans! We have decided to extend here in Seattle and stay here until the end of May. There are no jobs out there and we are in a good situation now. The tenets of our house are moving out in the next 2 weeks so that sucks :( we were hoping they would stay longer, so I hope we can get someone else to move in so its not left vacant. Ok on to the goals!

My Short Term Financial Goals by May
Heres what we got:
Last month= blue
This month= red

Our HouseFund: $1,345--$2,970.50(We made our first house payment 1/22)
My Checkings (high interest): $7,845--$9,493--havent paid the credit card yet...
My Checkings (no interest): $1,171.21--$2,252--dont know why that is so high, gotta transfer some to high interest
CD at huntington (expiring in march) will deposit into checking or house--or car!:$5,884--$5,909(I have decided to deposit this into my car savings so I wont have a car payment when we get home)
Adam Checkings (high interest): $745.00 (he is currently using another account at home to pay his bills)
Bank of America: $79--$79 --I have to close this account when I get the time...
Roth: $7,942--$8,071
Credit Card debt: $2,412--I get my statement on the 5th and will pay this off
401k: $1645--$1518 :(
**NEW 401k--$358-1,294.78--wow I contributed alot!
**NEW Emergency Fund: $792--our short term goal is $1000 WE DID IT!!--$1391 then 6 month of expenses

Ok so heres the goals until February 28(the end of this assignment):

Start contributing to my Roth this year and max out by April:$472 for December $674 January for 2008 contribution so I can max out(hopefully!) currently contributed: 2,737.00 for year 2008

Make 2 payments to Adams loans (on top of what he pays) : Currently -$9,821 from Direct Loan Service and -$41,317 from First Resource Federal none yet--he told me to max my roth and get the car done first

Try to get someone to rent out our house while we are away for extra money for our mortgage. done til Feb 5! Possibly Tim and Kristi...but not sure. Looks like we wont be getting this goal complete...

Split paychecks every 2 weeks into Mortgage payment, Roth IRA, Checking Account, and Emergency Fund--working out well so far and trying to build up all those accounts

Get $1600 for our apt in Seattle and bank at least $100 each month--Used any extra for the Roth

Continue to pay off credit card each month doing well with this

My meal plans have worked out pretty well. We go shopping once a week and have not spent over $100.
Jan 7- $49
Jan 14- $51
jan 22- $57
Jan 31- $91--that was close! but we bought adam new underwear and a serving dish for a potluck at work tonight so it wasnt just groceries.
I have been making a bunch of recipes that have turned out well. Thanks to allrecipes.com! I only make about one big meal a week and I eat soup at work. Adams new job feeds him at work so thats awesome! I made pastabake in the crockpot this week, turned out good! Next week potato soup! I just found a new site too: www.funnyspoon.com I will have to try some recipes on there!

Continue to get the deals at walgreens for a garage sale this summer with my sister!---still doing that! We got some free garnier shampoo that adam likes too! Oh and free chocolate, I love that.

I am still going to use as many coupons as possible. Joined new trains and got lots, now we just need cheaper grocery stores.

I am also going to try to get $50 or more in Chacha extra money (now $116.30 they have been slow lately but when I got called off work I did some..only made $2 :( ).
I signed up at Pinecone Research and got a $3 check for doing a 10 min survery this week! That was exciting!

So theres the update! Any thoughts are helpful. I think this month was a good one, mostly because of this job. Lets hope next month is a good one too!!

Completed Goals