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| Mon, 08-23-2004 - 6:14pm |
Here's my story. We're not really in a huge amount of debt, but we're just surviving and not able to put money away for retirement.
My DH makes pretty good money (60K) and I'm working part-time ($20.00 per hour x 20 hours) but we're 2000.00 in debt with our line of credit. I have two small children, 3 and 1 1/2 so I'm paying for child care. We have two vehicle payments (my van is 475.00 and DH's truck is 782.00 (minus a work vehicle allowance of 500.00). We pay all of our bills on time but with our mortgage, student loans, life insurance, utilities, child care, vehicle insurance, etc we have $175.00 left over for the month and that doesn't go very far.
We've tried the budgeting thing, but we can't save money that we don't have. We don't leave extravegant lifestyles, we eat out (fast food only) on Friday nights and I'm pretty good with the groceries.
Any suggestions? Thanks.
Maggie
p.s. I'm in Canada

Well, there are really only two things for us all to do to pay off debt quicker - and that's either bring in more money or cut expenses. It looks like you have the income part handled; it seems to me like what's killing you is the vehicle payments. You're paying probably about a quarter of your takehome on vehicles - as much as what most guidelines recommend you spend on your main expense, housing. DH's truck payment seems excessive. If it were me, we'd dump that vehicle and get one that the vehicle allowance completely covers.
I know our vehicle payments are a lot. I only have 2 years remaining on my van payment and DH's truck is what he wants. We don't pay gas so DH figured that with us saving on gas we could afford the extra $280.00 as a payment and in 4 years, we'll own it and still continue to get the vehicle allowance. DH spends $450.00 a month on gas that we get back. I guess that's how we justified the extra payment.
I've also taken on a temporary part-time job (just for 2 weeks) that will hopefully help us out a bit. Pays well but is only temporary.
Thanks!
Maggie
Welcome to the board!
My only suggestion is to make sure you see if you are paying more out by working part-time with the daycare expense and all (don't know if you have to dress up for it or not), gas and all that stuff than if you would be staying home.
Groceries are always a good place to look into cutting expenses but since you said you are already doing that just wondering if they have something like Aldi/Sav-A-Lot in Canada???
Becky
CL of 4th, 5th & 6th grade Scoliosis