Slowly changing habits...
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Slowly changing habits...
| Wed, 08-17-2005 - 7:43pm |
Many of us find that we do things differently now than when we first started our journey to be debt free.
| Wed, 08-17-2005 - 7:43pm |
Good post. I'm trying to use cash to pay for things more. Also, adding a little something to our saving every paycheck.
My husband has gotten a little out of control in the debt reduction. (I mean it in a negative way).
MYM
Edited 8/17/2005 11:37 pm ET ET by mymartes
Waaahhhh!!!!
Becky
CL of 4th, 5th & 6th grade Scoliosis
I guess one thing is that every first of the month I subtract the recurring bills from our account and have set them up to be paid automatically from the checking. Also, I pretty much balance the checkbook every day so I can see exactly what is there after all the recurring allocations have been subtractd. I guess I really should put the miniscule savings account onto an automatic payment/deduction like the other recurring bills -- at least then I'd actually put something into it LOL.
I think at least having the cc payments set up to be automatically paid pretty much as soon at the bill is due has made sure we are not late on them. They really have to be paid -- I can hedge the food or clothes dollars in a crunch and spend less there if I have to sometimes, but at least all the recurring bills are paid.
Megan
Our biggest, best new habit is having an emergency fund.
All my best,
Danni
We are working on a few new habits and the first is simply being more aware of where all of our money goes. Tracking our spending and actually seeing in black & white where we are frivolous has really made a difference. I've also been very diligent lately about putting money into savings each & every week ON payday. If we can keep this up, we will definitely have a nice "emerg fund" set up in a few more months. Another thing that I started doing is making a cc payment online every week. Our cc banks allow 4 online payments per cycle, but no more than one per day. Perfect!! So the first 2 payments are to "meet or exceed the minimum" and anything after that I consider a snowflake.
We've really started cracking down hard on this in the last couple of months. So far so good, but we all know it only takes ONE little thing to cause a major mudslide.
Having an emergency fund, plus having other accounts that money gets automatically transferred to makes all the difference in the world!
It's nice to not have to worry about where the money for house insurance and taxes is going to come from anymore!
The other thing that we do is surf balances. It took me a looong time to realize that the companies don't care WHO the money is coming from, just THAT it's coming. Otherwise, I'm sure we'd *still* have cards with 19%+ APR's hanging around our necks.
I'm much more conscious about where the money goes. I know that we used to be terrible about eating out. We still do, but it's not a given anymore, and that's cool.
Lisa