Ch-ch-ch-changes

I had dinner with a friend last week and I wanted to get more information on what I can do to curb my spending. She has paid off ALL her consumer debt in less than two years. She did not say how much her balance was, but she told me that she pretty much “didn’t have a life”, and that she wouldn’t recommend that approach to anyone else. I told her about my weekly challenge and she said that maybe to just ease into it than completely making a drastic change – because first you’ll need to change your lifestyle.

I thought about it and rather than giving up on this challenge – I am going to revise a couple of things.

• Make it into $150/week – this will only include variable expenses (ie. Food, gas, entertainment etc.), but not the fixed monthly expenses (ie. Storage, debt payments)
• Track my variable spending (every penny) – I can use my cash or debit card
• Do not use credit cards - Completely off limits
• Have a monthly debt payment target amount – I want to target to put least $1k into my debt this month.
• Have a monthly savings target amount – I want to hit $1k of my emergency fund … $100 more to go. I haven’t posted about this yet!
• Have at least ONE day of no spending

So watch out for my weekly update on Saturday and see if I was able to hit my target goals this week.

How many times do you revise your debt payment, spending and saving goals?