Happy Thanksgiving

I am drinking my hot cocoa this morning to start setting up for the Family lunch this Thanksgiving!


... I am THANKFUL for...  

My Family, Jay, Friends, Immediate & Extended Family and my Dog for just making my every day's as happy that it could be

... and I am also thankful for you - whoever is reading this blog right now...

I hope you have a great Thanksgiving with your family and friends! 

To save or not to save....

I am torn. Do I start saving now while I am paying off my debt? or hold off on this until I have paid off everything?

My current savings is pretty much what I have been contributing to my current 401k and what it is gaining right now. I used to have a Roth IRA but its currently down to $500. A savings account under $500 and an emergency fund hovering around $100. I know its kind of sad. This is why I have been thinking of what I should do by the start of next year.

Take note that I probably will not start this until the new year starts, but below are the 'tentative' goals I have for the upcoming year.

• Start an Emergency fund Goal $1000
• Increase 401k contribution. Currently at 5% and bump up to 6%
• Restart contribution to IRA @ $50/per paycheck

Should I even start paying myself now or should I just focus put it all to my debt repayment? 

Week 25 : We are down to THREE

Finally - I can organize everything!

I am finally down to 3 companies I need to pay off debt. I am hoping I can pay off the Personal Loan ASAP - that will be a huge burden off my back because then I can control the payments that are going out for the other accounts and not have an automatic withdrawal per month. Plus, the payments that I make manually doesn't get posted until a week after and sometimes that can get frustrating to me.

I have made the balance transfer - which probably will not post until the next week or so (since its a holiday the whole week). It cost me about $130 for the fees but this will be at a 0% until Dec 2015.

I am now down to 3 creditors to pay. I have paid off the car insurance for the year, although, I have a payment that I need to make for my car registration $135 which is budgeted below.

Anyways, Thanksgiving is almost here and I think I will be contributing to thanksgiving dinner. No, I am not cooking lol but probably will be buying a holiday ham for the family =) That will need to get budgeted in - they are expensive!

Current Debts:
Its not a payday this week, but below are the current total debts.

Current	Previous	Current	Difference
Personal Loan	5,488.00	5,488.00	-
Student Loan	6,217.00	6,200.00	17.00
Credit Card	8,924.00	8,960.00	(36.00)
Car Misc	135.00	135.00	-
TOTAL	20,764.00	20,783.00	(19.00)

Starting Debt: $20,764  || Paid/Interest: $19 || Ending Debt: *$20,783

Weekly Spending: 
Looks like I spent too much this week, but I actually took out $200 for the payment I had for my Personal Loan to fund this trip

Sat - $66 Groceries | $6 Breakfast | $13 Dinner | $35 Drinks | $65 Hotel & Gas (my share)
Sun - $55 Lunch
Mon - No Spend Day!
Tue - $45 Target
Wed - No Spend Day!
Thu - $20 Lunch
Fri - $20 Dinner

Weekly Spending Start $200 + $200 Travel Budget = $400 || End $325

Have a good weekend xo!

Target End Date - Revised

This week I am starting think of financial goals that I would like to accomplish in 2015. The main goal is paying down the big three debts that I have and in this order

1. Pay off the Personal Loan $5,788 as of today
2. Pay off/down Credit Card @ $9,000 as of today
3. Pay down Student Loans @ 6,220 as of today

There are also 3 options that have been circling my head on how to get these bad boys paid off.
Keep in mind that I get paid bi-weekly so most of these are broken down by the pay period instead of per month.

• Debt Snowball 
• Paying the minimum on the last two debts and the max I can pay on the first debt.
• My debt budget will be hovering around $700 
• Personal Loan Payment $540 - paid off by April 2015
• Credit Card Payment $100 - paid off by Oct 2015
• Student Loan Payment $60 - paid off by Jan 2016

• Pay off within the year - 26 payments
• Debt budget approx $850
• Personal Loan Payment $250 - paid off by Nov 2015
• Credit Card Payment $350 - paid off by Nov 2015
• Student Loan Payment $250 - paid off by Nov 2015

• Pay off within 1.5 years - 39 payments
• Debt Budget approx $600
• Personal Loan Payment $150 - paid off by May 2016
• Credit Card Payment $250 - paid off by May 2016
• Student Loan Payment $200 - paid off by May 2016

This doesn't include any extra payments that I might be able to pay out next year. Either way - this will be sooner than the Target Date I have set for myself which was July 2016.



Which one do you think is the best option? 

Week 24 : Roadtrip

My girlfriend and I are heading to Vegas/Arizona this weekend for a quick trip. We bought the Skywalk Grand Canyon reservations last year and was not able to use it at all - our schedules did not match up. But this will be a great time to catch up with her since I did not see her the whole year. Horrible!


Current Debts:

Its payday week and the debt increased. Its actually because of my puppys surgery

Also, I wont be paying anything for now on my Credit Cards to let everything settle and so I can transfer the balance from one to the other and get the 0% APR until Dec 2015. And.... * I am actually going to be taking and extra $200 from the budget into this mini-road trip. This is why I am only paying $300 for the Personal Loan which was originally budgeted as $500

I suck this week! =/

Current	Current	Paid	Ending
Personal Loan	5,788.00	300.00	5,488.00
Student Loan	6,237.00	20.00	6,217.00
Credit Cards	8,924.00	-	8,924.00
Car Insurance	300.00	300.00	-
TOTAL	21,249.00	620.00	20,629.00

Starting Debt: $21,249 || Paid/Interest: $620 || Ending Debt: *$20,629


Weekly Spending: 
Omg we are on a roll - do you see that the whole weekend was a No Spend! Whoooo.... it went down like this. Saturday and Sunday were spent with family functions and since we were super tired we just had a lazy night and watched movies : Captain America and X-men.

I actually resisted buying shoes the past weekend also, but we ended up at the mall again last Tuesday (That Wednesday definitely felt like a Monday!) and I bought the shoes with a 20% off!

Aaaand the big portion of this was my dogs surgery ***

Sat - No Spend Day
Sun - No Spend Day
Mon - $45 Dinner
Tue - $60 Shopping
Wed -$7 Lunch | $2,551 Surgery | $68 Pet Misc
Thu - $38 Pet Misc
Fri - $50 Gas

Weekly Spending Start $200 || End $2,819

Have a safe fun weekend!