Debt Dumpers - 2015

[dayvewc]

I'm just curious what software people use to establish a budget and to help work on paying off debt? I've been trying to organize and get a plan implemented, but it seems that everything I try out just doesn't work for us. I've done it on my own and done Mint.com. Any recommendations?

I use (and love) "You Need A Budget".

I just use Quicken. I have all my bills set as recurring, and enter them in about a month in advance, so I can then see a running total of what is left in my account. It is not a "system" per se, and Quicken does have a budget feature (I just haven't figured out how to use).

I have looked at "You Need A Budget" before and it looked workable, but I realized I was getting pretty much the same thing out of my informal system that it was doing (and I didn't feel like adding another level of complication to my finances). I have heard that a lot of people really like it, though.

 

[PrincessKymm]

It's exciting to see everyone's progress! Even if it's two steps forward one step back you're still way ahead of most people!!!!

I have been real busy, it's just craziness anymore. I will have two cards paid off this month! Whoop whoop!!!! Plus a huge dent in another. I'm still aiming for July-October to be credit card debt free.

I keep talking myself in and out of disney trips! Lol I'm sure you all can relate. I sit down and do the math and say "yeah it's doable" but then I look at my debt and I just want cry so I say no. Every time! I'm looking forward to being able to book my 2016 mother/daughter/grandson trip. My mom wants to stay at POFQ so no discounts but I think we've settled on early August to celebrate mom's birthday. I'd love to go at Thanksgiving for DS's birthday but I just don't think I can handle the crowds. Well I should get back to work. Thanks for keeping me company while we had no phone, Internet, or email!

 

[gracie1]

It's exciting to see everyone's progress! Even if it's two steps forward one step back you're still way ahead of most people!!!!

I have been real busy, it's just craziness anymore. I will have two cards paid off this month! Whoop whoop!!!! Plus a huge dent in another. I'm still aiming for July-October to be credit card debt free.

I keep talking myself in and out of disney trips! Lol I'm sure you all can relate. I sit down and do the math and say "yeah it's doable" but then I look at my debt and I just want cry so I say no. Every time! I'm looking forward to being able to book my 2016 mother/daughter/grandson trip. My mom wants to stay at POFQ so no discounts but I think we've settled on early August to celebrate mom's birthday. I'd love to go at Thanksgiving for DS's birthday but I just don't think I can handle the crowds. Well I should get back to work. Thanks for keeping me company while we had no phone, Internet, or email!

That is great getting two more cards paid off this month!! Just think - if things go as planned you'll be cc debt free in about 6 months!! I know how you feel about the trip planning - I keep doing the same thing but then figure there's things to the house that money should go to, i eventually will need a car (hoping to get 2 more years out of mine), and I want to start tackling extra payments on my home equity loan. So the most I may do is maybe a show or a day trip somewhere.
You are doing a great job!! You should be proud of yourself!!

 

[bubba]

I love to read everyones posts! You all seem to be doing so well! I am on track to pay off 5 of 6 cards by May! We'll still have a balance on #6, but we got one of those balance transfer deals, so we'll have this one paid off by November. Please keep posting your progress, hints, tips and tricks! You are all so inspiring. I don't think I could have gotten to this point without you guys!

 

[BernardandMissBianca]

Glad you've stopped by!! I agree - a pay cut is worth it to make you mentally happy!! Car repairs are the worst - I put a couple thousand in mine last year and still have little things to do and even though mine is old I want to get at least another couple years out of it!

My car is only 5 years old but has 166,000 miles on it. I drive everywhere! LOL
But I'm hoping to to drive it another 5 years. Then I can scale down because all the boys will be driving at that point and it will mostly be just DD and me. DS18 and DS14 both have cars now, we just need to start looking for one for DS13.

Of course yesterday I had to buy a new battery for it, to the tune of $200 even with the a great discount from the dealership. That was painful too!!

 

[dayvewc]

Well, bad news, good news, and neutral news.

Bad news: I came out from work yesterday, and had a flat tire. I managed to get it inflated enough to get to the auto-shop.

Good news: They were able to patch/plug/repair it, so it only cost $11.05 instead of $130 for a new tire.

Neutral news: I got a CC offer for a 0% APR on balance transfers until 12/31/2016 (about 20 months worth). I usually don't apply for new credit cards to keep the dings off my record, but I thought, "why not". I was approved, and approved for a credit line that will double my current combined credit lines from my current cards. ($11,000 approved vs. current limits of about $10,000). It does have a 3% transfer fee, but that will be about $200 total to transfer everything to the one card, and I currently pay about $70/month in interest, so in 3 months it'll be saving me money. It also has a lower interest rate than most of my cards, so if I don't have it paid off by the time the promotional period ends, I won't be paying as much interest anyway. And, based on the total of my balances (about $5500), I should be able to pay it off completely ($300/month over 20 months is about $6000) before the intro rate ends.

I'm actually thinking the best news is that by doubling my available credit, but not using it, I'm going from about a 60% credit usage to about 30% credit usage - which is in-line with what FICO expects.

 

[Dentam]

Neutral news: I got a CC offer for a 0% APR on balance transfers until 12/31/2016 (about 20 months worth). I usually don't apply for new credit cards to keep the dings off my record, but I thought, "why not". I was approved, and approved for a credit line that will double my current combined credit lines from my current cards. ($11,000 approved vs. current limits of about $10,000). It does have a 3% transfer fee, but that will be about $200 total to transfer everything to the one card, and I currently pay about $70/month in interest, so in 3 months it'll be saving me money. It also has a lower interest rate than most of my cards, so if I don't have it paid off by the time the promotional period ends, I won't be paying as much interest anyway. And, based on the total of my balances (about $5500), I should be able to pay it off completely ($300/month over 20 months is about $6000) before the intro rate ends.

I'm actually thinking the best news is that by doubling my available credit, but not using it, I'm going from about a 60% credit usage to about 30% credit usage - which is in-line with what FICO expects.

I would call that good news! I hope I get a similar offer once I pay off my 2 cc's so I can have 0% interest to pay off the rest.

I also had a flat tire awhile back - really random... my garage faces an alley with dumpsters and apparently the garbage trucks left behind a concrete lawn ornament that wedged itself into my tire. There was no salvaging the tire so I had to pay about $60 for a new one.

 

[Docmom]

I'm just curious what software people use to establish a budget and to help work on paying off debt? I've been trying to organize and get a plan implemented, but it seems that everything I try out just doesn't work for us. I've done it on my own and done Mint.com. Any recommendations?

I started using You Need a Budget in January and absolutely LOVE it. It helps me know where the money is going, I've been really good at paying down our CC the past few months and because I set up an emergency fund it's saving us extreme stress now at tax time. DH worked as an independent contractor teaching online classes most of last year (now is an employee) so they didn't take out taxes. We thought that it wouldn't be a huge ding since we also bought a house last year and have that deduction. Aren't finished plugging in all the numbers but looks like we're going to owe much more than I expected. Without YNAB I'd be completely stressed out (now am just a little stressed out). It does seem like we are taking two steps forward and one step back (sometimes one step forward and two steps back) but definitely will just keep swimming! BTW, hardest thing for me about YNAB is wrapping my head around every dollar having a job and realizing that when I buy something or pay a bill it's already been budgeted for with the money we have in our account so I don't have to stress.

 

[k_reile]

We got hit big with owing this year. We knew we would owe (DH self employeed) but our income was higher than expected this year.

I thought about opening a 0 interest CC to pay off the rest of the CC's so at least I am not paying the extra for the interest. It we want to refinance later this summer to do our addition and I don't want a new credit card on our credit so close to doing the addition. Most of the credit cards should be paid off before we do the loan anyways. It would just be nice to not have to pay the interest but it's not worth it in the long run right now

 

[Ratsmith]

I'm just curious what software people use to establish a budget and to help work on paying off debt? I've been trying to organize and get a plan implemented, but it seems that everything I try out just doesn't work for us. I've done it on my own and done Mint.com. Any recommendations?

I never did find software that keeps things organized the way I wanted. So I created one for my specific needs using a spreadsheet program.

 

[gracie1]

Well, bad news, good news, and neutral news.

Bad news: I came out from work yesterday, and had a flat tire. I managed to get it inflated enough to get to the auto-shop.

Good news: They were able to patch/plug/repair it, so it only cost $11.05 instead of $130 for a new tire.

Neutral news: I got a CC offer for a 0% APR on balance transfers until 12/31/2016 (about 20 months worth). I usually don't apply for new credit cards to keep the dings off my record, but I thought, "why not". I was approved, and approved for a credit line that will double my current combined credit lines from my current cards. ($11,000 approved vs. current limits of about $10,000). It does have a 3% transfer fee, but that will be about $200 total to transfer everything to the one card, and I currently pay about $70/month in interest, so in 3 months it'll be saving me money. It also has a lower interest rate than most of my cards, so if I don't have it paid off by the time the promotional period ends, I won't be paying as much interest anyway. And, based on the total of my balances (about $5500), I should be able to pay it off completely ($300/month over 20 months is about $6000) before the intro rate ends.

I'm actually thinking the best news is that by doubling my available credit, but not using it, I'm going from about a 60% credit usage to about 30% credit usage - which is in-line with what FICO expects.

That is great news with the cc offer! Look at how much you will be saving in interest over all those months! And when you make your payment 100% will be going to the balance!

 

[gracie1]

I love to read everyones posts! You all seem to be doing so well! I am on track to pay off 5 of 6 cards by May! We'll still have a balance on #6, but we got one of those balance transfer deals, so we'll have this one paid off by November. Please keep posting your progress, hints, tips and tricks! You are all so inspiring. I don't think I could have gotten to this point without you guys!

Your doing a great job getting your debt dumped! You should feel proud of what you have accomplished!

 

[bcwife76]

Been an expensive week, but at least it's all covered. DH bought new tires for his car on Monday - they have yet to ship from the supplier so the charge hasn't actually gone through on our Mastercard yet, it's just sitting there as pending. I called today and paid our upcoming cruise in full (it wasn't due til July 9th) because the CDN $ continues to tank against the USD $. It cost us an additional $460 due to the exchange rate. Ouch. However the silver lining is that (a) we have the money set aside for both of these expenses and (b) our Mastercard closed for the month yesterday (billing date is the 9th of each month) so neither of these transactions will appear on our statement until the next billing period. Which means they don't actually have to be paid until the end of May and our money can continue to grow a tiny bit of interest in our savings account until then

 

[gracie1]

Bumping thread!! How is everyone doing?

 

[Dentam]

Doing well here... paying over the minimum on all of my cards each month (some by double or more) and waiting for the sale of my house to close in about six weeks. At that point I will pay two cards off in full and use the remainder of the proceeds for a downpayment on a used vehicle. Hope everyone else is doing well!

 

[gracie1]

Doing well here... paying over the minimum on all of my cards each month (some by double or more) and waiting for the sale of my house to close in about six weeks. At that point I will pay two cards off in full and use the remainder of the proceeds for a downpayment on a used vehicle. Hope everyone else is doing well!

That is great! Glad that you sold the house and go to closing so soon!!

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

We are hanging in there. Back from our trip with no added debt. Yay!
Yesterday we got our termite treatment done and he did spot some structural damage in the crawlspace. It's not awful and dh is very handy so he can do the work but it will probably cost around $500 in materials. The exterminator is a friend of dh and said it's not urgent but should be done before the heat of summer makes it an even more uncomfortable job.

Ds14 needs a tutor for science in order to pass for the year. If he has to take it again next year in addition to biology, it would really be a struggle for him. If it's anything like ds18's math tutor back in 7th grade, they get around $60/hr. It's expensive but this would be $ well spent imho.
We are around 5 weeks away from paying off this next cc. Dh will have an extra shift of OT this week so that will help out dealing with these bumps in the road.

Just keep swimming!

 

[dayvewc]

We are hanging in there. Back from our trip with no added debt. Yay!
Yesterday we got our termite treatment done and he did spot some structural damage in the crawlspace. It's not awful and dh is very handy so he can do the work but it will probably cost around $500 in materials. The exterminator is a friend of dh and said it's not urgent but should be done before the heat of summer makes it an even more uncomfortable job.

Ds14 needs a tutor for science in order to pass for the year. If he has to take it again next year in addition to biology, it would really be a struggle for him. If it's anything like ds18's math tutor back in 7th grade, they get around $60/hr. It's expensive but this would be $ well spent imho.
We are around 5 weeks away from paying off this next cc. Dh will have an extra shift of OT this week so that will help out dealing with these bumps in the road.

Just keep swimming!

Wow, $60/hour for a tutor? I've never seen anything higher than $20/hr (cash basis, 1-1 help) and if contracted through a school and paid by check (with taxes etc.) the going rate has been $25/hr.

Maybe I need to move there and advertise as a tutor!! That is over twice what I get paid per hour as a teacher. Now, to just find enough students that need help to fill 2000 hours a year ....

Good deal on the no added debt from your trip!! YAY!!! I didn't manage that, though I can say the only added debt came from a difference in what I was expecting the car rental to cost and what it did cost - but that was still $225.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Wow, $60/hour for a tutor? I've never seen anything higher than $20/hr (cash basis, 1-1 help) and if contracted through a school and paid by check (with taxes etc.) the going rate has been $25/hr.

Maybe I need to move there and advertise as a tutor!! That is over twice what I get paid per hour as a teacher. Now, to just find enough students that need help to fill 2000 hours a year ....

Good deal on the no added debt from your trip!! YAY!!! I didn't manage that, though I can say the only added debt came from a difference in what I was expecting the car rental to cost and what it did cost - but that was still $225.

Chances are good our property taxes are triple also.
Teachers in our district generally earn 60-90k per year depending on their degree and years of experience. That $60/hr was 5 years ago for math. We'll see what the going rate is now for a science tutor.

 

[PrincessKymm]

Hi everyone!!!!! You are all just chuggin' along! Great work everyone! I just had to stop by and shout YAY!!!! I paid off my two cards with my bonus! I did charge some new clothes but have the money to pay that off right away. It saved me money to do it that way so I'll pay those off as well tomorrow. Sometimes a girl just needs a new dress! I will be working on paying down 2 another cards monthly and then paying all but one off with my next bonus in July.

Also, has anyone ever not felt secure in their job if they've been there a long time? I've been at my current place for more than 3 years and until yesterday never felt secure. I about lost it due to a rude coworker (he thinks he's funny but really he's just rude) and sent an email to my bosses. One of them, the VP, sat down with me and helped offer solutions and then told me I was important and valued. It felt nice! I did not get this picture during my annual review so I wasn't sure why he didn't say it then. No way does this impact my desire to save but now I don't feel like I'm drowning. Now I feel like if I save its to save to save, not to save my butt from a fire LOL. Not sure if that makes sense but thanks for letting me get that off my chest! Now I just need you to all smack me on the nose and tell me NO DISNEY this year. I keep trying to sneak a trip in!