Debt Dumpers - 2017

[Jen and Ashwin]

We actually aren't. Trust me, we've done out the math. If we want to remain a two income family (which we would want to be AFTER daycare), he has to work. Otherwise it's five (or more) years outside of the work force, entering back in at 40+ with a salary that's much, much less than five years of work experience, raises, and promotions. It would be a really, really, REALLY risky gamble.

We were in this position with several of our kids--in fact, for about three years, it cost more to send our kids to daycare than I was bringing home in salary. But it still made long-term economic sense for me to keep working, because I kept my position and seniority. If I had stayed at home for a few years, it's hard to say what positions would have been open and what they would have paid at that point.

DH and I always plan to be a dual income household. For us, DH makes much more than the cost of childcare, so it isn't quite as extreme for us. But even if the math was closer, I would want him to continue working because his earnings potential is much better if he doesn't leave the work force. Men actually get penalized more for having employment gaps than women do, so that is a big consideration for families as well. And I currently make much more than DH, so it would never be a consideration for me to leave my job.

 

[AquaDame]

We actually aren't. Trust me, we've done out the math. If we want to remain a two income family (which we would want to be AFTER daycare), he has to work. Otherwise it's five (or more) years outside of the work force, entering back in at 40+ with a salary that's much, much less than five years of work experience, raises, and promotions. It would be a really, really, REALLY risky gamble.

Yep, I agree. As long as there isn't a huge difference financially it makes sense to stay in the workforce to make it easier on yourself. My boss works even though its a wash for her, but she says its nice getting to step away for eight hours a day and interact with adults so she won't quit... at least not until they are school aged.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

I hate to break it to you but it's not all rosy once they reach public school. Then there is a huge expense of summer camp. Yes, it's not as much as FT day care but unless your work hours are extremely flexible, you may be limited to the most expensive options like we were. There are a lot of places that call themselves 'day camp' but many are geared toward stay home moms that just want some alone time or shopping time, or sports-themed for the kids. Only a few could accommodate the hours of a FT job schedule as in dh leaves work way before me and I leave home around 7am. He gets home at 4 and I get home either 5:15 or 6pm depending on which floor I'm on at work. So alllllll those camps that have hours from like 9am-1pm, and there are a LOT of them, were worthless to us. Our families all worked too so there was no one to lean on for help.

The few camps that offer all-day hours, lunch, transportation (because they're usually out in more rural parts) were around $500 per week per camper. All to hear my kids complain that they have to get sunblock on at 6:30am and be forced to play baseball when it's 95 & humid and they just want to sleep in a little on summer vacation. This was 10-15 yrs ago so who knows what it's up to now but back then we still budgeted like $10k for summer camp.

We were so relieved when our kids were getting to be around 9 & 12 and were in karate and 2 of the older female students in the class were looking for work/babysitting $ and agreed to alternating weeks of coming to our house. It was easy money for them and we were all much happier. (of course the karate costs were a ton of money too but I guess that's any activity kids are into.)

By then my "we work so hard therefore we deserve a Disney cruise" addiction was full steam ahead. Which led me to here.

 

[DLgal]

I hate to break it to you but it's not all rosy once they reach public school. Then there is a huge expense of summer camp. Yes, it's not as much as FT day care but unless your work hours are extremely flexible, you may be limited to the most expensive options like we were. There are a lot of places that call themselves 'day camp' but many are geared toward stay home moms that just want some alone time or shopping time, or sports-themed for the kids. Only a few could accommodate the hours of a FT job schedule as in dh leaves work way before me and I leave home around 7am. He gets home at 4 and I get home either 5:15 or 6pm depending on which floor I'm on at work. So alllllll those camps that have hours from like 9am-1pm, and there are a LOT of them, were worthless to us. Our families all worked too so there was no one to lean on for help.

The few camps that offer all-day hours, lunch, transportation (because they're usually out in more rural parts) were around $500 per week per camper. All to hear my kids complain that they have to get sunblock on at 6:30am and be forced to play baseball when it's 95 & humid and they just want to sleep in a little on summer vacation. This was 10-15 yrs ago so who knows what it's up to now but back then we still budgeted like $10k for summer camp.

We were so relieved when our kids were getting to be around 9 & 12 and were in karate and 2 of the older female students in the class were looking for work/babysitting $ and agreed to alternating weeks of coming to our house. It was easy money for them and we were all much happier. (of course the karate costs were a ton of money too but I guess that's any activity kids are into.)

By then my "we work so hard therefore we deserve a Disney cruise" addiction was full steam ahead. Which led me to here.

Yep, people forget about summer break, holiday break, spring break, random school days off, half days, etc.

Unless one of you is a teacher and will be home anyway, you really have to crunch the numbers.

Of course, there is a very real potential opportunity cost with choosing the stay at home parent route as well. Everyone's situation is different. I think, though, that many people think they won't be able to manage on one salary when it would be very possible. I have two sisters who have very different situations with work, children, etc. One of them has a husband who, IMO, should have quit working long ago to stay home with their son, who has had lasting issues from being in daycare for years (separation anxiety, social anxiety, can't sleep alone in his room still at age 6, etc). Her husband has bounced around from temp job to temp job, while my sister makes enough to support them AND she is a teacher. His "career path" is a joke...at 43 he still doesn't have a solid career and he basically spends all his income on stuff for himself. My other sister has 2 kids and both she and her husband had lucrative jobs in graphic design. They live in San Francisco (in the actual city). After she had her second kid, my sister quit her full time job to stay home. She works part time for a barre studio. There is hourly drop in daycare there that she uses during her shifts. They are on year 3 of this arrangement and it's working great for them. They have more money now that she is only working part time. They went down a tax bracket which was HUGE for them, plus the daycare savings. This is the sister who said 1) I will NEVER have kids. 2) I would NEVER quit my job to be a stay at home mom.

 

[Ngwira]

I hate to break it to you but it's not all rosy once they reach public school. Then there is a huge expense of summer camp. Yes, it's not as much as FT day care but unless your work hours are extremely flexible, you may be limited to the most expensive options like we were. There are a lot of places that call themselves 'day camp' but many are geared toward stay home moms that just want some alone time or shopping time, or sports-themed for the kids. Only a few could accommodate the hours of a FT job schedule as in dh leaves work way before me and I leave home around 7am. He gets home at 4 and I get home either 5:15 or 6pm depending on which floor I'm on at work. So alllllll those camps that have hours from like 9am-1pm, and there are a LOT of them, were worthless to us. Our families all worked too so there was no one to lean on for help.

The few camps that offer all-day hours, lunch, transportation (because they're usually out in more rural parts) were around $500 per week per camper. All to hear my kids complain that they have to get sunblock on at 6:30am and be forced to play baseball when it's 95 & humid and they just want to sleep in a little on summer vacation. This was 10-15 yrs ago so who knows what it's up to now but back then we still budgeted like $10k for summer camp.

We were so relieved when our kids were getting to be around 9 & 12 and were in karate and 2 of the older female students in the class were looking for work/babysitting $ and agreed to alternating weeks of coming to our house. It was easy money for them and we were all much happier. (of course the karate costs were a ton of money too but I guess that's any activity kids are into.)

By then my "we work so hard therefore we deserve a Disney cruise" addiction was full steam ahead. Which led me to here.

Tell me about it, sister, JCC is $9k for my 2 and that doesn't include before 9am drop off and after 4pm pick up. Luckily, we found a center in Marlton that's a fraction of that but summer camp and activities like summer enrichment adds up.

 

[Ngwira]

With lots of trips on the horizon including inner harbor/Baltimore in May, Vegas/Grand Canyon in June, NYC in July and Disney World in August, debt dumping is on hold and I'll be paying the minimum on my existing debt. Luckily, we only have the window loan (I'm not counting our mortgage or my student loans). Honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way. I'd rather spend money on experiences than things. I want to do everything I can, while I can. While I have my health and a sound mind.
Debt dumping will return in September. Stay tuned.

 

[hmack]

I knew it was coming, but I still didn't like it.

After 3 consecutive months of having our overall CC balance go down, it went up. DH and E had a successful father/daughter road trip and I don't regret that expense at all. I think it really helped E make a decision and my baby has decided that she's off to Roanoke VA in the fall. (hours and hours and hours away from her momma, but that's a topic for another day.)

For my part, I took a road trip with the other kiddo to Vermont to pre-celebrate her upcoming college graduation and I don't regret that at all either as she's going off to Ohio for graduate school in the fall and I know our adventures are precious. Both DH and I tried to be cost conscious on our trips, but things just add up.

We also paid $250 for E's college deposit but we were able to take that out of our savings.

I need to write one more check for E's marching band trip, but the money is all set aside for that. Now I need to decide what would be a good amount of spending $ for her to have. It's 4 days on the road, a trip to D.C. and a stop at Six Flags. Everything should be covered except for spending money (snacks, souvenirs, etc). She's not much of a spender but I do want her to have some "fun" money.

Next weekend is a trip to NH for O's college graduation. That shouldn't be too bad. One night in a hotel, food, and gas.

On the good side, we're getting bonuses at work and mine is going to tires. Not the sexiest purchase, but I need 4 new tires and this is way better than putting them on my credit card. I've also (finally) re-started putting money into a retirement fund. With the girls starting new chapters in their lives, it has me thinking that it's time for me to really start getting serious about preparing for new chapters in my own life. At my work, if you put aside 3%, my employer matches 5%. Seems like a good deal to me.

 

[Eureka]

Tell me about it, sister, JCC is $9k for my 2 and that doesn't include before 9am drop off and after 4pm pick up. Luckily, we found a center in Marlton that's a fraction of that but summer camp and activities like summer enrichment adds up.

All of these reasons were part of why I freelanced at home part time when the kids were small. When they were 10 and 12, I went back full time to a job that had flexible hours and for which I could work from home several days a week. Now that I am in a job with less flexibility and right now, all in-office, I can't wait for summer because our schedule eases up some. The kids are 14 and 16 now and can get themselves to swim practice and can ride their bikes to most of their friends' houses. DS16 will be taking drivers ed this summer but that's in the evenings. During the school year with sports pick ups, other activities and half days on which sometimes they still have practice just earlier, it's more difficult. Dh has the more flexible schedule now so he works part of his days from home to be the chauffeur.

I was not really happy as a sahm when they were little, got more content when I started freelancing, but the trade off was I could volunteer at their school and was around to go to awards etc. but we did pay a price...we didn't have any savings in those years and after seven years of working part time, I am now putting close to a quarter of my pay into retirement to catch up for the years during which I didn't contribute. Plus my company chips in another 10% of my salary so that helps.And we now have some college savings but couldn't start that until way late considering their ages.

 

[Miss Whimsy]

debt dumping and moving don't really mix.

 

[DLgal]

debt dumping and moving don't really mix.

Ugh...seriously. I know.

 

[DisneyMandC]

Home from our weekend out of state for a horse show. We had a really nice time and my horse was great! We also had our first experience with Airbnb, which was fantastic. Since we were at a horse show, we know that we will be in our room literally only to shower and sleep as we usually get in late at night and are out of there early in the morning. We found an Airbnb where the guy was no longer living in the apartment and literally had only a bed and a futon in it. Perfect for us at $30 a night! We will definitely use Airbnb for other horse shows in the future!

Budget was a little close for April, but we will get a lot of the money back this month. We bought DH several items anticipating that he may be showing a horse soon, but that deal fell through. So we will now be returning about $550 worth of product so all of that money will go right back into our horse show fund.

 

[Eureka]

Found out over the weekend that DS16's quiz bowl team is going to Nationals in Louisville in June. He is psyched! I think the county pays for the actual registration and bus, but we don't really know the details yet about what we're responsible for. I don't have enough vacation time to go with him (and still be able to go through with our summer vacation/winter holidays plans), not sure if DH wants/plans to go. I don't think he needs a parent with him but of course they'll need chaperones. This is one time where I kind of wish I was still freelancing so I could go.

 

[Jen and Ashwin]

April summary.

Some of our regular expenses rose last month. Internet went up $10 and the escrow for our mortgage went up $25. In order to account for these changes, I had to figure out where to trim from other places in the budget. Since DH and I carpool to work, we never seem to use our entire fuel budget, so I took $35 out of that. There is still a little bit of flexibility in our budget, since I like to leave about $50 unaccounted for each month to place where necessary, so I wasn't too worried.

We did pretty well last month. We went a little over in our dining out category, but covered it using some extra per diem money from my work travel. We also bought that tent for our camping trip in June, so that means we won't any have money in our family fun category in May in order to make up for that expense. Otherwise, we kept on target and even saved a little extra towards our DVC fund thanks to credit card cash back, Swagbucks and some extra per diem money from work travel. It makes me really happy to see the balance on this category increase so I can continue dreaming about a new DVC contract (we are now thinking that we want Grand Floridian instead of Wilderness Lodge).

Our emergency fund is now up to $5k! We are definitely on track to hit $9k by the end of the year.

For May, we will be gone for about 10 days on vacation. Most of our expenses, including most meals, are covered while on the cruise, but I have set aside about $350 to cover some transportation expenses, a few meals and any other incidentals while we are traveling to the ship. For some of these funds, I shifted about 1/4 of the regular grocery and fuel budgets into the travel category, since we won't be incurring these costs while we are gone on vacation. I am hoping that we won't spend the whole $350 and I can save some for our camping trip in June.

 

[Jen and Ashwin]

Found out over the weekend that DS16's quiz bowl team is going to Nationals in Louisville in June. He is psyched! I think the county pays for the actual registration and bus, but we don't really know the details yet about what we're responsible for. I don't have enough vacation time to go with him (and still be able to go through with our summer vacation/winter holidays plans), not sure if DH wants/plans to go. I don't think he needs a parent with him but of course they'll need chaperones. This is one time where I kind of wish I was still freelancing so I could go.

I was on quiz bowl in high school and loved it! I loved it more than swim team, to be honest. There is something so thrilling in hitting that buzzer and answering the question faster than anyone else. My team made it to state, but never nationals.

Congrats to your son and his team. I am sure it will be an amazing experience.

 

[lorac4disney]

We are back from Orlando and I have to say that we did very, very well on our budget. I'm still crunching the numbers, but it looks like we spent almost half of what we budgeted for this vacation. Our budget was $2000 and we spent a little more than $1000. We ended up skipping Typhoon Lagoon because we were tired and just needed a down day to rest.

So here's the breakdown:

Gas: Budget $300, Actual $188
Beach Hotel: Budget $200, Actual $198
Typhoon Lagoon: Budget $200, Actual $0
Souvenirs: Budget $300, Actual $207
Food: Budget $1000, Actual $505

Total: Budget $2000, Actual $1098

Yay!!!!!

Now that vacation is over, I will be putting more money towards our most expensive debts (DVC and home mortgage). They are also my smallest debts so that helps too. Now it's time to buckle down and really see how much money I can put towards eliminating my debts. Unfortunately, my vacuum cleaner died right before we went on vacation. So now I have to buy a new vacuum. The good part is that I have earned enough Swagbucks to buy a cheap one while putting next to nothing towards it (less than $5).

 

[Eureka]

I was on quiz bowl in high school and loved it! I loved it more than swim team, to be honest. There is something so thrilling in hitting that buzzer and answering the question faster than anyone else. My team made it to state, but never nationals.

Congrats to your son and his team. I am sure it will be an amazing experience.

Thanks, he is on the It's Academic team and loves it. We watch a lot of Jeopardy in our house

 

[MrsTurnerLovesDisney]

oy this month took a big dent on us!!

We paid off DH Disney Visa (yay $1480 down) I used it to rebook our Disney trip for November when the free dining came out but it will be paid as soon as the statement comes in.

I paid $800 down on my card leaving $600 to go (0% interest til Jan should be paid off in July)

But we over spent by like $400 (new underground dog fence and eating out way too much) DH and I both had some major dental work done 2 weeks apart and we didn't feel like cooking at all and ate out a lot and lots of runs to grocery store for sprites, ice cream etic.

I had a tooth out which was fine but I had a reaction to the medicine and developed nasty canker sores and a bad sore throat that had be feeling awful for about week and half. Last Monday DH had gum graft surgery done. Used the last of our HSA for it and still were $500 short so we put that on care credit. We were given 6 months to pay off at 0% interest but we are shooting for August to have that done.

Time to buckle down!

 

[dayvewc]

Used the last of our HSA for it and still were $500 short so we put that on care credit. We were given 6 months to pay off at 0% interest but we are shooting for August to have that done.

Not going to help immediately, but ... my HSA card will pay me cash for any qualified medical expense that I have to pay out of pocket. So where I had to put $800 of dental work on my care-credit card, they will reimburse me for it at any point I ask (which I'm waiting until I have a large enough balance to do so and still have a little left on the HSA card). Just something to keep in mind.

 

[DnA2010]

We are back from Orlando and I have to say that we did very, very well on our budget. I'm still crunching the numbers, but it looks like we spent almost half of what we budgeted for this vacation. Our budget was $2000 and we spent a little more than $1000. We ended up skipping Typhoon Lagoon because we were tired and just needed a down day to rest.

So here's the breakdown:

Gas: Budget $300, Actual $188
Beach Hotel: Budget $200, Actual $198
Typhoon Lagoon: Budget $200, Actual $0
Souvenirs: Budget $300, Actual $207
Food: Budget $1000, Actual $505

Total: Budget $2000, Actual $1098

Yay!!!!!

Now that vacation is over, I will be putting more money towards our most expensive debts (DVC and home mortgage). They are also my smallest debts so that helps too. Now it's time to buckle down and really see how much money I can put towards eliminating my debts. Unfortunately, my vacuum cleaner died right before we went on vacation. So now I have to buy a new vacuum. The good part is that I have earned enough Swagbucks to buy a cheap one while putting next to nothing towards it (less than $5).

Good for you on being almost half you budget! That's pretty awesome if your mortgage is one of your smaller debts! Ours is massive (high house prices) but due to dumping is our only debt

 

[MrsTurnerLovesDisney]

Not going to help immediately, but ... my HSA card will pay me cash for any qualified medical expense that I have to pay out of pocket. So where I had to put $800 of dental work on my care-credit card, they will reimburse me for it at any point I ask (which I'm waiting until I have a large enough balance to do so and still have a little left on the HSA card). Just something to keep in mind.

thanks for that tip! i'll have to see if we can do that as well.