Small Debt Payoff – Round 2
Well friends… We done f-ed up. March 2019 went swimmingly, but in April 2019 things started to fall apart. We started talking about a babymoon (I feel dumb just typing that word! – more on that later). We also decided to put hardwood floors in our bedroom, buy a new bedroom set, and get a mower. I mean we were down almost $9K in debt! Here is how we ruined all our progress in a few short months!
3 Fails…
First purchase mistake: the mower. We have over an acre of lawn. Just. so. much. GRASS. My husband had spent 2 years mowing it with a push mower. He hated it so much. I don’t blame him at all. It took him over 2 hours to mow which often resulted in him putting off mowing and creating a bigger job for him. So we decided to buy a ride on mower and not just any one, a John Deere. We did pay for half in cash and we financed the other half. Do you smell it? Yep, another 0% financing for a year.
Part of me wishes we did not buy the mower until we had all the funds, but the joy it brings my husband and the time it saves is really beneficial for him.
Second purchase mistake: we decided to put hardwoods in our bedroom. Our home is only 3 years old, mind you. We did save and pay for this in cash, $2K to be exact. But in hindsight, that $2K would have been super useful to IDK – buy the mower outright maybe? Duh. Or put towards one of the larger debts (student loans, my CC…). Honestly. I love them, it’s so much easier to keep clean with the dogs and just looks beautiful! But, could I have waited? Totally.
Third purchase mistake: new bedroom furniture including mattress! I will admit this was my fault. I was obsessed with the idea that if we did not get this furniture now we were never going to get a new bedroom furniture until well after the baby (and any subsequent babies) was born, I mean I was thinking in years! Which again, looking back, a few years would have been fine.
Story Time!
But since the damage is done, this is the story – I loved this set and stalked it for a couple months (similar to my dining room set, sense a theme?). My husband and I just went to look at it. So we go and we’re full of confidence, we find the furniture, look at it make sure we trust the quality. Then the sales person comes over and asks us when we were thinking of buying, we say oh a few months maybe. He says what if it’s not available? We respond, then we will find a new set. This is where the story should have ended, but it doesn’t. My husband is now looking at the set online and there’s a color concern. A few weeks later, he calls the store. The sales person informs him that the stain color we liked might be discontinued in June. Well sheeiiiiitt. Not entirely sure where that confidence of “Oh we’ll find another set we love” up and went to, but damn did we fall for that sales tactic. The following weekend we were in the store, bought ourselves a new mattress and the set in the stain we liked. Is the color being discontinued in June? No, it’s not. They are adding another stain. We were duped! I felt really dumb, but at the same time I’m happy for the new set. The king sized bed and mattress has made the second half of my pregnancy an enjoyable sleeping situation for both me and my husband. The set is beautiful, provides much more storage, and I love it. The debt is set up for 5 years, 0% financing, the payments correlate to 5 years exactly, no concern for paying back interest thankfully.
Remember that babymoon? Yea… We decide to head to Stowe, VT the weekend of July 4th. My husband feels like he’s doing a good thing, finds an AirBnB and books it on the American Express. This is fine, except May hits and we have a whole slew of expenses we should have planned for in May and June. In May alone my nephew is making his first communion, my husband’s nephew is getting baptized, and one of my brothers is getting married. In June I have three bridal showers and we signed up for our birth and delivery class. Let me break it down for you:
- Communion: $100
- Baptism: $100
- Wedding gift: $250
- Bridal shower gifts: 3 @ $30-100
Oh? And did I mention I am the MOH for one of the brides? My final unmarried brother is also getting married this year and I’m the MOH so I am throwing this shower!
A lot of cash went out the window and led both me and my husband to use the credit cards again. We painted the bedroom as well; got an area rug for the room and one for the walk-in closet; bought some king sized sheets, pillows, and blankets; put recessed lights in the bedroom and the nursery; and we put ceiling fans in both the bedroom and nursery as well. All of these little expenses added up and I used the American Express for a good chunk of the shower planning.
Thankfully, the fellow bridesmaids are some of the best I’ve ever dealt with and paid in full the day of the shower. I was able to put all this money to the American Express. The only problem is the babymoon is the following week and we have nothing saved for it really. We racked that card back up to $2K unfortunately, and we weren’t even going crazy spending.
Meanwhile, the bachelorette for the bride is the weekend following the babymoon. You guessed it, poor planning = more credit card spending. I was able to use my parents beach cottage as a place to stay and reuse a lot of the decorations from the shower to decorate for the bachelorette. The one thing I did plan for was the limo for the night out and the matching tank tops. Again, dealing with the best bridesmaids in the world, they all paid that weekend and all the brides friends paid for their tank tops and portion of the limo either on or before that weekend. I was able to put this all back to the American Express.
So, where does that leave us?
| Debt | Balance |
| Mower | $1425.00 |
| American Express | $1430.22 |
| Capital One | $2079.23 |
| Furniture | $6366.26 |
| Total | $11300.71 |
Yup, we accrued more debt than we paid off. Can you believe it? I can’t. I’m so embarrassed.
In June 2019 we faced another speed bump. My pay periods changed from weekly to biweekly. While this has not deeply affected how we budget it was still a learning curve. I have had biweekly paychecks in the past so I was more comfortable with it. My husband struggled with it though. We decided to swap how we budgeted. My paychecks would be used for bills and debt payment and his paycheck would be used for weekly expenses: groceries, gas, and parking.
Throughout this time period we did make one smart decision. We opened a savings account at a bank not affiliated with our primary bank. I adjusted my direct deposits to put a small sum in this account every pay period. This has become our emergency fund. While it is now over $2000, we do not plan on touching it for a while. We are pregnant, so even though we have literally everything we need to have a baby and great health care, this is our emergency fund/stork savings (stork savings is another Dave Ramsey ideal). We are choosing not to just stockpile funds just because I’m pregnant and still focus on debt payoff. The main reason for this is I will still get paid at 100% of my pay for my maternity leave and I will not have to pay for my train pass or train parking during this time, a roughly $400 savings for 3-4 months. However, the extra $1000 cushion in the secondary bank does give me peace of mind.
More to come with debt payoff!
