Saturday, May. 17, 2014 1:16 p.m.

things in 'motion'?

K was offered a part time job two days ago (after I wrote my last entry) at a company he's been doing some freelance work for the past year. He'll start this coming week.

I can't even tell or explain how amazing this news is. I think I'm still scared to believe it. As we always say, "we'll believe it when the paycheck cashes".

It's only a part-time job; it's not life changing news or a life-changing amount of money. And we don't really know how long the position will last. It might only be a couple months.

But still. I'm not going to pretend that it won't make a huge difference. It will. A huge difference.

But I'm scared to jinx it. To think about it to much. To try to make a budget based off a new income.

2013 was a rough year for us. In many ways, but especially financially. Now that our taxes are done and we have proof of our income - we definitely earned below living wage. About 200% of poverty level. And that was for a family of three (and in a city with a higher cost of living than average). The start of 2014 has been better to us, but if we use our 2013 tax returns, and now considering that we are a household of 4, we're considered more like 175% of poverty level.

The good news is that because we can use 2013 tax return info, we can now, FINALLY, qualify for discounts and financial assistance from many places. The bad news is, now we have a little bit more money. Last year is when we could have used all the financial help, but last year we couldn't prove our income since our 2012 tax returns were higher.

So...we we take advantage of qualifying for financial benefits now, to "make up" for the difficulties of last year? I'm inclined to think so, but I still feel a bit guilty.

Whatever. We're still kind of poor though!

I have learned so much about finances though. I've learned what you really need to live on. I think I've been changed some, and changed permanently. I don't think I will ever bring myself to pay full price for anything again. Not when I know how many different kinds of coupons and deals you can get if you know where to look. Not when I know that I can buy used from garage sales for WAAAY cheaper, as long as I don't mind doing a bit of work to clean things up first.

People waste so much money. And they don't even realize it.

Of course, K doesn't see money as I do and is much more of a spender. If we do get to a point where we have enough money coming is that we have some to play with, I don't know how we'll deal with this. It may be an issue in the future. At least right now, he's willing to scrimp and save and not spend money needlessly. But I've already heard him say a few times "Now that I have a job, I really want to buy this". I have to make him see that we can't just start spending money. We really don't have extra money to spend - we need to use any extra money we get to pay off our debts still.

I'd love to get him to read a Dave Ramsey book, but he always has so many other things he'd rather read; I doubt he'd read it.

Anyways...the part time job is good news. Very good news. I'm hoping that it's real and that we can someday start getting back on top of our finances.

One things for sure - I think I'm swearing off credit cards. I don't think we've made a charge to a credit card in all of 2014. Only ~$8000 more in credit card debt to settle at this point - we've managed to settle something like ~$12,000 in debt, for ~$5000, already this year.

If we ever fully come out of this thing, and K feels ok with me sharing this, I ABSOLUTELY plan to write a blog post (oh, I have a real blog now - did I ever mention that ?:)) about how to settle credit card debt for less than you owe. I had to learn this all on my own and there's not a lot of info out there about it. Which is kind of understandable, as being in so much debt is a bit shameful...AND there's already so many debt settlement companies out there trying to swindle you - but when your only other choice is declaring bankruptcy - I at least felt like debt settlement was a more honorable route to go.

It destroys your credit score of course, but eh, when you're in enough financial trouble, maintaining a good credit score becomes the least of your worries. I once had good credit. Now I don't. There are worse things that could have happened to me. I'll live.

I'm really hoping that this is just the beginning of things and that we can turn the page on this long chapter of our lives soon.

previous | next