“We spend too much money”
Posted on July 25, 2008
Filed Under Spending | Leave a Comment
After years of carrying a heavy debt load, my wife and I paid off all of my credit card debt by late last year and have even managed to accumulate some savings. However, the past few months have been stagnant. Looking at our latest bank and credit card statements, my wife made the comment that “we spend too much.” Of course, she is correct – we do spend too much. Beyond that, I’m not earning to my potential, but that’s a story for another day…
The question is, what do we cut out? We have a fairly low mortgage payment, and most of our other expenses are fixed (car insurance, child care, etc). About the only places to trim are our grocery and utility bills. Then it kind of dawned on me – since paying off the credit cards, we’ve sort of drifted back into the paycheck to paycheck lifestyle. Our bills are covered, but we never really developed a plan to deal with unexpected expenses, which seem to crop up all too often at the worst possible times.
My first challenge, then, is to come up with a plan to get us off of the paycheck to paycheck cycle. The way I see it, it will involve several things:
- Cutting spending
- Increasing income
- Better prioritizing
- Setting realistic goals
Will it work? Gosh, I hope so. There is no way I want to go back to the financial mess I was living in before.
Cheers,
Ken
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