Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Sacrifice..!
For a long time Tom and I have been asking ourselves why it is we do not have any money saved. Why so and so who makes less owns a home, why this person and that person can manage this and that but we cannot. We know many people out there have credit cards they spend with when cash runs cold. We do not ever plan on having credit cards, we live off of cash and cash only. We decided a long time ago that we did not want to reduce ourselves to a family who had to rely on credit to survive, we don't want to live above our means and end up in "credit counseling" like some of our friends. We look at things simply , "we have money to buy it or we don't". At the same time we find that we spend our money, all of it. We save nothing, not because we squander it but because in some odd way we DO live above our means. We live above our means for our "future" well being. We afford everything we own, pay our bills on time but have nothing left which sucks because like all else we want the American Dream. We are just not willing to go into debt to obtain it like most else. To accomplish our goals of owning our home with CASH and not credit we have decided it is time to make sacrifices while the girls are still young enough not to notice. Sacrifices of space and "pretty" neighborhoods are our main needs. We sacrificed 2 rooms to move into this house and if Tom was still working on the road making on the road money it would have been a perfect sacrifice. But now that we made the sacrifice of 20.00 less an hour in Salary for him to be at home with us it turns out our original sacrifice was a necessary sacrifice to make our bills not a sacrifice to save. So what do we do now? SACRIFICE ALL OVER AGAIN.
Tom loves his job in Round Rock so we plan on sacrificing one or two ways. 1. Moving into an apartment with amenities like a playground, cable, Internet, pool, etc...for about 900 per month with all of us crammed into 2 bedrooms or 2. Staying in Taylor and renting a house at 595 a month which would bring our rent/bills down to what we pay total on rent here also cramming ourselves into a 2 bedroom.
Pros: Apartment Living
Everything at our fingertips. No driving to the gym or park.
No setting up a pool.
Possibly kicking out cable and/or Internet bills
on site maintenance
closer to work
no more Gym membership payment
closer to Tom's work
No more lawn care
upscale community
more stuff to do in Round Rock
More kids to play with
Cons:
Application fees out the wazoo
Possible denial of app fee (we had some credit trouble between Griffin issues and Miriam's disability)
loss of privacy with neighbors being so close
still paying 900 - 1000 per month
Long Haul to move
Possible savings if we move to an apartment = 435.00 per month (not including savings on utilities living in a smaller place.)
Pros of Staying in Taylor:
Leisurely move
less rent by 300.00
less electricity for smaller house
Maybe get to keep play set
private home
get to stay at church
house a block from city park & pool
we know the area
Cons:
Window Units
Not as nice as apartments
Still have to pay all bills
Tom still has 20 minute drive
not sure if we "like" the area
Gas Bill
Possible Savings: 400.00
Sacrifice, Sacrifice. Question is, how much do we sacrifice and what is important to us? Looking at this list I am thinking apartment living is the best option. It is just such a hassle trying to find the right place that is not going to rape us in fees.
The other thing is, if we move to Round Rock Tom and I both plan on getting jobs. We both want to get our TABC and work around each other's schedules to bar tend. ALL of our money from those jobs we plan on saving. So we are looking at at the very least 2,000 more per month which makes it possible to save at least 25,000 in one year. Home wise we are looking at a 25,000 3 bedroom "Tiny house". A house small enough to sustain a family while saving money on utilities. We plan on putting this home on property we plan on buying within the next few months in Oregon. 5 acres for less than 5,000! We found that if you buy property that is unincorporated outside of major cities in the country that you can find excellent deals. We would need about 75,000 to get the house built plus electricity , water, telephone & sewer set ups. We want to pay CASH for this, no loans. Our goal is to own our own home out right. Tom will go on the road a few months out of the year and we will live off of that money. With few bills, this is possible.
It took us a long time to come up with a good plan and we think this is the plan. We decided to wait out Miriam's procedure because it is looking more and more like it will be here in the US within the next few years. Beike Biotech is working REALLY hard to see to it every child has a chance and with stem cell research becoming more and more acceptable it WILL happen. We have not forgotten about Miriam. We just decided that it is more productive to focus on all of our children's future. God will see to it Miriam has her chance, I have no doubts about that. And when we get to Oregon we will have better luck at fundraising efforts.
I cannot wait for the day when we don't have to say "we need to sacrifice". I think once we own our own home the only real sacrifice we will have is Tom going on the road a few months out of the year. The nice thing about it though, is that because we home school , we can go with him! Maybe sacrifice a bit longer to buy a travel home to make it easier & cheaper for all of us to go. Sacrifice, a never ending road!
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Good Plan! Keep your eye on the target and anything can happen. We live on cash only (mostly)... we do however have a house loan, and one truck loan.... work work work... you can do it!
ReplyDeleteDana
Thanks for the encouragement Dana. :-) We are even toying with the idea of buying a travel trailer, putting the most important stuff in storage, selling the rest and living very small for a while. We plan on sticking one on our land while we build our house, so we will have to buy one anyway. Who knows! We just want to save, save, save, LOTS of money.
ReplyDeleteI know of at least three families who have lived in a travel trailer to save money to build or buy a house. It's easier to do while the kids are little. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteThanks Virginia. Everything is still up in the air and we would have to figure out how to afford 3-5 grand for a trailer but in the end we could save about 5,000 the first year and 10,000 the second. We figure between 3 jobs, and saving on rent we could easily pull in 50/60,000 within 2 years. But our thoughts are "while the kids are little". We want them to look back on it and think we were camping for 1-2 years..lol
ReplyDeleteYes a travel trailer would be great! Do It!
ReplyDelete