The current balance on the CITI Professional Card is:
The current balance on CITI Premier Pass is:
We are having a lot of unexpected expenses and without an emergency fund we are forced to cut our debt payments and pay the mounting bills. My wife had surgery this week so we are expecting a mountain of medical bills. Gas and groceries are not helping the situation, just last night we spent $120 dollars on groceries for two, believe me that won’t last more than a week.
Best Buy balance remains the same. I would like start paying at least 50 a month towards this debt. The big screen TV in the living room sure doesn’t look so good anymore when we still owe over 1600.
Let me know what you think.
HS
8 comments:
You seem almost defiant about not using anyone's financial plan but your own. Your own financial planning is what got you into this mess. The TMMO plan worked for me, but there are other ways to go about getting out of debt. Your's seems to be very frustrating to you right now. It's time to try something else.
Without a budget and a written plan, you are going to continue to fumble around. You clearly see the huge wave of medical debt that's coming your way. You can either tighten up, get a game plan, and batten down the hatches *OR* you can get your ass kicked by the wave.
Restructure before the storm hits.
You seem to have some great goals, however I recommend that you develop a written plan for becoming debt free and review the plan weekly.
Sell the big screen and use that money for debt repayment, and then when all debt is payed off start a savings account for a new tv. And what else around your house can you sell for cash?
I go around every few months and have a virtual yard sale on craigs list or a local free list we have, even if I make $30 it helps. Sell DVDs, cds, games, books, toys, furniture, etc.
Also right now cut back to minimum payments on all debt, until you have about $1000 in an emergency fund!!!
Thanks for the honesty in you blog!
p.s. $120 on grocerise for 2? I spend about $30 a week for 1 adult and 2 kids, and we eat salad everyday. I do angel food ministries $30 for a huge box of food every month, check there website. It is for anybody not just low income people. (So my groceries for food are $30 a week and $30 for box a month, $150 a month total, plus $30 for non groceries-contact stuff, etc.)
I fail to see why your financial plan isn't working and am not sure why the others are harping on you. I think it was a few months ago the balance on that larger card was much higher than it used to be. While I think it's more proactive to pay smallest to largest balance, it's up to you how to go about doing it. You don't have to take my advice, do what you think works best.
I wouldn't sell the TV though because I doubt you'll get enough out of it to pay off that Best Buy card. If owing money for that TV is bothering you, why not focus your debt payment energy on it? I remember owing money on my living room furniture and it bothered me. When you pay something like that off it is a huge relief that it's not having over you anymore.
Groceries do seem a bit high though at $120 a week for two people. I try to budget $10 a day, which is around $300 a month and that is more than enough for two people to live on. If you want to try to reduce what you're spending a bit, use coupons. For what I save on groceries I could pay myself around $20 an hour to cut them up every week.
Emergency fund is also something you should consider. If you can't get up to the 1k in a month, start with $500. It does reduce the stress and strain if you find yourself having unexpected things come up. Without an EF more than likely you'll run to the credit card to fix the problem, thus creating a new one. I speak from experience on this and it is a great feeling to have money on the side incase something happens.
Hi. I am a new visitor to your site and a new PF blogger as well. If you don't mind, I would like to post a link to your blog on my site.
The best advice I can give is to start an emergency fund. We used our stimulus for our emergency fund. It is much less depressing to use your emergency fund than it is to use your credit cards when an expense comes up.
Check out moneysavingmom.com--she feeds herself and 2 little kids for $40 a week--she has ebooks on it and lots of tips--you two should be able to shave the grocery spending way down since you have no kids :)
Well, I think that if you're in serious debt, you should get in touch with a company which provides expert debt advice on various solutions to become debt free, and which doesn't take any money for it, like a not for profit organization.
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jim dunn
debt advice
http://www.debtadvicetrust.org/debt/debt-advice.html
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