Money money money MONEY.  Money!

We have been doing a lot of repairs and renovations on the house.  We knew we would need to do this work when we bought it, so it isn’t like it is a surprise, but hot damn, house repairs on an 80 year old house that has not been updated in 40 years are expensive.  (Good news, the house was very well maintained so the repairs are mostly cosmetic.  Bad news, there was a lot of cosmetic work to do.  Good news, nothing was aesthetically “improved” in the 70s, 80s or 90s, so we don’t have to deal with harvest gold appliances or pink bathroom tile.)  But all these little (and not so little expenses) have been adding up.*

Debt bothers me a lot.  Mr. A and I both still have grad school/law school debt.  We have been steadily paying it down for the past 10ish years, but there is still a chunk out there dangling over our heads.  (Who knew?  Fancypants Law school is very, very costly.)

I will be the first to admit we haven’t always prioritized paying it off extra-fast like we could have.  We took our big trip, which was VERY expensive.  We also had to cover all our costs (mortgage,  utilities,school COBRA, loan payments, etc) while Mr. A was traveling and not working.   I don’t regret the trip because it was an awesome bonding experience for us as a family and we got to meet L’s birth family, but it was a big financial commitment that we made in exchange for that time.

The combination of the home repair debt and the school loan debt has finally pushed me to a breaking point.  We need to make some extra money so we can get these monkeys off our backs.  Mr. A makes a good living, but if we want it gone faster (and I *do*, I really really DO.),  Mama is going to have to make so money.

This month, I have started hustling to make a little extra cash.   I did a consumer research focus group for $150.   I have been doing some gigs as a Housing Tester which pays $75 a pop  (4 more tomorrow!).  And most surprising of all, I am going to do some part-time  pickup work for a catering company.  I might even hire a babysitter.  I am going to see what I can do without getting a real job, but hustling as much as I can around the girls’ and Mr. A’s schedules.

Oh, yes my friends,  we are getting a little Dave Ramsey up in here.   I am going to spend the next year snowflaking the heck out of our debt.  A little bit here, a little bit there.  We might not be able to get rid of all of it, but we will make a good dent.

* Even with the housing market in our neighborhood kind of tanking this year, we are pretty sure we will come out ahead when we sell in another year or two.  Even if we don’t increase our equity by a ton, we are hopeful that we will come close to owning the vacant lot (which is currently our side yard and the site of the future Forever House) outright when we sell.

I started to answer some of the school loan comments in the comments section, but it might make more sense to answer them as their own post because several comments had overlapping themes.

On Working while in College:

Both Mr. A and I worked while we were undergrads (we met working at the same restaurant), which is how we both managed to afford traveling (Mr. A on a trip to Europe and then to China for a year. I backpacked in Europe, lived in Cambodia for 3 months and visited Mr. A in China). I absolutely expect the girls to work while they are in college.

I actually want them to get jobs in Jr. High (papergirls?) and high school so we can start contributing to a Roth IRA in their names asap.  (Seriously, click that link. Compounding interest is mindblowing!) They need to earn actual income for us to be able to do that, so they will be working. Work builds character. It will be good for them to appreciate the amount of effort that goes into making a living wage.

On parenting/my parents and money:

My parents wouldn’t talk to us about money either.  I developed a deep-seated fear of debt from listening to their whispered adult conversations about money when I was very little. They were pretty hard up  when I was very young because they both went to college after I was born (my dad on an athletic scholarship and my mom with loans).  I think my mom finally graduated when I was about 8 years old.  After that, our family’s financial circumstances improved quite a bit.

It turns out my parents managed their money very well and were very financially conservative(especially considering they were teen parents!) but the debt-phobia had already taken root in me.  It wasn’t until two years ago when I accidentally saw their tax return that I figured out how much money my parents made each year.  I am sure they would be horrified to find out that I know.

We are already working on teaching the girls to be financially responsible.  M has to split her $7 allowance and put 25% aside for charity and 25% away for long-term savings.  She also just opened her first savings account and likes to tell me each week how much she has saved already.

Retirement vs. Paying for the girl’s college:

I am incredibly uncomfortable having any kind of debt.  I have just come to accept that in our circumstances it is a necessary evil.  If we can help the girls avoid the burden of  school loan debt, I would like to do that.  Our debt has certainly impacted the job and career choices we have made (i.e. we always need to make enough to live and pay down our debt.)  That being said, I expect that they will probably want to attend graduate or professional school and they will have to fund that themselves if they burn through the amount we agree to give them.

One thing that makes me fairly comfortable with the idea of paying for 4 years of college for each girl is the likelihood that Mr. A’s income is going to continue to rise in the next 10 years before they go to school.  It isn’t 100% certain, but given his current career trajectory and employability, it is very probable.  It is also quite likely his final 20 years of employment it will likely be much, much higher than his income now (Conservatively speaking, maybe more than four times his current salary?).

Even though we know we will probably have more money in the future, we maintain our current standard of living with the income we have right now with no consumer (credit card) debt.  We save for retirement like this is the amount we will always earn and this is the amount we will need to live at our current lifestyle in retirement.   One of the reasons we want to buy our final house now is to lock in our housing expenses forever (or at least until Mr. A retires and I demand we spend part of the  year somewhere warm).   When (or if!) our financial circumstances change, we will adjust accordingly.  Whenever we have more income, we will save more for retirement and college and pay down debt faster.