Debt Dumpers 2022

[dayvewc]

I am back.

My goals for 2022 are

• Ignore the fact that the year is pronounced 2020 too
• Continue to build my personal retirement stash. $1,500 of $60,000 accomplished
• Build my side business as a travel agent.
  • Starting this in January of 2022. I am working with an established company out of Branson that primarily does cruises, but also handles resorts, including Disney and a few others.
• Finish paying off my final debts
  • CC1 @ $10,000 (est)
  • CC2 @ $2,000 (est)
  • Olaf (car) @ $26,000 (est)
  • Student Loan @ $37,000 (est)

Other than continue working at teaching and remain employed while functioning with increasing disability issues with my back and joint issues, that's it.

 

[Tygerlilly]

Our extended family does a gift exchange every year. I put a few canning and preserving things on my list and am super excited that my uncle who drew my name (or my aunt who most likely is the one who bought it ), went that route and got me a book on canning/pickling and a canning tool kit! We are planning a big garden this year to help with the rising costs of fruit and veggies and I'm very excited to try my hand at pickles, pasta sauce, and whatever else sounds interesting.
Hubby also got me the cookbook by Eiven and Eve Kilcher (from Alaska: The Last Frontier TV show), and a lot of her stuff is from scratch but easy recipes. Hoping to really continue with eating 90% of meals at home next year!

 

[Irish_Mike]

Jumping onboard for the first time after some lurking in the 2021 thread, hello everyone!

My 2022 Financial Goals:

• Pay off my credit card (currently sitting at $5k due to unbudgeted moving expenses and emergencies)
• Build emergency fund up to $1,500 to reduce future credit card requirements
• Save for a house down payment with my partner. He's well ahead of me and just received a substantial raise with our employer, so I'd like to be able to meaningfully contribute in 2023 without leaning fully on him. Not setting a firm goal right now though
• Save for a nice dinner on our September Disney trip
• Begin work on my student loans ($30,000, all federal)

My 2022 Personal Goals:

• Exercise a bit more - we have a beach wedding in June and I'd like to be down a few pounds beforehand
• Cut back on eating out/improve my skills in the kitchen to avoid the temptation
• Advance in my current job after a year of unplanned changes in 2021

 

[npatellye]

Goals for 2022:

• Lower the amount we spend on eating out.
• Cut down discretionary spending. This is going to be a tough one because my husband just can’t say no to the kids when they ask for “just this one toy, please” every single time they go to the store with him.
• Start saving for a kitchen reno. The bulk of this cost is in the appliances because I’ve been eyeing some ridiculous things for years.

Personal goals:

• Get wills in order. We have been discussing this since right before Covid hit and it just hasn’t gotten done. This whole health issue with my father has really kind of highlighted to us how unexpectedly things can change.
• Stop checking work emails and taking work calls on weekends.
• Take more day trips than we did in 2021.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Goals for 2022:

• Lower the amount we spend on eating out.
• Cut down discretionary spending. This is going to be a tough one because my husband just can’t say no to the kids when they ask for “just this one toy, please” every single time they go to the store with him.
• Start saving for a kitchen reno. The bulk of this cost is in the appliances because I’ve been eyeing some ridiculous things for years.

Personal goals:

• Get wills in order. We have been discussing this since right before Covid hit and it just hasn’t gotten done.
• Stop checking work emails and taking work calls on weekends.
• Take more day trips than we did in 2021.

We stopped taking our kids to stores with us after a while. It was just so much quicker and easier to shop without them. I don't think it scarred them.



For all of you battling impulse spending, what is your trigger?
Is it seeing other items in stores that weren't on your list?
Is it an ad for wonderful sales that you can't miss out on?

I found that I even spent less time focusing on spending $$ if I cancelled all the email notifications of sales at websites I shop at. Those daily reminders of "Get this!" "Try that!" would lure me in.
I finally unsubscribed like a maniac and that's one fewer sources of temptation.
If I need to return something from Kohls, of course CS is way in the back of the store, so I try to walk through an area that doesn't really tempt me: Mens' clothing or little girls clothing. No little girls in our house and buying stuff for dh is nice but not something I can't resist.

If I'm surfing online, I put things in my cart and wait a few days. I usually forget most things by then and the urge is gone.

I also try to remind myself of my goals and ask myself: Is this a need? or a want?
Good luck and stay strong! You can do this!

 

[jen7233]

welcome @ Irish_Mike

@npatellye I need to do the same with work, with my work phone especially pulling up emails and seeing the MS Teams chat on work issues, it's tempting to me to get pulled in so I leave it off. I also need to log out on time at home working from home, in office I'd always be logged out on time. At home I notice I tend to let additional 5 to 20 minutes tack on to finish that one more thing, look up and see the time passed longer than I thought, or I answer just that one more rabbit-hole email or answer a call two minutes before supposed to be off, since most emails require research and no calls are simple.

 

[2China2009]

2022 Financial Goals
1. Max out Roth IRA $6000
2. Continue to build savings acct and
Emergency fund.
3. Pay off medical bills

I am debt free. I paid off my mortgage this year at age 49. Beefing up retirement to retire at 62.

 

[virge]

Hi! I’ve been lurking on the Debt Dumpers threads for a few years, and I’ve quietly sending cheers and hugs as I follow your journeys. Your posts and advice have helped me several times, and I‘d like to join the thread to help with accountability.


Financial Goals

• Build regular savings account to a balance of at least $10,000. (Used a large amount of that account to pay for surgery and other medical bills.)
• Put any “extra” money towards mortgage. (I count “extra” money as supplements from work, items sold on eBay/fb, etc.)
• Increase automatic monthly transfers to 529 accounts to match salary increase that starts in Feb.
• Increase automatic monthly deposits towards supplemental retirement to match salary increase that starts in August.
• Organize financial info for my family. (I take care of all the bills & finances for my family, except my husband’s retirement accounts. I tease that he would be in trouble if something happened to me. I need to make sure he has all the info in one place, so it won’t ever be a real issue.)
• Run annual credit reports.

 

[Tygerlilly]

Organize financial info for my family. (I take care of all the bills & finances for my family, except my husband’s retirement accounts. I tease that he would be in trouble if something happened to me. I need to make sure he has all the info in one place, so it won’t ever be a real issue.)

I actually started on this last night! I handle everything too and if something were to happen, he has no way of paying anything. I'm keeping all the info in the binder that hold out birth certificates, marriage license, etc.

 

[DLgal]

I actually started on this last night! I handle everything too and if something were to happen, he has no way of paying anything. I'm keeping all the info in the binder that hold out birth certificates, marriage license, etc.

You may want to consider digitizing this information and storing it on the cloud. This way, it's easy to update and you can simply share access to the documents with your husband or anyone else you choose. We use Google Drive for this, as it makes it much easier to manage, update, share, etc. I handle everything in our house and created several documents and spreadsheets under a folder called "Emergency Planning" in my Google drive, and granted access to my husband and sister. The days of keeping this kind of stuff down on paper are past us. You can password protect files if they contain sensitive information.

 

[huggybuff]

For all of you battling impulse spending, what is your trigger?
Is it seeing other items in stores that weren't on your list?
Is it an ad for wonderful sales that you can't miss out on?

My triggers are boredom at work, emotionally spending when I'm depressed/upset, and my OCD - feeling that things aren't 'complete' until I have whatever item it is that I'm fixated on at a particular moment. I rarely shop in stores anymore so it's all online shopping for me. And yes, they get me with sales. My email inbox is filled with companies that are continually running specials. It creates that 'gotta jump on it now!' feeling in my gut. Exactly what they're aiming to do

I just upped my biweekly loan payment by $40 and change to a nice round number. Just doing that cut off 5 loan payments.

 

[Nettlelondon]

You may want to consider digitizing this information and storing it on the cloud. This way, it's easy to update and you can simply share access to the documents with your husband or anyone else you choose. We use Google Drive for this, as it makes it much easier to manage, update, share, etc. I handle everything in our house and created several documents and spreadsheets under a folder called "Emergency Planning" in my Google drive, and granted access to my husband and sister. The days of keeping this kind of stuff down on paper are past us. You can password protect files if they contain sensitive information.

My DH commented some while ago that he would be in a rather difficult spot should anything happen to me as I was the only one with access to our bank accounts - both personal and business. After about 10 years we decided to fix this issue. We discovered that he was unable to gain access to the accounts because he was using a date of birth that did not match with the one the bank had. The best bit? He set up the bank account on his first day at work there 34 years ago!

We discovered this during a long & painful call with the bank but it is all fixed now.

The downside is he now has access to the bank accounts and can see just what goes on - none of it bad, but he just keeps asking questions!

 

[DLgal]

My DH commented some while ago that he would be in a rather difficult spot should anything happen to me as I was the only one with access to our bank accounts - both personal and business. After about 10 years we decided to fix this issue. We discovered that he was unable to gain access to the accounts because he was using a date of birth that did not match with the one the bank had. The best bit? He set up the bank account on his first day at work there 34 years ago!

We discovered this during a long & painful call with the bank but it is all fixed now.

The downside is he now has access to the bank accounts and can see just what goes on - none of it bad, but he just keeps asking questions!

Ha ha. My husband is still fine with being oblivious. His favorite joke is "I don't even know how much money I make."

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Ha ha. My husband is still fine with being oblivious. His favorite joke is "I don't even know how much money I make."

This is my dh. He loves being blissfully ignorant of what things things cost: taxes, insurance, electric bill, etc.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

My triggers are boredom at work, emotionally spending when I'm depressed/upset, and my OCD - feeling that things aren't 'complete' until I have whatever item it is that I'm fixated on at a particular moment. I rarely shop in stores anymore so it's all online shopping for me. And yes, they get me with sales. My email inbox is filled with companies that are continually running specials. It creates that 'gotta jump on it now!' feeling in my gut. Exactly what they're aiming to do

I just upped my biweekly loan payment by $40 and change to a nice round number. Just doing that cut off 5 loan payments.

One step at a time. Each one is some progress.

 

[Tygerlilly]

You may want to consider digitizing this information and storing it on the cloud. This way, it's easy to update and you can simply share access to the documents with your husband or anyone else you choose. We use Google Drive for this, as it makes it much easier to manage, update, share, etc. I handle everything in our house and created several documents and spreadsheets under a folder called "Emergency Planning" in my Google drive, and granted access to my husband and sister. The days of keeping this kind of stuff down on paper are past us. You can password protect files if they contain sensitive information.

Nope. Hubby is not a tech person and hates trying to do things digitally. So having it listed on paper works best for us.

 

[jen7233]

@virge welcome

If I'm surfing online, I put things in my cart and wait a few days. I usually forget most things by then and the urge is gone.

I do this too. Amazon cancellation, did that today on some couch covers. Nothing is making these couches look good, will just keep using what I have been. DH wants to get new couches.

 

[DLgal]

Nope. Hubby is not a tech person and hates trying to do things digitally. So having it listed on paper works best for us.

Hope you have a good fireproof safe!

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Hope you have a good fireproof safe!

We do. Thats where we keep our passports, SS cards, birth certificates, marriage certificate, and spare CCs that we don’t use often enough to keep in our wallets.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

2022

Personal Goals:
1. Finish the photo slideshow I’m making of my dad’s life story. Hopefully in time for his 80th birthday in late Feb.
2. Throw my dad a nice 80th Birthday dinner party.
3. Get more sleep each night
4. Survive another year at my job.

Financial Goals:
1. Save $8,000 for our Panama Canal cruise in March.
2. Save $20-30,000 for a truck for dh. Not sure if that will be new or used.
3. Finish paying back the savings I used to pay off the mortgage. I paid back $10,000 but still have $20,000 to go.

Number 3 should be number 2 but dh’s current truck won’t pass inspection in July with the engine light still on. I want to be ready by then.