Amber's Personal Finance Blog

At the rate I am going I should have atleast $10,000 by the end of the year in my challenge account for a new house. I figure if I can hang in there with my mom for about 3 years and include all raises and bonuses I should have about $36,000 for a down payment. That is a nice chunk of change. So let the count down begin.

I just added my bi-weekly deposit brining my new total from $1416.05 to $1563.90 I will definately meet my $2000 mark for the month

So far for the year I have contributed $1281.51 to the challenge

I have really surprised myself the last few years. I mean I always talked about getting serious when it comes to savings and debt but never really did and last year I paid off debt started saving and now there is a real possibility that I may be a home owner in the next few years it is an exciting process

Lately since I have paid off my CCs I have gotten a ton of CC offers in the mail. Now the old me would have jumped all over that, I am so thankful that I am blogging my financial journey which I credit to keeping me focus and on track.

I changed my heading from "Reaching Financial Freedom" to "Living debt free and loving it" I tought it was time to change since I have reached freedom and that is living with out debt, that's until I buy my new house

I just added $7.88 to the challenge
$2.00 because I excercises yesterday
$5 to match the amount for dining out
$.88 just rounding up the change
New total $1416.05 looks like I am going to meet my goal of $1000 a month I only have a little less than $600 to go

I did some excercising on Wednesday and took the stairs today so that was $2 added to the challenge, next we got ur paystubs (pay day is not until next Monday0 so I set up my automatic deposits to the challenge, EF, misc account, IRA, auto account and tuition accounts

New totals:
challenge/home $1408.17
EF $1841.35
tuition $130.33
Car account $111.71
IRA $1070.45
Misc/vacation $21.47

I have really got to get my dining out to a science I eat out wayyyyyyyyy too much:

Here are the totals

Expense Categories
Bills : Student Loan Payment $787.93 Paid in full
Miscellaneous $691.79 loans to family
Education : Tuition $357.70
Taxes : Federal Income Tax $193.88
Groceries $161.15
Personal Care $154.74
Taxes : Social Security Tax $120.89
Gifts $115.36
Bills : Electricity $99.45
Healthcare : Eyecare $99.00
Automobile : Gasoline $96.57
Dining Out $93.12
Clothing $80.88
Bills : Cable/Satellite Television $65.87
Healthcare : Prescriptions $61.99
Healthcare : Physician $60.00
Charitable Donations $40.00
Bills : Telephone $38.78
Taxes : Medicare Tax $28.29
Job Expense : Non-Reimbursed $28.14
Sales Tax $20.48
Household : Furnishings $17.29
Healthcare : Dental $11.65
Household : Laundry $7.58
Job Expense - Unassigned $6.94
Leisure : Newspaper $0.99
Total Expense Categories $3,440.46

Grand Total -$3,440.46

Added $4.08 to the challenge brining my new total to $1198.91

I just checked my points with Mypoints.com and I have a total of 3,050 points. This is great because I plan on cashing in, in November for X-mas gifts. I am hoping to have over 10,000 points which would give me at least 3 GC. You need about 3250 points for a $25 GC so if I can hit my mark by November that would be great

Now that I am debt free (sorry I am still grinning) next Monday would be my first paycheck in which I only have to pay necessities such as water, cell phone and internet. Now I use to pay $20 each pay period towards my student loan and have decided to add this amount to my tuition/ing account every month. I figure why stop now

I have a friend who is currently looking for a BMW. Anyhow she realizes that she can not afford $600 a month on the 5 series ( the one she wants) and now is considering a lease because her payments will be much less and she could afford it with the option to buy. I said to her if you can not afford to buy then it is not affordable if you have to lease. I am I wrong; she thinks this is just a great idea. I have tried explaining to her even people who are financially set tend to not lease statistically

I stayed home last night saved about $30 but I am onky adding $20 to the challenge + $1 for not spending today

New total $1194.83

This was in my inbox from the Dollar Stretcher and decided to share:

She Saves $90 per Month

I found an easy way to squeeze out $90 or more per month to
deposit in the savings account by totaling the following:

(1) Reward card savings - I total all the sale price and card
"savings" listed on receipts and earmark that amount for
savings. This can total around $50 per month. (After all, I
would have spent it anyway.)

(2) Spare change - My bank has a "Keep the Change" program
that rounds up each debit card purchase to the nearest dollar,
and deposits the difference into my savings. This can total
around $15 per month. I also roll my coins as they're
received, and this totals around $12 per month.

(3) Luxury tax - Any time I buy something not strictly
necessary, I tax myself 10% of the purchase price.
Unfortunately, this totals around $15 per month now, but at
least, it keeps me honest

Well I was planning on going out tonight and decided not to...basically the person I was going with did not want to wait and I was going to drive myself anyway, well it all worked out because I saved some money about $30 ($10 cover charge and two drinks at $10 each)

I added to the challenge today in the amounts of $.64 (rounding up the change) and $9.11 (had lunch and dinner out)

New total $1173.19

Finally I am totally debt free I got my tax return (not much but thankful) and paid off my last student loan which was $767.93

I am soooooo happy, no cc no student loan, no car payment. Now I can start socking way for my house

Part of my challenge was to pay off debt, last year I used the funds to pay off cc and only two months in the year and my student loan is gone. I am sooo excited I can not stop grinning

Added to my chllenge today. I took the stairs $1 and then I got "B" on an exam in which I did not study for and had no clue so I added $2

New total $1164.08

Well tomorrow is payday (part-time job) I decided to save a $100 each pay period which is $200 a month from my little part-time gig, in order to reach my $1000 a month goal (well this should help). So I added my first $100 to the challenge + an extra .51 giving me a new total of $1149.29 leaving me with $850.71 to go before I reach my goal for the month

Sold a book on Amazon, I will make $11.50 so I went ahead and added this money to the challenge.

New total $1060.28
Leaving me with a difference of $939.72 in order to meet my March goal of $1000

Added $16 to challnge because I had breakfasto out and dinner, so I needed to match this amount

New total $1048.78

I have set a new goal, and that is to save at least a $1000 a month towards my new house which will give me $11,000 end of December. Any how I just added my weekly deposit of $25 + .20 to my challenge brining my total to $1025.97. So wish me luck

You know I never knew what it was like to have a EF. Now I am trying soooo hard to build one up. Today was payday and I would have had an even $1400 but I had to lend my brother (the one who never borrows) $200. My nephew his youngest son went to jail on Friday and he needed money for bail and an attorney. Now my brother has been having problems with this kid before his mother died and now it seems like he is simply out of control. If it were me I would leave him there. Any how the point is we all need a little cushion because you never know what will happen.

Yep I added the $6 in order to catch up to Tina ...lol. So Now I have made my first $1000 towards my new home now I have $15,000 to go yippie.

Well my brother sent my nephew down for a few days and he will be turning 4 next week so of course he made a suggestion to my mom that we have a little something for him, and of course I am always the one ending up spending the most. I do not want to talk about how much was spent it was less than $100 but more than enough. We had pizza and a cake and then I had to buy two gifts one from my mom and one from me along with batteries. But my mom said eveything went well because I had to go to work

To meeting my $1000 challenge goal, I just added $8.89 to my challenge/home account brining my total to $994.77. I can not wait until I meet my $1000 goal and start working on my second thousand. I feel like transfering monye from my EF account just to meet this goal, but I'll wait tomorrow is payday and i will add the six bucks then

I have been eating out like crazy, I need to really buckle down. I had breakfast out and dinner at least I bought my lunch. So aded to the challenge $4.16

New total $985.25 getting close to $1000

I feel like God has a plan for me. At times I feel lik I have not made any progress with much in my life but then something hits me. My car is paid for, I have close to $2000 saved in case some thing really does come up (never in my life that I can remeber other than taxes did I have $2000 saved). I also have no cc debt, it's funny because when I get my check I feel like I am missing something (a bill that is). And after I get my taxes I will be able to pay off my last debt which is my student loan. Maybe next month I can try the 60% solution or start depositing $475 (that was what I paid for rent when I lived on my own) into my house account. We will see

Now today I was able again to add to my challenge, $1 for the stairs and $1 for no spending then .80 for rounding up my change.

New challenge/home total $981.09

Well I ate out today, cost me $11.47 but I am unable to actually match this amount so I rounded down and added $5.43 to my challenge/new home account.

New total $953.29
Looks like I will meet my mid month goal of $1000, next week is payday and it will be a big check over 90 hours

I am not in a relationship right now (would like to be but oh well) as the day progessed my co-workers came into my office/room with two huge packages for me. I thought who in the world would be sending me a Valentine's...well my God daughter. I got a two, two dozen roses and a large and I do mean very large bath and body set It has a bath brush, rock, candle, lotion, shower gel, body wash, soap, spray and a ton of other stuff. I know this was well over $100 but I enjoyed it, I had a beautiful surprise. It shows that her parent's really appreciate the little things that I do for her

Well today has marked one year since I have been blogging here. I reviewed my first blog and proud to say I have met one out of two goals. One was to save for a home and another was to pay off CCs; well the CCs are paid off and I am working towards saving for a house

I'd like to say thanks to every one who provided me words of encourgement

Just listed two more books on Amazon, hope they sell. I have one more to list and my brother is suppose to provide some more books. Just trying to make some extra cash