DH and many of my friends think we are insane for not having cable, but let me just tell you how much I love it.  When I don’t have cable, I can’t just veg out on the couch for hours and lose my time.  I feel like I need to take advantage of my free time.  I use my free time to write on this blog, write heartfelt emails to my friends, study for college classes that I take, study on the internet or in library books about topics that interest me, and spend time with my family.

Many people out there are spending $30 every month to veg out in front of their TVs.  What more functional things could they be doing during that time?

What are the things that you could be doing instead of sitting in front of the TV?

Good evening!  We’re back in the saddle here at Dollar Frugal today with our monthly goals.  I have stated in my blog that we follow “groundhog day goals,” which means that I revisit my goals each month on the month-date matching (2/2, 3/3, 7/7, etc).  Here are my goals from last month:

1.  Pay off 42,000 of my mortgage.  I don’t have any other debt (beyond monthly utilities and food costs), so this is my only debt payoff.  A+.  I’ve paid off $33,992.52 already for this calendar year.  Only $8007.48 left for the year to reach this goal - and 4 payments to do it in!

2.  Cut sugar out of my diet.  B.  I’ve been super-cognizant of health in my foods this month.  Results?  Expensive groceries, but I feel much better about my choices.

3.  Schedule more of my weekends.  C.  This is happening more, but not the 5-5 that I wanted.  I will work up to those 12 hours.

4.  Input new layout for my blog by July 15.  B.  The new layout has been done, but I’ve been unable to work out the glitches.

5.  Be on track to payoff the house by March 2009 instead of May.  D.  This goal is not going to happen.  I will continue to strive for my best possible, but personal things have come up that we will not be able to put as much money as previously toward the payoff.

6.  Find a decent living room set and get it to my house by the end of the year - under $500.  D.  DH says that used sofas are not allowed.  Scrap this goal as well, but I’ll change to it finding a desk and a bookcase, which he doesn’t think are as gross to buy used.

7.  It’s more expensive, but purchase groceries that are more healthy and interesting.  Our bodies are more important than our money.  B.  We went on vacation this month, so restaurant food isn’t very healthy, but it is interesting!

Another new thing:  a new goal every month.  Right now, I’ve already completed a few of these items, so I can scrap them for some new goals.  Here’s my new goal for August:

8. Get back to one post per day on this blog.  I’ve been faltering lately, as I’ve been trying to spend a lot more time with my family, but this blog brings me a certain thing that cannot be provided by other activities. 

I challenge you to state your goals here in my comments section.  Next month (September 9th), I will challenge everyone that comments here to see how they’re doing with their goals. 

Post your progress for the month below!

Here are the commenters from last month (post your progress in the comments below if I call you out!):

Last week, we talked about the first part of dieting - keeping a food diary.  If you keep a food diary, it’s like you’re accountable, and you will automatically eat less junk food.

I’ve found that another option that helps me is portion control.  If we let ourselves have the thing that we want, diets aren’t so bad.  Even if it’s just a bite, just to have a taste, usually that’s enough to make me realize that I just wanted that - a taste.

In the U.S., we have a problem with portion control.  All of our portions are currently being made into sizes for giants, and if we just would adjust them down, we would be in good shape.  And save money!

Many diets work off this particular idea - think of the “healthy” TV dinners.  When you open them, they’re anemic versions of the regular TV dinners.  Well, actually, they’re probably regular portion sizes, but we’ve just gotten so used to our huge portion sizes that we can’t imagine that those sizes are normal.

Once you’ve gotten used to eating less, you’ll have a better idea when you’re full.  It’s hard at first (about the first 3 days), but it gets much easier once you’ve passed through that threshhold.

What do you do to diet more cheaply?  Is it really that hard to control your portions?

Photo credit:  atconc

Good morning, my frugal friends, it’s time to wake up!  Each and every one of us has probably been through a similar experience with a day that we realized that it was time to stop spending like we had no limit to our incomes.  This is an important point of change in our young lives where we become more mature and decide to take responsibility for our choices and “make it better.”

For me, this important rite of passage happened early - super early.  I had just wrecked a car and gotten married.  I owed money for the car and had a lot of credit card debt.  I had a bit of a panic moment when I realized that I couldn’t cover the payments that they wanted me to make on that car and also the credit card minimum payments!

What was your “wake-up call” moment?  When did you realize that you couldn’t cover unlimited purchases and had to quit your debting lifestyle?

Photo credit: DHDesign

Yesterday, I wrote about my best friend and the fact that she’s not taking advantage of the benefit of free Metro fares from her employer.  This was a concrete example of how people don’t realize just how much money they can save by simply not purchasing an item.

The differences are drastic.  Let’s do an example, just to show the math.  Let’s say my friend spends around a tank of gas, or $40 in her car per week.  So, in order to purchase the gas, she has to work 2 hours (assuming she makes around $20 per hour - but she’s salaried) of her week in order to make this money.  She actually has to make around $47.05 before taxes (2.35 hours work) to get this money.  Here’s the math:

2.35 hours of work = $47.05

subtract taxes - $47.05 - 15% tax bracket = $40.00

So, she had to work 2.35 hours to make the money, just to purchase the gas.  Here’s the kicker:  included in the $40 price of the gas is the sales tax at 20 cents per gallon this year in the District of Columbia.  To fill up her tank, she’s buying around 10 gallons, so that’s around $2 that’s just in taxes.  She has to work 1/10th of an hour (about 6 minutes) to pay the taxes on that gas. 

So, all said, she’s worked about 2.45 hours of work each week just to pay for her gas to transport her to work.  This is money that she can’t recoup.  Around $9.05 of that money that she worked for is paid in taxes.  Get the comped Metro pass.  Please.  It’s hurting my feelings. 

Photo credit:  Tokyo Butterfly

Good morning!  I have stated in my blog that we follow “groundhog day goals,” which means that I revisit my goals each month on the month-date matching (2/2, 3/3, 7/7, etc).  Here’s how I’m doing on the goals I’ve laid out for myself this year so far: 

1.  Pay off 42,000 of my mortgage.  I don’t have any other debt (beyond monthly utilities and food costs), so this is my only debt payoff.  A+.  I’ve paid off $33,268.40 already for this calendar year.  Only $8731.60 left for the year to reach this goal - and 5 payments to do it in!

2.  Contribute $4,000 to DH’s IRA.  A-.  Done back in June.  This goal is removed starting August.

3.  Pay for DH to return to school.  A+.  Grant is good to go.  This goal is removed starting August.

4.  Cut sugar out of my diet.  B.  I’ve been super-cognizant of health in my foods this month.  Results?  Expensive groceries, but I feel much better about my choices.

5.  Schedule more of my weekends.  C.  This is happening more, but not the 5-5 that I wanted.  I will work up to those 12 hours.

6.  Input new layout for my blog by July 15.  A.  New layout is done, working out glitches.

7.  Be on track to payoff the house by March 2009 instead of May.  C.  I’m not still sure I’ll make March right now, but that’s why we set goals!

8.  Find a decent living room set and get it to my house by the end of the year - under $500.  D.  I need to be more aggressive starting this month with Craigslist.

I want to take this opportunity to say that this goal-setting method has really worked for me.  I automatically do many of these things that would just rest in the back of my mind if I didn’t have this blog nagging me to complete my goals.

I challenge you to state your goals here in my comments section.  Next month (August 8th), I will challenge everyone that comments here to see how they’re doing with their goals.

Another new thing:  a new goal every month.  Right now, I’ve already completed a few of these items, so I can scrap them for some new goals.  Here’s my new goal for July:

9.  It’s more expensive, but purchase groceries that are more healthy and interesting.  Our bodies are more important than our money.  This month, I would have gotten a B on this, since I purchased 2 weeks’ worth of groceries in this manner.

Post your progress for the month below!

Photo Credit: scottwills

My goals have changed as the year has worn on, but here’s how they’re looking:

1.  Pay off 42,000 of my mortgage.  I don’t have any other debt (beyond monthly utilities and food costs), so this is my only debt payoff.  A+.  I actually only have a few more months to kill this $42k.

2.  Contribute $4,000 to DH’s IRA.  A-.  I did this by taking money out of the emergency fund, but I replaced it 1 June.  The emergency fund was depleted for one week.  Luckily, nothing happened.

3.  Pay for DH to return to school.  A+.  His grant is fully paying for his tuition and books.  Hallelujah!

4.  Cut sugar out of my diet.  D.  I should just scrap this goal.  Or maybe not….

5.  Schedule more of my weekends.  C.  This is happening more, but not the 5-5 that I wanted.  I will work up to those 12 hours.

6.  Input new layout for my blog by July 15.  C.  No new layout, but I’ve worked some new fixes to some problems that were bothering me.  I will do this soon… 

7.  Be on track to payoff the house by March 2009 instead of May.  B+.  I’m good to go for March right now, but I’d better not have another bad month like this one was.

8.  Find a decent living room set and get it to my house by the end of the year - under $500.  C+.  I found a couch that I only marginally liked.  I’ve got to keep my ear to the ground!

Now, my goals are a little harder!  What are your mid-year goals or resolutions?  Have you been keeping up with your 2008 goals?

It’s halfway through May now, so I’d better start planning on what my goals are for the rest of the year.  I’ve been doing pretty well on my New Year’s Resolutions, so I know I need to come up with more or better goals.

1.  The only current goal I am not meeting is my cutting sugar out of my diet goal, so I will keep this goal.  Mother’s Day is over, so no more treats!  Or I will find fruits and other “treats” that don’t involve processed sugar.

2.  Schedule more of my weekends.  I would like to have my weekends a little more solid, instead of whatever pops up.  This way, I won’t waste them away on my computer surfing the Internet.  I will have the time from 5:30 am to 5 pm scheduled and the evenings will be waste-able!

3.  Input new layout for my blog by July 15.  My current setup is not professional and it could use a lot more “white space”.  This would only require a few hours’ work to transfer everything over.

4.  Be on track to payoff the house by March instead of May.  I might currently already be set up to do this, but I’m not really sure right now.  This was a stretch goal, but it’s becoming a reality.  Now, to just stretch it even farther!

5.  Find a decent living room set and get it to my house by the end of the year - under $500.  I would like to have some decent living room furniture, but I don’t want to pay an arm and a leg for it.  I also want to surprise DH, so I will have to borrow a truck and some help!

That should be enough.  Here are my original goals, that I am pretty much killing:

1.  Pay off 42,000 of my mortgage.  I don’t have any other debt (beyond monthly utilities and food costs), so this is my only debt payoff.  

2.  Contribute $4,000 to DH’s IRA.  

3.  Pay for DH to return to school.

4.  Cut sugar out of my diet.  

What are your mid-year goals for 1 June?  How are your old New Year’s Resolutions coming along?  Can you refresh them if you’ve given up?

A new girl at work called me yesterday around 4 pm at my desk.  I was so excited because she was asking me to do a price analysis on a home that she was looking at.  She had offered $131,000 and to pay her own closing costs.  Asking price for the home was $145,000 and the counteroffer that the sellers were giving her was $141,000 - a difference of $10,000!

Zillow said her home was worth $120,000 and my old 5% simple compounding rule put the home at $144,000, so I think $131,000 was a very fair offer.  The owners had paid $90,000 12 years ago.  I cheered her up and told her to stick to 131, since the market is horrible.  Her real estate agent pushed her to go up to $135,000.  Of course, the real estate agent doesn’t mind if she makes extra money!

I explained to the new girl that it isn’t often that she gets a chance to make $10,000 in one day and to stick to her guns, but not to feel pressured by me.  There are tons of other homes out there.  I can’t wait to see what she did.  I was just excited that someone actually asked me for advice, instead of spending their money stupidly!

Well, yesterday was 5/5 or Groundhog Day Goal-Readjustment day.  The carnival took precedence, so here are what my resolutions were for the year and my personal grades for them:

1.  Pay off 42,000 of my mortgage.  I don’t have any other debt (beyond monthly utilities and food costs), so this is my only debt payoff.  A+.  All told, I’ve already paid 21175.50, and the year is not half over yet.  I’m getting my bonus on the first, too, and I bet you know where that’s going!

2.  Contribute $4,000 to DH’s IRA.  A+.  This is simple and automatic.

3.  Pay for DH to return to school.  A+.  The grant is processed and DH starts his first grant-funded semester in 3 weeks.  Now, to pay for the babysitter is another headache!

4.  Cut sugar out of my diet.  I’m sure you PF readers don’t really care about this one, but I put it down anyway! B-.  I’m getting better at this one.  I’m planning on meeting up with some old high school friends next month, so I’m getting a little more motivated!

I’d say I’m doing pretty well for the year!  Now it’s time to start thinking about some June 1st goals, since I’m killing these and the year is not even halfway over yet.

How are you doing on your New Year’s Resolutions?  Do you even remember what they were?