hqueen's collection of Far From the Usual stuff.

[hqueen13]

Lol Well it's not my fault anymore! Though the bf got home a lot faster than I expected so I didn't get the garland down. Maybe today.
I need to quick pickup the house a little and then head out to do chores. AS is coming over to see the routine for feeding. It doesn't matter as much anymore since Kahlua is leaving but at least she can see how I handle storm.
I hope I hear from the girl at the bank today so I can take her this paperwork stuff that she needs. I just need to know if I'm going to have to print out a copy of my statement or if I can email it to her real quick for her to print since printing will mean I'll have to go where there is a printer.
I guess I'd better get moving.

 

[SSDreamin]

on getting the consolidation loan! Just don't be like my DH & I were! He talked me in to one of those, and I was very happy. MUCH lower payment, lower interest. It was great. Then, he kept finding things he/we 'needed right now!' until he maxed out all the cards again (he refused to cut them up or close them - because having a couple cards with zero balances would be 'good for our credit' ) so now we have all the 'old' payments back again, plus a bank payment I love the man to death, but when it comes to finances, he's a train wreck!

 

[hqueen13]

Yes, I am worried about that, so the cards are going to get locked in the safe! I have one card I will probably use But other than that there won't be credit cards! I'll also set it up so that I receive alerts when the balance gets to a certain point. That should help keep it in check.
Just found out what we owe in taxes and we can't afford it. I don't know what we're going to do. I'm rather frustrated and feeling a pretty big emotional pushback right now which probably isn't all fair. The bfs cousin is a tax lawyer and has been helping us to set things you with the business, but she keeps changing things and I swear every time we talk to her the numbers keep going up with what we owe. I'm really not happy about it and feel like we are getting jerked around. I know this is the worst time of year to be dealing with this, and I know we aren't really paying customers for her, but I feel like we are getting the short end of the stick in this deal. It went from me owing a couple hundred dollars to now we owe over $1000 between the two of us. It's making me feel sick thinking about it.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Oh My Goodness... that sucks! I'm so sorry. I'm about to finish my stuff up and get it to the tax man so I'll be crossing my fingers...ugh!

 

[hqueen13]

I just got home from the bank and getting the farm order. Hurray raw milk! How I've missed you!
The bank was good. I was even excited because we qualified for the lowest interest rate! I didn't expect that we would. It payments are under $200.00 power month and the loan is technically for 60 months. We are free to pay it off as fast as we'd like and that will of course lower the risk amount of interest that we will pay. I'm actually excited to see what this will do to our credit scores. Having something other than credit cards will improve the score and freeing up all of the available credit will hopefully boost the score even more. I'm probably a fork for looking forward to what this is going to do for us.
The taxes is the bad news. I put a call in to the tax accountant that T uses that she highly recommended so she is supposed to call me back. I'm praying that she knows something that the bfs cousin doesn't. If she can get us more back then I'm happy to pay her to do so!
Now it's hurry up and wait again.

 

[Denim Deb]

If you owe and don't have the money, if the interest on one of the cards that you're going to be paying off is lower than what the government would be charging in interest and fees, maybe use the card to pay it off, then pay that off as quickly as you can.

 

[hqueen13]

That is a thought, Deb. I'd hate to do that buy I guess it is an option.
Just got done messing with the tracking spreadsheets. I'm a dork because now they are all fancy and transfer the info from one sheet to another and track the income and expenses in groups. Whee for fancy tracking! I'm going back over the numbers again I did find some more expenses that we missed the first time do that might help a little I guess. Hopefully anyway...

 

[FarmerJamie]

The bank was good. I was even excited because we qualified for the lowest interest rate! I didn't expect that we would. It payments are under $200.00 power month and the loan is technically for 60 months. We are free to pay it off as fast as we'd like and that will of course lower the risk amount of interest that we will pay. I'm actually excited to see what this will do to our credit scores. Having something other than credit cards will improve the score and freeing up all of the available credit will hopefully boost the score even more. I'm probably a fork for looking forward to what this is going to do for us.
.

Credit Cards....the root of evil - particularly when one partner is not good with discipline around money, particularly with regards to impulse spending. It took me about a year, but I finally got rid of all the debt (credit card and medical) the ex-wife incurred and payed only minimal amounts on the last 4 years of the marriage. A huge sense of personal accomplishment when I was able to close a joint account that had been used to finance a home improvement project 5 years ago and was supposed to have been paid off in 6 months. I did pay off a gas card that I kept open, but lowered the limit on - I like to have the ability of having an option for buying fuel in an emergency situation.

Stick to it! It can be done!

 

[Denim Deb]

I haven't used a credit card in years. Hubby ran them all up and we've been paying them off for years! But the 2 big ones are paid off. Only problem being, they also cancelled the cards. I had hoped to have them for emergencies.

 

[hqueen13]

Maybe you can get them reopened when you get the debt cleared off of them Deb.
They are the root of evil, Jamie, but they are also necessary if you ever hope to have a prayer of buying property or a home. That's the part that I don't like.
I'm happy to be moving forward with things, and it feels good to know that we accomplished something in getting the loan and getting the best interest rate they have to offer. We should be able to pay it off in under 2 years if we really work hard. The lowered interest will help the most. The fact that its going to free up our credit cards for a better credit score is a really good thing too. I'm proud of how far we've come, we just have to continue to work harder to maintain things.
Cooking and food is the biggest area that our budget needs work. I'm just not so good at planning and being motivated to cook, so that means that the bf ends up buying a bunch of junk while he's at work. Somehow that has to stop...
I'm such a dork though that I am really excited about the spreadsheets that I have set up. I have the categories loaded into little drop down selections in the fields, so that when you put an entry into the spreadsheet, and then label it with a category, the categories are automatically totaled, and then that total is transferred to the annual totals sheet. Pretty nifty stuff! I enjoy crunching numbers, so now if I can be dilligent about keeping up with things and really getting the information entered I think it will dramatically help our budget, well, I should say that we should be able to create a budget.....