I continue to be amazed at the speedy passage of time. It’s 2009 already. I’ve lived in this apartment for 5 years and Pete has been here for 3 of them. We’ve now been married for 2.5 months. It all seems like it’s sliding by so quickly! A year ago Pete and I were realizing that we really DID need to select a date for the wedding… and probably sooner than later. 
A lot of things happened in 2008 that were amazing and a lot were unexpected. Over the past few days, I’ve been thinking a lot about the last year – things that have happened, friends I’ve made, things I’ve learned. I guess it’s that time of year for ruminating over what has gone before. I’ve also been thinking a lot about what will come in the next year. Will we have less debt? Will we be in the same jobs? Will we be parents? Will we still have a positive net worth?
Today we were talking a lot about our financial goals for the coming year. I know I’ve mentioned on and off on this blog that Pete and I have really been trying to get our finances in order over the past year or so. It still floors me that personal finance is, in many ways, still a taboo subject. I think that prevents us from teaching children about managing money wisely and from learning how to do it ourselves! I don’t really care if people know how much or little we make, owe, or have in the bank. Wealth – or the lack thereof – not the measure of our worth as people so why should it be taboo? The authors of one of the personal finance blogs I read regularly post an accounting of their net worth every month or two. I think that’s pretty cool! For a concrete thinker like me, it’s nice to see an example of how one family is managing their money rather than just hearing it in the abstract. Anyway, we’ve all screwed up in some ways financially and we’ve all succeeded in some ways financially. I think that richer discussions result when some of the abstract personal finance ideas are discussed in concrete ways. But I digress…
In February, 2008 we successfully paid off the last of our credit card debt. It’s been an amazing feeling to be out from under that. This month we’ll be paying off the smaller of my student loans. Kind of exciting, if you don’t think about the over $50,000 in student loans still outstanding!! Over the last year we’ve selected and changed our financial goals several times. Sometimes it made more sense to work on paying off Pete’s car, while other times it seemed better to focus on student loans, saving for a down payment, or funding the wedding. It can make things a little challenging to have a moving target so this year we’ve selected some definite goals to work toward. (Actually, I may be using the word “we” a little too liberally. Pete is doing most of the leg work and then we talk about what he’s found. Sometimes I disagree or have something else to add. However, most of the time he’s thought it through so well that what he’s recommending sounds good to me.) So what are our goals for this year? They are to pay off Pete’s car early and to have in savings by the end of the year at least $10,000 of available cash. The other goal is working towards living within our budgeted amounts more carefully. There are some areas that we tend to always go over in (eating out and groceries) and others where we’re typically under (dry cleaning, entertainment). The goal is to get the budget to reflect our needs and then to get us to stick with our budgeted amounts. So, financially speaking, what are we proud of that we did this year?
- Paid for a wedding without going into debt – Both of our sets of parents helped tremendously with this one but we still chipped in nearly $10,000 of our own money. All without carrying a balance on the credit card or taking out a loan!
- Increased our contribution to my 403b to 10% of my income
- Continued to contribute to Pete’s 401k
- Created a budget and (mostly) lived within it
- Put some money into savings every month
- Paid off our credit cards
- Learned to use the AmEx regularly and to pay it off in full each month
- Ended the year with a positive net worth! What tipped the scales into the black for us was a gift of stock from my parents. However, even without that gift we’re pretty close to a positive net worth all on our own!
- Continued to live pretty frugally so that we can make some headway financially. No, we don’t get to go to the concerts or shows we’d like to, we don’t travel as much as we’d like, we don’t go out as much as we’d like, and don’t have the gadgets, clothes, and household furnishings we’d like BUT we are making headway on the path to becoming debt free and that’s really, really cool!
There are a lot of things I wonder about with regard to 2009, including what our financial picture will look like at the end of the year. I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that we’ll be out from under at least 2 of our debts, I’ll still be driving my 9-year old car, and we’ll meet (and possibly exceed) our savings goal. Guess we’ll have to wait and see what January, 2010 looks like!
