Hey there, I’ve lurked the forums for some time casually and decided to finally post in hopes of getting some feedback and hopefully some encouragement that we’re not entirely on the wrong track. Partner and I have been married almost 6 years, we have one toddler and one baby due in the next week. We’re not really that “eco”, I just couldn’t think up a good username.
Since getting together, we’ve both had periods of “mini retirements” where we’ve taken time to have “passion work” like working at bike shops, music. We combine finances. Husband currently works at a 9-5 making 34k/year with bad health insurance (so that’s not a motivation to stay) and we run a music business on the side netting 9-10k/year. His job satisfaction is variable and they have a lot of lay-offs so we’d like to have more security for him to quit soon. I “stay home” with our kiddo but spend time running the music business and we both teach music lessons in the evenings.
I’ll post a run down of our net worth and expenses separately, I have a toddler screaming for me.
Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
Re: Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
Okay, our current assets are the following:
House: 77,000ish
Mortgage: (16,500) - will pay off in 3 years if we don’t pay extra but we do.
Retirement accts: 34,000
Brokerage: $100
Cash savings: $8,000
I’m not sure how detailed to get with expenses, we spend less than 2k/month and $480 of that is our mortgage principal/interest. We have two paid off cars, a 2010 Toyota Corolla and a 2001 Chrysler Town & Country. We never buy cars for more than 2k and husband is able to do many repairs.
We’re saving 10% of his income into retirement and have been putting all of our music money into the mortgage but I’m thinking of redirecting that to our brokerage acct. Our mortgage interest rate is 3%.
I guess my goal in the next 4 years is to have our 1) house paid off 2) 200k in investments - to throw off $8,000 in income and 3) side jobs or our biz making us 10k/year.
House: 77,000ish
Mortgage: (16,500) - will pay off in 3 years if we don’t pay extra but we do.
Retirement accts: 34,000
Brokerage: $100
Cash savings: $8,000
I’m not sure how detailed to get with expenses, we spend less than 2k/month and $480 of that is our mortgage principal/interest. We have two paid off cars, a 2010 Toyota Corolla and a 2001 Chrysler Town & Country. We never buy cars for more than 2k and husband is able to do many repairs.
We’re saving 10% of his income into retirement and have been putting all of our music money into the mortgage but I’m thinking of redirecting that to our brokerage acct. Our mortgage interest rate is 3%.
I guess my goal in the next 4 years is to have our 1) house paid off 2) 200k in investments - to throw off $8,000 in income and 3) side jobs or our biz making us 10k/year.
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Jason
Re: Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
Well, that certainly falls under "soon." Good luck. I don't have kids but my piece of advice would be to tell them "next month" when they start asking what day they were born. By the time they figure it out you'll have saved on at least one birthday.
Re: Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
Wow, what a whirlwind of a few months!! We had a baby and all of a sudden - covid!
Thank you all for your input! I agree celebrating birthdays are ridiculous - ha! We got him exactly $0 in gifts and he could care less. Grandparents and everyone else gave him way too many toys anyway. We didnt follow the advice on the mortgage - though, I haven’t even logged on since posting because of the baby (see below).
Thankfully my husband’s job seems pretty secure and he’s working from home. Our side hustle, however - GONE! All of our gigs have cancelled and many of our students have lost their jobs and have cut discretionary expenses. We have about half of our students that want to take via conference call. We’re trying to get creative and do Facebook lives to make some tips. Restrictions in our state are barely loosening up so we’re not sure what the future is with that.
However - good news, our mortgage is gone! Our cash savings was getting pretty high so we just knocked it out. Our expenses during a real spendy month are about $1,300. I haven’t looked at investments to see the balance but I can guess. I’m just riding the wave. Logically, I know it wasn’t the smartest move but theres just such a good feeling in saying f-u to the bank that kept messing up calculating interest and our escrow account.
Frugal things we’ve done so far to save money:
-We’re eating rice, beans, tortillas, & salsa about everyday for lunch. Husband adds ground beef while supplies last.
-We found an old rusty swingset on Craigslist for free, scrubbed it, painted it, changed out the swings with ones from another dilapidated swingset. Both I and our two year old are thrilled!
-Husband is working from home - SUCH a benefit while adjusting to having to two kids.
-We’ve found so much on the side of the road - brand new baby bouncer, a wagon, weights.
-A gym membership is obviously out of the question right now so that’s some savings. That’s something we were planning on starting up but now we’re not.
- I’m composting and starting some garden beds at home.
It’s really been a lesson in being content & finding joy in staying home & being with my kids in our own backyard. I’m looking forward to reading through some other journals!!
Thank you all for your input! I agree celebrating birthdays are ridiculous - ha! We got him exactly $0 in gifts and he could care less. Grandparents and everyone else gave him way too many toys anyway. We didnt follow the advice on the mortgage - though, I haven’t even logged on since posting because of the baby (see below).
Thankfully my husband’s job seems pretty secure and he’s working from home. Our side hustle, however - GONE! All of our gigs have cancelled and many of our students have lost their jobs and have cut discretionary expenses. We have about half of our students that want to take via conference call. We’re trying to get creative and do Facebook lives to make some tips. Restrictions in our state are barely loosening up so we’re not sure what the future is with that.
However - good news, our mortgage is gone! Our cash savings was getting pretty high so we just knocked it out. Our expenses during a real spendy month are about $1,300. I haven’t looked at investments to see the balance but I can guess. I’m just riding the wave. Logically, I know it wasn’t the smartest move but theres just such a good feeling in saying f-u to the bank that kept messing up calculating interest and our escrow account.
Frugal things we’ve done so far to save money:
-We’re eating rice, beans, tortillas, & salsa about everyday for lunch. Husband adds ground beef while supplies last.
-We found an old rusty swingset on Craigslist for free, scrubbed it, painted it, changed out the swings with ones from another dilapidated swingset. Both I and our two year old are thrilled!
-Husband is working from home - SUCH a benefit while adjusting to having to two kids.
-We’ve found so much on the side of the road - brand new baby bouncer, a wagon, weights.
-A gym membership is obviously out of the question right now so that’s some savings. That’s something we were planning on starting up but now we’re not.
- I’m composting and starting some garden beds at home.
It’s really been a lesson in being content & finding joy in staying home & being with my kids in our own backyard. I’m looking forward to reading through some other journals!!
Re: Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
The debate on whether one should pay off the mortgage first is neverending. I am on the side of "pay it off." Regardless of how the percentages stack, paid off shelter that you own outright brings a lot of resilience and peace of mind. In the end, it comes down to a person's risk tolerance. I am also the type that would prefer a paid-off dwelling.
Congrats on your frugality and DIY victories! It's so satisfying.
Congrats on your frugality and DIY victories! It's so satisfying.
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horsewoman
- Posts: 659
- Joined: Fri Jun 07, 2019 4:11 am
Re: Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
Congrats on the baby! Since I stopped after one child I can't even imagine the chaos of a toddler and a newborn - you are very brave 
I'm too in the "pay it off camp" , we've been throwing all our money on the mortgage since day one and nothing beats the feeling of being completely debt free before hitting 40. Another positive effect of it is that we avoided lifestyle inflation during our "formative years" moneywise - I see it all around me, people get older and earn more - and suddenly need expensive cars and holidays. We never had more to spend because everything went towards the farm mortgage, so we never got used to a lot of disposable income. This makes it pretty easy to live well on part time work now that the mortgage is paid off.
It's a good thing that your husband still has his other job. I'm a musician myself (on the side) and some of my friends, who are full time musicians/music teachers, are really hit hard with the restrictions. These days it is a good strategy to have more income streams, that's for sure.
I'm too in the "pay it off camp" , we've been throwing all our money on the mortgage since day one and nothing beats the feeling of being completely debt free before hitting 40. Another positive effect of it is that we avoided lifestyle inflation during our "formative years" moneywise - I see it all around me, people get older and earn more - and suddenly need expensive cars and holidays. We never had more to spend because everything went towards the farm mortgage, so we never got used to a lot of disposable income. This makes it pretty easy to live well on part time work now that the mortgage is paid off.
It's a good thing that your husband still has his other job. I'm a musician myself (on the side) and some of my friends, who are full time musicians/music teachers, are really hit hard with the restrictions. These days it is a good strategy to have more income streams, that's for sure.
Re: Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
Paying off the mortgage has been a huge relief! We’re excited to spend some time fixing up our property now. I have some used tires I’m using as raised beds to slowly start gardening.
Our plan to bring our investments to 200k is really just to save a lot. We need about 14k/year to live without a mortgage. So we should theoretically be able to throw about 30k/year to investments. I don’t see my husbands income going up anytime soon so I’m trying to focus more on saving and increasing our music income.
I’ll start posting investment account balances at the end of each month.
Our plan to bring our investments to 200k is really just to save a lot. We need about 14k/year to live without a mortgage. So we should theoretically be able to throw about 30k/year to investments. I don’t see my husbands income going up anytime soon so I’m trying to focus more on saving and increasing our music income.
I’ll start posting investment account balances at the end of each month.
Re: Starting Out - Family of 3, soon to be 4
We're doing so good and loving the mortgage-free life! If we scrimp, we could live on 1k/month so we would love to have 200k in investments + a paid off house. This would give us a lot of comfort for my husband to quit his full-time job and we could just teach & play music. I would love to pick up part-time work at a bike shop too... Employee discount!! haha
7/15 Investment Balance: 38,433. I'm really proud of how much we've been able to save! We've started having some gigs again and about 75% of our music students are back. Well-paying gigs should be back end of August too!
Vacation plans - Our August vacation should be pretty frugal - we're driving, packing food and mostly staying in a house playing games and watching movies with family. My parents insisted on buying us AAA for our birthdays so that's great. Driving gives us the flexibility to take a lot of cheap groceries so we won't have to buy food in the expensive touristy town. Our basic plan is - don't spend $$, enjoy the scenery, and take advantage of family who can watch our kids so we can sleep - haha.
Fun story - some friends who have a bit more spendy car with loan mentioned today they wanted a van. I was like - vans are great! You can find a nice used van for less than 2k in our city. My husband immediately found one on craigslist. Then he went to work at the music store and the SAME VAN happened to pull into the music store parking lot!! What a coincidence! He looked it over and it's in great shape, a few cosmetic issues but nothing that can't be fixed. I sent it to them with all the info - I really hope it works out for them! They're laid off from work and I just really hope they don't have to stress about money.
7/15 Investment Balance: 38,433. I'm really proud of how much we've been able to save! We've started having some gigs again and about 75% of our music students are back. Well-paying gigs should be back end of August too!
Vacation plans - Our August vacation should be pretty frugal - we're driving, packing food and mostly staying in a house playing games and watching movies with family. My parents insisted on buying us AAA for our birthdays so that's great. Driving gives us the flexibility to take a lot of cheap groceries so we won't have to buy food in the expensive touristy town. Our basic plan is - don't spend $$, enjoy the scenery, and take advantage of family who can watch our kids so we can sleep - haha.
Fun story - some friends who have a bit more spendy car with loan mentioned today they wanted a van. I was like - vans are great! You can find a nice used van for less than 2k in our city. My husband immediately found one on craigslist. Then he went to work at the music store and the SAME VAN happened to pull into the music store parking lot!! What a coincidence! He looked it over and it's in great shape, a few cosmetic issues but nothing that can't be fixed. I sent it to them with all the info - I really hope it works out for them! They're laid off from work and I just really hope they don't have to stress about money.