Well! We had a stellar month and we made a BIG choice to cash in some of our investments from when we were teachers and we PAID OFF the subaru! Woot!! This frees up $425 a month to go toward other debt. So that’s the good news! The bad news? As I type this our dishwasher has completely and totally died. This is our second dishwasher in 7 years 🙁 granted the first one was broken by one of our children, but still- it hurts. I did a little bit of research today and think I’ve found last years model of what we’re looking at still for sale at a local store and it’s a great price even with a 5 year warranty plan added to it. So tomorrow during my lunch break that’s what I’ll be doing. Before I get a suggestion that we just hand wash for awhile- it’s not an option. With 5 people who eat at home for most of our meals we run the dishwasher every single day and sometimes twice and that doesn’t include pots and pans that get hand washed. We lived without a dishwasher for 2 years before kids, but we are drowning in chores around here as it is and the added burden of hand washing all dishes would put my stress level through the roof.
Remember when I said that we were hoping for a finally quiet week were no one got sick? Well we can all laugh along with the universe because our youngest ended up with a UTI which I didn’t know was a thing but is apparently very common. So yeah, more money, no sleep, no time etc. etc.
I may have mentioned it, but we also had to replace tires on both of our vehicles and the cost was much more than anticipated. I think I’ve gotten a good idea for what to do the next time we need tires to save money, but we should be all set for awhile. Both cars now have all season and winter tires that are in great shape and should last for a long time, only downside was they cost about $600 more than we had budgeted for OUCH.
To round it out- we had to pay an additional $700 for propane this year that we weren’t planning on paying, so it’s been an uber expensive and surprise filled end/beginning of the month. Paying off the Subaru means we came out way ahead, but the June numbers should be interesting and we’ll probably (unfortunately) see an uptick in credit card debt.
Ok so on to the numbers- keeping in mind that the everything breaking and kids getting sick will be on the July 1st numbers so stay tuned for a sad update.
- Frugal house- $203,850
- Frugal Student Loans- $161,000
- Frugal Private Student Loan- $2,800
- Frugal Car 1- PAID OFF WOO HOO!!
- Frugal Car 2- $13,000
- Frugal Credit Cards Total- $32,770
For a grand total of $15,000 paid off this month!! WOO HOO!! I know the first part of the post was all gloom and doom, but this really was a fantastic month for paying things off. This month put us over 40k that we’ve paid off since starting this journey. We’ll be focusing on #3 our private student loan next- but I think it will probably be 5 or so months while we dig ourselves out of the hole mentioned above before we’ll really be able to start throwing money at it.
How are you doing on your journey?
Congrats on paying off the car. That’s awesome. Sorry you’ve had so much sickness and the expense that goes with it. And yes, you need a dishwasher. As much as you guys work, you need something to help you out on the home front. That’s time you can spend with your kids instead of hand washing dishes….Vicky in Ky
Thanks Vicky! We’re really really hoping for a quiet month after all the craziness. Glad you agree on the dishwasher- it’s a necessity!
What was your natural remedy for the UTI? Thank you.
Hi Sara, since we seem to always hit the worst symptoms after hours, I looked up and started her on D-Mannose, we did also end up going with a course of anti-biotics and probiotics in between doses, and I would definitely encourage you to do some more research (and talk to your doc), but it seemed to speed healing for her and we’ll continue to mix it into some apple sauce even after she’s done the antibiotics for a bit as a preventative measure.