Since my mind seems to be racing with thoughts while I lie in bed next to a sleeping Beanie I decided I might as well get up and get some of these thoughts out of my head. Not for good of course, but at least out so I might get some sleep tonight.
Mostly my worries are financial. I made the "mistake" of opening the email from our mortgage people tonight right before laying down for bed. We had received a good faith estimate based on a supposed sale price with the sellers paying our closing costs. We ended up agreeing on a lower sale price (yay) but without the closing costs covered. Apparently, according to our realtor if I understand correctly, we could go back and ask for a higher sale price with some concessions for closing costs as long as the net to the seller is the same. I don't know, seems weird to me but whatever. So.....obviously a lower sale price is a good thing, but closing costs are right out of your pocket. Like, if we had them paid by the seller we would have that much more money in the bank. And the difference between the higher price (with closing costs covered) and the lower price where we pay closing costs is only about 50 bucks a month. Its going to take a lot of 50-bucks-a-month to put that money back in the bank. Doable? Yes. But ideal? No.
Our new mortgage will be just a little over what we were paying for mortgage, homeowner's dues and car payments before. But add on water, sewer, garbage, cable (maybe) and a lawn mower and we are increasing our monthly expenditures.
I know there are many, many ways we can save more money. We go out to eat far too much. We head to Starbucks for espresso when we have a fancy-pants Italian espresso machine at home (and I might add Glenn's espresso's taste much better than Starbucks anyways!). We let food go to waste. I don't do coupons (although, to my credit, I have tried to get the Sunday paper a few times and once there were no coupons at all in it and the second time not even enough to make up for the $1.50 I spent on the paper). I want to try to do coupons and know there are all sorts of saavy ways to do so...someone share some tips!! So i know we can save money doing little things and planning a little better.
But still, its scary. And keeping me awake. And it also makes me wonder if I'll ever be able to quit slinging milk at the grocery store again. Not that I don't like getting out and all (I pretty much consider it my day off...lol) but I would like to have that time to spend as a family, not one less day for that, you know?
Thanks for reading; you may have helped me get a better night's sleep :)
Hi Kristen,
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, congrats on the house! Some things that have helped us save a little bit each month (on top of giving up the goodies like meals out, coffee and netflix!) is meal planning. I put together a calendar and have our meals planned through the end of August and we just rotate. It makes it a lot easier to shop for groceries, I don't buy as much stuff that we don't need and I clip coupons every week. I've found Fred Meyer has better prices than Safeway AND get a Rewards card! Then you rack up points. I'm not sure what the points are for, but they've got to be good for something. And finding free things to do with the kiddo is always good...we go to the zoo a lot, are exploring parks more. And making games, much better than buying toys for him. He doesn't really enjoy the store bought toys. We made a garage with an old box a week or two ago and he's still playing with it! I can't really think of anything else that we've started doing. Hope this helps and that you all start feeling better soon!
I have to agree about eating out. That's us in a nutshell. We are however trying to cut that but it's hard especially when you are both working and tired to fix anything up. Definitely will save money by eating less.
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