I have been reading Crystal’s Financial Shape Up Challenge for this year with great interest. Even though I decided to keep my goals for this year plan and simple. I figured I would post an update.
As far as our resolution to be disciplined about investing on 529s for both of our sons that is already up and going. A monthly contribution of $50 is getting sent to each of their accounts. Also last month we sent in an additional $50 each from mileage reimbursement from my husband’s work. In the next couple of weeks we will be sending $1500 (split for both) from our tax return.
I am amazed at how much money we have saved by using coupons. I want to clarify again that I am tracking savings by using coupons only. I am not tracking how much I save by shopping sales because like my husband said “anyone can shop a sale” but not everyone wants to put in the extra effort of clipping a coupon. As much as I have saved I feel bad to see that amount grow and not be reflected in our savings. Last night I talked to my husband about contributing to a Roth IRA on his behalf (right now we are only contributing to one for me). He was a little hesitant because of increasing gas prices and other growing expenses. However I am confident that we can do it. We have decided to start doing this in April because that’s when he gets his yearly salary increase. This is another way to save painlessly, since we have never needed that extra money we can put it away without any pain in our budget. I still feel we can send an extra $25 or so. So, right now I am committing to sending $100 per paycheck to a Roth IRA on his name.
As far as flops, those have been plentiful and related to what I mentioned above. Because we have been saving money by using coupons we have been spending that extra money in “stuff” (at least we have been using cash). We need to cut back on the impulse buys no matter how small they are.
I like this “financial update” thing. I will post an update next month again.
