Wants & Needs

WANTS & NEEDS

Before I get to the baby savings, the Ginger and I need to get our everyday spending in order. We currently live the lifestyle we thought we would have as adults…going to hip restaurants in town, constantly getting new clothes, buying the latest gadget to impress ourselves. But the thing is, we’re not really ready to live that lifestyle yet. We went from being poor college kids straight to plastic-swiping “adults”. We need to find a happy medium (leaning more towards the poor college lifestyle) to still have fun but to live within our means. I know this all sounds very obvious to some, but we are just now realizing that we can’t just buy what we want while we pay only the minimums on our loans. Better late than never, right?

Our first step in the process is to decide what we actually need to live. Now I know our need list might be outrageous to some (iPhones and Netflix? What?), but we’ve decided that the only way to stick to this is to be realistic. We cut out the most expensive things in our lives and have decided that we have to keep some of our daily joys to keep sane. As time goes by, we can probably cut out more.  For now this will be our guide.

Wants (after May 1 we’re cutting these things from our budget):

Cable

Going out to eat

Tickets to shows and concerts

Loft, Target and Etsy shopping (basically clothes, shoes, housewares)

Birchbox/make-up purchases

Soccer jerseys

Amazon instant movie purchases

Movies in theaters

Daily coffee from shop

Haircuts at my favorite salon

More than one beer at soccer games or watch parties (for the Ginger, obv)

Needs:

Rent

Utilities (keeping lights and air conditioning/heat low or off)

Groceries (after going through all the food in the house)

Car payment and insurance

Some gas

Doctor co-pays and medicine

Bus pass for the Ginger

Netflix

iPhones (we use our phones to check email for work a lot)

As a final hurrah before the spend fast starts tomorrow, the Ginger and I have concert tickets tonight for the Black Keys and will treat ourselves to a “Last Supper”, if you will, at a restaurant downtown. I’m excited for tonight, but I am so looking forward to May 1 to begin this spend freeze. It almost feels like a game since it’s a challenge. I can’t wait to see how much we can save in month one and then try to beat it each month!

Winning!

Over the weekend, the Ginger and I attended a fun event in our community, A Taste of Brookline. We sampled food from the local shops and bars (no drinks for me, obv) in our neighborhood. It was a great time, but at a price. I bought the $65 tickets pre-spend freeze which doesn’t officially begin until May 1. I know I won’t be spending that much money on events like this for a while, but we still had a blast. And best of all, I won two, count ‘em, two raffle baskets! In that I feel like I made my ticket money back! 

The first basket I won was for a $75 photo session with a local photographer and $75 worth of prints! How perfect is that?? The session expires next April, so it will be no problem to use it for our maternity photos! We’ll probably wait until October to have those taken. 

The second basket I won was called the Art of Beauty. It was valued at $170! It included samples of professional shampoos and conditioners, full size bottles of Redken shampoo, conditioner, hair spray and heat spray! Best of all, it came with a gift certificate for a free haircut! I had planned on simply trimming my hair myself during the spend freeze, so I’ll have at least one more professional cut! Yay! The basket also included an original painting in a gorgeous frame and five notecard prints from the same artist! 

I know that this spend freeze will be hard and I won’t always get free stuff, but it was such a treat to start out with some luck! 

We're Having a Baby!

Last Sunday I experienced the longest three minutes of my life…twice (two tests). As the Ginger and I waited for a ‘yes’ or 'no’ to appear on the pregnancy test, a million thoughts ran through my mind. A big portion of those three minutes was wasted thinking about money rather than this amazing miracle that was happening!

We planned this pregnancy, just as we planned to start a spending freeze two months ago. But the freeze has not gone as planned, with more than one shopping trip to the Loft and several dinners out.

As the Ginger and I sat in anticipation, I thought of all the purchases I will need to make in the next nine months. I started adding up numbers in my head. Then I realized that even in this moment I was thinking about shopping. And that’s when I knew I have to stop talking about changing my spending habits and actually change them. The first step in this process is getting rid of debt: student loans, credit cards, and a car payment. When I am debt-free, money won’t be ever-present in my thoughts. So when the 'yes’ finally appeared, I fully recommitted myself to a spending freeze.

May 1, 2013 begins my total spend freeze, spending money on only essentials, rather than wants. I want to raise a child in a home where we don’t live paycheck to paycheck, and I don’t want to raise a child to be obsessed with material things.

Drowning

For years I have been proud of my work ethic. I had my first job at 14 and haven’t stopped working since, even through college where I worked at least two jobs at any given time (dog kennel, university TV studio, local TV station). 

Despite all this work, I never seem to have money. My jobs in college never paid for school or loans, they funded my need for stuff. Clothes, make-up, shoes, haircuts, just stuff that I didn’t really need but I thought would make me feel better or give me confidence.

From college to the real world, I haven’t stopped adding to my stuff collection. Fancy pillows, kitchen gadgets, Etsy prints, my collection is growing. And it’s not only stuff ripping through my pay check, but activities are getting more expensive and frequent, too. Charity and alumni events, theater and comedy shows, dinners…these activities make me feel like a successful twenty-something. 

However, the amount of debt I have does not make me feel very successful. With student loans, a car payment, and credit cards I have finally realized it’s time to make a change.

The Ginger and I have started a spending fast, inspired by the blog And Then We Saved. It’s eye-opening to add up all that we spend in a month and then add up our debt. We’ve decided on a five year plan to be debt free. Debt free means we have the opportunity to spend on things we actually want to spend on, vacations, a house, etc. rather than on student loans. 

We’re making big cuts. We have a list of our actual needs versus our wants. We’ll be sticking to only the needs. I’ll be updating on our progress. 

(And is it coincidence that this post comes after a three week trip to Italy? Eesh.)