Let's share

[houseelf]

In our sparkly new forum, let's share our financial goals:

For our household:

1) Keep DS in his school
2) Keep the consumer debt at bay
3) Have me continue to work part-time for at least 6 more months.

What about you all?

Kelly

To manage to sock away some cash for our retirement while attending school

To work somewhere that won't mean $300 worth of daycare each week.

To use the credit card as little as possible.

To keep our equity and have a quick, profitable sale when the time comes.

[DCJenn]

1) To pay off the adopton debts...(see the "how much do children costs" post for that ugly amount!)

2) To pay off any other outstanding consumer debt

3) Once we know where we'll be heading with Uncle Sam, a whole lot of other decisions will then fall into place : one car vs. 2, buy or rent, private school vs. public school, SAHM vs working mom, etc.

Jenn

[migirl]

Since we're lucky enough to have only mortgage debt, our main financial goal is retirement savings. Of course, we'd also like to turn a tidy profit when we go to sell our house eventually, but much of that is not up to us.

Eventually, though, I'll be a SAHM, and we'll have to adjust our finances accordingly since I've been working full-time for the past 3 years. I have a feeling that will be hard for us...

[Auspicious]

Yeah, right now it's Operation Brace for Impact, aka adding $X to savings over the course of this year so that we will have $Y total with which to make the transition into residency next summer.

Of course since I have no idea what kind of situation we'll match into, I can only make random guesses and pray that $Y will be enough.

Someone please look into their crystal ball and tell us what we need Y to be.

[Sheherezade]

right now it's Operation Brace for Impact

We've been in that place for awhile.....

I think .... maybe Y = 26 million dollars?

[Auspicious]

I think .... maybe Y = 26 million dollars?

With that kind of money we could even get Tivo. And a washing machine. Or, if I remember jloriene's calculations correctly, approximately 619 tiny adorable Russians. Hmm. We may fall short of that dollar amount, but I hope we at least have enough for a place with a washing machine.

[Sheherezade]

With that kind of money we could even get Tivo. And a washing machine.

Now let's not get crazy here ....

Hmmm...maybe I need some more concrete goals! I'm starting to get a bad "who cares" we only have 2 years left. Or 3. And this time, it better really be the last 2 or 3 years!

I've pretty much decided to start doing some sort of work come fall to augment our budget and my sanity. We have always made a point to pay for the "basics" from DHs more reliable salary and use my income for unexpected expenses and then extras. But I didn't notice how much I was pitching in. Between that and some differences in benefits etc...I've noticed!

So that's my goal. Find a reasonable source of part time income and start monitoring spending more closely.

[SuzySunshine]

Our goals as of right now are to go meet with the financial advisor next week and have her set some!

Actually my biggest goal is to figure out how I can stay home when we have kids without taking on more debt.

[PrincessFiona]

Our financial goals right now are to monitor our spending so that we aren't spending every drop of every paycheck. We have become very poor financial managers.

We are hoping to put our house on the market at the beginning of August and are going to make a contingent offer on that house....and we need to get a grip!

kris

[Sheherezade]

Our short term financial goals now are to get disability insurance and save up money for a remodelling project. We need to change our staircase and the level of the floor in the master bedroom. Basically, the center core of our house is Escher-like. We don't want to do the whole borrow equity thing, so instead we are saving. How archaic. We did the same thing to buy our cars. I guess that is what happens when you stare down 150,000 dollars of educational debt each month. Long term, we are trying to pay off our mortgage in 15 years instead of 30. We have consolidated the loan debt at under 3 percent for 30 years, so we'll keep that unless we get a windfall. There are NIH programs that pay back loan debt if you are doing academic research --up to 35,000 a year plus taxes. We would love to get one of those, but it requires obtaining research funding from an outside source first. Guess I should work on those grants with him.

1. Set up a trust fund for the little guy.

2. Save up to buy a lot that we can build on sometime down the road...should we ever decide to move.

3. Set up an LLC so that we are protected should DH ever get sued.

[Vishenka69]

Short term: Stop DH from talking me into expensive splurges because "we can always rent for another year."

Long term: Buy a home once we're out of residency (2-3 years).

I'm in finance, so this type of planning comes very naturally. I've got spreadsheets for just about anything (vacations, monthly expenses, retirement plans, etc.). DH thinks I'm crazy.

[Meenah]

My husband doesn't have his name on anything just in case of lawsuits. The house is in my name only, but both names are on the loan!!!!
Luanne