Thrifty Thurdsay

Happy Thrifty Thursday To You!

Today I want to tell you about a way I make 2 extra house payments a year without ever feeling it. For about the last 6 months, I have taken my house payment and rounded it up to the next nearest $100. For me, that works out to be paying about $70 extra a month. Then, I divided the payment in two equal parts and I pay half every time Matt gets paid. Since some months he gets paid 3 times instead of two (he gets paid every other Friday)...in the long run, it ends up being a couple of extra payments a year and I never even notice the money difference.

For example, if you house payment is $935/ month, round up to $1000 and just decide to pay $500 every pay period. I only mail them in once a month...so I can save on stamps...but eventually, we will have cut several years off of our mortgage AND saved TONS in interest!

Now for Tip #2:

When Brooklyn turned 6 this year, I realized WOW! there was only 10 more years until our baby girl would be 16 and ready for her very own car. That got me to thinking. If I could set aside just $10 a month for the next 10 years, she would have a whopping $12,000 CASH (besides all the interest that money will draw) to spend on a car! For SURE I could manage an extra $10 a month so I got busy saving up and when we had enough, we opened a savings account for her with this money. I had considered doing the same thing for Grant, but I decided to just wait until he turns 6 too...and that way I'll only be doing $10 for the next 3 years instead of $20 and plus, that would only be fair. Anyway, my suggestion is for you to think about this with your kids. No matter what their age...if you can start putting just $10 a month away for them in some account that you won't touch...when they get driving age, you'll have a nice down payment at least for a car. By the way, the picture of the convertable bug is up there because at the age of 6, that is Brooklyn's "Dream Car." She also told me last night that she wants her own MP3 player for Christmas! ha ha...boy 6 year olds grow up fast these days. What happened to crayons and barbies?

Well, I hope you found that helpful! I'm off to VBS......