Pay off all debt except the mortgage.

This is going fairly well, although with Christmas and all the January birthdays, I may have to suspend the larger payments I’ve been making on my credit card for a month. Basically, I need to finish paying off my credit card, and all but $100 of my paycheck is going towards this twice/month. When that’s finished, I’ll pay off the couch and chair and then the water heater. Both of these bills are on a same as cash program, and I’ve been paying the amount each month that it would take to pay that off in time, even if I can’t devote the larger chunk of money to them.

I’ve had to divert a couple of the payments I had previously set up twice/month to pay off my credit card, and I’ve put more on the card with the airline tickets to Las Vegas. Plus, our water heater just went out, so that’s another $1200. Basically, I’m spending too much. I probably need to get back on mint.com, look at where my spending is going, reset budgets, and try to stick to them. This is not just me, though, as any real budget needs to include DH, and he’s not really willing to look at his spending too closely.

In the meantime, we went on vacation and spent quite a bit of money. However, we did receive a tax refund, which we used in part to pay off my husband’s credit card and my other credit card, which I hadn’t realized I had put so many charges on. The rest of the refund goes to the college fund. I’m afraid if I apply it to the remaining credit card debt, we’ll never have money for college, and that way, I know I’ve committed the money of my future paychecks to paying off this same card, so I won’t spend any more. Basically, I’m back to the beginning of owing on one card(although it is much less now) and owing on a couch and chair we purchased(although that’s on a same as cash basis for another year or so), and that will come after the card is paid off.

I read a New Year’s resolution list by Suze Ormand, which included
1. Don’t look upon unexpected windfalls as disposable money
2. Max out the matching part of 401Ks

I took these to heart and used some unexpected money to pay off debt, and the entire matching part of my husband’s 401K is now met. We were 2/3 of the way there before, and then my husband got a raise, which we don’t need for living expenses. It was really good that I was thinking of this because it made me force DH to follow up on it, whereupon he learned that he hadn’t actually received the money, even though he received the raise on paper 3 months prior. Who knows how long he might have gone if he hadn’t followed up!

And am now working on a credit card. It should take about 6 months to pay this off.

For about 15 minutes I had this goal accomplished and then I purchased new, energy efficient doors for the house, and I’m now paying these off. While I’m paying them off, I’ve been accruing debt on the credit cards again, which definitely isn’t good and which I’ll address after paying off the doors, which are “same as cash” as long as I get them paid off within the timeframe, which I will.

I’m estimating this will take 4 months to do.

This added expenses to two credit cards I had already paid off. It will take a few months just to pay them off again, but I’m already started on it.

With the rest of the tax money. Now I’m working on the last item, which is an interest-free-for-a-year credit card. Should take me about 4 months.

Just have a third credit card(no interest for a year) and a car loan left to go, and I’m expecting some tax money back.