I'm doing 20 things
My husband is currently deployed and before he left we made some serious financial goals we wanted to achieve, namely saving $30,000 over the course of his one year deployment.
We are a young married couple with combined debt (college and personal loans), need a new vehicle, and want to get some cash in secure savings before we have children.
Our plan is to split the 30k thusly:
1) Stick 10k in federal bonds and savings CDs (this is far and away our primary focus)
2) Have 10k to outright purchase a used vehicle (or use as a down payment and maybe take out a small loan, no more than 5k)
3) Pay off 10k of my student loan debt, practically eliminating all of my higher interest loans while in deferment and putting us in a position to only have about 5k left by the time I’m out of graduate school
At six months we are just over 15k, and it was done by aiming to save 2k a month. I’m basically the one that handles our finances. Sometimes it was a little less, sometimes a little more. Sometimes I have to transfer money from savings back into checking. Through not spending money on many luxury items (easier when my husband is gone and we’re not taking ourselves out for nice dinners once-twice a month) and keeping the goals in mind I have not found it terribly difficult. The allocation of these funds will put us so far ahead of the game that it doesn’t make it too terribly difficult to not spend (plus we’re both naturally frugal). I also took on a second part time job to make sure we get there no problem.
We hope to be able to save at least another 15k before his contract is up (after he returns from deployment we’ll have 1 year left) for active duty service to put towards a down payment on a home.
We are extra motivated to save since after he finishes with the army we’ll go back to be broke ass college students (I am shooting for my PhD and he’s wanting to go back for his masters). With memories of ramen and tuna dinners in mind we find financial responsibility a lot easier… lol :D
