Free From Broke is about to turn a year old (October 4th to be exact). A lot has happened in the past year: I took the jump and started my own site. We decided to live off one income so my wife can stay home to watch the kids. We’ve had car accidents. We bought a new car. We received an economic stimulus check. And so many more things. (I also built up some great relationships with other bloggers and readers out there! Thank you all!)
So now to look toward the next year. Here are some things on the horizon for our personal finances:
- Discover how livable one income will be. So far we’re doing ok but we haven’t seen what my paycheck will look like yet after we’ve changed the withholding and health care with my employer. There will be lots of adjustments for us I’m sure!
- Take our idea of frugality and kick it into high gear. We’ve always lived relatively frugal (at least I think we have). With two incomes though we were able to splurge when we wanted to. Now with one income we’re really going to have to lock our costs down and take our frugality to the next step. Grocery shopping is one thing we’ve really been watching lately.
- Continue building up Free From Broke. I gotta tell you, this site is a lot of fun to run! A year ago I couldn’t have imagined the site would be where it is. Still, I’d like to see the site grow more. I’d like more reader interaction and interaction with other sites. A year is a long time but I think we’re still very much only beginning to grow here!
- Look into what it will take to buy a house. I know, I keep talking about one income and now we want to buy a house! But realistically I don’t think we’re too far off on affording it. We’ve been saving and we have full equity in our co-op. We need to crunch some numbers and seriously consider whether a house is something we can handle in the next year and beyond.
- Head back to school, again. I’ve been slowly going back to school taking around a course a semester. I took off this semester (last semester was a bit crazy) but I think I need to go back in the Spring. I have some ideas about what I should be majoring in. A change in career may very well be in the works too.
- Continue doing what we do with our investments. The sky may be falling today but it won’t last forever (it won’t right?). I’ll keep adding to my 401(k) and also build up our CD’s in ING. As we’re able we’ll add to our Roth IRA and general savings.
The next year will be interesting for us for sure!
Now to the contest!
First I’d like to wish MiB Smarter Money happy blogoversary as well! We’re both teaming up to bring you as many chances as possible to win some great prizes. Check out Hank’s contest! Hank is asking his readers: What is the single most important thing you’ve learned over the past year?
I’d like to hear what you’re going to do with your finances in the next year!
To help celebrate my one-year blogoversary, you’ll have a chance to win one of three Amazon gift cards totaling $100 ($75, $15, and $10).
Here’s how you can participate:
- Leave a comment on this post about what you will do with your finances in the next year (5 entries) Make sure you leave a valid email address!
- Comment on MiB Smarter Money’s contest (5 entries). Contact me to tell me about your comment.
- Comment bonus – The top commenter on all posts in the contest period will automatically get 15 entries while the 2nd and 3rd highest commenters will get 10 entries! (Comments should be on current articles within the contest period).
- Subscribe to my RSS feed or via email and email me the secret phrase (10 entries). If you are already subscribed you can email me the secret phrase to enter as well.
- Subscribe to MIB Smarter Money’s RSS feed and email me his secret phrase (10 entries). Again if you already subscribe to MiB just email me his secret phrase.
- Favorite this post in social media and email me the link showing me where you submitted it (5 entries each). This could be Digg, Reddit, Stumble Upon, or PF Buzz.
- If you have a blog write about what you will be doing with your personal finances in the next year and link back to this post (20 entries). Email me your link. I’d love to hear what you will be doing with your finances on your site!
- Link back to any post in Free From Broke during the contest period (15 entries). Have a round-up? Add one of my articles! Think one of my articles fits well with one of your upcoming articles? Add a link back! Each link will be worth 15 entries. You have to contact me and tell me where you linked. No spam!
- Add Free From Broke to your blogroll (10 entries)! Again, contact me and send me your link! If I’m already up there you can still enter by emailing me!
That is a lot of ways for you to enter! The more you enter the more chances you have of winning!
Some legalese – This giveaway is meant to be in fun. Please have fun and do not try to “game” the contest in any way. I reserve the right to determine what a valid entry is and also reserve the right to adjust the rules if necessary (only one comment per article posted in the contest period will count for entries). I will not tolerate spam entries! All entries will be entered onto a spreadsheet and a randomizer program will pick the winners. You must leave a valid email address so I can contact you if you win. If your email is not valid I will move on the the next email that comes up in the randomizer. The contest period is September 22, 2008 to 11:59AM EST on October 15th, 2008. Odds of winning depend on the number of entries. You can enter each way once. Only one winner per gift card.
What will you be doing with your finances in the next year?
Sign up with ING Direct and get a $25 bonus
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We plan to generate more income. I’ll be going back to work full time, hopefully. We’ve also scaled back our frivolous spending. We can see how careless we have been in the past.
Right now we are planning on continuing our weekly contributions to retirement even though the markets look dreadful.
Congrats on your Blogoversary!
We too would like to better prepare ourselves for home buying in the near future. We’re one income also and trying to make it work. In the future, I hope to become better with my hobby of photography and find some clients, in hope to help that 1 income.
Our finances keep going up and down but we have found a common goal that my husband and I can agree on. So what we are going to be doing with our finances is taking 10% each week of his paychecks and putting it into the bank. As we save up enough money we are going to pay off one of our bills that is in collections. Then we will start over again saving and pay off the next one as we go. We figure this is the best way that we can get our credit report cleaned up.
I’m looking into finally getting an emergency fund that won’t be wiped out in less than 30 days!
Word. I’ll be saving as much $ as i can while trying to remain afloat with the Mrs. is in Grad School and us living off of 1 paycheck the whole time
thank goodness we’re frugal, eh?!
I am hoping to pay down some of our high interest credit cards, I want to be debt free one of these days!
Since both my kids just went back to school, and they are both in full-day (no longer one in Kindergarten), I have taken a subbing job during the day so that I can help pay off some items. I am able to work while they are in school, and still be home for them when they come home. The little extra I get is applied to debts, and I coupon aggressively to lower our food costs. We live in CA so it’s hard. Great giveaway – thanks for offering!
~Tanya
the4moyers(at)msn(dot)com
What I’ll do is paying up all my credit card debts and invest more. To do that I need to eran more money
In the next year, we plan to save at least 40-50% of what we earn to go towards our plan of financial independence. We need to get our savings high enough so that in about 10-15 years, we can just live off the interest.
The contest is now closed. Thank you all for your submissions. I loved hearing about everyone’s financial plan in the next year.
Fatigue is not something i want my assets to feel, ill be saving in a high interest account in FL.
Great Giveaway!
We are planning on paying as much of our debt as possible and spend cash for whatever we can so the debt doesn’t get bigger. It’s big challenge for us to do this, but we have to!
Thanks for the chance to win!
We’ve already gotten rid of all but just under 1k of credit card debt. The next thing will be to get the medical bills under control and set up a payment plan that works. Will also see about buying up some real estate while prices are depressed.
Charles’s last blog post..Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Tax Credits
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