I just happened to realize today that my 6 month blogaversary is coming up real soon. Technically, my six month anniversary is December 23rd but due to the holidays, I'll probably be too busy to celebrate.

I've made some big changes to my finances in only a short time. It will be interesting to see how things look a year from now.

Here are some of my prior posts with an update.

  • I'm starting to do it right.... - I posted about starting to save for those irregular expenses instead of paying for them with a credit card. I've saved enough to cover about 75% of my irregular expenses for a year. I should be able to fully fund that account over the next 2-3 months.
  • Official Debt Tracker - I posted a debt tracker on the sidebar to keep track of my debt reduction progress. I started the year with over $66k in debt. I've since reduced this to a little over $47k.
  • SingleGuyMoney is Mad - My cousin called me to "borrow" a thousand dollars and got very upset when I didn't loan it to him. He still hasn't gotten the money and WILL NOT get it from me.
  • "I want to be rich like you" - My cousin (not the one that wanted to borrow money) thought that because I have a nice home and car, I am rich. I had to sit him down and explain a few things. He knows now that appearances are not always what they seem.
  • $70 Error - I made a big mistake when changing bank accounts and learned an expensive lesson.
  • Real Life Example of the Sucky Housing Market - Two of my friends were trying to sale their homes. They STILL have not sold them.

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1 comments

  1. Anonymous // December 5, 2007 at 9:16 PM  

    I just found your blog and was reading through. I noticed that you are 'knocking out your small balances' as opposed to paying the 'highest interest rate debt first' I think that since you had such a large emergency fund, you should have paid more towards your high rate car loan as opposed to your low rate 'fixed for life' credit card balance. Also, have you considered re-financing your auto loan to a lower interest rate? Have your run your debts though a snowball debt calculator? here is a link to one: http://www.whatsthecost.com/snowball.aspx?country=us

    Also, reading through, I noticed that as soon as you paid your non-mortgage debt down $10k, you were going to increase your debt with an investment property for much more than that amount you reduced your debt by. I don't think that was a good idea. When I look at your debts, and without knowing the specific numbers, I would say that your primary goal should be paying your mortgages down to 80% LTV so that if you needed to sell one of them in a pinch, you could. BEFORE considering another investment property.

    Either way, congatulations on realizing your debt and making it a goal to reduce it. My finances were very similar to yours. The only thing I did differently was to pay off my $35k 6% car loan and keep my $15k in credit cards at 2.99% fixed for life. I am down to $32k in non-mortgage debt. My goal is to pay my $222k mortgage down to $200k by my 5 year anniversary of owning my house (jan 2011). At that time, my $32k debt will be about $20k just by paying the minimum payments...but still at a low-low interest rate. I am taking the approach of reducing my expenses as much as possible, without copromising my 'quality of life'. And being more aware of where my money goes. I still eat out for lunch every day like you do....my lunch expense has a daily cap of $7.50...but I usually spend $6.00. I also cancelled my cable service, downgraded to dsl internet, decrease my car insurance coverages, found a better homeowners insurance rate, got rid of my land-line, reduced my cell phone bill by changing plans, using energy saving light bulbs, a programmable thermostat, installed new windows(did it myself), a new shower head, etc etc etc...so I actually have more spending money now than ever before and my debts are still decreasing rather than increasing. Well i blabbed enough...GOOD LUCK! STAY THE COURSE!