Big, Scary 2018 Financial Goal

When Mark and I first married, he was 21 and I was 22. I was one year out of college and he was about 2 weeks out of college. We were young and living on love...and nearly $25,000 in student loan debt.

We made a plan, a firm plan, and we rocked it! Less than 2.5 years later we had paid off ALL of our student loans and purchased our first house. Here is my 7 Days of Dave series that gives the details.  We bought our current home in 2013 and we did a 30 year-mortgage because I was not working at all and we feared the bigger payment with a 15 year mortgage. We did verbally commit to each other that we wanted to shoot for that 15 year mark! Well, 4.5 years have gone by and we have not made many significant strides on our mortgage beyond our monthly payments. We have no new debt and have purchased different vehicles, two washing machines, a dishwasher, and spent nearly $15,000 in medical bills. We are happy that we are still debt free and that we have adjusted our budget time and time again to stay debt-free.

Last summer, when I started with Usborne Books & More my initial goal was that my paychecks would just go to put money on the principal of our mortgage. Then we had four eye exams, three ER visits, a flooded kitchen, a new dishwasher, an immediate care visit. My book money covered 80% of that! I still haven't made an extra payment on our house BUT we were able to cover so many things without even touching our savings!

But...

A few months ago a certain number kept popping in my head. Over and over again. I started seeing it in my dreams. I would think of it 10-15 times a day. I began praying on it and the more I prayed the more it felt like where God was leading me.

Over the weekend, I read Money Problems, Marriage Solutions by Chuck and Ann Bentley. I won this book on my blog friend Abbi's blog - Proverbs 31 Living (If you love homemaking, homesteading, homeschooling, blogs hers is one to follow! I have been reading and enjoying her blog for years now!) Thank you Abbi for this great book!

Last night, Mark was out helping a friend move and the kids were in bed so I wrote the number down. I spent about 30 minutes doing math and figuring out how to get what we owe on our house down to that number. My goal date is 12.31.18. Poor Mark came home and I said, "Guess what I want to do next year?!"

The goal feels scary - we'll be making almost a double payment every month (with the second, extra going to the principal) but with book money and extra money from babysitting, sales, etc it's totally do-able!
The goal feels uncomfortable - we are going to have to edit some parts of how we live. We're going to have to choose the house money over pizza money. We're going to have to go without a few of our fun purchases.
The goal feels like a stretch - while it's completely attainable with dedication we haven't made a goal this big since I was working part-time.

We will not compromise:
Our health - we will continue to go to all medical and dental appointments. We will also continue to buy fresh fruits/veggies and organic meats.
The children's education - if it is something they need for learning we will continue to give them 100% of those experiences.

We will compromise:
Our fun stuff. Maybe we don't need every camping item or pair of shoes that we love.
Eating-out. We are working every month to get better and better about not relying on conveniences like a quick meal out.

I do not plan on making this into a series but just wanted to share this here as an encouragement to others. I do plan to update a couple of times over the course of next year and will update at the end of next December to let you know how we achieved this goal!
What big financial goal can you make for your 2018? What debt can you eliminate?

Join us as we prayerfully strive to, "owe no man anything but love." Romans 13:8