by Beks
OK. Ready? Italy was unexpectedly tough on our finances.
We didn’t expect to have to pay a cover charge for each meal. We didn’t expect the exchange rate to be so poor. And we didn’t expect the high entrance fees to see the sights (and by high, I mean 50 euro – EACH).
The exchange rate surprised us the most. We made the majority of the plans in June – when the exchange rate hit its lowest. We traveled in October… the rate was nearly at its peak for the year.
I budgeted high thinking I would come home with extra money, money I could use to make a large debt payment.
That didn’t happen.
In fact, I had to stop by an ATM three times before returning home.
How bad was the damage? $500 out of our emergency fund. Eek.
Upon returning home, our water heater broke, taking out an additional $300 from the emergency fund plus another $35 for miscellaneous parts.
Add that to the $150 we had to spend on cleaning supplies and replacement curtains thanks to the stupendous house sitter.
Are you following my math?
We have $15 left in our emergency fund.
In the whole scheme of things, if this is the worst of the damage of an international vacation, it’s not bad. I just hate another month of no progress. Minimum payments this month so we can replace our emergency fund fully.
Here are the new numbers:
• Original Debt: $38,495.86
• Added Debt: $1,781.50
• Total Debt: $40,277.36
• Paid: $30,546.19
• Remaining: $9,731.17
•
• Broken Down
• Auto Loan 1: $0
• Credit Card: $0
• Student Loan: $8,781.17
• Auto Loan 2: $0
• Vet Loan: $950.00
Beks is a full-time government employee who enjoys blogging late into the night after her four kids have gone to sleep. She’s been married to Chris, her college sweetheart, for 15 years. In 2017, after 3 long years working the Dave Ramsey Baby Steps, they paid off more than $70K and became debt free. When she’s not working or blogging, she’s exploring the great outdoors.
buttttt, what did you do about your niece.
On the bright side, you HAD a emergency fund to draw from and didn’t end up writing a post saying that you had incurred $985 more credit card debt! I love your blog and have recommended it to many friends who are on the road to a debt-free lifestyle.
OMG! Having just returned from Europe myself, I can confirm the poor exchange rate. But I was there for work and didn’t get to see many sights. Entrance fees of 50 euros!? Who can afford that–seriously?
On the plus side, recent studies show it is best to spend money on experiences, as opposed to consumer purchases, in order to maximize on happiness.
So in this sense, it is a wise decision to go to Europe rather than spend that money on trips to the mall. You’ll remember that trip for the rest of you life.
You guys have still made amazing progress, hang in there this month, it will get better!!
Ouch! But your fund carried you through. You are still on track, just have to . . . um . . . fix the wheels on the caboose (to stretch the analogy too far). And it sounds like you are getting things in the house settled down, and that’s a big sanity assist.
Yeah, the dollar has lost almost half its value since we were there in 2001 and it was like 85 cents to buy a euro. We had such a good time that trip. You can thank Greenspan and Bernanke for the devaluation.
You know Beks, your emergency fund did exactly what it was supposed to do… be there for emergencies. Whether home or abroad. So, it served its purpose admirably, you had a fantastic, amazing, extremely memorable (I hope all of the above) time, and you got through your trip without adding unnecessary financial debt. Good for you!
Now, as someone else said… what about your coming-home drama?
Next to yours, our emergency fund looks like a Chinese ping pong game. Rejoice in the stability you’ve had with it over time. Don’t look at this small frame of time only…you guys are rockin’ it!
I guess I may have forgotten to warn you about the high entrance fees – Sorry! In my defense, I had such a great time in Italy that I sort of blocked out annoying stuff like that. 🙂
Gotta agree with Wren – you had a great time – your emergency fund worked perfectly. DON’T beat yourself up! Life happens 🙂
Now – come on! What about the “rest of the story”?
It’s perfectly OK to take a break from paying off the debt to have a well-deserved vacation. Remember, you can’t take it with you! I had also forgotten about the ‘cover charges’ in restaurants in Italy. I thought that really odd when we were there. Luckily, our package included breakfast and dinner at our hotel, so we didn’t have as many of those. We also learned from our hotel owner that tipping there was not only not expected, but also considered a no-no as it would offend the servers if it were offered. (Glad we asked.)
I know this journey often feels like one step forward and two steps back……but you have made thousands of steps forward already. This is just a hiccup. Your blog keeps me motivated, and makes me realize my own journey (when it gets frustrating like yours is right now), is a marathon and not a sprint.
The Bright side: No new debt, and wonderful vacation memories! Keep looking forward, it’s a little slow right now, but you’ll build the steam back up.
You got a great vacation–if you were doing it quarterly, that’d be one thing, but I think 500 bucks over is nothing to be ashamed of. I visited Italy before the Euro conversion, spent next to nothing, told my brother about it…he went after the Euro came about and spent a small fortune. The Continent just isn’t the bargain it used to be!
You’ll be back on track before you know it.
I just was in Italy myself and the exchange rates is horrible. With that said I did not want to come home. I was trying to find jobs and apartments. Incidently the un employment rate in Sicily where I was for 2 1/2 amazing weeks was nearly 20%. For every $100 U.S. I only received 66 Euros. Yikes oouch that hurts a lot. Check out my site for great ways of saving money and great loan info.
I’m with pretty much everyone else on this. Your emergency fund covered you and you got a great vacation out of it.
I’ve always looked and debt repayment plans and budgets a little like diets. There needs to be some flexibility or you’ll cheat. Once you start cheating you cheat more.
If your financial plan is flexible, then you can make adjustments to it as needed without feeling like you cheated. Then you’re more likely to stick to it.
Keep it up!
This is one of those times it is easy to get discouraged, but it is also a chance to sit back and be thankful you had the emergency fund there to help you when you needed it.
And I hope you also SAVED $100 by not paying the worthless pet sitter who ruined your house.
I feel ya on the frustration of no progress – I made a mistake on my income taxes in April and had to cough up an unexpected $375 this month. That wiped out all the money that was going to go to my non-essential savings goals this month.
But! This is a perfect example of emergency fund awesomeness. Good job budgeting high for Italy in the first place, too. No new debt – yay you!
I just looked at your numbers in the sidebar. You’re doing AWESOME.
I’m sure your disappointed but just think, what would you have done if you didnt have that emergency fund?? Either put it all on your credit card and gone further into debt or not been able to do as much stuff while you were there, which defeats the purpose of being on vacation!
How much did you budget for your trip? My husband and I just got back from a week in Rome and we went to an ATM just once. And that was because we decided to do a little Christmas shopping in Rome for our friends and family. We went through a travel agent who booked us two tours, so they were already paid for by the time we got there. I think the only extras we really had to pay for were a couple of museums we decided to go to. And we never got charged a cover for a restaurant. Though we did get a six euro “service” fee on our last night!