by Hope
My focus is split – student loans and savings. I just updated you on my debt load after payments made this month. Now it’s time for a savings update.
I currently have a total of $6,249 in my personal savings accounts. $807 is in my long standing personal savings account. And the rest is in my new Ally savings account assigned to all my savings buckets that I created when I created my budget. There was original (post house sale $4,000 more in savings. I will explain use when I get a May finance update together.)
How do you like Ally?
I am so grateful to the person in my comment about a high yield savings account who recommended Ally. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the buckets and related goal and date feature. And then seeing cumulative total is very motivating.
It’s been so easy to set up and use. And feels “far away” so I’m not at all tempted to look at it often let alone touch the money there.
My only complaint is that transfers take anywhere from 3-4 business days. While they take the money out of my account on day 1, they take 3-4 days to deposit it into my account. (Even if they listed it as Not Available). They do show the transfer as pending, but seems like a stretch to take that long to even record in my account.
I only have the single savings account. And I’ve already earned just over $17 in interest. And that’s in just over a month. Woot, woot!
Very motivating.
Future Plan
The plan remains the same, with a small hiccup of this unplanned stay in GA while Beauty and fiance recover from 4 wheeler accident.
I will continue to live with my parents, helping care for my mom (and dad as needed) until I am no longer needed. Things are working well with dad. I take care of day time care – feeding, bathing, and changes. And then cook several times a week for dad and I, eating leftovers in between. Dad handles evening care and is free to get out of the house during the day. We are both quite happy with this schedule.
And I’m able to work around mom’s schedule, and vice versa. I start at 4:30am daily. And we make it work. I am diligently saving and paying some extra to my student loans every month. But I think I am leaning slightly more to saving.
My siblings have stepped back in while I am here in GA.
Hope is a resourceful, solutions-driven online business manager with over two decades of experience helping clients streamline operations, manage projects, and grow their businesses through digital marketing and technology.
But life has a way of rewriting your plans.
A year ago, Hope made the decision to move in with her aging parents full time – a season she wouldn’t trade, even as it came with its own financial and emotional weight. Earlier this year, she lost her mother, and is now walking the tender, disorienting path of grief while learning what “forward” looks like from here.
Hope came to the Blogging Away Debt community in 2015 as a single mom raising five foster and adoptive children. She’s written through job changes, financial setbacks, and the bittersweet transition to an empty nest. Her kids are finding their footing in the world now – and so is she.
Rooted in faith and fueled by the same perseverance she’s brought to every hard season, Hope is ready to face her finances with fresh eyes and an honest pen. She believes that clarity, courage, and community can change the trajectory of anyone’s story including her own.
She lives in Austin, TX with her dad, loves adventures with her dog Addie, and is figuring out, one step at a time, what this next chapter is meant to be.
