Blogging Away Debt Blogging Away Debt follows real people on their journey to debt freedom — with tips on the debt snowball, budgeting, cutting expenses, and staying motivated.

by Adam Dawson

It may be too early to say conclusively, but I think the breakfasts out problem may be solved.  My new employer has a break room stocked with juices, greek yogurt, granola bars, several types of cereal, dried fruit, nuts, several varieties of fresh fruit, V8, milk, soy milk, almond milk, bread/toast, PBJ, and some other things.  What a treat!  And to top it off, they cater in breakfast tacos on Friday.

Previously, I think I was eating breakfast on the way to work 4-5 days a week at times.  This had a terrible effect on my health as well as our budget.  I think bacon and eggs at home would do me well sometimes, but this ensures I won’t go without breakfast.  This could be an $80-$100 savings every month.  There are a lot of carbohydrates in this selection, but there are healthier options as well. I have been thinking through the idea of getting a single serve blender and some protein powder to supplement the free options.

Turns out there are very few restaurants near the office, so it seems more people bring their lunch here, which will be good for me.  Today I brought leftover stir fry.

In addition to the smorgasbord, I’ve also learned that there is an adequate, free gym in our building, and the company also offers 50% reimbursement on membership to the gym of your choice.  I’m also excited that one of the free drink options is La Croix sparkling water, which is a nice easy let down from the diet soda I have been wanting to cut down on.

Obviously this isn’t a health blog, and I would be the least qualified person to write one anyway.  But I’m excited that the new job might provide an opportunity to improve both the budget and healthy habits!

by Adam Dawson

Ok Ok…when we started this blog I planned to update the debt balances every month, on the 1st of the month.  Obviously that hasn’t happened.  The best laid plans, I suppose.

The past few months have been very difficult for us regarding debt payback. I explained in a comment that for the first 3 years, we were essentially on autopilot.  We made our snowball payment every month, and added in our $7000 extra per year out of our  tax returns, bonuses,  and extra paychecks.  Then, we started blogging….and for the first time since we started on this journey, we missed some snowball payments.  We are still paying the minimum payments, but accelerating our payoff has been eluding us.

I have been thinking about why this may be.  Maybe it’s the blog’s fault.  I joke, I kid.  I can’t be sure, but I think it’s mainly due to the big change of buying our house this spring.  Since we  rented the last 3 years, our monthly payment was steady and we  didn’t have to worry about maintenance.  When we bought the house, our monthly payment jumped about $350, but the readers of this blog know we’ve already been hammered  with maintenance.  With the septic pump, the  well issues, the tenants’ washer and dryer, and then some deferred car maintenance (2 new sets of tires and some new brakes), we have shelled out a few thousand dollars – the recent months have definitely  been the most expensive months of our lives.

I think the house has effected more subtle changes as well.  We are spending more on gas than we were before.  Our highway has notoriously bad traffic and I think the extra commute time is contributing to our eating out habits – especially breakfast.  Finally, there have been some expenses related to moving – the cost of the move, plus those little things you need in  a new house.  Home decor, tools, etc.

I’m not making excuses, really, just speculating about what has  changed that’s made debt payback so much  harder in the last few months.  We’ve noticed the comments where readers are wondering if we’re really serious about getting out of debt.  The comments baffle us because we’ve been on this journey for 3.5 years now and we’ve made progress.  But just through the  lens  of this blog, I can understand why it might look like we’re less than 100% committed.  You’ve caught us at a bad time, for one.  Also, some of  our spending increases, I guess you’d call them, have been somewhat planned.  We’ve fought and pinched and cut our way to this point so that we can be on our 7-year debt payoff schedule, and we always planned to be able to do a little bit more with our money if our income ever went up like it has this year.

So it makes  sense why some might see the spending and think we’re not serious.  Please don’t misunderstand – we are deadly  serious about the big picture…being debt-free except the  mortgage by age 35 and unshackled from the  golden handcuffs so we can pursue our collective dreams, which are always growing.  But we also know we have serious changes to make with regards to our finances.  Our spending is not sustainable.  Eating out as much as we do is not ok, for our bank account or our health. Entertainment spending also has to decrease.  We realize  this and because of this blog, we are working together  for the first time on these issues, with very slow progress so far.

I also saw some people asking – if we have a plan and don’t intend to accelerate it, what is the purpose of our blogging? This is a fair question.  Well, I think you are seeing the purpose unfolding before your eyes.  We are going through a lot of life changes.  A new house, a new job (for the 2nd time this year), planning to start a family, beginning some of our homesteading dreams, and still trying to make our finances and debt payoff work.  Your advice and tips, and your life experience/wisdom really has been valuable for us as we work through these things.  Some have mentioned that we are defensive and don’t listen to advice.  I think we listen to advice that comes across kindly, but also – we are working on the defensiveness too.  You wouldn’t be the first person to tell me that.

I promise I will update numbers as soon as some of the payroll changes and payments post.  I hope this post has answered some questions and I hope you’ll stick  around a while as we keep trying to make our debt plan work.