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 Emmily Schulze

Jeffrey, the blog moderator, sent us an email that said we may not be the best fit for this blog because we are too much on the same page. We both laughed out loud when we read this! Do we agree too much for readers to identify with us? Not at all. It been a constant struggle for us to compromise on how much to spend, how much to save, and how much to put towards paying off our debt. I hope we are able to be open enough to reveal how differently we think about not just money and debt, but many other issues! If you’re married or in a serious relationship, I hope you can relate. 🙂

Thankfully, we don’t fight about money like we used to, but i think we still have many disagreements becuase we think about money so differently. Adam does not spend money. He’s disciplined and likes stability, which means he’s very interested in saving, paying down debt, and making as good of an income as he can. He’s very ambitious and chases promotions and takes every opportunity to get ahead. He will go to great lengths to save $1! He will fight to pay off our debt until the very last payment. I admire his dedication and hard work very much, but it’s hard for me to identify with.

I, on the other hand, LOVE to spend money freely. Budgeting is a challenge for me. I have LOTS of ideas for how to spend our money (that I think will greatly improve our lives) but Im not very disciplined or patient to follow through on my ideas. I don’t like waiting, so it can be hard for me to see the big picture when i want something NOW. The debt bothers me, but not enough to want to pay accelerated payments every month. We pay more per month in debt payments than many people earn in income per month, and it’s hard for me to see that huge chunk of money just go away. The idea that we’ll be doing this for another four or five years really trips me out. I tend to see things very black and white, so I’d much rather pay it off in less than a year or stretch it out and pay for it slowly for 30 years. I just want to get on with our lives without our debt getting in the way.

We’re very happily married and i believe we have a great marriage. Many people have commented on how happy we are together and how good we are for each other, and its true, we’re definitely better together than we were before. That said, we are still working on being on the same team with our finances. It amazes me that we can have such different views on debt, spending, and budgeting and still be so happily married! I think it’s lucky that we agree that having money isn’t the most important thing in life, and that’s probably the thing that’s saving us from marital discord. 😉

Do you identify with either of our money mindsets? Which one?
Do you and your significant other agree on all your money matters?

by Adam Dawson

Emily’s right.  We must start budgeting again.  This is probably the financial issue that holds us back more than anything else.  We haven’t had a budget that we actually followed for probably 24 months.

When we started out, we took the online Dave Ramsey course and tried the envelope method.  For a few months it worked out well.  I would faithfully trot to the bank once or twice a month and ask the teller to give me so many tens, twenties, fives, etc. so I could fill the envelopes accurately.  But once the novelty wore off, our disagreements about how to spend our income really came to light.  Budget meetings started to deteriorate into arguments and eventually we stopped budgeting at all to avoid having the fights.  Just writing this down brings back all those memories of difficult moments in our relationship.  On the months where we had our envelope system going well, it seems like something would come up to throw us off track (something as simple as not wanting to cook on Friday night even though we’d already spent our restaurant budget) that would cause us to drop the whole plan and pull out the debit card.

On the plus side, we learned that using cash really did help us stick to a plan. The few times we did, we felt very empowered and in control at the end of the month.  I believe that we know and understand one another better now, and so I’m hoping it will be easier to agree on what we need to plan for. And since the blogosphere has clearly spoken that Emily should get a reasonable monthly allowance for hair, hopefully this next round of budgeting will be easier.

We’ve noticed that many of you have already chimed in with your tips and budgeting/spending plan advice, so THANK YOU!!  This is exactly what we need.  As I start to plan the next month’s spending, I have some questions for how some of you do it.

• Do you use a cash method like the envelopes or something similar?
• How many categories do you have?  In the past I found it easier to stick to about 10 envelopes or fewer (which doesn’t count bills that are paid directly from the bank account).  Do you prefer big, general categories (ie “personal care”) or do you have many, specific smaller categories?
• How do you handle spending money/blow money?
• It’s very personal, but if anybody cares to share how much you plan for certain categories (and your household size) it would be helpful for us!
• I’m the planner and Emily is the free spirit.  How do you balance competing spending priorities in marriage?

For me, my biggest personal obstacle is eating out for convenience. I have a very difficult time getting out of bed early enough to eat breakfast at home and prepare a packed lunch, so I end up eating out WAAAYYYY too much during the work day.  If we can corral this pony, we’d solve a huge portion of our budget failures in one fell swoop.  Not to mention improving our health.  Do you have any tips for reducing daytime food expenses?

Wish us luck!