Wouldn’t you know it? I used to congratulate myself that I was able to retire on $40K a year. ($39,896 to be exact). After all, I had been living most of my pre-retirement years at $25K to $30K a year. So, you’d think (at least I did) that for me, $40K annually would be pure luxury?
Ladies and gentlemen I am probably going to be one of the first people to finally admit that I can not pay my bills as I used to. Either on time or in full. Don’t get me wrong. I’m doing it BUT I’m getting caught up in all the probable problems people who don’t pay their bills get snarled in. Like interest!
I’ll give you an example. My gas bill for my car (and included in my written budget) was $100 a month. I either spent the hundred dollars on gas for my car or I spent less. Either way, I never went above $100 for gas for two cars. Fast forward to January 2020 and my gas bill is $289, almost triple!
I only have $100 set aside in my budget to pay the gas bill. What to do? I thought of this great solution (or so I imagined) that I would pay the minimum payment before the due date to make sure I wouldn’t be late (thus avoid a late charge) paying my bill and then before the actual due date, I’d hustle to come up with the rest of the money (so I wouldn’t be hit with an interest charge). The bill would have been paid on time, in full and I’d incur no late fee or interest.
WRONG!
The first part worked out OK (the minimum payment, $30 paid January 6th) but the balance ($259.26) missed the deadline (January 18th) by two days (it posted January 20th). So, on a $289.26 bill. I was charged 20% interest and an additional $5.60 is now due on my next bill, in February.
“Houston, you have a problem!”
For the first time in like ever, I got zinged with an interest charge. This is NOT a good sign going forward. Obviously, my idea didn’t work. I think I’m having a problem paying my bills. I’ve re-looked over my written budget again and there really isn’t anything I can cut back on (other than food). No clothes. No travel. No entertainment. No streaming services. No eating out. Grocery supression. Installed a pellet stove to replace our propane heating expense (lowered costs by 50%). Everything looks like it’s in balance on paper, yet in reality it’s not working out. (I’ve since transferred funds over from my savings and got everything back in balance and on time. But this was something I did not want to do.)
What am I missing?
What I’m missing is that America has now become a very expensive place to live in. Anyone at or near my income level is being hit the hardest. According to this recent report (click here) for the news outlet, The National Desk, “continued inflation and record price hikes are hitting Americans hard everywhere, but new polling suggests that lower-income families are more likely to see things get worse before they get better.”
High inflation is eating up the budgets of American households. According to the new Gallup poll, 45% of households said they experience either severe or moderate hardship as a result of recent price hikes.
“It’s really kind of frightening because if this continues, it’s going to be really bad news.”
I haven’t ordered anything from Amazon in over two months! Instead, I go twice monthly to a heavily discounted odd lot chain store and buy whatever I need there instead. In other words, my whole life has changed and it’s just barely working out. At least I’ll admit it. How many people will NOT admit they are having financial difficulties? Blame some news outlets also because even The NY Times is in denial. Our financial troubles will not simply go away. They’re here to stay..
FYI: Moving, getting a job nor an EV will solve any current problem of mine right now. Till then, I’ll have to keep coming up with creative ideas and solutions.
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Ciphers From Cindi 
Hi Cindi, I can’t imagine driving my Subaru that many miles in a month to spend $269 on gasoline, how much of this is tolls? In my normal monthly routine for babysitting and grandkids sports, I drive 1200- 1500 miles and stop three to four times to fill, maximum 50 gallons! With rewards applied to my charges it’s below $150. Yes this is $50 more then 2020 and the first three months of 2021. In September this will be cut in half. Perhaps if you curb the frequency of driving for food bargains and use what you have already in your stockpiles you can have a break from high credit card bills for gas and maybe cut your current food expenditure. IMHO, FOMO on bargains on groceries is Creating a viscous cycle and is very time consuming. I did my January can-can replenish and my baking ingredients during holiday sales and the next big replenish will be at Easter time. ShopRite will have lasagna ingredients on sale, bake goods ingredients , and great meat sales. Aldi’s will have bargains, too. Over my lifetime my experience is: You can always find sales to create cheaper meals.
In the terrible storm last weekend I had both of my first floor heating zones stop working over Saturday night -found out Sunday morning when I got up, and my bedroom zone- upstairs failed over Sunday night too. None of the Angi contractors could come out till Tuesday or Wednesday because they were all booked with no heat appointments. My son found a highly rated plumber with emergency service on Yelp. Their diagnosis technician was out in 45 minutes and a team was here in two hours. My 2007 furnace needed four parts and 2.5 hours of labor and $948 later I had heat. I charged it to get 2.65% back in rewards and 6 month extension on the warranty and this will come out of my maintenance account when the bill comes in. My bones were chilled so I had knee pain for two days. Sincerely, Lara
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Lara, it’s my husband’s pick up truck that’s the gas guzzler. And it takes premium gas. Not regular. UGH! We do have a fuel efficient car (36 to 40 MPG) which I scream to Nick he needs to use more. We do most of our shopping in Kingston. It’s around 12 miles from our home, so that’s 24 miles round trip which is almost a gallon of gas. We can’t go shopping here locally because I live in a rich community and all the prices are adjusted accordingly. I’m not a millionaire. I just pretend to live like one. LOL. The sad part is that they closed the Goodwill in Kingston and if I wanted to shop at one I’d have to drive 45 miles away to the next location. Not doing it anymore. Oh well. That’s been a very big loss.
Sorry to hear about your heat. You’re so lucky to have a son nearby. We just switched to another charge card that has larger rewards. It’s always something, right? Stay warm! Literally. PS: our pellet stove is working out great. Inside temps hit between 70 and 72. We never had it so warm. It’s amazing!
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My son is 140 miles away and my daughter 45 miles away.. so your Close by store doesn’t have the great weekly sales
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Lara, one of the drawbacks of living in a wealthy neighborhood is that shopping locally is totally out of the question. Even a cup of coffee in our local cafe’ would set me back $8. They’re ridiculous. Food shopping is preposterous. A gallon of milk is $6. It’s best for us to get in the car, pay a $1.45 round trip toll and go over to either Kingston or Poughkeepsie and get our essentials filled there. Much more reasonable and down-to-earth prices. My neighborhood didn’t start off to be rich when we settled here 21 years ago. It was a quiet town till some celebrity moved in and starting telling the world, on talk shows like Jimmy Kimmel where he and his wife lived. UGH! It was an explosion. Celebs walk these streets now (thus raising ALL the prices) all day and night long. We very rarely, if ever, come into town any more. Last time we did we got a parking ticket! Naturally I fought it and won but never again. A celeb would have just paid it and that’s what the local town supervisor knows. It’s a money haven for them. A money trap for us.
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The plumber put in a high efficiency circulating motor and said I should see some savings. He’s seen some clients have 25% savings . I would love that!
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Hold on to the 36-40 mpg car. Oil is over $92 a barrel! Gas is heading up,
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Lara, I heard that once it reaches $100 per barrel, all hell is going to break out! Ugh. That’s about all I can say. Yup, we’re holding on tight to our fuel efficient vehicle.
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Did you get a card with a reward for spending a certain amount in three months? Or zero interest? Or no annual fee?
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I already have several charge cards with higher reward programs. We’re switching over to using them rather than the one currently. The current one used to pay 5% rewards. Then it dropped down to 3%. Now, it’s paying 1%. No thanks. Plus they upped the reward limit. We used to get gift cards at $10. Now, it’s $25 which is a lot harder to do at the rate of 1% rewards. Everything changes so rapidly. Who can keep up??
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