Friday, October 24, 2008

Number 101

This is my 101st post. I've blogged my way through Botswana, across the USA, and in Namibia. I've expressed my views on politcal and religious beliefs. I've shared about my battle with weight, my family and the lady who thought I wasn't going to stop at the stop sign. I've had mostly good comments although one person told me I was wrong to feel the way I feel about who should be the next President of the United States of America.

I am very concerned that our nation is quickly becoming Socialist--expecting the government to do everything for us from birth to death. God help us is my prayer.

Credit cards....stop using them unless you can pay it off EVERY month. It took me awhile to learn that lesson but I have found it is an excellent way to live--debt free.

House...don't buy a house that you can't afford to make the monthly payments. That is the cause of the foreclosure problem going on here in the USA.

Live within your means is a good motto to live by.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

When my husband and I bought our house, we bought it based on his income only. My income enabled us to make double house payments and help us save for the future.

Everyone we knew gave us a hard time and criticized our decision to buy a fixer upper that we could afford even in the leanest of times. 7 years later, our house is paid off and we've survived some VERY lean times, including job losses, illness and a serious accident that almost killed my husband. That nest egg that we had worked so hard to save was wiped out in less than 5 months while we lived on our savings and my job to pay our bills. Common sense like yours and Dave Ramsey's is what got us through.

Many of our friends are facing foreclosure because they simply got in over their heads. They don't have emergency funds, they did have nice cars and vacations and more credit card debt than they earned in a year, in some cases. My husband's ex-wife is one of those people. Her idea of fiscal responsibility was transferring her credit card balance to new cards that offered 0% financing, then running up the cards again and refinancing her house, taking a HELOC and relying upon the child support she received for my stepkids to pay it all off. My stepkids are now in their mid-20s and there is no more child support. While I feel for her as she is the mother of my stepkids and her financial crisis affects kids I love dearly, I am also feeling a lot better about the decisions my husband and I made to live below our means. There but for the grace of G-d we could have gone.

Thanks for getting the word out about what is the real problem with our economy. I like reading about your trips and the things you do.