I feel like a hamster. They run around on those little wheels with all their might and never get anywhere. No matter how much money I make, I’m always living paycheck to paycheck. I was stretched as thin working 75 hours per week as I am working 20 hours per week. (I’m paid hourly.)
I’m fortunate enough to have a job. I recognize that in this economy, that’s a big deal. I’m fortunate enough that this job is flexible and part-time, so that I can go to law school.
I’m known as the queen of cheap. I was able to find an apartment significantly below the going rate and fill it up with roommates so that we could all live with rent ranging from $275-525 per person in an area where $1000 is more the norm. Unfortunately, the living situation became untenable when one of my roommates went off the deep end. I ended up having to move out with little notice, and now I’m in my own apartment.
I followed the advice of most financial gurus who say to have a 3-6 month supply of living expenses saved for emergencies. Well, the apartment situation became an emergency, and it wiped out my savings. I ran up a bit of a credit card bill, too. According to my math, I’ll have that paid off by mid-July.
My job is enough to pay my rent and other living expenses, but it doesn’t even make a dent in my tuition. That’s all financed by student loans. Law school is absurdly expensive, and when I’m done, I’ll have a mortgage on my brain as large as people in many parts of the country have on their houses! Something has to give.
Every dollar I save is a dollar I don’t have to borrow to pay for tuition. Every dollar I don’t have to borrow is about $1.25 that I don’t have to pay back later. (I’ll spare you the math, but I ran it through a loan repayment calculator to get that figure.)
So, welcome to my radical cost-cutting plan. Almost no idea is too far out. (Curb shopping is ok, but I draw the line at dumpster diving. That’s just unsanitary!) Over the next few days, I’ll be outlining my multi-factor plan, and then I’ll be chronicling my successes and failures. I’m going to attack my problem from both ends – I’ll cut costs and increase my income.
I probably won’t blog every day, since I work, go to school, and maintain two other blogs. I’ll try for several posts per week. I don’t know how long this blog will last. Hopefully I won’t need extreme belt-tightening for long.
