Succeeding Financially

**staceyy** · 10-06-2005, 08:39 PM

What has helped you succeed the most financially and what has held you back the most? What do you need to master?

I attribute owning my own home, my 401K, change jar and mastering couponing to helping me the most financially.

Credit card debt has held me back the most as well as not having mastered driving and sales and marketing as I am a great designer and inventor but selling is just not my forte. My fear of selling has also prevented me from attempting to master Ebay. I am also thinking of taking on more "do it yourself" type projects. I've found www.thriftyfun.com has a lot of good "do it yourself" directions.

**Shell** · 10-06-2005, 09:10 PM

The Tightwad Gazette is what first opened my eyes!

Although I would not go as far as her, it taught me lots of tricks & taught me a new way to look at money.

By practising some of her ideas I learned to pay off all my credit cards. Once my car & credit cars were all paid off I had a lot more money. With that extra money I now had I save it!

**Telephus44** · 10-06-2005, 11:05 PM

I would say what has helped me suceed most financially is planning. I am very involved in preparing our taxes, creating our budget, figuring out where our excess money should go (401Ks, Roth IRA, Savings, investments) and constantly re-examining our financial plan has helped me the most. Generally, just not being afraid of money management or the fear that if your not a financial planner, then you're not qualified to make your own financial decisions - because its not rocket science, it just involves a little discipline and education.

Also on the plus side for me is frugality, the strong financial sense I got from my father, and the love of couponing and bargain hunting.

Working against me has been primarily my lack of negotiating skills - when asking for a raise, or a discount on an item, etc. I either don't think of it or else am too shy to come out and ask for it.

**ecgsmama** · 10-07-2005, 08:34 AM

My dh and I's education, work ethic, common sense, and the lack of needing the "latest" anything have helped us the most financially. My refusal to pay interest on my credit cards and my love of yard saling also have helped.

I can't pinpoint where it came from (I think maybe my grandparents or my mom), but I have always been very sensible with my money. I've always lived below my means.

What do I have against me? Formula and disposable diapers. BUT in exchange, I have three beautiful, happy, and very lovable boys!

**sanderson76** · 10-07-2005, 08:37 AM

I would say planning and learning to save and look for bargains have really helped us financially.

One thing other than credit card debit would be the money we spend on the kids that really makes it hard to save some weeks. Since they are older it seems like every week we have to pay something out. It really runs into money with extra activities but that's what we are here for.

Honestly though, I wouldnt' want it any other way.

**Mamaw** · 10-07-2005, 08:42 AM

What is helping me to learn now to succeed is frugal books such as tightwad gazette and Dave Ramsey. Websites such as the village and an awareness of just how much I am wasting on interest and debt

What is hurting me is my desire to buy for other people. Read..children and grandchildren as well as hubby! Also my lack of follow through and sometimes laziness. It sure is easy to just go out to eat instead of cooking. LOL I also always want to give the people I love everything they even remotely want. I need to work on giving of myself, my time, talents and love instead of material possessions

**canadian gardener** · 10-07-2005, 01:37 PM

moving too often (work), selling low and buying high in every place but one and credit card debt are the worst for us. Line of credit was a terrible thing back when we were very young.

BUT what has worked?

learning to buy used cars (gently used, 2 yr old with warranty) for CASH! (better bargaining position PLUS you don't owe a cent) and

being a one car, not a two car family.

Oh and watching friends sink under the weight of the hidden costs of car leasing --I will NEVER EVER LEASE a car. It's a one way ticket to poverty.

Next good things:
Buying a house near work, dr, shops etc. LESS GASOLINE! amazing how that adds up, week after week, year after year!

Using mortgage brokers with the last 4 or 5 houses, and saving big time on the interest rates. They shop the banks for us, and get the best deals. Well worth it.

Making sure that the mortgage has prepayment clauses built in to allow us to put money on the principal alone over and above our biweekly payment.

Biweekly payments to the mortgage add up to almost 5 or 6 years off the mortgage compared to monthly payments. You chew away at the principal faster so you pay less in interest over the life of the loan.

Buying that house in a good neighborhood but a much smaller house! Less taxes, insurance, heating and electric costs! More savings that just keep adding up.

Double set back electronic programmable thermostats and running the furnace fan 24/7-- pays for itself in 9 months usually, and after that it's gravy!

Menu planning, price book, pantry principles and good home cooking. Whatever works to stay out of stores. The more times you go in, the more you spend. I do a biweekly pay day shopping for a menu I plan for a 2 week payperiod.

Stay out of the malls as much as possible (save gas, save money). Know what you need, have a list in your purse so when you do go, you spot the bargains for your NEEDS not some whim. Knowing that you need to replace your bras, means saying no to the cute purse on sale.

Being willing to do some strange and crazy stuff that makes perfect sense really, but goes against the consumer throwaway mentality like cloth sani pads (cloth diapers when kids were little) and cutting my own hair.

Learning to entertain myself cheaply-- classical music and jazz on the radio, books, parks, having fun with the kids.

Learning to diy things: sewing and knitting, gardening, learning to paint, repair the house, and basically do a lot of diy stuff. Car repairs and maintenance.

**forestdale** · 10-07-2005, 03:30 PM

We are debt-free so that helps us a lot now. Discovering this website and applying what I've learned here helps on a day-to-day basis. I guess what helped me the most overall was changing my attitude to money.

In the past we were held back by that attitude. We spent like there was no tomorrow. When tomorrow dawned we had to change.

**peanut** · 10-07-2005, 06:46 PM

What has helped us the most financially is to not carry a balance on our credit cards. Also finding frugality about 7 years ago. It made a huge difference in our lifestyle.

What has held us back has been lack of negotiating skill. Dh and I don't like to barter or dicker over the price of things.

**alabamagirl** · 10-07-2005, 07:05 PM

Great post!

Most helpful - buying a house in our means and paying it off instead of buying bigger, newer homes.

Obstacles - eating out, DH's mid-life crisis sports car, youngest son can be a spendthrift.

**ironmaiden** · 10-08-2005, 09:23 AM

Hmmm... having really good jobs, hopefully I'll get to go back to mine part-time.

The only debts I've ever had were my student loan, my first car and the house. All will be paid off ahead of schedule. I paid off the car and student loan when I was single. It was important to me to come into our marriage debt free.

Buying a house big enough for us to have a family, but cheap enough that we could afford on one salary. By not upgrading the size of our house like all our neighbors have done, we probably saved a good $200,000. Not adding on to our house. Our mortgage will be paid off in under 20 years as opposed to our neighbors who refinance taking out money and restarting those 30 year loans or buy bigger houses and will probably still have a mortgage when they retire.

By only having 2 kids. The third kid caused most of our neighbors to need a new car - SUV and minivans plus decide that they needed a new house.

Start investing when I was in my 20's.

Always lived below our means.

We both had depression era parents. To buy something you couldn't pay for in cash (outside of a house) was unheard of.

**Mom23boys** · 10-09-2005, 01:40 PM

I would say what has helped us the most is having a plan, using it and sticking to it! That includes budgeting and menu!

What has held us back is debt. I want and plan to be debt free!

**PrairieRose** · 10-09-2005, 02:14 PM

I would say what helped us the most was learning to snowball debt payments and get out from under what seemed to be a *normal* amount of debt. We still have some bus. real estate debt but we're gaining on that one as well and look forward to being debt free as soon as possible. Being almost debt free has freed up so much money that we were paying in interest that it has allowed us to save money for emergencies and manage our income much easier.