Finances

Wow! I feel amazing right now. Justin and I are fortunate to have such wise people in our lives. People with far more life experience than us, that have given us such great advice to carry with us for a lifetime. Here lately vehicles have been the biggest stressor in our home. We currently have two vehicle notes. One for our Mazda the other for Justin's motorcycle. We wanted to trade in our Mazda and sell the motorcycle just to acquire EVEN more debt on two new vehicles... Doesn't really make sense right? If we were to stick with the two vehicles we have, they would be paid off in the next year and a half. People get so caught up in the "we want things now" they neglect to make better decisions to set themselves up for success with their financial futures. This was a piece of knowledge given to me this morning. It really dawned on me... WOW that is so true. Justin and I are still fairly young, we have a chance to set our family up for success, if we go about our finances correctly. I also took into consideration that our country's economy is still  not in good shape. Jobs are still scarce, especially for our military. They are looking for reasons to kick people out of the military. We may not be in that situation right now, but we need to be prepared for anything. Do we really want to have to stress about car payments if Justin were unable to stay enlisted? If we close the chapter on Army life sooner than expected, I'd like to leave with NO DEBT. That means cars, credit cards, etc. I wanted to make a virtual list of some of the benefits we'd have with sticking with our new plan.

1. Motorcycles are CHEAP on gas. (Definitely saving money here) We wouldn't have to worry about Justin not being able to afford to drive his motorcycle at any given day of the year.
2. We owe less than 12,000 on our loans combined.
3. We know the Mazda is a reliable car that fits every member of our family
4. Each vehicle has great mileage
5. As said before, these vehicles will be paid off in the next 1.5 years. 
6. the Mazda is great with gas as well.

AND when we are on the new hunt for a newer vehicle, rather than starting up a new car loan, we can SAVE the money that we would be spending on a car payment until we have enough to cash out on a car ourselves. By this time we will have already established even better credit lines for our future. This decision feels so good and leaves me smiling!