Friday, May 28, 2010

Windfalls

A few weeks ago I was watching Suze with the hubs. She was talking about windfalls and what you should do if you find yourself with some extra gifted money. I remember looking at my husband and saying, "man, I wish we'd get a windfall."

Fast forward to this morning. My husband comes home from work and says, "would you like some money?" To which I laugh and say, "it's not your pay week." He then hands me his first ever bonus check. Even after grimmacing over how much Uncle Sam got from our bonus, I was excited because the money will put us back on track for debt payoff since I screwed up the budget earlier in the month.

As I drove to work, I was thinking back to what Suze had said in her segment about windfalls. She asked one caller, "What would make you feel powerful?" As I asked myself this question in the car, the only thing that came to mind was paying off my debt. (I would truly feel powerful is my house was paid in full, but since that will take a good ten years, I think I should stick to my student loan debt.)

I was prepared to discuss and defend my opinion on how the windfall should be spent when I got home from work. I hadn't mentioned Suze to my husband at all, but when I brought up the bonus, my husband shouted "WINDFALL!" He SO gets me. We discussed our options and decided that we will send the majority of the money to debt repayment while saving $16 for my husband to get a haircut (he really is starting to sound and look like a Wookie).

With the bonus check and my previous payments, I managed to send $3340 to Sallie Mae this month leaving me to hover dangerously close to the $20,000 mark. In just a short month, I will owe under $20k. I thought it would take me years to get to this point, and now I will get to see it in thirty days. Bring. It. On.

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