Money Monday!



We were finally able to sit down and go through the December budget.  It wasn't too bad at all.

We were able to save 100% on the old housing plan, and 73% on the new savings goal.

However, we are getting rid of the old and the new goals.

Confused?  Me, too!

Tony and I have been doing a lot of praying, pondering, and talking (what's a p-word for talking?  hmm) about how we want to use our income going forward.

I've never been overly comfortable with our savings plan.  Although I am beyond thankful for the money, it seems too much to just save for us.  On the other hand, I don't want to be in a position of purchasing a home and accumulating mortgage debt when we return to the States.

A conundrum.

We went accountant on the issue!

We decided to get online and look at Coldwell Banker to see how home prices looked in our most-likely return location.  It was eye-opening.  The house bubble must not have burst too severely there!  We decided on an amount that we feel will provide us a reasonable house that meets our needs.  We have currently saved around 50% of that number.  We then figured out the likely number of months remaining here and divided the remaining amount of money between those months.  Tony also receives bonuses so we tried to factor those in to the mix.  Then, we did the hokey pokey and turned ourselves around.

Poof.

We had our savings number which is slightly higher (15%) than the original number, but considerably lower than our top goal.  (I know this is hard to follow, but Tony won't let me just give you the actual numbers.  Mr. Private, ya know!) 

Our prayer is that all the rest will be given away. And, for all I know, some of the goal will be given, too!   This is not tithe (that's for another post), but giving as the Lord leads us to do.  The Christmas give was so amazing for us that we all look forward to an entire year devoted to giving!

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