Living a Debt Free Life: Let Me Envision What That Will Look Like For My Family

Yesterday hubby and I were going over and talking about our finances. We did great this week with not spending money on stupid crap. Not like last week. And we also reached our first milestone of putting $1000 into an emergency fund. Now that was with the help of our tax return but who cares it is still there. Also, I am happy to report that we sent $1500 to pay off our credit card. We still have a consolidation, home equity, and car loan on the table. But all in due time. It feels good to have at least one accomplishment. Well actually two.

So as we told our money where to go and talked more about our finances I started to envision a debt free life. And to me it looked good. So then hubby and I started to talk about what a debt free life would look like for our family.

Let me just back up a second though. During that conversation we also talked about why we even wanted to become debt free. We both have really great jobs that are family friendly and pay really well. We have never struggled to pay bills, food, or provide for our children. We have always had some "play" money but not a huge amount. But enough were we never felt deprived. Honestly, I felt we were just living the life of middle America. We had the "normal" bills that everyone else had.

So why would we want to go debt free?

Because, right now in this moment in time, if one of us lost our jobs we would be totally screwed! We have created a life way to dependent on our two incomes. That needs to change.

Now let me tell you now what a debt free life looks like for hubby and I:

• An emergency fund of at least $18,000. I feel this is really important because hubby and I have been blindsided many times by emergencies that we were not prepared for. For example, last summer we had bats in our house and ended up having to get an exterminator that cost us $1600 we did not have. And of course there is always the car maintenance and anything else life threw our way last year and will continue to throw our way. I want to be prepared. Because guess what? Emergencies are going to happen that is something we can count on.

• Our checking account always having money to draw from. We are thinking at least $5000 in there at all time. So if we need stuff like a new lawn mower, snow blower, bed for the girls, clothes, etc we are not sitting there empty handed because we have no money to purchase it. We don't live a frivolous life and don't plan on doing so anytime soon or ever but it would be nice to have the actual cash for when we do need or want to purchase something.

• Being able to fully fund our girls college educations with cash. This is a huge one for us. Our kids WILL NOT take out student loans. Student loans are evil and I plan on in later posts telling you why I think so. And why I think NO ONE should ever take out students loans.

• Not being chained to our jobs. As I have said both of us have great jobs that we went to school for and work really hard to get. But...we would like the option to leave them should either of us want to. Or if one of us lost our jobs we don't want that sending us into a financial crisis.

I am sure I could go on as I think more about it. But these are the four main reasons for us going debt free. I will talk more about all of them in later posts.

Now your turn! What would living a debt free life look like for your family? And if you are already then tell us about it. I love to be inspired!!