Financial crisis. What do I do??

[Fizgig]

It's great that you're making progress.

I think that with all of the "fun" you've had this year, it's really demonstrated how important it is to plan for life's inconveniences. Too often our budgets only consider regular monthly bills, but not those irregular events that can really throw us for a loop.

In the last 1-2 years I've had a hit and run accident total my car, refrigerator break down, and a hurricane cause $8000 of damage to my home that wasn't covered by insurance. Those events weren't fun at all, but because I had stashed money away they just gave me heartburn instead of a heart attack.

I know you're still catching up, but it makes life much easier when you treat contributions to savings like it's just another bill. Set up an automatic transfer with every paycheck and just forget that money exists until you really, really need it.

[Scanner]

Joeysayso,

Don't mind Lovcom. . .just to let you know about his "marital experience". . .he is divorced and went after his kids 50% of the time to avoid paying his ex any child support (my assessment of his motive), dragging them from house to house 50% of the time and advised the forum anyone who didn't do the same must not be a good father (myself and Broken Arrow) and oh, yeah, dont' you know? Kids like living one place 4 days and the other place 3 days. He's a psychologist.

That's his definition of "manning up" - splitting kids down the middle in a King Solomon fashion.

He must have a bug up his ass about his divorce/failed marriage and is choosing to take it out on anyone within reach. You were the closest this week.

Don't accept any marital advice from this chucklehead. If the partnership agreement was she was to handle the finances, then she had a moral responsibility to report to you if you weren't meeting monthly expenses, not just brush it under the rug. I mean, Lovcom's whole moral reasoning is rather childish. . .it's like a teenage girl saying:

"Well, you didn't ask me, Dad, if I banged up the bumper of the car so I am relieved of any responsibility of reporting it to you, right?"

Of course, we don't have her side, but from what was posted, you wife lied by deceit by omission. And no, IMO you are a partnership, not a CEO - employee relationship. Hopefully she's sorry and the two of you can move on with forgiveness.

Good luck. . .$10,000 seems like a lot, and I don't mean to minimize it, but there have been people here $50,000 in debt and were able to retire it with creativity and determination. I think a promissory note of some sort between you as a couple and your father seems in order to let her know the consequences and motivate her to secure a job to pay it off.

[joesaysso]

Just to update as I've been busy with the holidays: the house appears to be saved. The wife's dad sent us 5000 and I was able to tack on a grand of my own. I just called the bank and they confirmed that they recieved and cashed the payment and have now begun to stop the foreclosure process. I might actually get a good night sleep tonight. First in a while. We aren't exactly out of the woods with debt as we still have the credit card to deal with but compared to losing your house, the credit card seems like a lightweight problem. I'm not exactly thrilled that my credit has been ruined but I also appreciate that it isn't permanent provided we stick to the plan and pay more attention.

Snafu, just to clarify a few things. I admittedly don't look under the hood of my car all that often. I go under to check my fluids periodically but I don't really look around when I'm in there. The oil got changed every three to five thousand miles without exception. I take it to Walmart to have it done. the most recent oil change was done about a month or two ago. The battery was the original battery in the car. Meaning it was about 10 years old. Whether the battery had been corroding for a while or just all of the sudden, i couldn't tell you. All I know now is that it is done and now I have to fix it.

The fridge was not unoticed or ignored for three months. Three months was how long it took for the people our home warranty sent out to fix the fridge to actually fix the fridge.

Guilty on the mortgage woes. I blindly let the wife do her thing. Obviously, I've learned a lesson here. Thats the best I can do with that one.

Fizgig, we have been living paycheck to paycheck for a while now. There really wasn't any money to put on the side. We somewhat gambled in that when the kids were old enough to go to school, the wife went back to school full time instead of going to work, with the hopes of finishing her degree so she could get a better job in the long run and makes that much better off. We had numerous conversations where we both stated that we were running out of money and we were going to get burned if something bad happened. We had a good run where nothing bad happened to us for years. We were always able to get by. She was close to finishing her degree so we rode it out with the hopes that she finished before our luck run out. She didn't. It did. We gambled with the present to set up our future and eventully we crapped out. She knows now that she will have to put her degree aside for now and go back to work until we could put some money away.

Scanner: I appreciate the kind words. I didn't let Lovcom bother me too much. Being new to the forum, I didn't want to start a huge war or anything. Plus, I didn't want to play a part in hi-jacking my own thread. I've got more important things to worry about other than lovcom marriage counseling. I did do some digging on past forum topics to learn more about him though and found out that he already had a failed marriage under his belt. After that his words became very hollow.

The wife is sorry for what happened. Nevertheless, I have to protect myself better from now on. So, once I took over the bills, I told her flat out that things were going to change around here and she could either accept them or find the door. To her credit, she offered no resistance and is doing her best to adjust. I am too.

We are both moving on from here. I still need to figure out what the hell to do about the credit card but I feel a lot better today than I did 4 weeks ago. Thanks everybody for all the advice and words of encouragement. I'm glad I found this place.

[minnie1928]

We are both moving on from here. I still need to figure out what the hell to do about the credit card but I feel a lot better today than I did 4 weeks ago. Thanks everybody for all the advice and words of encouragement. I'm glad I found this place.

I'm so glad you came back and posted an update. Many posts like yours go on unanswered, so this was nice to read. It sounds like you are making progress on the financial and marriage fronts. Have a good night's sleep tonight and remember that tomorrow is the beginning of a new year. Let 2009 stay in the past.