Medical bills nearly destroyed us. We learned to economize.
I cut the family’s hair for years at home. I went to the hairdresser for mine because no one else was comfortable doing mine. Saved us a few hundred a year.
We bought our cars used, took care of them, and drove them until the wheels fell off. Saved us thousands.
We bought our clothes at Good Will, Salvation Army, and thrift stores whenever we could. Our kids got new. Saved us thousands and I always looked like a fashion slate.
We road-tripped across the US. Museums, parks, free or discounted events, city passes to save money, some big splurges thrown in. What we saved in airfare for 5 people we used for Sea World, amusement parks, etc. We packed coolers for breakfast and lunch and only bought dinner. We stayed at nice hotels, but chose hotels on the edge of the City or just outside the City because they were half the price and had free parking. Most offered free breakfast.
We racked up points and used them for the next trip.
We bought jewelry, bikes, guns, and musical instruments at pawn shops for pennies on the dollar.
We cooked at home, but treated the family to restaurants once a month or more for Saturday dinner.
I decorated rooms in a classic style, with timeless decorations, and kept them that way for years.
My husband and I are not collectors (except books), so we didn’t spend wild sums of money on collectables.
We spent good money on quality furniture, linens, drapes, mattresses, and towels. They last.
Installed own tile floors, baseboards, brick patio, wooden deck, painted our rooms and house. My husband was impressed by my precision back-cuts on the table saw. Lots of sweat equity.
Plenty of years, my Christmas present was a new vacuum or something we needed for the house. My husband would get tools or new work boots. The kids had a budget of $100 each from Santa and only bought what they really wanted. If they kept their grades up (they were exceptional students) they could go over. Sometimes they would ask if we could combine Christmas and Birthday to get a bigger item (Xbox or computer).
We were creative.
Despite the struggle, our kids lived amazing lives, went to the opera, ballet, theater, traveled the country, played sports, ate well, dressed well, and had a pretty, comfortable home.
It sounds like a great life. One that your kids will remind you of in years to come while you are playing board games with their spouses.
I enjoyed reading your post.
We were a little late to getting control over our finances. Not sure why, probably because we lived on my pay while our kids were young. When my wife went back to work we kind of went a little bit nutty. Then kids college. Still, we put some into our 401s but were consuming our take home pay at the same rate we were earning it.
Then finally we had that moment of clarity. From then on we went all in, paid off all our debt and mortgage and started saving. Took us 5 long years but the 5 years of austerity changed everything, now austerity has become our normal. Instead of owing banks 100s of 1000s of dollars we have 6 months income in savings and another 2 months in our checking account and continually adding to that and our 401s every month.
Still not where we want to be but way better than 6 years ago when we were in the financial toilet. In summary it wasn’t a change in income rather it was a change in our behavior. I think about 50% of US families don’t have $1000 for an emergency and are over $90K of debt. If the economy stalls and people start really losing their jobs it will be a blood bath. No savings, no income and a lot of debt it will not be a pretty sight.