Trent details his story about “Financial Armageddon”, and how he is working to overcome it and take control of his financial life.  His story resonated with me and I was drawn in.  I have read parts of his site many, many times, and am currently working through his 31 Days to fix your finances series.  This is one of his series that I have read and read multiple times, and have worked partially through it a few times.  I am doing it now, but don’t intend to take 31 days to do it.  He strongly recommends that you do indeed take the time, and he is the master, but I have been giving it alot of thought lately, and am ready to go.

  I have downloaded a few budget spreadsheets from different sites, and will post up the details of the one I finally decide on.  I figure I will take advantage of the personal finance blogosphere and not reinvent the wheel, at least in the begining.  Trent provides great advice on lots of different things, that can help reduce expenses and generally get your act together.  He also provides links to other great bloggers that provide valuable lessons and tools to help get things straight.  As time goes on I will discuss more and more of these tools and people, but for now I have to get busy making the budget.

Side note

  As I am writing this post, my wife walks by me and starts laughing.  “You have been talking about doing a budget for months.  I have been tracking our money and paying our bills and holding down the finances for a long time and you have to admit I have been doing a good job”.  And she is absolutely right.  She has been doing all the finances and making the decisions and I have been talking about doing a budget for months.  We then had the first of what will be many talks about our plans to be debt free (minus or mortgage) in the next four years, when I retire from the military.  It’s time now to roll up the sleeves and get down and dirty with this budget.

Anonymity

  First thing to note is that I am trying to write without revealing my name.  Some of you who may eventually check out what has happened with the site (guys who were originally writing on here when I first opened the website) know who I am, and I ask you not to reveal my identity.  The reasons are simple.  I am in the military.  I love the military for the most part, but I do have some complaints and some rather strong political opinions and observations.  In the military you are allowed to have an opinion and even voice your opinion, but it must be clear that you are expressing your own opinion and not making a statement that can be percieved as an official statement or stance.  The nature of the internet is that random readers will often criticize your writing, and make the assumption that what you are writing is fact and/or official.  The easiest way to avoid this besides throwing up a disclaimer that what you are reading is my opinion, is to write anonymously.

  Another reason is that I have made alot of mistakes in my life, especially in the realm of finance, and I am working hard to correct these decisions, and am sharing my experiences as tools to help you prevent these same mistakes, and even to correct them, I still feel shame and embarassment over my decisions and actions.  I am not quite ready to “come out of the closet” for everyone to know who I am, and what an idiot I have been.

Background

  I am a happily married 35 year old, semi-intelligent, ruggedly handsome and super sexy father of two.  My third child is on the way and I am stoked about it.  I proudly serve in the military, and have only a few years until I retire from service and move on to something else.  I am in my senior year of earning my Bachelor’s Degree, mostly paid for by the military.  My lovely wife and children are the center of my world.  I coach my son’s soccer team at the local YMCA, when soccer is in season, otherwise I am an active parent for my son’s team whatever sport season the local Y has going on. I have transferred my Montgomery G.I. Bill benefit to my wife, so that she can pursue her degree as well.

  I grew up well and did pretty good in high school.  I could have done much better, but fell into the typical teenage trap of hanging out, wasting time, and generally not applying myself to the best of my abilities.  My parents were divorced, and I spent the school year with my father, and the summers with my mother.  Both are good people, who raised me well and taught me the values of hardwork.  My dad was a pretty typical man of the times, and had basic knowledge and skills to do almost any type of minor repair himself, skills and traits he tried to teach me all the time, but I wasn’t interested.  My mother was the same way in dometic issues, but again I wasn’t interested in learning.  The real point I am trying to make is that like most of you, I am a pure consumer, and it is all my own fault.

Today

  I am happily married, and trying to raise my own children as well as my parents raised me.  The economic crisis the country is facing has impacted everyone, us included.  I see my “buying power” and financial stability crumbling as the dollar devalues and wages stay the same.  I watch monthly as my excess money at the end of every pay period shrinks, and the items I own start to wear out and break.  I have decided it is time to take control of my life away from debt and consumerism, and to pay off my bills, and become self sufficient.

  As the price of day care increases, the ability of my wife to take an entry level job at lower wages has disappeared.  It actually costs more to pay for child care, than she can earn right now, making the smartest decision for her to be a stay at home mom.  One of our long term plans and solutions is for her to work on her degree, while being a Domestic Executive Manager, so that as the children begin school, she can enter the work place into a career in a few years, when I have retired from the military and settled into a location.

 What I am not

  I am not better than anyone else.  I don’t think I am better than anyone out there.  I am smarter than most, and sexier than most, but I have my own character flaws, make stupid decisions, and have to correct them.  I AM DETERMINED, however.  I am going to apply myself and learn about lots of things.  I am going to break free from constantly consuming, and become self sufficient.  I am going to drag my family kicking and screaming along with me, and teach them the skills I develop along the way.  I am going to share with you what I am doing, what I am learning, and share with you the pains and joys of this journey.

  Everything I have read to this point about blogging says you have to have a niche, and stick to it.  Become an expert in a particular area and share that with your readers so that you can maintain regular readership.  I am all over the place though.  I guess my niche is going to be me.  I hope that you come here over and over again and find value in what I have to offer.  Afterall we have somethings in common, we are father, husband, student, military, coach, etc…

Lot’s of things have happened in the past couple of weeks, and I always give myself an excuse not to do what I set out to do.  In the last few days, soccer season has ended for my two boys.  I was coach of the team for my oldest.  Me and the Mrs. also found out we are expecting our third!  Yay!  Work, has also been hectic.  My wife has hit mid-terms in her college classes.  As you can see we have been really, really busy.  This website has been neglected, the wife’s website has been neglected, the house is a disaster, and I think the dog is pissed.  These things happen though and so its time to make adjustments in the daily routine, and renew our commitments.  I will spend some time going over my list of commitments and ensure that I still have the time and means to accomplish what the priorities are.  If I find that I am over committed, I will take the steps to eliminate what is not important.  I will keep the commitment to this website though.  I am spending the money to have it, so I will use it.  Be prepared for a rush of smaller, focused postings, as I have at least been keeping a list of the things I want to write about.

The site started out as a WordPress powered site, with some buddies of mine, to provide some information, some entertainment, and provide a soapbox to get our message out.  After we all started moving around the country and doing different things with our lives, the site was not maintained and some less than clever Turkish hackers used a documented security hole in an old version of WP that I had not updated for a long time, and “HACKED” my site.  When I got around to taking it down, I installed Drupal, and was determined to learn that incredible system, but have had no real time between school and work.

A couple weeks ago I received my Credit Card Statement with a rather large unknown charge, and upon investigation I realized that my domain and web account auto-renewed.  I determined that this time I was going to get that Drupal site up and working.  I worked on it over the last couple of weeks only to realize that I wanted too much for what my skills allowed me to do, and that much of it may be overkill for a fledgling website anyhow.  Finally today I reinstalled WordPress and a couple of extensions and themes and I am setting to work.  I will make this website work this time around.  It will take dedication and effort from me, but I really do enjoy working with it.  I am just hard pressed to find the time.