After a few weeks of not recording all our expenses, I finally caught up again this weekend. And it stinks! I am very depressed about it all. With my forced job change, our income is not enough to cover our expenses. I thought we were keeping things under pretty tight control; instead, We've managed to spend all the extra money we came up with earlier in the month from some unusual windfalls. What are we going to do the rest of the months?!
I don't want to reveal too much of our personal details, but many of our expenses are farm-related, and it's not like we can really plan those. I mean, to some extent, we can average the expenses that we've had in the past, but with less income now, we can't set aside the money because we don't have it to set aside! The farm does not pay for itself in any way, shape or form. When things break down, they need to be fixed. DH isn't able to do a lot of what needs to be done, so we have employees hired. I think we need major adjustments but I don't think DH is ready to commit to those. He sort of jokingly asked today, "so what do you want to do, sell everything and start over and buy a house on the lake?" "Yes!!! I would love that. It would get us out of this money pit that we're in." But, it was just that - a joke to him. He wasn't serious. I am. I want to sell everything and reorganize our life to make it more jointly enjoyable, less stressful, and financially workable. And I don't care if it's by a lake or not.
I may try to bring this up again another time, but it's so tricky to do that. DH reads so much more into things like that than he should. He says things like "you hate it here" and "you're just sick of me". No, and no, but I am sick of all the stress that we have currently. He is too, but he wants to figure out something that will bring in more steady income from the farm. That would be great, but it requires spending money to make money and we don't have it to spend!
If you made it this far, thanks for reading. This is one of my PMS-induced mood swings, I'm sure. As I reread the last paragraph, it's full of "buts", which will just come across as excuses. Maybe they are. Tomorrow, I'll be back at work, and will be able to push these blues back somewhere beneath the surface. We'll find a way to survive the finances, because something will sell and we have some money saved back. My problem is that I don't want to rely on those things to get thru each month.
This is part of the reason I never updated my goals on the sidebar. What would they say? #1 - work some magic. #2 - get old job back. #3 - pray. So, waaaahhh, I feel better actually after writing all this down. I still don't know exactly what we're going to do about it. We did, however, take one action step today, and filled out info on LendingTree to see if we can refinance our mortgage. That's a teeny amount of progress, I suppose.
Down in the dumps
April 19th, 2009 at 11:50 pm
April 20th, 2009 at 12:36 am 1240187812
April 20th, 2009 at 01:09 am 1240189785
April 20th, 2009 at 04:16 am 1240200985
April 20th, 2009 at 04:42 am 1240202575
April 20th, 2009 at 06:33 am 1240209228
I do all the bills and handle all the money, but when I feel too overwhelmed, I call DH in and just say "I need help." And usually, he'll rub my shoulders and say "we'll sell this" or "the insurance check for the ruined wheat should come in by this day" or something. And we'll get through it.
But, if the farm really isn't paying for itself and will not ever, then really, your husband has a very expensive hobby that you are trying to support. Either he needs to do custom work for someone else to bring some money in or he needs to get an off the farm job. Or you need to sell out.
Farms can be profitable, so you guys need to figure out why it isn't. Are the crops sucking out all the profit, or the animals? For us, the cows make us money and the custom work, but the crops haven't yet. It may mean going in a different direction, like doing custom work, growing a different crop, or specializing in organic or something...if you are close to a city, that could pay off.
This sentence sticks out: "DH isn't able to do a lot of what needs to be done, so we have employees hired." Can he not do it because of a disability, or because he lacks a skill? If he lacks a skill, he needs to learn that skill. I don't know what to do about it if he has a disability.
April 20th, 2009 at 07:35 pm 1240256133
I work full time outside the home, help with the books (no pay for that job) and just started a direct sales business myself (which I will NOT run in the red). We truly believe that his business will pay for itself; some bad business decisions in the early years was the problem we are still dealing with now (the newbie business owner was taken advantage of). I'm doing all I can to keep us current with our bills. The business bills? Well, we're trying...dh will call me at work every so often and say "so and so company called - they're looking for money. Do we owe them?" and I reply "who don't we owe?" We pay who we can before they shut us off, and keep payroll flowing so our people show up for work. Little by little, debts are being paid off at home and at the business. But it's still stressful and a struggle.
Hopefully the businesses (his and mine) will pick up and we'll do better. Until then, I've mastered the art of juggling! LOL