Financial Goals

There is an update to this post that you can find here. Enjoy!

So after my post on Money Saving Mom, some people commented (and just flat out asked me) what our financial goals are. They asked a lot of questions, but this was by far the most popular.

I think some of the readers are motivated by knowing someone else's financial goals, and the rest are just a bit nosey. :) Whatever it is, I think sharing our goals helps us be more accountable.

A little bit about us

:: Because we were taught about money management at an early age, neither my husband nor I have (or had) any debt. We give a tremendous amount of thanks to our parents for teaching us money management!

:: We don't have any kids so our emergency fund can be lower than what you would think-- It's at $10,000 right now. That's about 3 months of living expenses. Our rent is almost $3,000 a month in case you're wondering! Even though our jobs are quite secure, we still need to keep at least 3 months worth of expenses in a money market account so I can sleep at night.

:: I think in the future we'd like to grow that to a full year's worth of expenses ($40,000), but because we don't have kids I don't think it's necessary right now. Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comment section below-- I'm sure someone disagrees with me!

:: Please remember we are young! I know we cannot use this "excuse" much longer, but we are not in our 40s and "ignorant" about our money. I'm 22 and my husband is 24. We don't know much, but we know not to spend money we don't have.

:: We use credit cards. Both my husband and I have our own credit cards we use for expenses (bills, groceries, random Dairy Queen nights, etc). We rarely use our debit card because of the rewards we get with a credit card. My husband actually has a special credit card through our bank for gas. It's his longest standing card so we'll never get rid of it and it gives extra cash back for gas. I also have a few store credit cards that give a % off a purchase. I love Dave Ramsey, but because we don't have debt we don't follow him to a tee.

Now that you know about us, some of our goals include: 

:: Continue putting my entire salary (blogging included) into our savings. This money is our "house fund". Because the housing market never really crashed here, homes are expensive. It will be many years before I will even consider looking at a house! I would give my left arm (not really) if we could pay 100% cash for a home, but I just don't think it's possible here in DC.

:: Set up my retirement fund. My husband has a Roth IRA from his job, but I do not.

:: Continue "living" off my husband's salary. We made it our goal to just live off my husband's salary and save mine. So far, so good!

:: Check into pet insurance. It's about $80 a month. It's something that I'd like to look into. If my husband is reading this he's going to freak out-- sorry, honey!

:: Get my husband more involved in our finances. He is fine being completely out of the loop, but I'd like him to be more aware. We have weekly "money meet ups", but I'd love for him to get into investing, stocks, I don't know-- something! (BTW I will definitely post about our money meet ups soon!)

:: Figure out what we're doing. This sounds too broad. We are young. We won't be young forever, though. We need a plan. Do we want a vacation fund? Don't we want a new car eventually? (My husband and I dream of an Escalade).

While I know this isn't exactly what the readers were hoping for, these are some of my family's financial goals.

Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comment section below!

Please check out my latest update to our financial goals here!