anyone NOT feeling a fiscal crunch?

Its not 'dome building' it's empire building. Pass the bread, I need to enjoy more circuses.

We're serving healthy Hemp Bread today. [link to www.frenchmeadow.com]

Big Oil and Halliburton appear to be doing ok.

can someone pass the guberment cheese please???

I'm a truck driver and it cost $500 to fill this 18 wheeled beast up. I only get 5.5 mpg driving 60 mph sometimes 6 mpg. Yea it hurts. Remember less than $200 filling up the truck. I remember back in 1999 in Missouri, diesel was only .89 a gallon. Ahh the good ol days!

It always amazes me that an 18 wheeler gets as good a mileage as it gets. My F250 diesel only gets about 16 mgp on a good day, hauling no payload. You get a third that mileage for hauling a huge load of whatever.

Yes, feeling it very hard.

When we bought our house 3 years ago, we had more than enough to pay for it, the basics, and some extras. Now, we are $-900 per month in income, and the gas prices have nearly killed us since my husband has a 58 mile drive to work 1 way, and the rising costs of food, utilities, and even personal basics have us in the hole every month.

My husband refuses to see it; he wont listen to the basic math equations, much less entertain ideas I put forth so that we arent being put further into the hole. Oh well, when we lose it all, I wont say "I told ya so", because I'm going to have to be there to just keep this family together.

You sound like a good wife, 130833.

You wouldn't happen to have some sort of suicide mortage on that house, would you? (ARM 80/20 HELOC neg-am no-doc interest-only etc.) If so, figure on your mortgage going up.

Something I mentioned on one of Polly's threads last week - I added up what she told us about her energy consumption and it looked like it was in the $10,000 per year range. There was a thread over the weekend about electricity bills - someone said they paid over $700 per month.

As an exercise, add up your direct energy bills:

- electricity
- gasoline/diesel
- natural gas/propane/heating oil

for a year. What does it come to?

Then figure what will happen if it triples over the next 3 years, as I expect it to.

I fully expect things to get worse before they get better. Don't wait! Take action now to get your spending under control.

doesn't bother me... i wipe my ass with hundred dollar bills.

I was feeling it a few years back. I have a decent job now, so the crunch is less obvious. I also quit driving, which helped me to quit buying gas. If this crunch affects the internet though, I'll be pissed!!

Elvis has left the building!!!! :elvis:

...Or was it Alan Greenspan?

Thanks Green Man; I try to be a good wife, mother, child and friend.

We have a Contract for Deed, but sadly, our contract is up Sept 28th of this year, and when we tried to refinance (tried through 8 different companies), we were denied because although my husband makes the money, he has no credit score, not even a 0, but marked as X. I am the one with the credit score (have 1 small credit card, with a line of $500), but no income. I am a full time homemaker and homeschool teacher. I've tried to get employment that would allow me to continue with what I do at home, and work to supplement some income into the home, but anything available for my schedule wouldnt even pay for the gas back and forth, much less just the maintanance on the vehicle.

So, our contract holder says we need to "renegotiate", which I have NO clue what he means by that. I am suspecting he is going to up the purchase price of the home; we have stuck $11K into remodeling and bringing it all up to date (including wiring, appliances, etc). We bought the home for $75K, owe $70K on it, and it is worth (according to appraised value) $120K. I cannot afford to pay more for it than already agreed upon, so I guess I will end up just walking away, and not looking back. Hubby refuses to sell it now.



I've figured our utilities (heat/electric) which comes to in the summer months just roughly above $75/month. However in winter our heat bill averages $277/month. Our first winter here, our heat was set on 70 degrees, and we found our avg. Last winter, we kept our heat at 68 degrees, and our avg remained the same. So 2 degrees cooler meant we kept even with our avg of the previous year. I am suspecting to keep our avg this year, we are going to have to turn our temp to about 64-65 degrees.

As for gas, my husband fills up the van 2 times a week, at $40 a shot. We fill the truck 1x every 10-15 days, at $70/shot. I use the truck when need be when hubby has the van at work, or other times when the van just doesnt cut it. It use to cost us about $200 for him to get back and forth to work per month, now we are at over $320/month.



When I was looking into refinancing, I wanted to get enough cash out to turn to an alternative heating system which would take care of heat and hot water. Although a major purchase upfront, I think it would pay for itself in a very short time. But now that is impossible, and I know that we will not be able to continue here, and eventually WILL lose it all. I dont fret over it though, I am ready to walk away the way it is.

I moved to close walking distance of my job 2 years ago. I moved to a place that I could afford to live in even on half my pay. Not feeling any crunch at all.

No, and just landed a higher paying job.

No, and just landed a higher paying job.


your job will be out sourced shortly

Just bought a Toyota Camry Hybrid Today. 40 mpg oughta help out the budget!!!!!

You will soon

Yeah, it sucks.

I cut down every possible way starting around 1999. And small changes do help but it is stressful.

Everything seems to keep going up, staple kinds of things. Now even our city water went up dramatically.

Nothing is certain anymore.

There is something to be said to not being owned by your posessions. Still, it's rough that you are facing the loss of what you've already put into the house.

Your husband is a lucky man, and you can tell him I said so!

I second that OP,,, bravo.

You need a change of mindset tho...nothing is lost at this point. Review your options and do what you have to to keep your house.

At some point, you have to take a stand and make it work. Might as well be now.