Alright, posting my first case study. I'm 27, she's 26. I'm going to post income, bills, and "other bills" - bills being monthly set amounts, other bills are a bit more interchangeable.
About us - Married with a 1 year old. I work in the insurance industry as an agent, so while I have a base income, it does flucuate with commission checks. Also, just pointing this out now, budgeting fuel for us is tough, because I can be on the road quite a bit, but I do get reimbursed at a certain set amount per mile I travel for work.
My wife is in the health care field, just passed her boards, and if they told her right, her income should take a 75% hike, which is the number I'm using for her income.
My employer provides my health insurance for $20 a month - we moved dw and daughter to her policy, which is $260 a month (instead of $578 for the three of us on mine)
I file 0 withholdings, she files for 2, if I remember right. She has a state funded pension, which is awesome to have, but she can't put more into the pension than the amount decided by the state each year.
Income
DW $1,600.00
ME $2,300.00
Total $3,900.00
Bills - Monthly payments
Mortgage $650.00
Student Loans $339.00
Daycare $500.00
Alliant $150.00
Car Insurance $90.69
Life Insurance $83.00
Cell phone $110.00
Internet $45.00 - only provider besides satellite internet
Furniture $100.00 - 0% interest til July of 2016
Hospital $50.00 - paying on bills from child birth
Netflix $7.99
Hulu $7.99
Amazon Prime $8.25
Total $2,141.92
Other Bills
DD (Dear dog) $50.00
Groceries $300.00
Gas $300.00
Entertainment $100.00
Total $750.00
Income Total $3,900.00
Bill Total $2,891.92
Difference $1,008.08
My 401k's
Old job: $30,371.87
New job: $4,105.62 - I contribute 6%, company contributes 3%
Wife's IRA (403b rollover): $1,669.64 - she worked this job for a year before getting into a medical field 2 year schooling program, to obtain the degree she has now
Wife's pension - No idea, I don't have the log ons to it - but it's pretty low, as she's only been in her new roll 3 months. I think she puts in about 6%, state contributes 9%
Debts Owed
Furniture - $1,182.43 - Finished our basement, wanted furniture, became a spendy pants. Dumb.
Credit card 1 - $2,534.31
Credit card 2 - $761.14
Total: $4,477.88
Student Loans: $48,260.96 - Word to the wise, don't go to a for-profit school to complete your bachelor's degree.
Yup, terrible - face punch time! My wife had our child at the beginning of her 2nd year of college, so we were trying to scrap by with one income, and racked up some debt. There is also a set of tires there were unplanned (poor planning on my part, I'm smart enough to know that she needed tires, but it wasn't safe for her to keep driving on the ones she had, so that's that).
Assets
Two paid off cars, combined worth of $25k
House - we owe 59k on, bought for $83k. We did a bunch of work to the place, only paid for a bit of HVAC labor for new AC duct work in the basement. Had our realtor come and look at the house, said she'd list it for $125k-$130k. So, we have quite a bit of equity in our house.
Total Liabilities: $111,738
Total Assets: $121,147.13 - includes vehicles and equity in the house, along with retirement accounts.
So, roughly a 10k net worth
What we lack is an emergency fund - which is at $2,200 right now - we want that at 5k.
We do have two accounts opened for our daughter which was done by each of our sets of parents - one is a 529, one is an EJ account (which I need to research) - and we have $700 in additional savings account for her.
In my mind, the first things that need paid off are obviously the credit card/furniture debt. With a $1k planned surplus every month, that shouldn't be a problem, as long as we reign in our spending. I do make about $2k-$4k extra every year helping farm, but some of that gets used on LP for our winter heat, so it depends on a few different things.
***Now, here is what our 3-5 year plan is - might get bumped to a 1 year plan - which you'll all hate***
We found an acreage for sale, 20 miles from where we are, and it's EXACTLY where we want to be. We'd have to build a house on it though.
So, if we can sell our current acreage, which is very doable, for on the low end of $115k, we'd be able to clear the mortgage and student loans, which would leave us with $0 of any serious debt. Ideal, right? If we get more for it then that, it could clear us buying the acreage (worth about $20k) with aggressive savings from now til then, plus any surplus from the house sale, and not have to carry a mortgage on the ground.
We'd probably rent for a year ($300-$450 a month estimated), and be able to stock pile, heavily. This would give us a great ability to get a solid downpayment ready for the house, in which we would be STAYING for the rest of our lives. We are near both our parents, heavily engrained in our communities, and it's the best place we could choose to raise our children. Our jobs are both 99% stable, using 99% because something COULD happen, but it'd be pretty slim chances (the agency I work with has been around for 90 years, and she works for a state-run hospital, and it's the only one within 30 miles of where it is. It isn't going anywhere).
After running numbers with a banker friend, he said that any bank would loan us money (credit credit scores north of 730-750 for both of us) for building a new house. I just want to make sure we have enough down payment to avoid PMI, and I'd like to be on a 15 year fixed like we are now.
Anyways, that's us in a nutshell.
Face punch away!