Comments On Article: The Bumpy Budget

My husband and I live in a 37 year old mobile home. We do our own repairs. Since our mobile home is not on a concrete pad, we can't get home owners insurance here in Florida. I retired from teaching two years ago, but am maintaining my teaching license in case as "hurricane insurance". If our home got destroyed, I'd go back to work. 

With the influx of people moving into Florida, everything has gone up in price. Our property taxes increased by $200 this year. Our sons' rent went from $1200 in 2020 to $1900 this year. The cost of housing is so high it's scary for young folk. We live on an acre of semi rural property and are considering putting an RV or tiny home on it for our sons. Like everyone, food and gas and utilities have gone up. 

We are blessed though. We are debt free. My husband retired at 62 and I retired at 60. I paid into an old fashioned pension while teaching and drew that while waiting until I turned 62 to pull Social Security. My husband gets Social Security and a very small veteran disability check. His health care needs are covered by the VA and I go without insurance. It's 100% risky, but health insurance would wipe out my pension income every month. 

We grow fruit and veg and raise chickens for eggs. We don't travel and really don't drive that much.

This young gal has a YouTube channel about frugal cooking. She recently did a 30 day $100 for the month cooking challenge. It was inspirational.

I am always glad that I live in Ontario/Canada despite wait times at hospitals. Once 65 years old, pills from the pharmacy have a 100$ deductible which I pay, but over that is covered. Not all medication is covered, but most is. I have been living in the same house since 1989, and so it's paid for. If I had to rent I wouldn't be able to afford it, but it's true: taxes, hydro, bell telephone (this one especially) and food has all increased. Hydro I have some control over, being very careful what I use and when I use it. The telephone company has a monopoly over rural residents- the wires underground are owned by Bell and internet service is not a great quality even though they say they are high speed--that's not my experience. All other companies would have to pay Bell to rent the wires to deliver the service so the price would be about the same as what I pay for Bell. I heat with wood and have propane as a back up. Canada is pushing heat pumps as a means of heating homes but it is not enough to warm a house up when it's minus 37C/ you need a 2nd heating source. Also they never talk about the increase of your electricity bill. I grow many of my vegetables, I can, and eat vegetarian fairly often. I shop at Costco once a month and I share my card with another family person who has to feed a family. Between the 2 of us, the card is paid for and then some with the rebate Costco gives.My goal is 200$ per person-- though I certainly have gone over.  I often unplug my stove--and use a hotplate to cook, along with a bread maker to make my bread. I think that with the larger plugs that are on a stove, more electricity is drawn. I also haven't used my drier in 14 years. Everything is hung up. My car is 14 years old, but I don't drive often. My happiness is at home. And that's one thing that as an introvert I don't have any problems with. I'd rather be at home than anywhere else. I rue the day that I must stop feeding wild birds as part of my cost cutting measures.

Debby I heard a similar broadcast on a tv channel and I kept looking at my husband with puzzlement.  "WHAT?!?  What world is he living in?  Why are they lying?"  Seriously the way this person spoke the world is rosy and cosy and prices are down and we're all managing just fine...It's surreal.

We rent currently and don't see that ever stopping unless we inherit a house. The landlord is absolutely wonderful but I question if this house is even legal to rent out....I don't care if it isn't though. At one point, the well pump went down. We thought the well went dry. The landlord said he wouldn't be able to afford to dig a new one. I asked him if he would allow us to live here anyway. He told us we weren't going anywhere if he could help it. We have no central heating but do have a nice woodstove and plenty of woods around us to collect from. We have family around who traded hunting rights on their property for wood rights to their neighbors property. So we have over 100 acres roughly to collect from. Our rent is so cheap that my desire to own a house has disappeared. Because my landlord is so great and rent is so cheap we repair a lot of things around the house ourselves to help improve our living and his property. I stay at home so I don't carry a cellphone. My husband does and has the monthly pre-paid plan. We don't have cable but do have some streaming services at the moment. My oldest son works almost full time. I am okay with both of my oldest sons staying at home well into their adulthood as long as they are respectful to me. That there lays one of the biggest issues that is in our control when it comes to making it in this economy....we need to all learn to get along! The young need to learn to respect the elder and in turn the elder need to help the young with child care and possibly a place to live if this is in the capabilities. Churches should step up, open their doors during the week, offer safer schools for their members (at the very least) children and maybe even daycare for those struggling....free meals to those struggling...neighbors need to watch out for neighbors. Garden if you can. We have chickens and when we have too many eggs (if I remember!) I will frequently take the eggs to my church on Sunday and just give them away. Same with extra produce. Others in my church do the same. The more people do this, the more people start sharing also. When black walnuts fall around here, there is a man at our church that will give baggies of nut meats away. Another man fishes and stocks the church freezer with trout. 

My husband works a physically demanding job and he worries he won't be able to keep it up. We just try our best and pray that an answer will come if needed. We don't have any retirement plan. I guess he and eventually I will work until we simply can not anymore or we die. I don't believe it is going to get any easier. I am a Bible believing women and I do believe this is all written about. The best we can do is work on our character because getting along will be the make or break of a lot of people in my opinion. Learning and teaching the old ways...including some of the basic or even mildly moderate medical emergency care. I am partially disabled from military service so I have free health care through the VA. But my husband and kids have state insurance and insurance through my husband's work. 

The sad part is, it is (in a round about way) illegal to be homeless in America! I know...I've been there. You can have your kids taken from you, you can be fined for sleeping in the wrong places....one of the most stressful things about being homeless is the laws against you. Back in the great depression families were not torn apart simply because they didn't have a home. Now, that's not the case anymore. Our biggest problem in the world right now is caused by lack of character and lack of integrity on a large scale. Families refusing to take care of families, neighbors refusing to care for each other...I truly believe the biggest thing we can do to make it is, search ourselves for disagreeable behaviors then correct those, search our households for relationship issues and correct those...continue circling out. As these corrected circles start colliding, I do believe we all would see a massive improvement despite the economy. The answer isn't any governmental change. No particular party is going to fix this. The fighting needs to stop as much as it is in our power to do. The rest is all up to God. 

What a relevant topic!  Wow!  What a lot of responses!  I haven't read them yet (will do so tonight and tomorrow) so if I am redundant in suggestions just ignore!

I am experiencing much the same as you. My husband, 67, is still working, not because we need the money, but because he enjoys the work and the comradery.  The income is most welcome!  As is the employer sponsored health, vision, and drug insurance.  This year has been a particularly difficult year medical expense wise, and boy do I realize the value of the insurance.  My husband tends to put things off and I have been a taskmaster(!) in making sure we get the followup care we need while we are covered by private insurance.  My daughter has been covered on our insurance as well (she ages out this month) as she did not have employer sponsored insurance.  It turned out to be lucky we continued her on our insurance as she had enormous expense this year which would have severely rocked us financially as she was also out of work.  Long story!

Our home is not paid off.  We refinanced 5 years ago when rates hit 4% less than we were paying, paid off the car, and helped our son with college expenses.  We have been paying monthly payment and an extra $500 per month to pay it off faster, and are about 2/3 done  We do have a car payment unfortunately.  We needed a replacement car in 2022 and there really were no used cars to be had at a reasonable price.  This was a result in the manufacturing slowdowns world wide due to COVID.  This shot up demand, and we saw used versions of the car we eventually bought at the price of the same car, new.  Well at least at the MSRP list price, which is what we paid.  We did see dealers marking the MSRP price up a couple of thousand too.  Insane!

The biggest price jump has been in the car insurance and the homeowners and umbrella policies we maintain.  22% last year.  I haven't calculated this years bump up.

In addition to health care costs going forward, my biggest concern is being able to stay in our home as we age, or worse, long term care costs.  And also the lack of meaningful, affordable in-home services to enable people to stay in their home as long as possible.  I wanted to move to a one story home, we looked at a few places, found one that I thought would work for us, and after going through the whole process, my husband tells me he doesn't want to move. He finds moving too traumatic.   I thought about it for a week, then asked calmly asked did he think it would be less traumatic in say 10 years when one of us was no longer able to use the stairs to get to the bedroom and the bathroom? And moving might be physically difficult for us?   Sigh, it didn't work.  I am a planner; my husband is not.

In reading your story, Donna, I had a thought about the houses.    Could you rent out the one you would get the most rental income for, and live in the other one?  Just a thought.  When we moved here 20+ years ago, I wanted to keep our old house (mortgage was paid off) and use it as a rental.  My husband did not want to have anything to do with being a landlord.  I have since learned that there are companies that handle the "landlord" duties for a fee, of course.  The price of that house has almost tripled since we sold it.  

That must be a hard decision to make.  You have made your home a haven, and worked extensively on your gardens.  As you described the areas, your house seems more likely to be closer to services you might use than Madge's house. Her house seemed in a more bucolic (?) area, maybe less hurried?  So that would be a plus too.  Which is closer to family?  Is there a fee to talk to a realtor and get an estimate as to would you could sell either house for, or what you might be able to get for rental income if you kept both?  

Well, I have rambled on enough here.  I look forward to reading others comments.

Wanted to add (is there an edit button I missed) I live in south east PA, in a hot real estate market, and the prices of EVERYTHING have gone up accordingly.

An additional thought about the food budget-I keep my budget so low by making my menus based on what I have already purchased at loss leader prices.  Working it the other way around where you make menus and then shop is very expensive.

Debbie ( in PA)---

We put a stair lift in our two story house and it was worth every penny.  For me it was not a matter of if I would fall down the stairs but when.  Problem solved and easily.  Also it is helpful for taking loads up and down.

I'm in the US.

What scares me most is medical costs. Medical expenses and the cost of medical insurance are out of control and are not sustainable. Medicare pays out a lot more than it takes in. How long can that keep going? If Medicare collapses then medical care collapses because it's such a big part of the medical industry.

Social Security takes in slighty less than it pays out so it's not in serious trouble. Those payments will be made.The problem is it isn't going to keep pace with inflation.

Then there's the younger ones like my daughter & her family-- they are stuck in a tiny apartment they had when they got married & now they have 2 children. Rent is getting too high but the prices for houses are crazy! My daughter said to me the other day she didn't know if they'll ever own a house.

We don't have a multi-generational home but my kids live together in another home that I own that is 3 houses from mine. It had been my parents home.  They do fine together and have their own private spaces. Technically there is a living space in the basement should any of the grands families need to join them. It could happen.....I also have room for family if needed and would joyfully welcome them.  We are very clannish so I suppose that helps. We spend alot of time together growing and processing food for all and bargain hunt for all. It is not easy at this time but I pray it gets better, not just for us but for all.

On the medical side, thankfully we have insurance but it doesn't come cheap. Deductibles go up along with costs of needed meds. One thing that I would suggest, if given the chance to take a class on falling down....take the class. Many are offered at senior centers and community centers along with the YMCA/YWCA.  People young and old fall, sometimes tripping, sometimes just out of the blue. But if you know how to protect yourself as much as possible when it happens it can prevent broken wrists, hips ant so on.  Just a thought....

JC

I haven't commented here for a long time, but still faithfully read every blog post Grandma Donna writes and find them (and all your comments) so helpful.

I'm in my late 40s with 3/5 children still at home. My youngest is 15. After leaving an abusive marriage 9 years ago, I've had huge legal costs for years just trying to protect my children. They were finally able to legally cut contact with their father on 1 July 2023, and I'm thankful to at last be out of debt on that front and doing all I can to keep it that way until the last 2 reach 18 and the court orders expire.

I live in regional Australia (a couple of hours SE from Melbourne) in a town of a little under 6,000. I'm thankful to have my own home (as rental costs are skyrocketing here even faster than interest rates!) but have a much higher mortgage than I'm comfortable with due to having to refinance to cover legal costs a few years ago. I pay a higher interest rate than if I went through the banks as due to the reason for the refinance, no bank would lend to me. However, being able to refinance was a miracle in itself as I lost my job just after submitting my loan application due to the vaccine mandates, but the lender didn't do an employment check which apparently this one always does. I'm just thankful to have my own home and have my children safe.

Two of my adult children have moved out and are living in a sharehouse, and the 3rd is hoping to move out later this year, but wants to get her own place. The housing situation is in crisis here, both rental and mortgage, but we all must get by somehow. My finances are very tight and I was very concerned how I'd manage when I lose the board money from my 3rd child when she moves out, but I've just got an extra job which will cover the difference and I'm hoping to save all the extra I can for the next few months to have a buffer.

For work I'm a seamstress who does alterations and mending from home, for the local menswear store as well as privately for the local community. I've just started doing outwork for a local cottage business that hand-dyes embroidery threads. I collect a few hundred threads each day to package and label at home, which is really helping my budget. It's a struggle to fit it in (about 30 extra hours a week) on top of my own alterations business, but I don't have another option right now, so just keep praying I'll have enough time and energy to keep up with it. It's amazing how God continues to provide for our needs even when we walk through these dark valleys.

I have a huge vegetable garden, fruit trees, chooks and bees, (even though I'm on a very small block in the middle of town, which really helps with our food costs, though finding time to garden this summer is going to be a challenge with the extra work. My teenagers will have to pick up a lot more chores than usual, but we'll get it all planted and keep up with it somehow.

I cook very simple meals, buy in bulk where I can, and use up all the leftovers possible. Anything extra goes to the chooks which saves on their feed and still feeds us through their eggs, so nothing is really wasted. I have a friend nearby who drops off her kitchen scraps most days in return for buying eggs from me at a discounted price. One of my neighbours volunteers for the local food pantry (which I also often donate excess eggs & garden produce to) and regularly drops us excess bread & fruit etc once or twice a week which helps a lot, and I've been there regularly at times in the past when money was too tight for groceries.

I just keep praying while doing all I can each day to provide for my family, and trust God will continue to provide if I am a wise steward of His provision. So far, it's working for which I'm so very thankful!

BeckySueK..... I also have the book " We Had Everything but Money" and often have thought we still don't have it as bad as those poor souls. Even in their hardship kindness and sharing would shine through.

Here in NZ currently petrol in gallon terms is $10.40 approx

Electricity has just risen. A daily charge just to have electricity coming into the house went up from $1.04 to $1.53. Then there's the electricity charge and the Goods and Services charge. Our normal power bill is around $200 month and only because we have a wood fire. Most new houses here have heatpumps/air-conditioning and I'd hate to think what those people pay. Also if the electricity stops for whatever reason they have no way to stay warm.

Kathryn P... I was genuinely shocked at the price of care for your father. My husband has Huntington's Disease. He is 10 years younger than me and I already feel exhausted but I'm quickly coming to realise that my reality may be he won't go into care as he worsens or I get past looking after him physically with the way care funding is getting chopped here by the Govt. It's no use thinking about it. Just one day at a time dear Jesus. 

Ingrid M... Thank you for your kind words in regards to our Daniels passing ( not from Huntingtons as he didn't have it but from a mistake made in his care at the hospital after he had a freak farm accident. He was 20 and him and I used to help people in need together. He was homeschooled and would give anyone his last $ and that laugh he had made everyone else laugh too)

I am so thankful for everyone's comments and helpful ideas. I am no -way near as industrious as all of you on finding ways to save but I am slowly trying to incorporate more and more of your suggestions.  We try our best to keep within a budget. We have experienced incredible increases in insurance, especially home and auto.  We make it a yearly quest to review costs and shop for lower prices.  

One of the items that is especially expensive for us (but worth it) is the cost of our animals.  We look for ways to save.  We buy whatever is on sale (or marked down)and make our own animal food mixed with vegetables and rice.  We take our animals to the free annual rabies clinics our town offers for their rabies vaccination.   We have utilized the Vetco Vaccination clinic (at our local Petco) to get the rest of the pet's other needed vaccinations.  We still get their annual checkups at the vet office but the immunizations are considerably less expensive at the Vetco clinic.  Another blog I follow found pet medications at a considerable discount from Discount Pet Meds in New Zealand. It is the same products our Vet has prescribed but at half the cost.  It takes about three weeks to get delivered but I have been very happy with the service so far.  We get our flea/tick meds(not name brand) at BJ's Wholesale as well as many other discounted bulk items (eggs are $3.00 a dozen, milk is $3.07 a gallon, chicken breast is $2.49 per lb.  We use their credit card (a little more expensive membership) but it gives us an extra 5% off all our purchases and the extra cost is covered within a few months for us and is then a great extra savings.  

We recently retired and are on my husband's retirement medical plan (so expensive) but we chose the lowest-cost plan with the highest deductible and 50% coinsurance to try and reduce expenses.  It does make you reduce your medical usage but at least provides added security in case of large medical expenses.  

After hearing about the funeral expenses I am looking in advance to find the least expensive process, so we can plan for it.   

My daughter currently lives with us, and that helps her to try and save for the future( she currently is very happy with the situation) so we find that an additional help for us. As a family, my sons (who currently live in their own apartments) often come to share meals- so it is a more cost-effective way to meal plan for all of us and do allow for some savings.  Small measures hopefully make for some savings and we thoroughly enjoy having our kids around.  

I love reading about living in the past and what they did, not all of it is something I am willing to do but it certainly has made me rethink so many things we do and try to find ways to improve our lives, our budget and to help mother earth and all it's creatures.  Thanks everyone!

Such good information in all these posts.

As Darlene and others have said there are many things they're not willing to do.  I totally agree that as long as I don't have to, I'm not going to.  However, I think it is important to have the knowledge and skills for doing those things we would not willingly choose to do so we are prepared if/when we no longer have a choice.  Hopefully that day never comes, but I want to be prepared if it does.  

I have read your blog for quite a few years and find it so peaceful and uplifting, encouraging and resourceful. Thank you for your writing. Keep it up!
I just wanted to comment, as a stay at home mom to 10 children in Canada. Our grocery bill would be absolutely outrageous if it was not for our very large vegetable garden, raising our own chickens and meat and finding free resources for food (neighbours are always telling us to pick up their free apples, fruit, etc. when they have too much). For some reason, I have always felt that we need to prepare for harder times -- and now, it is here. 

However, God is good. We stretch our resources as much as possible but are still able to help and feed others in the time of need. We have elderly neighbours with absolutely no family around - we make meals for them and help care for them. We all need to come together in this time. Community and fellowship is very vital.

"We all need to come together in this time. Community and fellowship is very vital."

This is so important! And funny thing when we are open to this, no matter how little we have or how much we're struggling, it seems we do have enough to share.