How We Got Here We’ve always had real estate as part of our retirement plan. It’s a constantly-evolving vision, as most long-term plans are. The property we just paid off is in the Chicago area and was purchased by my husband in the mid-2000’s on a 30-year mortgage. We met in early 2010, and a …
After having our summer plans ruined (as many of you did too), we started brainstorming what to do instead. We had almost 6 weeks off, and we weren’t about to spend it moping around at home. Luckily, some close family and friends had nothing better to do than host us. So off we went.
After somewhat recovering from the anxiety and self-pity I’ve put myself through in the past couple months, I got curious about how our spending patterns morphed during our state’s recent “lockdown”.
First of all, thank you all for the very unexpected level of interest in the status of our trip to Europe, and all the money and points we had invested in that. I’m sincerely flattered that you care so much! It will come as no shock that we are not in Spain as I type …
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’re aware that much of the world has recently been under various degrees of stay-at-home orders, lock-downs, and quarantines. The major disruption in our area has lasted about 6-8 weeks (so far). While this is far from ideal and not nearly as fun as being on a 6-week-long …
I’ve been getting a lot of questions about whether our international family megatrip will be canceled due to the ongoing Covid-19 crisis. And of course the question of how upset we are about it is heavily implied.
You may recall that we’ve got a 41-day vacation planned this summer. You can read about the planning process and backstory here. For those of us who like maps, the final version of the trip looks like this (route colors don’t mean anything in particular):
You’re here for the numbers, so we’ll dive right in. This is for a 5-bedroom, 3 bath home that has a “main house” and a “casita”. Total square footage is just shy of 3,000. The property essentially has 2 full kitchens (the only thing that makes the “kitchenette” not a real kitchen is it has …
The end of our Sedona Building Project is in sight! All the furniture is in. Kitchens are fully stocked. I’ve spent hours if not days washing towels and linens to get rid of that plastic-and-packaging smell. The wall art is en route, due to arrive in a few days. And somehow, despite the dire predictions …
After tracking our spending down the penny in 2018, I gave myself a break so we could focus on paying off my student debts, getting our business debt well under control, and finishing our first investment build. (We still rely on the magic of the the non-budget when it comes to managing our spending.) However, …