In order to reach this goal (and start our new lives together debt free sans the mortgage), we are and have been saving all the money he has been earning to go towards repaying this debt. Now that he's got some work with Labor Ready, it should be a lot easier to take care of this.
So how did my fiance rack up $1500 in debt???
When he was living in Utah, my fiance was working a few part time jobs and was not going to school. He figured out he was going no where. After talking with his parents he decided to start going to school part time. He let go of one of his three part time jobs to allow time to focus on school. When school started taking more time that he expected, he dropped one of his other jobs that didn't pay well and didn't offer a steady work load... and then he got laid off from his steady job as a school janitor in a slew of budget cuts and layoffs within 2 weeks of letting go his other job.
With the bad economy he wasn't able to get a new job with his record and so he decided to go to school full time. Then his clunker broke down. He needed money for the repairs since it was his only mode of transportation and his parents were willing to loan him the money since he was going to school full time. (About $600.00). When the next school semester came by, he couldn't afford books for classes so his parents loaned him the money because it was for school. (Another $300).
Before you start thinking my fiance was a mooch... he would donate plasma for cash twice a week at the donation center. He used that money to cover his daily and monthly expenses, but he just wasn't able to save any money for the larger purchases of life. At this time he also had about $400 on a line of credit attached to his debit card from purchases he stupidly made when he was working (and thought he'd have more paychecks coming in to cover). When he lost his job he wasn't able to pay off the balance in full, but he made sure to make the minimum payments each month with his donation money as well.
After we started dating and he realized he wanted to marry me... he cut his current expenses even further. He stopped driving his car to school everyday and opted for a student discounted bus pass. He waited out in the snow and the cold everyday to take the bus to school. He continued to take the bus to sell plasma twice a week... only this time it wasn't for gas money... it was for my engagement ring. Yup, my fiance sold his own blood plasma to buy me a modest engagement ring.
So at this point my fiance owed his parents $900 and had $400 on a line of credit attached to a debt card.
Once we got engaged my fiance took the next semester off from school to try and look for work. When it became apparent that the job market would not be too kind to him out there, we decided to move him out to California early so his job hunting efforts wouldn't be in vain if he did find a job. As he was getting things together for the move, his mom told him he should close his bank account in Utah... and the only way to do that was to settle the debit card line of credit that he had with them. His mom settled the $400 with the bank for him and they closed the account.
The remaining $200 came from re-registering his car in California and for the Smog test, etc that was needed to get him a new license and everything.
So how is he doing?
Right now he has saved up $248.00 saved up from his odd jobs thus far...
He has 2 paychecks from Labor Ready at home that we haven't been able to cash yet (he needs a bank account first) and he will get another paycheck today. We are taking $50 out of his checks to go towards the debt (the other $8 is for our fun money and for some things we need to buy for the house). So we have $52.00 from Friday's check; $50 from Yesterday's check; and $50.00 from todays check.
$400 saved... $1,100.00 to go.
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