I never said the Road to Financial Freedom wouldn’t be hard, but I wasn’t expecting to hit a roadblock so early in the series.
I wasn’t even planning on writing about emergency funds at this time, but with the week we just had, I felt it is warranted.
It all started last Thursday after cleaning a stinky toddler bum, I needed to wash my hands, preferably with hot water. When I turned the hot water on, a slow stream came out and it eventually dwindled…to nothing. I went to another sink and the same thing happened, but I could get cold water.
I won’t go into all of the details of what followed, but our hot water heater had leaked and the outcome was not pretty…$670.
Yesterday when our 9 year old car was in the shop for its state inspection, we got ‘the call’. Have you ever had ‘the call’? When the mechanic calls to tell you that in order for your car to pass the inspection, there are a number of things that need to be done…cha-ching…$700.
$1370 spent in 5 days. The good news is we have the cash in our savings account, but the bad news is the TV in the family room that needs replaced will probably be pushed back for a while.
Have you ever had an expensive week? How prepared are you for life’s sudden setbacks?
I will write more about emergency funds later in the series. Right now I need to go console my husband who is trying to watch a game on a TV that keeps going out.
Thanks for reading FamilyBalanceSheet. If you would like to receive FREE updates of FBS through your RSS Feed, please click here to sign up. Or Subscribe by Email.
I’m sorry that you had a hard week! I’m sure you are very thankful that you had your emergency fund well funded!!! It always seems like as soon as we get ours funded ($1000,as Dave Ramsey suggests), we deplete it with an “emergency”, but then we have to look at the bright side and be glad we didn’t have to use credit cards! P.S. I hope this week is better for you! 😉
I think we have all had these weeks before! The emergency fund is a great help but I think life sometimes just kicks us in the butt sometimes to show us who is boss. Wisdom and planning is the basis of good finances and sometimes we just have to fly by the seat of our pants. God Bless.
Oh, I feel your pain. We had just such a month in August. Our car repair that we had budgeted $400 for turned out to be closer to $800 because the problem needed to be repaired on both sides. It would have been more, but my husband was able to get a small discount. On the way home from vacation a week later, more emergency car repairs for nearly $200. In the same week, one of our dogs developed an eye infection: another $200 by the time we were done. And our dishwasher broke that week as well and that was another almost $300 for parts and service. So, almost $1500 in about two weeks. EVERY TIME we get our emergency fund restocked, things go wrong, so I’m not saying a word to anyone when we’ve got it filled again so that the car, appliances, pets, etc. don’t overhear and decide to break down or get sick again.
At one point earlier in the year it seemed like we had to replace a major appliance every month
I hope this week is better.
Really I can understand your sorrow.I’m not saying a word to anyone when we’ve got it filled again so that the car, appliances, pets, etc. don’t overhear and decide to break down or get sick again.