It sure has been a minute! 

Our financial situation has not changed much since my last post a couple years ago. Two big things happened: I have a full time, semi remote job and we started a business! We have been in business 17 months and it looks like it will be profitable within the next 12 months but it is VERY stressful from a day to day standpoint.

Our (personal) monthly cashflow is in the negative and I am not sure how we've been able to hang on for so long. But every month I figure it out. We are about to put on primary residence on the market this week and once it sells we will have a LOT of breathing room. It won't fix all our financial issues but it will let me sleep at night.

The plan with the house is to use the money to help us make more money. So that means investing a portion in the business, using a portion to renovate 2 vacant apartments so we can get them rented out, and putting a small portion towards debt. Once all our properties are rented then we will be able to tackle the debt fully. 

In the meantime, I am looking at all our monthly expenses and trying to lower them, as well as increasing our income where we can. We have been lax about spending for far too long and really need to reign it in.

My goal is to lower one monthly bill/payment per day. 

Yesterday I cancelled the PBS add on we had for Amazon Prime. We love watching the documentaries but we have been so busy lately that we are hardly watching anything right now. That is an easy $5/month to eliminate.

Today I lowered my cell phone plan, saving me $10 this month. I don't know why my cellular data was so high last month, but I am not projected to use nearly as much this month (we're already 2 weeks in) so I lowered it to the next lowest tier. I love that Consumer Cellular allows you to do this! (of course the trick is remembering to lower it the next month!) 

I also did grocery shopping at Aldi this weekend. I usually go to Kroger because I almost always have a mystery shop for it but I have been so busy that I haven't been able to commit to mystery shopping. I spent almost $100 and got enough ingredients for 4 meals, for a total of 10 servings (plus or minus) along with coffee and a couple of snack options. I am very happy with this even though I know there is room for improvement.

I am still selling things online and my goal (that I have never reached!) is to sell $100/day. I try to list 10 new items 2-3 times a week, and relist all items after 30 days. I know the more active I am on the platforms (mercari and poshmark right now) the more my items are view and the more likely I am to have a sale. I just have to remember to spend a few minutes each day working on the accounts. (I do pay $9 for a monthly service that shares my poshmark listings and allows me to crosslist to different platforms and bulk delist/relist. It takes one sale a month to pay for it and it saves me hours of time when I remember to use it!) 

My plan is to update daily (or at least several times a week) with what bills I've been able to lower and what extra income I have brought in. I am still embarassed about the amount of debt I have but will slowly reveal it once I start making progress in lowering it.