Going to Great Lengths

Over the next year, Justin and I are taking on some fairly expensive tasks including:

- going to Europe
- paying off credit cards
- possibly buying a car

and (the big one)

- buying a house

I'm still a bit in shock at the changes we are expecting to make in the next year. Currently, we find ourselves going through our belongings as we pack them away not knowing exactly when we will pull them back out again. It's a very different moving experience that I haven't really ever dealt with before, and I'm trying to make sure that none of our important travel documents are lost in the shuffle. Neither of us really wants to move, and we are certainly not enjoying being sick during the process. Ugh. No matter how you look at it, these next few months are going to be expensive. Luckily, thus far this month, we haven't really seen much change in our budget yet.

Over the weekend we went to buy Justin some jeans, me some shoes, and boxes/tupperware for moving purposes. Justin was down to one pair of jeans without any holes in them, I had been looking for shoes since August (!), and we needed the boxes to pack our belongings in. I think I made Justin a little agitated as I pulled out my phone to get points with ShopKick, GapNSnap, KarmaBox, Mobee, and PunchCard along with my receipt snapping using ReceiptPal and Receipt Hog. (Shopping now takes a while.) The good news is that even though we spent a lot, I was able to get some of that money back. (I go to great lengths to save money when possible.)

Anyway, here are the graphs (that's all you really read these posts for anyway, right?):

debts

We're doing really good at paying down debt this month! We're at the lowest amount since October!

Prediction: I suspect it will go up over the next 3 months, and then back down dramatically starting in June.

assets

We're down from last month's assets by approximately $100.

Prediction: I suspect this number will continue to go down over the next 3 months, but it will probably start going up steadily (not dramatically) starting in June.

net worth

Our net worth is looking pretty bleh. We have less debt than we did in October, but we owe so much for student loans that it's barely noticeable.

net income

The good news is that, so far, we haven't spent more than we've made this month. That will probably change (tonight or this week) after we book a few things for our trip to Europe. We have so much left to do before we take on that adventure!

So finance people, or world travelers, do you have any advice for me on how to save money while traveling? Anything I should know in the next two to three months before I go to Europe?

What about fellow budgeteers? Are you doing well? Do you have any huge financial obligations coming up in the near future?