Health Insurance, is the cost worth it to you?

Over the last few months I have noticed health care to be a really hot topic, especially with POTUS making it his legacy legislation to pass a huge health care bill. I have seen many blogs, websites, social networking sites and  friends emails discussing the rising cost in health care and health insurance. My question to you is: Is the cost of health insurance worth it?

With the rising costs of medical care, it seems to me the logical answer is yes, health insurance is worth it. But that is just my opinion and I know many people have a totally different view of this issue. Many people say they cannot afford health insurance at all, that the cost is just too exorbitant. Many people still do not have insurance through their jobs or cannot afford to pay the costs out of their checks.

In my case I say health insurance is worth it because the $500 a month we have taken out of our paycheck for our family of 4 is a bargain compared to what the costs of health care would have been over the last few years. With the birth of 2 children, 2 emergency room visits for injuries (daughter fell on the school playground), and then my son being hospitalized twice for asthmatic pneumonia, the hospital bills without insurance would have buried us in debt. Not to mention the weekly shots for my sons asthma which are totally covered by our insurance, no telling what they would cost but I guarantee they would be more than what we pay for insurance.

As a family we do go without some luxuries to have health care but to us it is worth it. I do not have to have a brand new car, or the latest technology but the money spent on insurance to me is worth it. I have had many people tell me that they just cannot afford health insurance or that their portion through work is just too high to pay and then in their next breath tell me about the vacation they just took or the new high tech toy they just bought which tells me that their priorities are different then mine.

I think many people need to take a look at their own selves before they complain about the cost of health care or the cost of insurance, they need to look at spending habits, if they have options they have not explored, if their habits are causing their health issues that they need covered, or if they actually have the right to complain as none of the above are in their control. I have seen people who are two pack a day smokers complaining that their medical costs are killing them but they don't think the $6 a day they spend on cigarettes is an issue since it is something they want, or the guy driving the brand new sports car with $700 a month payments not having coverage because he has to pay for the new car. If you only visit the doc once a year then no you probably do not need to be paying for insurance, if you are someone who gets sick often, has known medical issues, or a family history of bad health then yeah you should probably have insurance, and if you are saying you cannot afford it but you just renewed your monthly subscription to WOW or just bought the new COD BO (Call of Duty Black OPS) then you should probably take a look at your priorities and stop whining about how you can't afford medical insurance and look for affordable options. Spend more time on caring for yourself then keeping up with the Joneses.

Bonus

Every once in a while when you are shopping you can run into some rebate items. Most people I know don't like to waste their time to send these in and get their money back. But if you take the time you can find some really good rebates and it is basically money back on stuff you already purchase. In the past week I have found 2 really good rebates, 1 is for $10 cash back on the purchase of $50 in gift cards and the other is for $8 on the purchase of 2 bottles of Captain Morgan, Johnny Walker Red, or Tanqueray Gin.

On the $10 rebate I just purchased a $50 Kroger gift card on my way into the grocery the other day and then did my grocery shopping and used the card I had just purchased. Now all I have to do is send in the rebate and I have $10 back on my shopping trip which was already pretty good due to coupons now even better because of some free money from Coors (and you didn't even have to purchase beer). For the other rebate, we don't really drink at all but I do have a glass on the occasion that my buddy comes down from Ohio, or some old friends stop by so I picked up a bottle of Captain Morgan on sale at Meijer for $13.99 and a bottle of Johnny Walker on sale for $21.99 and I will get $8 of that back.

On top of the $10 rebate from Kroger, another thing to consider is the fuel points. At a time when gas is still fairly high every cent at the pump counts. Since I purchased the $50 gift card I got 50 points towards the 100 needed for fuel, when I spent the gift card on my groceries I got the other 50 points needed to make the hundred and now I have $.10 a gallon off at the pump just for spending $50 that I would normally spend on groceries anyways(which will be $40 once I get my rebate). Kroger is also running a deal right now that if you purchase $100 worth of gift cards you will get $.40 a gallon off at the pump on your next fill up. Considering this is Christmas (yes I said CHRISTMAS, not Happy Holidays) time it should be pretty easy to spend $100 on gift cards to give out, and this is on any gift cards on their wall, not just Kroger branded ones and you can save quite a bit on a fill up.

These are all little things to consider while shopping. Some stores may try and outright say they have the lowest prices but you have to add in any extras that you can get depending on where you shop and also any loyalty bonuses, I.E. Kroger's will send out bonus coupons every once in a while and a lot of times they are very good coupons based on your shopping habits on your Kroger card. Both Kroger and Meijer's have online coupons that can be used at the register without printing them out, they just come off of you order if you use your Kroger card or at Meijer just enter your phone # that you attach to the website.

Re-purposing

Since I have started using coupons pretty heavily the one thing I have noticed is that I cannot find a suitable way to organize my coupons. Until today I had been using one of those 12 pocket expanding file folders. I had a decent system going to separate them, but while shopping I still had to shuffle through the stack in each file to find a coupon if I found a sale on an item (Kroger is good about not advertising all sale items). One of the blogs I was reading had an interesting idea on it to use a 3 ring binder and collector card 9 pocket pages to sort your coupons. 

Since I have a quite a collection of cards just laying around I decided to give it a shot. So far it looks as if it is going to be a pretty good idea. It took about 35 pages for all of my coupons but now everything is sorted and seperated in a way that I will be able to find the coupons I am looking for pretty quickly. I found the idea on http://mamioffour.blogspot.com/ . Her blog also lists coupon match-ups to good sales as does http://mrspennypincher.blogspot.com/...... If your headed out to do your shopping this week, check out these two sites and see if you can save a little extra money.

Survival Bracelet

Checking my updates on facebook the other day one of the ads on the right hand side caught my eye. It was for a Survival Bracelet made out of paracord. Paracord has more uses than I can count and I always try to keep some handy in my truck, my hiking pack, fishing gear (you get the idea). Well usually I just ball up a length and try to keep it out of the way, but the bracelet looked like a cool idea to carry it just about any where. I check out the website and they have the bracelets starting at $23.95 which is way too steep for a 10' piece of paracord. I get to looking around  Ebay and Amazon and I see that they have the survival bracelets starting as cheap as a penny with $4.99 shipping and handling.


Not really having the money to be ordering stuff right now I decided to try and make my own. After searching the internet for a few minutes and finding the directions to braid your own it is pretty easy with simple to understand instructions. Theprepared.com has all the steps to do this with pictures to make it simple to do.

Not having any of the cool metal clasps that they use on Survivalstraps.com to make one, I used some old plastic buckles I had cut off of a backpack that I was throwing out. Total time to make the one in the picture was about 20 minutes and that was only because I didnt know how to tie off the end when I was done with the braiding. No real cost to make it since I used buckles I already had and just pulled the 10' of cord off of a roll dad already had (Thanks Dad!!)...

There is a ton of other projects you can braid out of cord like key fobs, belts, rifle slings, can coozies, baskets.. And now you can order paracord in 10 or more different colors to make these things of your own style.

Night Out

Even when you are cracking down and working on getting everything in line in your budget, you will need a reprieve. For some it is going to the movies, out to dinner, out with friends or even a weekend mini-vacation. These are a totally necessary thing or you will wear yourself down and not want to continue with your plan (unless you are an uber focused and totally dedicated individual who can go without a relax period) but most people need a break. It is not a deal breaker or even a bad thing to have some fun while working on getting out of debt but just like everything else you need to plan for it. It has to be in your budget and you can't go over the amount you set aside for it.

In my budget this category is called "blow money" and I allot the family enough to go out about 1 or 2 times a month and have some fun. And it doesn't always cost a ton of money. Sometimes you can go out even if you do not have a lot of money to spend in that category you just have to plan what you are going to do.

Tonight for instance I met up with some friends and we headed to Roosters for wings and beer (I didn't drink as I was DD) and then headed back to a buddies house to play Xbox Kinect Total night expenditure was $30 for me and that was being nice and leaving a good tip since it is Christmas season. On top of getting off with just the cost of my dinner we had a total blast playing the Kinect and even got some exercise with that thing.

Being on a written plan does not mean that you cannot live your life and have fun, it just means that you have to be smart about it and not break the bank heading to the casino with your entire paycheck expecting to break it rich. And just like with everything else, look into what you want to do first, there may be a coupon for your favorite restaurant or a deal to go to the movies. Sites like www.groupon.com  or www.restaurant.com can net you discount and deals.

So go out, have a drink, have dinner, go to a movie, or whatever is your idea of a good time, just do it reasonably within your budget.. Have fun!!

Books, Tools and Resources

Over the last few posts I have mentioned various books and resources we have used in our journey to go from living paycheck to paycheck to being able to have some breathing room and working to pay off our debts. With the immense amount of information out there on the subject of finances there is no way that I can give the books and tools that will work for everyone but these are the books that worked for us.
This list is the books that I used for learning about money and how to manage it.

1. Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover
2. The Total Money Makeover Workbook
3. Financial Peace Revisited
4. Financial Peace University and Total Money Makeover Complete 2009 Home Study Kit By Dave Ramsey w/ Dvds Cds Books
5. Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence: Revised and Updated for the 21st Century
6. America's Cheapest Family Gets You Right on the Money: Your Guide to Living Better, Spending Less, and Cashing in on Your Dreams

Each of these books has many things to teach in its own right. The Dave Ramsey books lay out the steps to getting on a written plan and getting on a budget. It has everything broke down into 7 easy baby steps that spell out how to transform your relationship with money. Your money or your life by Joe Dominguez outlines how to become more frugal, how to manage on less and how to interact with your money. America's Cheapest Family outlines how to stretch each section of your budget, how to watch for sale's and match coupons to fill your food stores as cheap as possible and it also covers when to stock up on certain things and how to cut some of your other bills.

A couple of Motivational books that I have read to keep motivated during this process are

1. Secrets of the Millionaire Mind: Mastering the Inner Game of Wealth
2. Rich Dad Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money-That the Poor and the Middle Class Do Not!



Don't rely on books alone during this process either. The web is full of useful information if you have a few minutes to search it out.  Sites like www.betterbudgeting.com or www.daveramsey.com . Blogs such as this one and others like http://mrspennypincher.blogspot.com/ ... All the resources are out there to assist you in a search to better your situation if you have the want and the dedication to search, read and learn.

Kroger Mega Sales.

OK so I am going to put a pause in the story for a minute to share one of the things I have learned. Coupon matching to store sales. This is one of the areas that I have used to really start shaving money off the budget. I have learned that you cannot just blanket shop at any one store but you have to research the Sunday sale ads to see what is on sale and where then match up any of the stuff you use to coupons you have. Here is an example of my grocery trip this week at Kroger's with their 10 item mega sale going on. If you buy 10 participating items you automatically get $5 off of your total (pretty much $.50 off each item). Then you can also match coupons to these items and get many of them cheap and sometimes even free.

Some of the stuff I got yesterday matched with coupons

(4)  2 liters of Pepsi products on sale for $1.29 each - .50 mega sale= $.79 each - $1 off of 4 coupon = $.54 each
(2) 48oz bottles of Wesson Canola oil on sale for $2.49 each -$.50 mega sale =$1.99 each, - 2 $.40 off of 1 coupons which Kroger doubles to $.80 = $1.19 each
(2) Best life buttery spread $1.79 each- $.50 mega sale = $1.29 each - 2 $.50 off of 1 coupons Kroger doubles to $1.00 = $.29 each
(3)Marie Callender's frozen meals $2.28 each - $.50 mega sale = $1.78 each - $1.50 off of 3 coupon = $1.28 each
(2)Healthy Choice frozen dinners $2.28 each - $.50 mega sale = $1.78 each - $1 off of 2 coupon = $1.28 each
(2)Kraft salad dressings $1.99 each - $.50 mega sale = $1.49 each - $1 off of 2 coupon = $.99 each
(1)Colgate total toothpaste $2.50 - $.50 mega sale = $2.00 - $1 off 1 coupon = $1.00
(3)boxes of Kleenex tissues $1.49 - $.50 mega sale = $.99 each - $.50 off of 3 coupon doubled to $1 = $.65 each
(1)Freschetta pizza $4.49 - $.50 mega sale = $3.99- $.75 off 1 coupon = $3.24 (not bad for a pizza that will feed the 4 of us, makes a cheap dinner)
(1)Red Baron pizza $4.49 - $.50 mega sale = $3.99 - $1 off 1 coupon = $2.99(again another meal sized pizza)
(1) Maxwell house coffee $6.49 - $.50 mega sale= $5.99 - $.50 off 1 coupon doubled = $4.99
(2) Half Gallons of Silk Almond Milk $2.49each - $.50 mega sale = $1.99 - $2 off 2 coupon = $.99 each
(2)Hunts tomato sauces 28 oz $1.49 each - $.50mega sale = $.99 - $1 off 3 coupon(bought a can of hunts roasted tomatoes not on the mega sale to fulfill coupon) = $.67 each

This is a sample of the items I matched with coupons, I bought more on the mega sale like bumblebee tuna packages that worked out to $.49 each after mega sale, and scooby fruit snacks for the kids came out to $1.49 on the sale. I bought a total of 40 participating items and got $20 off my over all order.

Total on receipt $179 after mega sale and coupons I paid $104.82  a savings of 57%..

Getting Organized

After the transmission went out in the suburban and we could do nothing about it, we realized it was time to get organized and get back on track with our goals. We decided it was time to totally reassess our situation and what our actual goals were. It was at this time that we found out that my wife's church was offering Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University class which we decided would probably be our best hope of getting back in line. While Dave's class is not a be all, end all total authority on how to handle your money it is a very good starting point and the tools and info a great asset to get you started on a path to financial Independence.

The first step of the plan laid out before us was to get $1000 in an emergency fund and get it put in a place that we could not tap into it except for actual emergencies. Now while a thousand bucks does not seem like much, it can actually seem like climbing a mountain when you are so far in debt that you were 1 missed paycheck away from a total breakdown. Knowing that I did not have the extra money within the monthly income to pull the thousand out of it in a short period I decided to get my butt in gear and make some extra cash to help out. I decided that I really didn't need to have a huge knife collection or multiple guns just sitting in my cabinet so I took a few days and started setting up at my local flea market to try and sell off what I could to come up with the cash. Suprisingly enough (to me) it only took me two weekends of hitting the flea market and selling my stuff to put the money into the emergency fund without pulling it out of the already stretched monthly income.

Now the second step of his plan (and the step we are still working on slowly but surely) is called the Debt Snowball. This step requires you to list all of your bills I.E. credit cards, vehicles, hospital bills etc on a list from smallest to largest then start paying all the extra money you can come up with on the smallest bill first. When we first started our snowball we did whatever we could to bring in a little extra cash and to cut corners in our budget to throw extra money to the top of our list and it really started to work for us. During this time I read a book called America's Cheapest Family that gave me ways to cut corners in my grocery bills and utility bills. Within the first 6 months of starting the snowball we had knocked out 6 bills (all medical bills) that had been haunting us since the birth of our 2nd child who had some problems early on and had racked up some medical bills. Getting the first 6 items checked off we realized that this plan was working for us and we started working a little more overtime, doing whatever sidework we could get into, and setting up at the flea market when we found the time. The more we did, the more we watched come off of our list, within a year after starting the plan again we had paid off all of our medical bills, our best buy credit card, my wifes school loans and were now at a point where we could get the suburban fixed without breaking the bank to do it.

Around 16 months in we slowed down on the debt snowball and (finally) took the Suburban in to get the transmission repaired and was able to pay the $2400 without falling back to the emergency fund. After getting the truck repaired we again sat down and looked at the budget and reassessed the debt snowball. We were making good headway down to just my school loan, the signature loan we had used to replace the heater and repair the truck, the suburban loan, some new medical bills and the house. Work had slowed some and we were not working the overtime we had been the previous year so we tackled the bills as best we could with just what we were making plus any extra we could make on the weekends but we stayed positive and in a few months after getting the suburban repaired we knocked out the medical bills again and paid down the suburban fast.  Going into New Years 2010 we were on track to have our snowball down to just the house within 16 more months at the most. I paid the final payment on the suburban in January 2010 almost a year earlier than it should have been leaving us with just the school loans and the signature loan which were the 2 biggest besides the house.

Now being me, I cant ever do anything easy and I lose attention to what I am doing when it takes way to long to accomplish. At this point I saw that we only had the 2 bills left on the snowball and we were doing all right on money so I decided to try another venture to make extra cash instead of just the flea market. So I went out and purchased an exmark mower (on credit, dumb me)and a lawncare trailer thus pushing our snowball back up to 3 bills, but I had the plan to pay it off quickly doing lawn mowing and small lawncare work not realizing how hard it was to break into this field. Even still, I managed to get a few lawn jobs and it looked as if it was going to work out.

Things were almost running on cruise control at this point, that is until I got in an accident in May and totaled the paid off suburban on the way to a lawn care job no less. The insurance paid out a great amount on the truck considering the age of it, but me seeing the nice amount clouded my judgement on finding a new vehicle. They had given me more than enough to find a good running older base model F250 or chevy 2500 to continue doing the lawn business with and at first when I started looking that is what I was trying to find. A truck for 5-6k that I could pay cash for and not go back into debt but then it happened, I walked onto a lot and my son saw an F250 Harley Edition sitting there, he looked over and said "Daddy I want the monster truck"  so I decided to check it out. It had all of the options I had been looking for and it had the power to tow the lawncare trailer. And here is where I made a rather big mistake, I assumed, I assumed that I would be able to pay the truck off just like I had the other bills because I had been with my comapny for the last 3 1/2  years and I assumed I would still be with my company. So I took the insurance check to the bank and I took part of it and paid off the mowing equipment and then I took $6k of it and used it as a down payment on the truck. My payment "only" $374 a month which was nothing I couldn't manage considering the money I was bringing home plus the side work.

Then came July 15th, and my assumption of a secure job turned into a huge mistake when I was walked out for telling a friend I was going to beat his ass. It was not a threat or even anything that he took serious but somebody within earshot decided it was enough for them to make a case against me. I was fired for threating a man who went to bat for me and told the management that he had not been threatened and it was just a joke between friends.

Now here's where the learning to be thrifty part comes in, having been fired for threatening an employee my unemployment was at first denied. So we went from having around $3500 a month after taxes coming in, to just over $1800 a month coming in to cover all of our bills, and the lawncare business, well it was dead due to a draught, no rain coming in to make my customers yards grow. Lucky for us we had set aside the emergency fund, had started building some savings and I had been stocking back a 401k through work (which I really hated to cash, but we wouldnt of survived without it) which I was able to cash out to cover not having an income. Knowing the job market was rough I started looking for ways to cut unnecessary spending out of our budget. Having more time to learn I started reading about saving money and ways to save money on groceries, bills, clothes and other stuff.

On the next few blogs I will start outlining the tools, books, blogs and other resources that I used to keep us afloat from July until October when my unemployment appeal was finally won and we started having some money coming in again.