How I'm Successfully Surviving The Current Cost-Of-Living Crisis.

 This is not a financial advice post. I can't tell nor advise anyone else on how to live. I can only control and worry about myself (and my immediate family). But I will tell you this: from my experience, it isn't until you lose everything and go bust will you finally figure out how to successfully live. Don't take it from me. Some of the best Professional Finance Advisors went bust. They either filed bankruptcy or simply just lost it all and built themselves back up again. People such as Suze Orman (click here), Dave Ramsey (click here), David Bach (click here) or the current trending sensation, Mel Robbins. Robbins husband lost his restaurant business many years ago and the couple found themselves $800,000 in debt. It took the Robbins fourteen years to pay off that debt. (click here for her story) Now? She's an expert at giving out life advice. 

I learned my route to financial success the hard way. Personally, I think it's the only way a person can finally learn how to properly handle money. We can read all the self-help books in the world we want but until you actually experience what it is like to NOT have a dime in your pocket, you truly can't learn anything. Just my opinion. 

Back in 2001, after the Dot-Com disaster of 2000 and the bombing of the World Trade Centers in New York City, I found myself broke. My computer business went bust. I had no cash and no job. I sold and closed the sale of my home of 16 years on February 28, 2002. Thank God because the next day, March 1st, my mortgage company was going to file foreclosure notices on my home and charge me an extra $3,000 just for the privilege of it all. I had already sold my vacation property several months prior and used that equity to buy 3.5 acres of land in a rural area in upstate New York. The equity I rounded up from my residential home sale was enough to build a new home (modular) on the land, buy two used vehicles for my husband and myself (my original car was repossessed for being only one month behind in my payments) and put some money into savings. 

My survival secret here was to not incur any more debt whatsoever. We paid cash for EVERYTHING.

David Bach always recommended that you own your own home. Never rent. And now you know why. It can come in handy went you go broke. Today, although there are more sellers than buyers, if you price your home correctly (i.e. lower the price) you might find financial relief. Bach also recommends you start selling whatever it is you don't need anymore. And looking over my 'stuff' I realized what a jerk I had been for many, many years. I bought way too much un-necessary crap. I was now going to learn the most important lesson of my life. What is a want and what is a need? I learned that the only things in life that were important was: having a roof over my head, food on the table, essential paid-for utilities and a reliable paid-off vehicle. Dave Ramsey calls this 'the four walls'. I call it genius. Click here for Ramsey's Bankruptcy Solutions.

I don't care what other people are wearing, driving, going, eating or living in. I only care about myself. Not what others think and do. 

So, we moved into our new home (and new life) on March 8, 2002. The essentials needed to run our new home amounted to $2500 a month. This included 1/12 of annual property taxes (that had to be put away in a savings account each month), electricity, home insurance, vehicle insurance, health insurance, groceries, gas, propane/pellet heating (for the winter months), misc account for home & vehicle repairs & maintenance. There were no extras. No cable. No meals out. No entertainment. No vacations. Today, we still live the same way but our essentials total up to $3820 a month. Despite being retired and on a fixed income, we still occasionally go to work to make up and save for the difference. This latter part is the part many, many people will NOT do. Rather than go out and get a job, they'll rack up consumer debt, take out equity lines of credit or borrow the money somehow, someway. This is the part that IMHO, you can only learn to go without by simply going and feeling what it is to be financially broke. It's at this point that you vow to yourself, as Scarlett O'Hara did in 'Gone With The Wind' you make a vow to yourself that you will do anything to never be hungry again. 

As I watched my most beautiful car being repossessed and dragged out of my driveway, I made a vow to myself, that nothing was ever going to be taken away from me again. I had been living a 'rented' life. But no more.

So, let's get back and down to the current cost-of-living crisis the global world is finding themselves in. Do you think the little things like inflation or tariffs or trade deficits or product shortages are going to disrupt my way of life in any way? Excuse my language right now, but I don't give a rat's ass about WTF Donald J. Trump is doing or anyone else for that matter. I only buy what I need. Inflation or the tariffs will not affect us. I won't let that happen. I shop around for the best price and whether I buy it new, used, at a garage sale or through bartering, if I need it, I shall have it. If I don't have it then I didn't need it in the first place. If you live your life debt free, you're chained to NO ONE.

If eggs are $10 a dozen, I either barter with my neighbors (most of whom raise their own chickens) or I pay the $10 or I go without. Secret is, I've got the ten dollars. Most people don't. When the price of eggs were high, my husband and I had oatmeal or farina for breakfast. If I had to bake something, I substituted apple sauce for the egg or I just didn't bake at all. Easy solutions. 

When the price of groceries are high, we just don't buy high priced foods. We substitute or find cheaper ways. Each week I comb the grocery store sales, make a list and hubby and I buy the loss leaders/sale items only. Nothing else. We make our meals up the night before based on what we have. NOT on what we want.

I only buy meat & produce heavily discounted. Period!

I mend all our clothes. I have a nifty Singer sewing machine that I use to either mend or make clothes (pj flannel bottoms, place mats, napkins etc) or make holiday/birthday gifts (make-up bags, oven gloves, place mats etc.) Hubby does all DIY projects. We hire no one to do anything for us unless it's an emergency. Hubby cuts the lawn and all the home and vehicle repairs. I do all the internal housekeeping (this is despite hubby having a heart condition and I undergoing 16 months of cancer treatments). I still got up, made my bed, tidy upped, did the dishes and all essential cleaning). After husband's recent heart surgery I did have to hire a landscaper to do our property spring clean up and mow the lawn just once till hubby was back on his feet. Thankfully, we had the $400 cash to pay the landscaper. That's because I save 95% of husband's job money. I keep it in high-interest bearing accounts and if and when we have an emergency I have accumulated enough in interest to tackle most disasters that come our way.

We do have charge cards now but only four. One is for gas and vehicle expenses. One is for the home expense and miscellaneous. One is for me and one is for hubby. They are ALL paid off in full at the end of each month. It used to be that once all the regular, standard bills were paid each month, we had $1950 in discretionary spending toward groceries, gas and any thing else we might NEED. I keep a daily running total on all our cards and when I see they are getting near our limit, I tell hubby to stop spending till the next billing cycle. This is what works for us. I have no idea what will work for you. Currently, that $1950 amount has dropped down to $1500 a month, due to inflation and the rising costs of all our essentials. Naturally, for us, the first thing we cut was our grocery bill but nothing else. We use portion controls now and for sure, are eating much less. But hey! That comes with getting older. We find that the older we get, the less we eat. So, it is all working out fine. For us.

If there is an essential that we need, and it is very expensive (over $1,000), we put it on a charge card and utilize zero interest payments. Even though we may have 12 months to pay it off, interest free, I make it a point to pay no later than 10 months or sooner. What I try to do is get the final payment down to a more affordable level and then just pay it off. We have utilized this method to buy a lawn tractor ($2500) Apple iMac Computer ($1500) and our yearly propane bill. We estimate how many gallons we will use in a year (from 1200 gallons down to just 300 gallons) but nonetheless the bill nears $1,000. The propane company gives us a discount because we pay their bill, in full, all at once. We put it on a special zero interest credit card with 12 equal monthly payments (no fees) but I always seem to pay it off in 9 or so months. Again, this is what WE do. What YOU do is up to you. All of us are different. These methods work for us. I have no idea what will work for you and your own family.

We don't listen to the news. We don't have cable service anyway. It doesn't matter to us what goes on in the outside world. The government can cut Medicare. They can cut Social Security. We'll manage just fine without them. Hey! Even if there is a nuclear war, we won't feel a thing because we will be instantly dead anyway. What the American government or our local folks do, has no influence on us. Our responsibility is to pay our property taxes, on time, and that is what we concentrate on. And file with the IRS every April 15th!!

Next week, our community pool officially opens. For $75 a season, we seniors get the pool all to ourselves for 1.5 hours each day this summer. Don't have money to join the pool, upstate New York has plenty of lakes, rivers and streams, many of which are free to senior citizens!

Once you get out of New York City (Manhattan and the surrounding boroughs) upstate New York is, in my opinion, the best and cheapest place to live. Homes are priced around $200K and bargains can be found everywhere. It's home to the Catskill Mountains, the Adirondacks, gorgeous (free) campsites, Lake George, the Finger Lakes, Lake Placid (home to the Olympics). New York has the best consumer protection laws in the country IMHO. The best health care, the best in arts and entertainment and also IMHO and it's just a hop, skip and a jump from the French atmosphere of Montreal in Canada. It's the equivalent of being in France without the price tag!

The more people think upstate New York is a horrible place, the better it is for the rest of us still here!

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