I read a book about a year ago titled The Family CFO. This came during a period of 2 months where I read about 20 books about money, finances, investing, and more. While there was interesting information contained in this book, the idea I took away was that a family needs to operate as a business, especially from the stand-point of finances.
We are now debt-free, except for our house (thank you Dave Ramsey) and are working on building an 'emergency fund' of 6 months expenses. We are 1/5 of the way there right now. But the economic slow-down that has been talked about in the news is finally hitting home. My husband works as an electrical superintendent, and while his job is secure, there is no overtime. This has happened before, at times. In his 11 years in this industry, we have experienced at least 2 occurences of economic slowdown. Both of the previous times we made awful decisions with our money and ended up with much credit card debt. We are committed to not making the same mistakes again.
That brings me to my role as the Family CFO today. I have responsibility to manage well the income that we bring home. My income is quite small compared to my husband's and is usually treated as a bonus. We refinanced our home in February to take advantage of the low interest rates. I have been scrutinizing our monthly bills and don't see a lot of room. We may be able to decrease our DirecTV subscription until things pick up, but those savings are minimal. I have been able to convince my husband that he needs to bring his lunch from home rather than eating out each day. This will save us $80 or more each month. I have re-committed myself to The Grocery Game (www.thegrocerygame.com - enter johnson6494@bellsouth.net as your referral email to get a free 5 week trial) which pairs coupons and sales for maximum savings at grocery stores and drug stores. This should keep us within our Food Budget each month with little sacrifice.
I am finding myself re-evaluating the items we spend money on and asking the question - "Is this a true need or a want?" So much is a want. I need to be content with what I have. I believe this contentment will assist in keeping spending under control. Our sermon yesterday was based in Matthew 6. We examined anxiety, especially about money, and unbelief. We are in a much healthier place from a financial standpoint during this slowdown. I am taking my job as the Family CFO very seriously. While this is not the time when this job is the most 'fun', it IS the time when my family needs me to be the most focused and aware of what is going on in our finances on a daily basis.
