Well, I’m back from vacation now and still have the itch to move back. I think I can tough it out here for awhile, so I’ll just keep thinking good thoughts about where I live now and try not to think of all the wonderful activities I miss back home. Thanks to all my lovely guest posters for the posts this week!  You rock!  Here are some of my favorite posts from the blogosphere this week: Mrs. Micah presents Two Steps to Protect your WordPress Blog. She is the guru when it comes to blogs! Kacie at Sense to Save is moving!  She was trying to weigh out the pros and cons and in the end, the new place won.  I think it’s a good decision solely that she’ll have a washer and dryer.  I think there’s nothing better than that! The “no spend summer” starts at Living Well on Less.  Karen and her hubby are trying to go a whole summer without spending excess money.  She’s inspired me try cash budgeting again.  It’s worth a shot! J. Money at [...]

In January, I wrote about how we’re not refinancing our mortgage. Well, I kinda lied. We’re kicking around the idea right now. The rates just have been enticing and I want a piece of them! There are a few problems, though, and I’d love your input on what you think we should do. Here’s some background information: We currently have a first mortgage of around $117,000 at 6.375% for 30 years (28 approximately remaining).  Our payment is around $953.00 a month which includes escrow.  We have a second mortgage of around $20,000 with an interest rate of 6.875% for 20 years (18 remaining).  We put 5% down when we purchased the house two years ago. What we’re thinking of refinancing to is a Home Equity Loan with an interest rate of 5.59% fixed for 30 years.  Doing so would lower our monthly payment down to around $1,000, saving us around $130 a month.  Right now, to me, having that extra cash flow is awesome.  There are a few things I’m concerned about though. -It would extend 10 years on our [...]

This is a guest post from my friend Kacie at Sense to Save. Be sure to stop by her blog and say hi! It’s true that having a baby will impact your finances. Naturally, you’ll have to budget for diapers, gear, clothing, college and all else that comes with having a child. But surprisingly, having a baby can have a positive impact on your finances. My son is just five months old, and his mere presence has helped us save money in a variety of ways. 1. Our entertainment spending is more purposeful. In these early months, we haven’t gone out to eat in a ‘fancy’ restaurant, gone to movies or enjoyed expensive entertainment. Instead, we visit baby-friendly cheaper restaurants and venues or just plain stay home. Our entertainment spending has gone down as a result. As he gets older, we’ll seek frugal forms of entertainment and save the expensive restaurants for special occasions. 2. We had extra motivation in becoming debt-free. We reasoned that the sooner we were out of debt, the sooner we’d be able to increase our [...]