How about medical bills - I mean serious medical bills? The kind you acrue after hospital visits and do not have insurance?

How about husband being laid-off 11 months ago. Sure, he would work at McDonald's - he has a wonderful work ethic. But, unemployment pays more than full-time at McD's.

I work full-time to cover the rent. We live a small affordable house. We spend little.

It's not always about over spending or living beyond your means.

Everyone has a different story.

In our case its a combination of both. Dh has 2 masters degrees and we ran up debt while in school. We started a church and ran a homedaycare so i could stay home. That grew to three and we bought 2 vehicles we could afford at the time. Now we no longer have church( not financially able to support it anymore) /d am back down to watching kids in my home. I jst lost 800 month as one family moved away. My dh is working pt for minimum wage and the Lord has blessed us with a baby after 14yrs of not having one. So im home again as I believe thats Gods wil. She is almost 2. We are struggling to meet basic needs. Some is due to poor decisions but most is not. The economy has shut down my businesses as families are getting laid off. Our God says ive never seen the righteous forsaken or His seed begging for bread. He is providing our Needs. Praise be to Him!

I live in a rural area where there are only a handful of companies that employ a large number of people. When Eagle brand foods moved their factory to Mexico, 80 families were forced to commute long distances to new jobs or leave the area. We had fundraisers for those families that were stuck with a mortgage on a house they couldn't sell. Many of them moved and had to carry the mortgage on their house here for years while paying for their new home.
Stroehmann went to Mexico and so did Hershey's. Less and less is made in America these days.

We have a factory here that makes standard pipe fittings that has continually laid off workers because there is no work. There is no work because there is a ship from China anchored off the East coast with a factory on board that makes standard size pipe fittings that only America uses. Everywhere else uses metric. They can do it cheaper. The jobs just keep leaving and as more people become desperate for work, they will work for less and less to get the job. The bills remain whether you hold a job or not and not many have planned for hard times.

Although I am not in a terrible position right now, I don't feel I am immune to it and anything can happen in a blink of an eye, so we have chosen to prepare for an emergency. We have purchased extra food on sale over time and put it away and extra hygiene products and put them away. We've all been so dependent on the 24 hour grocery stores that we can just run out on the spur of the moment and pick something up that many people don't keep a simple pantry anymore.

My husband's mother lived through the great depression and she wasted nothing. She also has said to him that she really didn't feel the hardships that many people speak of because she lived on a farm that was self sustaining, so their way of life didn't change.

I often wonder with all the business closings, what would be the best line of work when my children are adults. I'm very thankful that even though my husband has an incredible education that he can still change the oil in his truck himself or fix a leaky faucet. This kind of knowledge is very valuable as well. My 6 year old dd has been very persistent in learning how to cook by herself. Also, another good skill to have. The more you can do yourself, the less you will have to pay someone else to do it for you.

People everywhere are feeling the crunch of the economy. My dh won't have a credit card. He is against owning one. He was appalled when we tried to buy gas one day and the attendant was not allowed to accept cash! Credit only!

Prepare for the worst and be thankful if you never have to use your resources.

Our debt started when we got married. My dh was one that paid his credit card bills every month in full, which worked well when he was a bachelor. He had saved what he thought was enough to furnish a household, but had always rented furnished apts. while moving a lot with the Navy (at that point it was every 6 months) Well he was basing his estimates of what things cost on what his parents told him. Well they live in small town IA where they bought their house in 1973 for $30,000 and where new furniture etc. was fairly inexpensive yet. We moved to WA and although we eventually got navy housing we had to start out in an apartment and even a small 1 bedroom one was about $800 a month. My dh didn't want to buy used furniture because he'd never had new anything but it ended up eating the entire $5000 he'd saved because we literally had nothing, no couch, no bed, no tables, nothing and things cost a lot more then what he had thought. After that the Navy screwed up his check (they forgot to take his mess bill dues out) so for 2 months we lived on $184 every 2 weeks. We haven't always spent our money wisely but we do have expenses that most think we don't have. BAH isn't always enough to cover rent and electric/gas like it should. My dh's uniforms are not free, he does not get an allotment for them. This may seem reasonable but uniforms are expensive and then you times like now where DH just bought all new ones to replace 8 year old ones that were wearing out a year ago and then the Navy decides to change the daily uniform and we have to put out another $1000 for all the new stuff again. He can't use the old ones anymore and we can't sell them because nobody else can use them either. He does not get free food onboard ship, he has to pay to eat there which is about $250/month when they're at sea. It's not a lot but most think we get all that without having to pay it.

We also at one point bought a house in WI, which ended up being a huge money pit. The inspector said everything was up to snuff but within 6 months we had to redo almost all of the plumbing and most of the electrical and put in new windows. We didn't expect to have to do all of that so quickly.

We are working now to get ourselves out, but me working isn't an option. I would make so little after taking out childcare it's just not worth it. Dh is also not willing to put the kids back in school so I can work. He'd rather be in debt a little longer instead.

I guess people end up in debt for different reasons.

This post was edited on Nov 05, 2009 08:16 PM

This WAS our situation:

We've always saved our money and paid cash for things we want/need. We paid cash for both our cars, no credit card debt, only owned on our house. We bought a house that was atleast $100,000 less than we could have afforded. Basically living under our means, not above. We had plenty of money in the bank, over a yrs. salary. We also had a huge chunk of money invested for retirement.

Well, this is our CURRENT situation:

My husband works in the contruction field, and as we all know,
the field is VERY.......slow right now. Nothing is being built in our area. It's completely dead right now. Very little money is coming in because of the bad economy. Therefore we've had to live off our savings account for over a yr. No one is hiring, we have very little cash left so now we've been charging stuff on a credit card just to get by.
I also have medical bills from a recent surgery and we lost about 1/2 our inventment money last yr when the market almost crashed.

Long story short.......we thought we did everything right.
Saved our money, paid cash, lived under our means.
It just goes to show, sometimes it doesn't matter how well you prepare, you just never know what the future holds.

Judy

nm

This post was edited on Nov 07, 2009 09:45 PM

I haven't read other people's post but my husband and I are going through the transforming debt into wealth program right now - One of the things he mentions is that nobody teaches their kids about money and nobody teaches the downside of debt - as a matter of fact, we have become a culture of instant gratification and you must have things right away where my grandparents waited until they could afford it. I don't blame advertising or marketing or the stores - they are out to make a living and shame on us for falling for it. But if you watch anything on Tv,etc., it is all about instant gratification.
I'll give you a few thoughts....
Neither set of my grandparents incurred debt.
My parents wanted something and they bought it and with credit if need be and never discussed it with us.. I believe now that my mom went to work to pay off those debts and to pay for our college. They pulled out of it and were able to retire just fine.
But nobody ever taught me anything about money. I even worked in credit for years and saw what it did for people. But I got enticed into the got to have it now and many times it was gifts for others - part of my personality I guess. My credit is excellent but we are gung ho at my house on getting totally out of debt including the mortgage.
The mindset is to enjoy today and pay for it tomorrow - it is culturally acceptable. To be able to pay for it first is not and I think there are a few generations that have been raised with that mindset. I also think we have fallen into the trap of do and buy for our kids - I'm cheap compared to most people I know when it comes to parties and such for kids but my kids have gotten far more than I did when I was young and a I never thought I went without. I think a lot of people do it though to ease their conscience over both parents working full time and kids being in daycare and before care and after care. (I use to work full time and my kids were in that situation so I understand the urge).
For many it is an addiction - for some people they can't exercise or eat right and fight weight gain. For some people, they can't get their debt under control. Unfortunately, there are very few people that will tell you to lose weight for your health or to get out of debt for your future.

So -maybe this helps to understand?

We have always avoided debt if at all possible. We own one vehicle that has been paid off for over 7 years, don't put stuff on credit, and live within our means. I h.a.t.e. owing money!!!

However, the unexpected always comes up.

For us, in July our son had to have an emergency lifesaving surgery that cost over $25,000. Thank goodness insurance is covering $19,000 of it, leaving us with $6000 owed. I am actually grateful for that debt, as it means my son is healthy again. ; )

The majority of folks I know are not in debt. Not one of my siblings is in debt (other than a mortgage), my father, my mother, grandparents on both sides. We all try our absolute best to buy only what we can afford, save for what we want, and pray that the money will be there when the unexpected hits.

I think a lot of people are like that and don't ever intend to get into debt. But once something comes up that costs money and can't be avoided, it starts a snowball effect.