You always hear about how when you buy a house you need a ton of cash on hand to take care of all the unexpected expenses. Susan and I had planned ahead, but nonetheless we ended up more than 10k in the hole after the sale, mostly via the purchase of a spendy yard tractor and $6k+ in new appliances. Both were mostly necessary expenses. We definitely could have gotten by with cheaper appliances, but we figured ehh, we’re likely only going to do this once so we might as well splurge, so we bought top of the line appliances. On the tractor end of things, we could have spent at least $1500 less, but I was adamant that we should get something good and mobile. Good because all you read about is how the medium to low end ride on mowers wear out after 3-5 seasons, and we have 3 acres to mow. Mobile because the property has a lot of trees on it. I’m convinced I save an hour a week with our 4 wheel steering model.

We were smart about things – we don’t normally carry debt outside of car loans and mortgage. We research purchases using consumer reports and my endless googling. We talked through everything in the months leading up to the move. In the end though, we lucked out in terms of timing and got 0% financing from Sears on the appliances, along with a bunch of savings tied to a state program that was in play during the week we purchased, and similarly got a 0% finance plus accoutrements deal on the tractor. The downside to the finance deal was, we had a year to pay it all off. We just finished.

So that’s the good news, right? This should mean tons of free capital in the family budget. A Big screen tv, a new ipad 2, and a replacement for my blown up xbox 360, all on the menu this summer? It’s a no brainer! Err, except for two nefariously expensive words which I’ll close with:

Infant daycare  ;-(