My son graduates from high school in 3 weeks. According to the terms of my divorce decree, that is the point at which my child support will decrease. That means this is the last month I will get the amount of child support I have been used to receiving for 9 years ... $1,319. Beginning next month, I will be receiving $795, or a decrease of around 40%. Since I have only just begun to get a grip on my financial situation this year, I have not planned for this event. I'm starting to feel some fear!
I did get my car air conditioning problem repaired, although it might just be a temporary fix. I went with the mechanic who gave me the third opinion on the problem, because he actually took the time to LOOK for the real problem, his estimate was reasonable, and he actually seemed to be leveling with me honestly. The first mechanic told me to take the car to a dealership because he thought there was a problem with the car's computer and he did not have the proper equipment to diagnose/repair it. (I heard "computer" and equated that to $$$.) The second mechanic told me I needed a new evaporator core, which would necessitate removing the entire dash of the car, which would mean a charge of over $900 in labor alone! I decided to get a third opinion because the first two were different, and I couldn't see spending my entire baby EF only to find the evaporator core or computer was not the problem to begin with! The third mechanic, after spending a LOT of time looking, found a wire that wasn't connecting to the compressor, or to something else connected to the compressor. He also added freon because it was low. Why do I say this might be a temporary fix? Because I might have a leak somewhere in the system, since the freon level was low ... it might be a slooooow leak, or I might find myself back in the shop in a couple of weeks with no A/C again. So far, so good (it's been just over a week), so I am hopeful that IF I do have a leak, it will be one of those slooooow ones.
It just seems like it's always something, you know? At least I had my stimulus money this time, so I was able to use that for my repair bill and I didn't have to dip in to my baby EF!
BIG Income Cut Approaching
May 17th, 2008 at 08:47 pm
May 17th, 2008 at 08:55 pm 1211057705
May 17th, 2008 at 09:09 pm 1211058574
$500 is a big drop... but I'm sure you'll figure something out tho !! Theres loads of good posts/advise here re cutting back and generating extra incomes... since you've only just realised you'll be losing it, it is probably still a bit of a shock to you... maybe just put it out of your mind for 2/3 days and come back at it then.
I don't know if your son works, but if he does maybe he can make a token gesture to help you... I know you don't want to fleece him but even $50/$100 dollar a month contribution ( rent or paying a household bill) would be something and teach him about budgeting/the value of money.
Good Luck !!
May 17th, 2008 at 10:42 pm 1211064138
May 18th, 2008 at 12:41 pm 1211114478