Must be that time of year. For some reason, each January just towards the end I have a cash crunch. Its not that we don't have enough money because when January is over we always have excess, its simply the way things fall. This year its being caused by the expected but unknown at the time expenses of buying a new house.

What it really means is that we have to delay my DH's upping of the 401(k) contribution from its current level to 30%+ til February instead of doing it in January. In February/March we will pay off the last of the credit cards and for the first time in a while be credit card debt free!

Which of course means that the next couple of months are going to be obnoxious financially. I am not a patient person and I have to wait 3 months to pay everything off and figure out my true expenses since the transition period is the most expensive (we have rent through February and a mortgage payment starting January and don't forget duplicate utilities).

To even figure out when the cash crunch would hit since I knew we were due for one, I had to create a timeline of when things were due and when we got paid. Course all of this is moot if we manage to get bonuses this year but I don't count on them, especially in a year when the firm is trying to figure out its budget and the husband's company already did layoffs in the middle of its busy season.

I just look forward to the next 3 months being over. We will be moved out of the apartment, moved into the house, free of all the credit cards and able to build a really decent emergency and house fund for the first time ever (unless you count the house down payment but fortunately we were able to use that for the house and not an emergency).

I think I will have to wait till March to decide my 2009 goals because everything will have settled down by then. Probably will include saving like mad for expected house expenditures like windows and venting in the kitchen and bath, lol.