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What Would You Do With a Windfall?


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...just for fun.

 

You open the mail today to find out you are getting a nice, but not huge windfall. An uncle died and left you some money or maybe your company was bought out and you had some stock options, or maybe you won a drawing from those Cheerios box tops you sent in. The amount is $30,000.

 

What would you do with it?

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...just for fun.

 

You open the mail today to find out you are getting a nice, but not huge windfall. An uncle died and left you some money or maybe your company was bought out and you had some stock options, or maybe you won a drawing from those Cheerios box tops you sent in. The amount is $30,000.

 

What would you do with it?

 

Vacation!!!!

 

Home Repairs!!!

 

Savings!!

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Mostly, we'd save it due to our situation.

 

**I would definitely have hubby go get our stuff from Texas.

**I would definitely buy the coat I want so I don't freeze up here this winter (thanks to everyone for suggestions. I'm gonna work through them!).

**I'd pay for my mom a ticket to come visit us in December.

**I'd pay some troubling bills.

 

And the rest would be saved. We want to keep a good bit of money available due to our circumstances. We need enough to live off of while out of work.

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Divide it among these 3 categories:

 

1) Split it between the two kids' college funds. (I always worked 2-3 jobs simultaneously while going to college, and I never finished. I don't want my daughters to have to go through what I did. There are tears involved.)

 

2) Put a down payment on a house.

 

3) Drop it into a retirement fund.

 

Or, if we want to be superfluous, buy a Prius or a minivan instead of the very sensible Corolla we will order next month.

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...just for fun.

 

You open the mail today to find out you are getting a nice, but not huge windfall. An uncle died and left you some money or maybe your company was bought out and you had some stock options, or maybe you won a drawing from those Cheerios box tops you sent in. The amount is $30,000.

 

What would you do with it?

 

Go out to eat someplace fancy tonight. :)

 

Finish getting the house ready to sell.

 

Pay off our student loans.

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Romodel my 30+ year old kitchen. I have to turn my oven on with a screwdriver.

 

:lol:

 

Not to laugh at the situation, but that gave me a chuckle. I've been there before. Maybe not with my oven, but with other appliances on life support.

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We actually had this happen in 2001. I opened the mail one day to find a $20,000 check from my grandmother, who was passing on money she inherited from my great-aunt (she said she didn't need it, which was true). I just about threw up, put littlest dd in the car, and drove straight to dh's office. Dd is named after my grandmother and great-aunt, btw.

 

We were able to buy our first house just a few months later :) I used to say thank-you to my great-aunt and grandmother every time I entered that house. We never thought we'd be able to buy a house as we didn't have the down payment money saved. I still get verklempt thinking about it :)

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:lol:

 

Not to laugh at the situation, but that gave me a chuckle. I've been there before. Maybe not with my oven, but with other appliances on life support.

 

 

That's alright. I laugh at the situation, too. It goes along with the stove. The knob to the big burner is broken. I also can't can on it because the hood is only about 20 inches above the stove. The refrigerator will freeze my fruit even on the lowest setting. We've been living here a year and still haven't decided whether to fix what is broken, redo the whole kitchen (which is very poorly laid out), or live with it until we are transferred again.

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We just got some money--not that much but we:

 

1. Fully funded our emergency fund---we now have 6 months of living expenses in a money market account earning 4% interest.

 

2. Pay off the car loan--our only debt as the house is paid for

 

3. We tithed 10% but instead of to our church we carefully chose some missionaries/special funds that we gave to.

 

4. Set aside 10% to spend as we wanted---I am getting a new computer this week. We will likely use some for a vacation, etc.

 

Nothing huge or exciting but we are now sitting debt free with 6 months living expenses in the bank and are ready to focus more on investing for retirement yet the 10% we kept to spend is still a really nice "treat".

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With 30K, we would finish paying off dh's car and split the rest between savings and the mortgage. Our goal is to have everything paid for in the next 10 years and to be good stewards of our money. We have our "play" money every month...larger sums, like dh's bonus, go toward the ultimate goal of having 100K in savings and owing NOTHING by 2020.

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Hmm.

 

Pay off all debts.

Get Wolf and I the dental work we need.

Winter gear/entire wardrobes for the whole family.

 

After that, I'd throw it into the best savings situation as possible (T bills, or whatever) so that whenever WCB is done with me, I could go apply for pre-approval on a mortgage and go farm hunting :D

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Pay off credit card

 

Pay off van

 

Get new appliances/furniture to replace the ones that are broken beyond repair (not worried about fancy, just want something that works)

 

New windows -- seen that commerical where the couple is sitting on couch with coats on and curtains blowing. The woman tells hubby to close the window and he says "it is closed". That is about how it is here.

 

Emergency Fund

 

Give some to church

 

Rest put on mortage

 

Yeah I dream about getting a windfall but know it isn't going to happen.

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$30,000 would be nice but not a windfall. Now $100,000 might get me very excited!!

 

I hear that! Makes me feel really old. It wasn't so long ago that THREE thousand dollars would have seemed like more money than I'd know what to do with...now I'm sitting here thinking "$30,000...that wouldn't really go that far..."

:lol:

 

Not that I'd turn up my nose at $30,000 by any means!

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I hear that! Makes me feel really old. It wasn't so long ago that THREE thousand dollars would have seemed like more money than I'd know what to do with...now I'm sitting here thinking "$30,000...that wouldn't really go that far..."

:lol:

 

Not that I'd turn up my nose at $30,000 by any means!

 

I did specify nice, but not huge. ;)

 

So here's what I've decided to do:

 

5,000 - fund my wife's Roth IRA for the year.

3,000 - added to a mutual fund we own

8,000 - a money market set aside to buy a second car in a couple of years

2,000 - a stock that I'd been eying that pays a nice, safe dividend

3,000 - the vacation fund :D

9,000 - I'm saving this in the bank until taxes are figured out, just in case. We had a nasty tax bill last spring that caused some stress.

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Move back to NC now, instead of waiting until next spring. It would give us a good cushion while we get settled. I would also buy my dh a new (to him) vehicle to drive - the rusted out old minivan he is driving now is terrible! I would also pay cash for braces for my 12yo (his teeth/jaw are BAD and it is going to be expensive to fix.)

 

After we got settled (and I got a job), I would use it to pay some debts that need to be paid.

 

$30,000 would be a HUGE windfall for us and could very well turn our lives around even faster than our current plan.

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I did specify nice, but not huge. ;)

 

So here's what I've decided to do:

 

5,000 - fund my wife's Roth IRA for the year.

3,000 - added to a mutual fund we own

8,000 - a money market set aside to buy a second car in a couple of years

2,000 - a stock that I'd been eying that pays a nice, safe dividend

3,000 - the vacation fund :D

9,000 - I'm saving this in the bank until taxes are figured out, just in case. We had a nasty tax bill last spring that caused some stress.

 

Sounds like a solid plan!

 

Realizing I never answered the original question - I think we'd upgrade to a minivan sooner than we'd planned, pay debt, and move.

 

And buy books...so many books...

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Oooo. I like this post. $30,000 sounds like a good chunk of change to me! We would....

 

Pay off remaining debt. We're very close, so it wouldn't take much.

 

New roof. (Also wouldn't take much, as we got an unexpected royalty check in the mail so we've already got about half.)

 

Vacation.

 

College savings and retirement for the rest.

 

:)

 

Cat

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