I swear, if one more thing in our home breaks down or we get one more unexpected bill we’re going to go downhill fast.
Yeah, finances are tight – really tight, and things in our home keep breaking down!
In July our toaster oven suddenly stopped working … well, it still works if you hold the “toast” button and hold the door closed at the same time. Not a fun thing to do when your kitchen is super hot in the morning from all the sun streaming in!
Then, about three weeks ago our washing machine developed a problem. We were trying to do a wash and while the motor sounded like it was working fine, the machine wouldn’t go into a spin cycle or drain the water at the end of the washing cycle.
Our washer and dryer came with the house but they’re OLD! I think we were told that they were about 25 years old when we moved in, so add eight years and they’re 33 years old or older! Amazing that they’ve worked this long I guess, but I know we’d save a lot of money on our electricity and water bills if we could afford to buy a new washer and dryer.
The problem is, we can’t even afford to try to get the washer we have fixed!
So … for now, we’re taking our clothes to a laundromat nearby. At least with the nice weather we can save some money by hanging the clothes to dry on the line outside.
Then, the other day I went to use the vacuum and it looks like it’s motor might be shot. I have to check, but I think we have a lifetime warranty on it … but if not we need to find a new 115334 vacuum motor. Good thing we have all hardwood floors. I guess we’ll be sweeping for now.
We also have a problem with our Hot water heater. Well, not a problem with the heater itself. You see, Toronto Hydro is fazing out it’s flat rate billing and our hot water heater was connected to a separate line in the house that connected to the Flat rate line. Now we have to connect the water heater to our fuse box.
Easy enough … except we’re renting our water heater and the Electrical Authority says that because we’re renting the water heater we can’t do the electrical work ourselves. So we have to hire an authorized electrician to do the electrical work and then the electrical authority will come in and do an inspection. All in all that will cost us about $300! Yeah, for something we could do ourselves! GRRRRRR!
Obviously I’m not making as much money as I used to through my websites. I guess the recession hit the advertisers.
It’s so bad for us right now that last month I had to decide between filling all my prescriptions or paying all of our bills in full. As it turns out I didn’t fill one of my medication prescriptions. I’m going to have to make the same decisions this month and if things don’t change, by September I may not be able to get my medications at all … or maybe we won’t be able to pay the mortgage.
Needless to say I’m getting really stressed. I wish I didn’t have Crohn’s and could go back to work – like NOW.
I’m seriously thinking about putting up one of those PayPal donate buttons. I’d hate to do that and I doubt it would help, but I’m at my wits end as to what to do to change our situation.
i can feel your situation, i have experience before 🙂
Isn’t that always how it goes? You are already stretched to the max with your financial resources and BAM, another thing breaks. Sounds similar to myself. Spend $1200 on truck repairs. Save money up so I can possibly buy workout supplements and now my radiator is leaking! It’s just one thing after another. Keep your head up and do all you can to save money where you can.
Geez, tell me about it. We have a prepay electricity meter so all the power we have used over the past 2 years since we moved in has been paid for. Yesterday we got a bill posted to us asking for GBP 1788! Of course we won’t be paying it as it’s a clear mistake but it’s not the first time things like this have happened. We were charged a gas bill even though our boiler is broken and has been for a while now so how could we possibly be using gas?? I’m sure a lot of these companies are taking the mickey. To top it all off, I’m not working at the moment as the construction industry has collapsed over here and I’m only on benefits which is around GBP 45 per week!……Unbelievable.
Hope things work out ok.
BurningBoy X
Understandable Tricia, those times are never easy to deal with… I hope things have got better since this time frame.
i can understand what you are going through…. everything is happening exactly opposite in this recession. where we should be saving money to cut costs, such issues such as fixing your household pockets burn real bad hole in your pockets. it hurts. i just hope things start improving now. 🙂
Just keep going, the best you can do is save where you can – and get by. It’ll get better!