Setback

I mentioned a while back that our next short-term goals included buying tires for Shane's truck without putting them on our credit card. But Shane has missed work again because of the weather and with no temp jobs coming in and my start date on the seasonal job still more than a month away, it no longer seems likely.

After driving in a recent light snow (the first time he's driven this truck and the current tires under slick conditions), he's decided it would be foolhardy to wait any longer to buy new tires. We don't have ready cash for them, so on credit they will go.

After researching durability, traction, road noise and a few other factors, including price, Shane determined what brands and styles will or won't work for his truck and what we're willing to spend.

Instead of putting them on our major credit card, however, we've decided to take advantage of our warehouse club card and their option to charge certain items for 6 months interest-free. They have some tires that meets our needs and qualify for the offer; we'll divide the balance by six and pay that much each month between now and June. Of course, we'll pay them off earlier if we're able.

This illustrates again just how important it is for us to work toward paying down debt and building up our savings. This isn't the way we wanted to handle this purchase, but it's certainly a better choice than having Shane in an accident because we didn't go ahead and get the tires.