I’ve been a Dave Ramsey follower for 9 years now. Granted, I’ve never made it past baby step 3 because I’m a selfish spendthrift, but I’ve kept my debt load admirably low throughout that period. We’ve pretty much saved-up for everything we bought in that time, aside from our Honda Odyssey, and I swore with that one that I’d let that sick, in-debt feeling stay with me so I’d never make that mistake again.
Okay, that lasted right until Grace was born.
Grace is my (hopefully) last daughter, born October last year. Whitney and I rediscovered sleepless nights and random pain from sacking an infant and her jetsam around. We also discovered that the mattress she brought with her to the marriage was on its last legs, mainly because I didn’t put a third slat beneath the middle of the box spring. That pillow-top beauty was sagging like my 401k back in 2008.
So, a new mattress & box spring was in order. We set a budget. We shopped. Then, we went into the Healthy Back Store to look around, and we blew the budget. Big time. “Zero interest for 2 years!” they cried. So, I signed on the dotted line, after a hilarious identity verification call with GE Capital in which I threw down with the woman on the line that my MINI Cooper wasn’t green or white, it was BOTH British Racing Green (Metallic) and White. But I digress.
This is the bed we got:
Yes, it’s like sleeping on a large sponge, and no, you can’t have it back. I slept on my son’s bed last night and my back’s been killing me all day. Since we got the Tempurpedic, the arthritis in my back hasn’t been any trouble at all.
Still, there was the debt aspect. Even at 0%, I was in debt to GE Capital. So, as of yesterday, we paid off GE capital and my bed that I financed now belongs to us.