For 2018 I kept my goals for the year pretty simple:

• Have a heathy, happy baby!
• Save money for baby arrival.
• Save an emergency fund.
• Make $600 per month on Youtube with consistent video production.

I’m happy to report, at least one of those goals is fully complete! We can pay for our baby’s birth!

Our first goal of 2018 was to save up the “estimated” birth costs associated with having our baby girl in April.

I actually filmed this video last month but I’m happy to say we have accomplished this goal and have the money to pay for what we expect to be our OBGYN and hospital bills!

We’d saved up the amount estimated by my insurance to pay for both the doctor’s fees and for the separate hospital fees. It felt so good in that moment to know that we would be able to immediately pay for the baby. It’s nice to know I’ll be able to pay out of pocket for the fees associated with birth instead of adding to a debt burden just to start a family.

Ultimately we went even further than the amount saved and cash flowed the payments to the OBGYN out of our monthly budget, so we have the fully saved amount still available and ready to go for the hospital bill. This gives us a bigger buffer in case the “estimates” they gave us are incorrect or there are unexpected expense. We are ready!

(It’s a whole different discussion on whether I think it’s reasonable for people to have to pay thousands of dollars to deliver a baby in this country. Sure some insurance covers most costs, but mine doesn’t and my bill will be minimum $3,500 between the OBGYN and hospital. And that’s for a “good” employer provided health insurance plan. After living in countries where this would never happen… I am truly disappointed in the fact that families go into debt to have children.)

This experience of saving up to pay for our baby’s birth beforehand was a great reminder that paying off debt before starting a family was one of the smarter things we did.

Living without credit card debt or any debt other than a mortgage really makes life more simple.

It feels good to not have big monthly debt payments and even better to be able to save up to pay for events as they come. It feels great to know we won’t be adding debt in the form of medical bills!

Baby’s arrival inches ever closer… and we are getting ready!