As with most people I have read from here at HSB, we are striving to be debt free.  First was to pay any outstanding debts (we have no credit cards, but we had a few small bills with the hospital and doctor's office from when Matthew was hospitalized with the flu last fall), and paid them off in one quick swoop!  Yipee!!!  We have no car payments (last car was paid off 2 falls ago), no credit cards, no school loans, etc.  So we are pretty lucky about that.

All we had left in debt was our house mortgage, and since we have only lived here 3 years, that isn't going anywhere soon!  We recently got a letter saying our house payment was going down a bit because of interest rates though!  YIPEEE!  So our house payment is now under $350.00.  We continue to pay extra on our household mortgage by rounding it up to $400.00 and putting the extra towards the principal.  So far, so good.

But, about a week or so ago, my two brothers and I received a letter from Medicaid saying they were suing the estate of my parents (who died in 2006 and 2007) for the amount of $45,000!!!  When mom died (she was the last one to die), the house and vehicle was still in her name.  We all encouraged mom and dad to sign them over to my oldest brother while dad was still alive, but his pride got to him, and he refused.  So....mom and dad were on Medicare but Medicare found out about the house and the vehicle and have been fighting with us for some time to come after both.  We sold the house and the vehicle though, and the money has mostly been dispersed!!!  So now, each child has to come up with the money, or they can take my oldest brother David, (whose daughter just got married, as you can see in previous posts) to court since he is the executor of the estate. 

To make a long story short, my brother David bought me and Chris out on the house, giving us half our money last year, and half was to be dispursed this year.  He gave hubby and I our portions in full, so now we have to pay some of it back since Medicaid is coming after us.  He only gave my brother Chris half of his, but when it all boils down to it, Chris still owes David $2500.00 and we owe alot more.  Try $10,000!!!  Yeah!!! 

We have spent some of the money on fixing up the house a little, fixing my car (bent tire rod, new tires), new tools for Matthew at work, a new laptop computer (a luxury honestly), and well....a bunch of little stuff that adds up!  I wish we had put that in savings and NOT SPENT A DIME!!!  GEESH!!  A lesson learned on this one.

David is so sweet about it.  He is the best brother anyone could ever have, and he knows we are responsible and will pay him back, because he is going to end up covering our portion for us in full!!  YIKES!!!  We have $6000.00 in savings right now.  We will give David $5000.00 this weekend, keeping $1000 in saving for absolute emergencies.  So we will start making payments to him monthly for the rest.

My father was a Insurance Salesman (Medicare and Senior), and he owned his own business.  When he died he hadn't been able to work it for over 2 years, so there isn't alot of business still coming in.  However, the commissions on customers who renew their policies with dad still come in to the Estate (my oldest brother), so they are split 3 ways and dispursed almost every month.  Some months there isn't much, and other months several hundred.  It evens out to be about $500.00 a month.  So we are thinking about just giving those straight back to David and getting this debt paid off immediately.

It is nice that this debt is not from a company or collection agency, and of course David would never charge us interest, but I do so hate owing people money and especially family!!!  We are responsible for this debt and we will pay it, even if it means an extra job for me, cutting way back on expenses, etc.

So, today I am sitting down with a pad and pen, praying over the situation and asking God what we should do.  Matthew is working today, so I will fill him in on what is going on and we will both look over the finances and pary about the situation together.  I know God will guide us in this and will help us with the best path to take in getting this debt paid in full.

If you find it in your heart, please pray for us and for us to get a clear message from God on what we need to do next on this situation.

Thank you all!!!