Tyler empties his pockets onto the kitchen counter every night when he gets home from the plant. Keys, a tape measure, a folded receipt from Casey's, and whatever change he picked up that day. Then he sorts out the coins and drops them into the jar one at a time, slowly, so they clink. He says it's the best sound in the house. Moose, our dog, would vote for the treat bag, but nobody asked him.
The jar is a one-gallon glass pickle jar that used to belong to Tyler's grandma. When we moved into our side of a duplex here in Macon, Missouri, in January 2022, it came with us, scrubbed out, and it has sat on the counter next to the coffee maker ever since.
The rules haven't changed since that first week. Every loose coin goes in. Every $5 bill goes in too, no matter whose wallet it lands in. We don't borrow from it between counts. When we do count it, every cent goes into our savings for a house.
Who we are
I'm Lindsey. I'm 30, I grew up in Macon County, and I've been a certified pharmacy technician since 2015. I work about 28 hours a week at a retail pharmacy in town, plus some Saturdays and the odd 12-hour day. I make $17.50 an hour. I love a good deal, but I hate wasting a whole Saturday chasing one.
Tyler is 32. He's been a maintenance technician at a manufacturing plant in the area for seven years. He's quiet and handy, and he fixes our vehicles himself when he can. When he says "Let me think on it," he means no. He grew up near Kirksville, where his mom, Debbie, still lives.
We got married in October 2021 under a park pavilion. The whole wedding cost $4,800. We adopted Moose from a rescue in 2022. He's about 70 pounds of red hound mix, and he howls at the mail truck every day like he's never seen it before.
We rent a two-bedroom, one-bath unit in a 1980s duplex on the southeast side of town. It's about 900 square feet with a carport and a fenced backyard, and it costs $725 a month. It's a fine place to live. It's just not ours.
The house we're saving for
In January we sat at the kitchen table and decided, out loud, that we want to buy a house by the end of 2026. Nothing fancy. A starter house in or near Macon with a yard, some kind of garage or carport, and a kitchen where two people can stand at the same time.
On January 1, our house fund had $4,200 in it. That's what a few years of saving in fits and starts got us, jar counts included. At the end of January we moved over what was left in checking, $150, and the bank added 18 cents of interest, so this morning it says $4,350.18. I'm counting the 18 cents.
This month we put a number on it: $25,000 by the end of 2026. That should cover a down payment, closing costs and the cost of moving. From where we are now, that's $20,649.82 to go. Over the 23 months left, that's about $900 a month. We are nowhere close to that yet, and I'd rather admit it in the first post than the last.
I should be honest about the jar, too. It's a symbol more than a plan. A few months of coins and fives might come to $150 or $200. The real saving happens in bigger, duller pieces. At the end of every month, whatever's left in checking above a small cushion goes to the house fund. We have a tax refund coming, and it already has a job. And my 2017 CR-V has two payments left. After the last one in March, that $289 a month is spoken for, and you can probably guess where it's going.
But the jar still matters to us. When I'm about to buy something I don't need, I think about the jar. When Tyler gets a $5 bill back at the hardware store, he carries it to the counter like he's making a deposit at the bank.
What this blog is going to be
I started writing because I couldn't find many people saving for a house on two regular paychecks in a small town. Most of what I read assumes city rent and city prices.
Here's what you'll get: our real numbers, to the dollar. Our budget, bills, groceries, insurance, side money, and what it actually costs to live in a town of about 5,000 people. I'll show the math. I'll tell you when we mess up.
What you won't get is me telling you which bank, loan or insurance policy to pick. I count pills for a living. I'm not a financial advisor. When something gets complicated, I'll tell you what we did and why, and you can ask someone who does it for a living.
First up is our first real budget, in a shared spreadsheet that Tyler and I can both edit. I call it the sheet, and it will show up in almost every post from here on.
Thanks for reading. The jar is about a third full right now, and I'll tell you exactly what's in it when we count it this spring.
