On this 19th Valentines Day with my wife (including those while we dated), I decided to buy my wife a gift for the first time in almost nine years. (Shhh… don’t tell her as I haven’t given it to her yet.) It wasn’t because I didn’t want to but because we completely stopped giving gifts to each other almost nine years ago. And not just for Valentines Day but for all occasions. Birthdays? Nope. Anniversary? Nope. Chanukah? Nope.

For the last few months, my wife has been looking for a new to us car and while we had some marital conversations that weren’t always peaceful, we finally settled on a 2015 Mazda CX9. Not the newest of cars but a car that had a low amount of miles (61,000) and fit into our budget… of paying for the whole thing with cash.

Now some of you will disagree with this approach and that is okay. I am not here to say our way with personal finances is the only way. I am only sharing what has worked for us.

A little over a year ago, I read about this amazing savings challenge where a blog writer described how they didn’t have to worry about using money from their checking account for Christmas gifts because they had an extra $1,400 in savings that they could use for the holidays.  Now for the PFG family, savings has always been a part of our finances but we are always looking for new, innovative ways to save in a meaningful way.