Another bloggy friend in need of advice

When I went to your new blog and read about what you are doing I thought to myself "What a great idea...for other people." Well, guess what? Less than a week after you start your fabulous blog, I feel the need to put it out there.

I am having financial difficulties and am at a loss as to solving these difficulties. I got divorced six years ago and got a healthy settlement, I purchase my townhouse with a significant down payment, bought a car and furnished our new home and had dwindled my savings to around $10,000.

I have been in a relationship with a wonderful man for five years and we live together. He has been supportive in all ways including financial. I probably should not have qualified for my mortgage when I got it 4 1/2 years ago but at the time I was receiving child support for three children and now I get no child support.

Last November I got laid off from a decent paying job. I went on unemployment and started semi-looking for work. At that time Dave had a good job and was bringing in more than enough money to pay all the bills. His boss is a jerk and sometimes wouldn't pay the guys until Saturday and sometimes not until Monday but they always got paid.

About three months ago he kept telling me his boss was jerking him around with his pay and week after week I got no money or little money from him. My savings was slowing dwindling each and every week and my unemployment ran out in October so I had no income. After about six weeks of this bullshit I lost it.

Dave finally came clean with the fact that he had had $10,000 cash of his boss's money stolen out of his car and his boss was only giving him a couple of hundred a week until he got his money back. Now, he is in the produce business and lots of times he has had $80-100,000 cash to pay for produce so him having the cash is not unlikely. What really, really bothered me was he lied time and time again about his paychecks.

As soon as I found out I started really looking for a job. I found one within a few days of starting to search but for 2/3 of what I was making before I was laid off but I felt a job was a job. Now, as I said before, Dave's boss is a jerk and his expectations of Dave got more and more. He would be loading trucks until 2 or 3 in the morning and he has started his day at 8 a.m. His cell phone never stopped ringing, day or night. I finally told him it was either me or the phone in the bedroom because I was tired of being woke up in the middle of the night. And I also told him he needed to let his boss know he was not going to work 24 hours a day. Well when he told his boss that his boss fired him. I am happy to have him home evenings again and his new cell phone is blissfully quiet.

Now, here is my situation - I have $180 in my savings, $780 in my checking and a job that I bring home a bit less than $400 a week and monthly bills of approx $2,500 per month. And Dave with no job and the job market here sucks right now. What should I do?

Try and sell my place? I have so much clutter and junk in closets it would take me forever to get it ready and what do I do with the junk in the meantime? And with the market being so bad who knows how long it will take to sell.

Stop making my payments and let the house go back to the bank?

Take in a roommate? (Again, the clutter becomes an issue as well as two kids at home and three pets).

Get my two almost-grown children involved? Since I have always had a bit of money in the bank the kids think I have money to spare.

I am so frustrated and worried about my situation and will consider any and all advise.