The Money Mustache Community
General Discussion => Throw Down the Gauntlet => Topic started by: use2betrix on December 08, 2018, 10:26:20 AM
-
My spending was not great this year. I made a ton, and had over a 50% savings rate, but I should be doing way better.
I brush it off because my income is high and I’m working in a less desirable part of the country (for me) so I spend more to do stuff to make up for it. I’ve taken sabbaticals and know I can spend less when I’m not working, but for future FIRE planning, I think my discretionary spending needs to be kept under better control.
I’m throwing down the gauntlet here to see if anyone else wants to hold themselves more accountable in 2019. If there’s some takers, my goal is at a minimum to list total spending for the end of each month. We can break it down into as little or as much detail as we feel comfortable with. Can add savings rate if we want, tips, tricks, advice, etc. If you don’t want to list numbers, could just do savings rate.
I think the much-needed face punches and accountability may help out some. We’ll see..
-
This may be just what I need. I'm on a pretty low income compared to most people on this forum (although slightly above average for my own country) and my savings rate is pretty high, but recently my spending has gone up significantly. Every single month it feels like there are "good reasons" to spend more, but I haven't made much progress in Q3 and Q4. I need to start making progress again.
Reasons why I've been spending more than usual:
- I started a new job 10 weeks ago and I get paid weekly instead of monthly now, which had more of an impact than I thought it would
- Commuting costs went up due to new job (but so did my wages)
- I started my own business this year and had to invest a bit (probably a 3-figure loss over 2018 and I've bought most supplies now)
- All of my stuff broke at once - new glasses, new sunglasses, need to buy a new laptop + some new office outfits
- Theft - lost a bike, a wallet and most recently a phone through theft this year and I'm not careless, crime has just increased
- Price of groceries, electricity and natural gas are significantly higher than a few years back
-
I'm in. I've been spending a lot on work to my house this year, some of which has come from income and some from capital, so I've really no idea how much I've spent on running costs. I have a fixed income (albeit a fairly generous one) so it's information I really should have.
I'm not promising much in the way of detail, though. I had too much of budgeting to the last penny in my penurious youth and I'm not going back to it now.
-
I'm in. I've been spending a lot on work to my house this year, some of which has come from income and some from capital, so I've really no idea how much I've spent on running costs. I have a fixed income (albeit a fairly generous one) so it's information I really should have.
I'm not promising much in the way of detail, though. I had too much of budgeting to the last penny in my penurious youth and I'm not going back to it now.
When I first found MMM I logged every single expense in a book for over a year. It was helpful but now overkill.
This time I’ll just be collecting data from personal capital and adjusting some slightly more than PC allows.
-
I'm in!
2018 will wrap up with an ~82% savings rate, and my goal for 2019 is 80% as well. I have a decent income, with very low spending for a HCOL area ($18k this year).
Spend a ton of time over on ERE, and feel like I'm definitely on the more hardcore end of the spectrum accoring to MMM community standards (these days).
-
Exactly what I need. I'm in.
I'm highly increasing my pre-tax contributions to investment accounts to give myself as small of a take-home paycheck as I possibly can.
2018 I saved mostly post-tax dollars, which is awesome as well, but it also provides for more "wiggle room" and it makes it possible to have a more flexible budget.
Most of my money bleeds in the form of travel, restaurants and alcohol (I enjoy craft beer and visiting breweries) so that will be my focus. I tend to have a weekend a month where I travel and spend a lot on restaurants/beer and then I am good about cooking at home, meal prepping, etc in between. So I will have to either decrease the frequency of these "binge expenses" or not go as hard when I do.
Excited to be held accountable!!
-
I need to do this. I save a lot but I also spend a lot. I need to cut back on the non-necessary spending. Shopping trips with friends where I buy stuff I don't need, etc.
This also goes with my need to minimize the "stuff" in my house. I'm going to definitely try to be more conscious of brainless spending in 2019.
-
This sounds like something I could do with.
This year has been a bit all over the place. I was saving a bunch of money, but I tend to get too OCD and was saving too much (meaning I wasn't leaving enough for bills). About a month ago I got myself YNAB and that was a big face punch. I'm getting better control of it now and I'm hoping to start 2019 on a bit more of an even keel. Another issue was that we spent our savings renovating an inherited house (which will be a nice bit of money once sold, but right now it's just left us with no cash).
My plan for now is just to stick with 401k contributions, and not do any after tax saving until my bills are paid ahead a month and we have a cash fund again.
-
I'm in!
2017 spending was $36,724.93 (yes I track to the penny)
2018 spending is tracking to come out to ~$29,500
I'm very pleased that I have been able to reduce my spending by about $7k this year and want to continue in that direction.
2019 goal is to get spending down to around $25K, monthly goal is $2,100. Assuming I reach this goal and continue making the same or more income my savings rate should get up to around 50% or more.
-
HP, curious how you spend so little while living in Boston?
-
Well it's mostly due to my mortgage being super low. My half is $400 a month, (DH and I keep everything separate) If I lived on my own my yearly costs would easily be an additional $12-15k.
Here's my year to date spending;
$4,885.82 Mortgage
$3,241.89 Health/Dental
$1,746.24 Utilities
$2,859.14 Groceries
$833.47 Gas
$225.39 Car Maintenance
$1,325.00 Car Insurance
$1,254.04 Cellphone (for me and DD)
$1,479.80 Pets
$2,226.98 Dining Out
$713.25 Entertainment
$670.00 Donations
$138.97 Fitness
$278.08 Clothes
$258.18 Household items
$1,945.38 Travel
$209.44 Gifts
$1,010.91 Skiing
$2,840.58 Misc
$28,142.54 Total Spend
-
Thanks for sharing! We have had some really expensive years due to our own medical expenses and vet expenses. But we are much older than many on the forum.
-
Yes the vet can get pretty expensive. I have an 18 year old cat and last year she had a vet bill over $4K! thankfully she pulled through and has been fine since.
-
Definitely in for this. 2018 ended up insanely expensive. A huge part of that was accounted for with massive out of pocket medical (2 IVF cycles) and prepping our house to sell (replaced flooring, etc). 2019 will have at least 1 more round of IVF, but I'd like to keep spending under control otherwise.
-
Definitely in for this. 2018 ended up insanely expensive. A huge part of that was accounted for with massive out of pocket medical (2 IVF cycles) and prepping our house to sell (replaced flooring, etc). 2019 will have at least 1 more round of IVF, but I'd like to keep spending under control otherwise.
The good news is that no face punches will be given for those spending money trying to have a baby. I may be in a similar boat in 2019!
-
I'm in. This will require me to actually look at all of my spending. A fair amount it on "good enough" cruise control. FIRE is only a couple years away, and I really need to better asses.
-
Definitely in for this. 2018 ended up insanely expensive. A huge part of that was accounted for with massive out of pocket medical (2 IVF cycles) and prepping our house to sell (replaced flooring, etc). 2019 will have at least 1 more round of IVF, but I'd like to keep spending under control otherwise.
The good news is that no face punches will be given for those spending money trying to have a baby. I may be in a similar boat in 2019!
Damn, sorry to hear that! If you (or your wife!) ever want to talk about the infertility crap, feel free to reach out! It’s never easy, but it’s easier with support and community.
-
Sure! I've clearly been away from the site for too long, I just ran an expense report and... yikes. Even removing stuff that isn't an "expense" as such (reimbursed items) we are NOT on track to save anything besides 401k contributions. Yuck. I posted elsewhere about downsizing, and will do my best to make that happen, it would be interesting to see monthly spending before and after that change!
I will also set up our finance tracking to have accurate and sharable reports. (We only "saved" $4k according to my report, but that counts $9k in student loan payoffs as an expense, etc) - TBH this year has been so crazy I don't have a good handle on what our overall finances looked like, only short term items. I'll get that fixed and report back in February!
-
I’m definitely in for this challenge in 2019. We spent an enormous amount of money this year and I could really use some accountability for keeping things in check.
Our biggest issue is definitely food spending. If we could keep that under control next year, that’d be ideal! I’ll drop more specifics once this month is over.
-
I'm in. I tracked my spending for the first time in 2018 (thanks YNAB). It's been kind of a facepunch. I'm hoping to use what I learned in 2018 to improve my spending habits even more in 2019.
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
-
Definitely in. I'm going through the process of seeing where all of our money went for 2018. I've always meant to add it all up, but never really have. I'm going to spend a day or two over Christmas break and get the final tally, then see which areas can be cut. We do spend a fair amount on travel and recently spent around $10k on home renovations/improvements. 2019 will have a fair amount for travel still, but the house is nearly where we want it. Looking forward to this!
-
I think I need to join in. I did track my expenses in 2016, forgotten what my final number was. All I know is that 2019 will be quite a wild year for me, both at work and in my private life.
My food spending will be interesting to track (well, at least for me!). I know this is my weakness and I'm currently getting help for binge eating disorder. My food spending was crazy. Of course, the spending isn't the cause of the real problem here, and tracking probably won't really solve anything. Still, saving on food might be an extra incentive/reward to help me on my journey.
As for work, January will bring a nice bump in pay - an 11% increase. Thanks, unions! I need to guard against lifestyle creep. Two factors to mitigate this: 1: I'll be in a higher tax bracket and 2: sales tax on everything is going up. So even groceries will get more expensive.
All in all, I would feel better if I had a good grip on things. 2019 will be the year to get some more control.
-
Definitely in!
-
I'm in!
Every single month it feels like there are "good reasons" to spend more
Same, each individual transaction seems like a good idea at the time but the broader picture is not as good as it could be.
-
I have a theory that just tracking all your incomes and expenses manually changes your relationship with money simply through paying more attention to it. All without any struggle of budgeting (=setting limits on your spending).
With time you start understanding where your money goes, and you think about each expense twice: first when you make it, and later when you record it and see how it affects your situation.
Through this, you optimize your spending for the ultimate goal of the most happiness with the least amount spent.
Recording incomes and expenses is a really simple task compared to the overall "earn more and spend less". But it works. Been tracking my finances for 7.5 years now, it helped me a lot.
-
I like this idea. In a way my 2018 spend/earn ratio was better than I thought, my income (after taxes and employer deductions) was around $72,000 and my expenses at $44,300. Yet, somehow I feel like I don't have much left each month. This was a spendy year, with a new home, a move, and some family/travel stuff that was costlier than I'd like. I also gave pretty freely to charity. I was strict about sticking to a shopping ban (no new clothes, shoes etc for myself unless things were falling apart) and food (not buying lunch, coffee, dinner) and those sort of social spendy things (like spa, drinks, movies) that can add up.
The only thing is I track actual income and expenses with Mint and it doesn't always catch things that are intra-bank transfers (like IRA contributions) or reimbursed (like healthcare expenses). It matches up pretty closely to the Excel budget I set for expenses, however, on the Excel budget my income is $62,487.
How do you like to track expenses? I just use Mint because it's free and easy to set up since my expenses are rarely cash but it'd be helpful to increase the accuracy for 2019 so I can really drill down and see the larger trends of useless spending.
-
Oooh, maybe...
-
How do you like to track expenses? I just use Mint because it's free and easy to set up since my expenses are rarely cash but it'd be helpful to increase the accuracy for 2019 so I can really drill down and see the larger trends of useless spending.
I track all expenses on a Google Sheet. Since I use a credit card for 99% of transactions I just pull up the credit card transactions every few days and plug them in. It's a little time consuming but I think it helps me really see where every penny is going through out the month.
-
I'm in. We spent a fortune in 2018, and have 2 more kids weddings this year. I have to get a grip and increase savings.
-
While we all know savings rate is king, and it feels good to have a high savings number, I just constantly remind myself that the less you can spend and remain happy and comfortable, the less you need for fire. Living off $40k/hr vs $70k/years means the difference of $750,000 needed for FIRE based off the 4% rule.
My goal is petty compared to many here, but if I can hit $6,000/mo or less for spending for at least half the months of 2019, I’ll be happy. At $6k/mo that puts me at around a 70% savings rate. In another post I’ll break down my monthly expenses. I don’t have any standard expenses I plan on changing, it’s all the random unplanned for spending I need to cut back on. Clothes, toys, expensive date nights, etc. I saved about $110k in 2018 which is great, but at my spending level it’s a long ways to go.
My long term goal is I think in FIRE I can be content with $5k/mo and a paid off house, just need to start getting a little closer to that number.
-
Count me in! Last year, I spent about $15,000, so $1,250/month on average. I'm planning to retire at the end of 2019, so I'd like to set an ambitious goal to start my new life on a good note. So for 2019, my goal will be to spend no more than $12,000. If I spend more than $1,000 in a month, I'll try to make up for it the next month.
Just this month, I got my cell phone bill down to $0, and I also passed on a trip to Europe with my wife and her family in the New Year. So I think I'm off to a good start! However, last month I also bought a backpack that I don't really need. I think some accountability would help me avoid making these kinds of unneeded purchases. Thanks for starting this thread! It's exactly what I need for 2019. I'll post my monthly stats here to keep myself accountable :)
-
Count me in! Last year, I spent about $15,000, so $1,250/month on average. I'm planning to retire at the end of 2019, so I'd like to set an ambitious goal to start my new life on a good note. So for 2019, my goal will be to spend no more than $12,000. If I spend more than $1,000 in a month, I'll try to make up for it the next month.
Just this month, I got my cell phone bill down to $0, and I also passed on a trip to Europe with my wife and her family in the New Year. So I think I'm off to a good start! However, last month I also bought a backpack that I don't really need. I think some accountability would help me avoid making these kinds of unneeded purchases. Thanks for starting this thread! It's exactly what I need for 2019. I'll post my monthly stats here to keep myself accountable :)
That’s super impressive! Would love to see a breakdown of expenses. Are those both yours and your wife’s expenses?
-
That’s super impressive! Would love to see a breakdown of expenses. Are those both yours and your wife’s expenses?
Thanks! No, those are just my expenses. I haven't tracked the details of all my spending. I just know I spent about $15,000 because my paycheques after all deductions totalled about $65,000, and I've automated exactly $50,000 to get transferred into my investments haha.
Here's an approximate break down of my expenses that stayed more or less constant from month to month:
- rent+utilities+insurance: $480
- internet + mobile: $30
- groceries: $90
- total: $600
That means I spent an average of $650 per month on things that vary a lot from month to month, including travelling, restaurants, fitness classes, gifts, entertainment, clothes, and public transportation. Mostly travelling though: I went on two overseas trips (one to the Philippines only and one to the Philippines, Australia, and Hawaii). I just chatted with my wife, and I think we'll be increasing our grocery budget to $100 each in 2019 (to make up for eating out less). But I also got my phone bill down from $10/month to $0, so my fixed expenses will stay at $600.
I'll track my variable expenses at a granular level in 2019, which should help me keep them reined in.
You mentioned in the original post that you think your discretionary spending needs to be kept under better control. Do you have any plans yet on what you're going to cut down on?
-
Copying the first numbers from another thread where I had already posted this:
I spend almost 2000 euro more this year than last year. I had to investigate where it went:
- a new fancy-brand tent, 800 euro
- a new smartphone, 300 euro
- a new refrigerator for the cabin, 450 euro
- financial contribution to keeping the shop at our cabin alive, 250 euro
- extra unplanned income taxes, 450 euro
- food, 400 euro
- home, 750 euro.
For home, I discovered that living in our house has become more expensive. I now pay for a property tax and I pay more for electricity, garbage, water and private road than last year.
I did save 400 euro on clothes and 400 euro on health related costs (doctor, dentist, medicine), compared to last year.
Total number for 2018, minus the following 2 weeks:
Nett income: 49,505 euro (working 80% from September, minus extra income tax from last year).
Expenses: 19,418 euro
Savings in the stock market: 42,150 euro (including some money we received from previous owner of our home, not registered as income)
Average spending per month: 1,618 euro.
By far the biggest spending posts:
Home: 5,000 euro (26%)
Food: 5,000 euro (26%)
Transportation: 4200 euro (21%)
Smallest post:
Clothes 78 euro (0.4%)
Spending 19,418 / Income 49,505 = 0,39. So I saved 61% of my personal income.
Mind that these are my numbers only, as DH doesn't track his expenses.
I buy almost all the food and most of the fuel, because I use bonus programs, which my DH refuses to use. I pay most of the bills for the house, because I have better automated payments. So I really hope that DH has spent a lot smaller mount of his higher income, so that our total savings rate will be higher. I will ask him to calculate his numbers in January. Last year we saved 75%, while working full time.
Our food spending is quite high. We make practically all the food at home from scratch. But we like some fancy ingredients, like good cheese, good stock and sometimes fancy croissants as a treat. Further, we live in an extremely expensive country. I normally buy the cheapest bread and the cheapest juice and carefully watch everything I buy, especially meat.
Next year, I need to spend some money on a new trousers. Yesterday I saw that I could see through my favorite pair, just beside the place where I patched it half a year ago. I could try to patch it even bigger, but I think the trousers are ripe for replacement.
Update: total household savings rate was 70%.
-
That’s super impressive! Would love to see a breakdown of expenses. Are those both yours and your wife’s expenses?
Thanks! No, those are just my expenses. I haven't tracked the details of all my spending. I just know I spent about $15,000 because my paycheques after all deductions totalled about $65,000, and I've automated exactly $50,000 to get transferred into my investments haha.
Here's an approximate break down of my expenses that stayed more or less constant from month to month:
- rent+utilities+insurance: $480
- internet + mobile: $30
- groceries: $90
- total: $600
That means I spent an average of $650 per month on things that vary a lot from month to month, including travelling, restaurants, fitness classes, gifts, entertainment, clothes, and public transportation. Mostly travelling though: I went on two overseas trips (one to the Philippines only and one to the Philippines, Australia, and Hawaii). I just chatted with my wife, and I think we'll be increasing our grocery budget to $100 each in 2019 (to make up for eating out less). But I also got my phone bill down from $10/month to $0, so my fixed expenses will stay at $600.
I'll track my variable expenses at a granular level in 2019, which should help me keep them reined in.
You mentioned in the original post that you think your discretionary spending needs to be kept under better control. Do you have any plans yet on what you're going to cut down on?
That’s a great breakdown. You’d definitely fall into the early retirement extreme category. I just started diving into that blog - worth checking out if you haven’t already.
My biggest discretionary spending in 2018 was mostly replacing wardrobe. I built more of a “time capsule” wardrobe that should last a very long time. I shouldn’t “need” to add any more, so hopefully can cut back on that. I do need some required specialty work clothes, but will get reimbursed. Aside from that, cutting back on the number and cost of our date nights. I’ll be working more in 2019 (6 days a week mostly) so with less free time on weekends that should naturally reduce spending. We moved in 2018 (twice technically) and will be in March again, but should have limited associated costs.
We were upside down on our fifth wheel we lived full time in, had to pay to get out of that. Then we moved to an apartment and had 0 furnishings, so bed, dresser, table, couch, entertainment center, etc.
Things like that should be one-off’s for 2018 that I don’t expect for 2019.
-
I was not going to join this due to our higher that MMM average spending but after posting about 2018 annual spending, I am really disappointed and need to do something. This is very hard for me because although I am very frugal and the breadwinner the rest of the family is very spendy. I also do almost none of our food prep/cooking and therefore almost none of the shopping so I feel like I am not able to make an impact on one of our biggest expenses. I have started to make small changes the last few days that I hope will have a ripple effect.
2017 Total Spending = $87k (Family of 3 Jan-Jun, family of 5 Jul-Dec)
2018 Total Spending = $122k (Family of 6 - Includes $14k in house remodeling that although is not done, it should not be this high again and about $2-3k in other "should not repeat" expenses.)
2019 Total Spending Goal <$100k
My current budget looks like about $107k for the year. This includes principle pay down (~$30k) on some debt, so if I end up going over due to "extra" (>$30k) principle pay down I will probably give myself a pass.
-
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
-
I was not going to join this due to our higher that MMM average spending but after posting about 2018 annual spending, I am really disappointed and need to do something. This is very hard for me because although I am very frugal and the breadwinner the rest of the family is very spendy. I also do almost none of our food prep/cooking and therefore almost none of the shopping so I feel like I am not able to make an impact on one of our biggest expenses. I have started to make small changes the last few days that I hope will have a ripple effect.
2017 Total Spending = $87k (Family of 3 Jan-Jun, family of 5 Jul-Dec)
2018 Total Spending = $122k (Family of 6 - Includes $14k in house remodeling that although is not done, it should not be this high again and about $2-3k in other "should not repeat" expenses.)
2019 Total Spending Goal <$100k
My current budget looks like about $107k for the year. This includes principle pay down (~$30k) on some debt, so if I end up going over due to "extra" (>$30k) principle pay down I will probably give myself a pass.
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
Glad both of you decided to join! I’m in a similar boat which is why I started the thread. Hopefully knowing we are going to have to expose our spending at the end of the month may make us think twice.
@Slow&Steady - I don’t think my 2018 spending was much better than yours, if any.
-
That’s a great breakdown. You’d definitely fall into the early retirement extreme category. I just started diving into that blog - worth checking out if you haven’t already.
My biggest discretionary spending in 2018 was mostly replacing wardrobe. I built more of a “time capsule” wardrobe that should last a very long time. I shouldn’t “need” to add any more, so hopefully can cut back on that. I do need some required specialty work clothes, but will get reimbursed. Aside from that, cutting back on the number and cost of our date nights. I’ll be working more in 2019 (6 days a week mostly) so with less free time on weekends that should naturally reduce spending. We moved in 2018 (twice technically) and will be in March again, but should have limited associated costs.
We were upside down on our fifth wheel we lived full time in, had to pay to get out of that. Then we moved to an apartment and had 0 furnishings, so bed, dresser, table, couch, entertainment center, etc.
Things like that should be one-off’s for 2018 that I don’t expect for 2019.
Hey, thanks for suggesting I check out Early Retirement Extreme! Just started reading through the 21 day makeover, and, after converting from USD to CAD, it turns out my spending on housing and food are within the recommended ranges, and I'm already car-free. So those are the big three, and I just happened to do it ERE style without even knowing it haha
Sounds like you've set yourself up for a good 2019!! Clothes is a thing I need to work on too—in 2018, I bought new clothes and jackets that I don't need, so I think at this point I need to purge some older clothes I don't need and keep the essentials. I want to build a capsule wardrobe too.
Looking forward to seeing how your 2019 goes!! :)
-
I have been tracking take home income v spending for the last several months to see how much extra I can bank. This is after tax withholding and tax-deferred account contributions. It doesn't really have a significant impact on the savings rate, but it's good for discipline and accountability. So far it's been coming in at about an extra $500 per month.
-
I've been using various versions of this spreadsheet layout to track the big-ish picture. I'm happy to say that I've been consistently spending less over the three years I've used it! My goal for 2019 is to do a better job filling out the spending breakdown column, because I don't feel like I have a good grasp of where exactly I'm doing my spending.
-
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
Good idea @TNT I also sometimes feel silly posting some of our choices here (ie.how crazy my groceries were getting last year, and costs for trips) but if you are doing it with awareness, I believe tracking it is really healthy!
-
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
Good idea @TNT I also sometimes feel silly posting some of our choices here (ie.how crazy my groceries were getting last year, and costs for trips) but if you are doing it with awareness, I believe tracking it is really healthy!
I’m going to feel pretty stupid to post some of my spending, and that’s the whole point here :)
-
I definitely feel that spending money on baby making is a good choice. Yes we had 4 old dogs and got super expensive. 2 have passed and we added a young dog. Here vets are crazy expensive so as they die we will only have 2 dogs. Our gross is 60k and that works well for us with paid for cars and 400 mortgage. We are doing traveling and other experiences and don’t really spend money on things.
-
I'm in, I need a kick in the butt.
-
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
Good idea @TNT I also sometimes feel silly posting some of our choices here (ie.how crazy my groceries were getting last year, and costs for trips) but if you are doing it with awareness, I believe tracking it is really healthy!
I’m going to feel pretty stupid to post some of my spending, and that’s the whole point here :)
Our grocery spending will likely make ANYONE feel better about their spending, so there's that.
...people are posting numbers for their total living expenses that are JUST our grocery costs, roughly. So uh... yeah, there will be seriously different numbers represented around here!
Waiting until the end of the year proper to run end of year 2018 numbers. It won't be pretty. Also need to decide how I'll handle certain reimbursable expenses.
-
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
Good idea @TNT I also sometimes feel silly posting some of our choices here (ie.how crazy my groceries were getting last year, and costs for trips) but if you are doing it with awareness, I believe tracking it is really healthy!
I’m going to feel pretty stupid to post some of my spending, and that’s the whole point here :)
Our grocery spending will likely make ANYONE feel better about their spending, so there's that.
...people are posting numbers for their total living expenses that are JUST our grocery costs, roughly. So uh... yeah, there will be seriously different numbers represented around here!
Waiting until the end of the year proper to run end of year 2018 numbers. It won't be pretty. Also need to decide how I'll handle certain reimbursable expenses.
For 2018 a rough estimate based on my somewhat organized personal Capital is:
$8500 groceries (seems like a lot but we eat super healthy, balanced, measured meals. We aim for $150/wk so this actually isn’t terribly far off)
$4500 restaurants
$6000 clothing (this should be way, way less in 2019)
Are you much worse than that?
Regarding reimbursed expenses, I’m in a similar boat and for 2019 I’ll be traveling a lot for work. As much as I solely want to use personal capital for my budgeting, I think there are going to be a lot of caveats I’m going to have to create a separate note/spreadsheet for to really get the detail to the level I want.
-
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
Good idea @TNT I also sometimes feel silly posting some of our choices here (ie.how crazy my groceries were getting last year, and costs for trips) but if you are doing it with awareness, I believe tracking it is really healthy!
I’m going to feel pretty stupid to post some of my spending, and that’s the whole point here :)
Our grocery spending will likely make ANYONE feel better about their spending, so there's that.
...people are posting numbers for their total living expenses that are JUST our grocery costs, roughly. So uh... yeah, there will be seriously different numbers represented around here!
Waiting until the end of the year proper to run end of year 2018 numbers. It won't be pretty. Also need to decide how I'll handle certain reimbursable expenses.
For 2018 a rough estimate based on my somewhat organized personal Capital is:
$8500 groceries (seems like a lot but we eat super healthy, balanced, measured meals. We aim for $150/wk so this actually isn’t terribly far off)
$4500 restaurants
$6000 clothing (this should be way, way less in 2019)
Are you much worse than that?
Regarding reimbursed expenses, I’m in a similar boat and for 2019 I’ll be traveling a lot for work. As much as I solely want to use personal capital for my budgeting, I think there are going to be a lot of caveats I’m going to have to create a separate note/spreadsheet for to really get the detail to the level I want.
2018 YTD groceries are $8,527, although $350 of that is gift cards we haven't used yet we bought on cyber monday sale- so about $8200 for the year. From what I've read you post, we eat similarly.
2018 YTD restaurants are $1300
2018 YTD alcohol and bars is $1027 - this one is especially BAD
We're higher than many years on clothes, at ~$750. This definitely oscillates year to year, since we tend to batch buy then all our items wear out at once.
But total spending for 2018 is ~$120k. $37k of that is doctor/pharmacy costs for finding a brain tumor and 2 cycles of IVF. $7600 was preparing the house to sell. Another $2k is (now reimbursed) work lodgings. So at least without those it would be ~$73k, which I'm aiming to be under (excluding medical costs) for 2019. Which, considering rent will take up $33.6k of that, is actually a stretch goal!
-
Surprisingly, I banked an extra $2,100 (out of take home pay) in December 2018.
-
I'm in. I wasn't going to join because my savings rate is super low (and sometimes negative) and my choices are often decidedly unmustachian. But hey, making it public might at least pressure me into making absolutely sure I'm spending my money intentionally, right?
Good idea @TNT I also sometimes feel silly posting some of our choices here (ie.how crazy my groceries were getting last year, and costs for trips) but if you are doing it with awareness, I believe tracking it is really healthy!
I’m going to feel pretty stupid to post some of my spending, and that’s the whole point here :)
Our grocery spending will likely make ANYONE feel better about their spending, so there's that.
...people are posting numbers for their total living expenses that are JUST our grocery costs, roughly. So uh... yeah, there will be seriously different numbers represented around here!
Waiting until the end of the year proper to run end of year 2018 numbers. It won't be pretty. Also need to decide how I'll handle certain reimbursable expenses.
For 2018 a rough estimate based on my somewhat organized personal Capital is:
$8500 groceries (seems like a lot but we eat super healthy, balanced, measured meals. We aim for $150/wk so this actually isn’t terribly far off)
$4500 restaurants
$6000 clothing (this should be way, way less in 2019)
Are you much worse than that?
Regarding reimbursed expenses, I’m in a similar boat and for 2019 I’ll be traveling a lot for work. As much as I solely want to use personal capital for my budgeting, I think there are going to be a lot of caveats I’m going to have to create a separate note/spreadsheet for to really get the detail to the level I want.
2018 YTD groceries are $8,527, although $350 of that is gift cards we haven't used yet we bought on cyber monday sale- so about $8200 for the year. From what I've read you post, we eat similarly.
2018 YTD restaurants are $1300
2018 YTD alcohol and bars is $1027 - this one is especially BAD
We're higher than many years on clothes, at ~$750. This definitely oscillates year to year, since we tend to batch buy then all our items wear out at once.
But total spending for 2018 is ~$120k. $37k of that is doctor/pharmacy costs for finding a brain tumor and 2 cycles of IVF. $7600 was preparing the house to sell. Another $2k is (now reimbursed) work lodgings. So at least without those it would be ~$73k, which I'm aiming to be under (excluding medical costs) for 2019. Which, considering rent will take up $33.6k of that, is actually a stretch goal!
Well, aside from your medical expenses, you’re in good company with the rest :)
As mentioned before, I don’t think medical expenses are anything anyone should feel down about regarding spending, as it’s really outside of one’s control. Still hard budget wise nonetheless.
I’m not sure where we are at in bars, but probably worse than you. Mostly due to moving to a bigger city with more fun “going out” options. This will change in 2019 as we are moving again in March and my work hours pick up for the year. Working 6 days a week means more $ made and less time to spend it!
-
For 2018 a rough estimate based on my somewhat organized personal Capital is:
$8500 groceries (seems like a lot but we eat super healthy, balanced, measured meals. We aim for $150/wk so this actually isn’t terribly far off)
$4500 restaurants
$6000 clothing (this should be way, way less in 2019)
2018 YTD groceries are $8,527, although $350 of that is gift cards we haven't used yet we bought on cyber monday sale- so about $8200 for the year. From what I've read you post, we eat similarly.
2018 YTD restaurants are $1300
2018 YTD alcohol and bars is $1027 - this one is especially BAD
I will try to make both of you feel better, my 3 highest expenses are ....
2018 Food (groceries/eating out) ~ $15k
2018 Owner Occupied Mortgage ~ $11k
2018 Daycare ~ $10.5k
I am completely baffled by how much we spend on food compared to fellow MMMers, it is by far our biggest expense. We are a family of 6 (occasionally 7) and I am currently on a dairy/soy/egg/coconut free diet. This diet means that I am eating very healthy (and losing weight) but when I want a treat or to eat out it is very expensive (x6)!
-
I got a little spendypants this past year, because I was dealing with some really difficult health and family issues, but I've made it my resolution to lock this stuff down this year.
My cooking skills have increased a lot and it's gotten to the point where I am now comfortable cooking for friends. We have hosted brunch and holiday dinners for family and friends at our house and it cost us much less than going out, so we can continue doing that.
In addition, game nights have increased with both board games and my vintage videogame systems, which saves us a lot of money on entertainment. The only downside for me is that I wanted to host UFC Fight Night parties at my house, but the UFC made a new deal with cable sports channel ESPN, so I can no longer get the fights for free with an antenna. Oh, well. It was good while it lasted.
-
In addition, game nights have increased with both board games and my vintage videogame systems, which saves us a lot of money on entertainment. The only downside for me is that I wanted to host UFC Fight Night parties at my house, but the UFC made a new deal with cable sports channel ESPN, so I can no longer get the fights for free with an antenna. Oh, well. It was good while it lasted.
I don't know how this works in the US, but we don't pay for TV. A friend of ours has a paid subscription to a football (soccer) TV channel and kindly shared the login details with us. We then use a chromecast to play the games on the TV. We offered to pay the friend, but they refused. We often have friends over to watch games.
-
I'm in! We had a very spendy year and a half due to our house flooding, multiple car crashes where we only had liability, and a difficult family situation where we covered some expenses for a relative. We really need a frugal reset to get us back to normal. I would really like for us to spend less than $5000/month on average which would put us at $60K/year spend.
General budget category goals below:
Home (PITI & Utilities): $2,200/month
Auto (Gas, Ins, Maint): $500/month
Subscriptions (Internet, Phone, Streaming, Gaming): $200/month
Food (Groceries, Restuarants, Vitamin A): $500/month
Pets (Sitter, Vet, Food): $200/month
Shopping (Furniture, Home, Décor, Toys, Clothes): $200/month
Travel: $400/month
Giving: $500/month
Total: $4,700
-
WHEW 2018 was a doozy. Overall, it looks like we spent ~$83k over the year - about the same as 2017. However, $30k was toward paying down student loans (which most certainly was NOT the case in 2017).
Our other largest expenses were housing (~$16.8k) and food (~$12.4k). Food/Dining was abysmal...although this does include all groceries (we don't separate out any household goods/toiletries, etc from this amount). All in all definitely not great. But not nearly as bad as past years.
My goal for 2019 will be to keep our annual spending at the same amount or less, with the understanding that paying off our SL will be ~$40k and housing will likely increase to ~$24k.
-
My business income was so extremely high this year, and the work so time absorbing, that it was very easy to get very very spendy. I also used the year for some one time purchases (mainly home remodel type stuff) that I wanted to get done before FIRE, but looking back at my spending that doesn't come close to explaining it all.
December is always so gluttonous Jan is a pretty natural/easy low spend month, so gonna see what we can do. I'm hoping this will show we're at a better than 4% SWR on current investments for our low spend level.
-
I'm in! This is exactly what I needed. I stopped tracking spending a while ago, and I'd like to do it again this year and post for accountability.
We're a family of two adults and two teenagers, and our biggest monthly expense is groceries. We spend about $750 a month, and I would really like to get that down. Our second biggest expense for the past year has been utilities (gas and electricity). That has been insanely high, but should be decreasing. We're in a very weird situation of doing a major remodel/rebuild on an old house, and living in it while we're doing it; as we rebuild walls and insulate, each month the house gets a little tighter and more energy efficient. We'll also be looking at behavioral things we can change -- shorter showers, line drying clothes, etc.
So goals are:
1. $2700 or less per month total
2. Get food spending down
3. Get utility costs down
For the challenge I won't include any of our house reconstruction costs since those are budgeted separately. I'll just include our other, normal living expenses. Game on!
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. I overestimated my holiday spending. My 2019 goal of $40k seems even more attainable, so I better do it. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-I've already significantly reduced how much I eat out (I don't even want to know how much I spent on it before I started tracking), but I still spent nearly twice as much on dining out as I did on groceries in 2018. Yikes!! I really enjoy it so I don't want to cut it out completely, but I want to make it more of a rare treat. 2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. I'm aware that's a pretty pathetic goal for this forum, but if I don't do it in baby steps it won't be sustainable for me.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Right now, I'll spend $10-$20 extra to get tickets more easily and it really adds up.
-I also spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I grew up with acne and still get it, so I am constantly in pursuit of the perfect regimen that works for me. After a lot of trial and error (and $$ wasted), I've come up with a good routine. I need to stick to it, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products.
I think focusing on those categories is really going to help with my overall spending goal. It's great to hear what everyone else is doing, too!
-
I'm in. Current spending per month (for the last 12 months) is as follows:
Food: $598
Non-Food: $441
Eating out: $570
Medical: $603
Kids: $2806
Mortgages: $5122
Utilities: $2045
Transport: $1819
Holidays: $487
Total: $14,491 per month
My aim is to drop this by 10% overall. Some are fairly fixed, such as the kids money which is for accommodation at university, or mortgages, which won't change until the end of the year 2019 when we sell a property we are renovating.
Things that should reduce the most are:
- Transport - as we shouldn't need to buy a vehicle like last year, and will drive a lot less.
- Utilities - which should reduce for a number of reasons, but our son taking on some expenses and a house being mothballed as holiday home will reduce these.
- Food - aiming for under $500 per month.
- Non-food - there will be less clothes purchases as we are set up for the colder climate we are now in. :(
- Eating out - this has jumped around this year depending on when our adult kids are visiting. Meals out and visits to the pub seem to be the main culprits. Coffee adds up too. Aiming to halve this one.
I'll check in later to see how it works out.
-
I’m in! Trying to hit a few $0 days thru Jan as a start... I think I’ll aim for 11? A little over a third seems like it should be easy and yet I expect it won’t be...
-
Thanks for this challenge. My spending got out of control in 2018 and I’m determined to do better. I’ve just created a spreadsheet for myself and I’ll see how that helps me to track everything. Hopefully the focus will lead to the targets I want and I stick with it for the whole year.
-
I’m in!
Just looked at my 2018 total spending and, yikes, it was quite a bit higher than expected. Groceries and restaurants are the areas I need to focus on for 2019. Our family of four spent about $16k on those two things in 2018, which is much higher than previous years. Not sure what happened, other than that I stop following it closely because I assumed we were still doing good. Apparently not!
Time to buckle down once again. I’d like to get this down to around $10k for the year.
-
I've been using various versions of this spreadsheet layout to track the big-ish picture. I'm happy to say that I've been consistently spending less over the three years I've used it! My goal for 2019 is to do a better job filling out the spending breakdown column, because I don't feel like I have a good grasp of where exactly I'm doing my spending.
Yeah I do have an excel that's like that but I really like the aspect of Mint that just does it for you based on all your accounts. Except Mint is not totally accurate sometimes at tracking income and transfers for savings/retirement. I just wish there was a better (free and secure) app.
-
I've been using various versions of this spreadsheet layout to track the big-ish picture. I'm happy to say that I've been consistently spending less over the three years I've used it! My goal for 2019 is to do a better job filling out the spending breakdown column, because I don't feel like I have a good grasp of where exactly I'm doing my spending.
Yeah I do have an excel that's like that but I really like the aspect of Mint that just does it for you based on all your accounts. Except Mint is not totally accurate sometimes at tracking income and transfers for savings/retirement. I just wish there was a better (free and secure) app.
How do you do this in Excel? Because I'm one more person that would love to have that aspect of Mint but without storing all my data in "The Cloud". I do use Quicken and keep meaning to figure out if there's a way I can get it to generate a report along those same lines, but that means poking around online and then there's cat videos that need watching and somehow I never end up actually looking into it...
-
2018 expenses (all in CAD)
hm — business expenses but I do count them in my personal budget
tax — property tax
Total annual expenses:
2018 — $35k (fewer travel expenses than previous years)
2017 — $43k
2016 — $40k
2015 — $43k
2014 — $53k (extra taxes + more travel)
2013 — $45k
-
I’m in! Trying to hit a few $0 days thru Jan as a start... I think I’ll aim for 11? A little over a third seems like it should be easy and yet I expect it won’t be...
I still haven't spent any money in 2019! Hope to be able to keep this up until at least Saturday. I am cheating a little bit because I just loaded €50 on my travel card the 31st and I take the bus to work.
-
I’m in! Trying to hit a few $0 days thru Jan as a start... I think I’ll aim for 11? A little over a third seems like it should be easy and yet I expect it won’t be...
I still haven't spent any money in 2019! Hope to be able to keep this up until at least Saturday. I am cheating a little bit because I just loaded €50 on my travel card the 31st and I take the bus to work.
I love aiming for a certain amount of no-spend days/months. I colour (highlight) in the blocks of my dayplanner which is a good visual reminder for me..geeky thrills
-
I've been using various versions of this spreadsheet layout to track the big-ish picture. I'm happy to say that I've been consistently spending less over the three years I've used it! My goal for 2019 is to do a better job filling out the spending breakdown column, because I don't feel like I have a good grasp of where exactly I'm doing my spending.
Yeah I do have an excel that's like that but I really like the aspect of Mint that just does it for you based on all your accounts. Except Mint is not totally accurate sometimes at tracking income and transfers for savings/retirement. I just wish there was a better (free and secure) app.
How do you do this in Excel? Because I'm one more person that would love to have that aspect of Mint but without storing all my data in "The Cloud". I do use Quicken and keep meaning to figure out if there's a way I can get it to generate a report along those same lines, but that means poking around online and then there's cat videos that need watching and somehow I never end up actually looking into it...
I confess, this is an almost entirely manual process. I usually spend a few minutes on it at the beginning and end of each month. I pull the numbers from various tracking services (mint or personal capital or old ynab or whatever). I go to this effort because it's helpful for me to see all the numbers lined up next to each other.
Quicken 'ought' to have a way to generate that kind of report, but I've never used it. I couldn't make any of the things I use for more granular tracking spit out the info I wanted either!
-
I posted before, but I finally went over our 2018 numbers, even if they are somewhat disjointed.
My wife any I use a shared gnucash database to track our finances. I've set up an entirely new database, with better spending categorization, and actual liability tracking. I'm trying to figure out the best format for sharing the reports I've generated here. The thing is, as I have set up our accounting using GAAP, a simple expense report does not capture the whole picture, nor does a cashflow statement. I suppose it is probably OK to omit liability principal repayment here... Loans will show up as expenses only when disbursed, after that the only expense that shows up is interest expense. Seeing as I am currently working on a second degree, our 2019 education spending will be very high. I am using loans for a lot of it due to low rates- particularly subsidized loans!
This is a graphical expense report for the second half of December 2018 in the new database. It certainly makes clear what our major expense is and will continue to be... daycare. Other than that it really isn't representative.
(https://i.imgur.com/e0EzgZv.png)
And here, full disclosure, is 2018's numbers. (Different categories, but the general gist is clear)
(https://i.imgur.com/fJOEmSY.png)
My 2018 takeaways:
Auto: Unusually high, we bought a decent car, and also had a lot of car work done, including a shop doing a subaru head gasket. 2019 should be cheaper. (Numbers also include gas)
Education: I'm getting a second degree.... and am working as hard as possible to make the investment worth it.
Childcare: Will be even more expensive, but we are going from a part time nanny to full time daycare, allowing me to get a job again. (Also we have family helping out financially with daycare)
Groceries: Over $300 a month in 2018 was a lot for 2 people and a baby.. I will work to reduce this.
Communications: We bought phones, and this covers cell + cable internet. I'll try to keep this lower, which is doable. (It will still be high- we just bought/0% financed $1600 worth of pixel phones, but will get us $1600 worth of plane/hotel gift cards in return two months from now, which we will use within the next two years.... so we get new phones for "free" and spread the travel cost out month to month at no cost. It seemed worth it? It was a google Fi promotion)
Pet expenses: $100 ish a month isn't bad.
Hobbies at $900- this looks worse than it is, because of craigslist flipping our net hobby expense in 2018 was close to only $100
-
I was not going to join this due to our higher that MMM average spending but after posting about 2018 annual spending, I am really disappointed and need to do something. This is very hard for me because although I am very frugal and the breadwinner the rest of the family is very spendy. I also do almost none of our food prep/cooking and therefore almost none of the shopping so I feel like I am not able to make an impact on one of our biggest expenses. I have started to make small changes the last few days that I hope will have a ripple effect.
2017 Total Spending = $87k (Family of 3 Jan-Jun, family of 5 Jul-Dec)
2018 Total Spending = $122k (Family of 6 - Includes $14k in house remodeling that although is not done, it should not be this high again and about $2-3k in other "should not repeat" expenses.)
2019 Total Spending Goal <$100k
My current budget looks like about $107k for the year. This includes principle pay down (~$30k) on some debt, so if I end up going over due to "extra" (>$30k) principle pay down I will probably give myself a pass.
I have been working the 2019 Budget and trying to determine the debt payoff vs savings vs family rebellion priorities. I think I have a pretty good plan in place now.
2019 Total Budget ~ $117k
2019 Savings and Debt ~ $51k (some of this is rental related and will be paid off in 2019)
2019 Expenses ~ $67K (this includes daycare and kids activities)
My plan includes a FIRE income of ~$60k/year with no kids or debt (including mortgage), so I am happy with this budget. Now to just stick to it.
-
Glad to see so many members participating in this thread! It’s helpful to see all the different examples of how members are organizing, categorizing, and documenting their spending and savings. I have a relatively basic and rudimentary way to organize mine, but seeing so many other examples may give me more ideas or an incentive to change my process altogether.
I’m hoping at the end of this first month in 2019 we see a lot of good examples to document all this information. When I started this thread, I didn’t consider that aspect, and it may be something helpful to a lot of us as well, beyond discussing our monthly spending. Capturing good data will be key to finding where improvements can be made!
-
I’m in. We have had a bit of budget creep in the couple years after paying off private SLs. Our post-payroll, non-SL expenses were $47,997 in 2017 and $44,167 in 2018. I was happy with how much we shaved off, especially as we’ve had some lifestyle increases this year - added HBO Now, museum pass, some more meat back in groceries, and etc. And we started travel hacking (for 2019 trip), so I worried whether we were spending more to meet minimums. But we really cut down on how much we spent eating and drinking out by implementing a no-going out except for travel and social get-togethers rule. Since we’re introverts and our friend groups only get together a couple times a month, it worked well...except for when we broke our rule.
2018 expenses
Rent, Insurance, etc: $20,726
Travel: $7,078
Groceries & Personal (incl cat litter & alcohol): $5,777
Shopping & Cash (incl cat food,some grocery, clothes): $4,413
Eating & Drinking Out: $2,843
Other (incl transp, subscripts., ent., gifts, med.): $2,089
Internet, Phone, Elec.: $1,241
Total: $44,167
My goal for 2019 is 40k. Plan for reduction is mostly to cut travel expenses by travel hacking and taking less weekend trips. We started to find the weekend trips kind of exhausting anyways. Further progress on sticking to our no non-social eating/drinking rule. Cutting clothes expenses now that we replaced a bunch last year. Trying to reduce how much Amazon earns from us on misc things. Kicking my coffee break habit by remembering to bring beans to work and exercising more will power when I go with coworkers for the walk. I’m upping our auto savings to force some cuts too.
-
Early into the month and going very well. Last month we actually ended up way closer to our spending goal than I expected considering I took 10 days off work and we went on vacation. We were only about 4% over our monthly goal.
Last night we decided to stay in for our typical “date night.” We had a coupon for some wings and rented a movie off the Apple TV. Easily spent about 1/2 of what date nights typically are.
Our dog has been itching like mad off and on for months. We’ve tried everything and seen the vet several. There’s a prescription that gives him great relief but it’s $60/mo and not healthy long term. We’re trying an elimination diet soon for allergies. If that doesn’t work then unfortunately the next step will be a $500 allergy test. Sucks but better than that prescription long term and better than him losing hair/getting infections from scratching.
-
Did my first shopping trip of the year today. We have a price book and always use a list, but I took it a step further by doing a careful inventory first of what we already have, and planning out the meals for the week. I came in at $154, which is about $30 cheaper than our average week last year.
Off to a good start! Getting the grocery bill down is my #1 priority in this challenge.
-
Still haven't spent money in 2019! Except for a small business expense, but hey, that's not my private account, so it doesn't count, right?
I'm sure I'll have to spend money this week though. We've ran out of fresh vegetables and some other stuff. I have skipped some bus trips this week to stretch the money on my travel card. I've walked 20 minutes the train station in the morning (where I catch the bus to work) instead of taking another bus there to save €1,25 every day. I always walk on the way back from work, but walking in the morning means I have to leave home 5 minutes earlier and that's a challenge in January.
-
This thread is about accountability so here goes - definitely have spent, but have not tracked yet. This thread does make me want to track weekly instead of monthly(ish) but I haven't had time yet.
Spending I can think of off hand:
Day care - not optional
Gymnastics for kid - health-related, not just an activity for the sake of Having Activities
Lunch out last week - eeeeeh. I know MM would say Thou Shalt Not Lunch Out Ever, but it was less than $4. I do plan on allowing myself one lunch out to get a sub each week, I make it last for two lunches so it's usually <$4/lunch. Reasonable?
Groceries last weekend - Ouch. $160. Husband tossed the receipt when he was putting away groceries, but going forward we're going to try to track that to figure out why it's so dang high for two adults and a preschooler. That includes non-food stuff like cleaning products and toilet paper, but still. I don't usually do the grocery shopping, not sure that husband would feel like taking on doing one of those price book things. I'm guessing probably not.
-
Ok I'm joining. First week of 2019 was pretty awful regarding spending. Here the things I am to blame for:
- January 1st: Bought a new top. It was on sale for €15. I have fairly little clothes and hate shopping so I think it's OK, but def not planning to continue the trend especially as I wanted to focus on 2nd hand shopping more.
- January 4-6: Had a friend visiting me from abroad. Weather wasn't good so we basically ended up making it a "Dutch food tour" where we tried all the local foods while walking through the city. We had great fun, but it was EXPENSIVE. Brownies aren't local food. Should not eat brownies on local food tour (they were great though, really).
Other spending was at normal levels or lower than usual.
-
Okay. First week up.
Expected/Fixed:
Rent
Electric
Gym membership
Google Music
Food for the dog
Charity
(Debating sharing these costs specifically)
Variable/Elective:
Deposit for vet appointment (new vet since we moved. Pup's baby teeth haven't all fallen out, so we want to get those checked and plan for her getting fixed)- $60 deposit, appointment will be $170, then TBD on procedures
Groceries - $147 so far. We came home from Christmas out of town to an empty fridge. Includes a large haul of produce and some coffee coming tomorrow from Imperfect Produce. Also just replaced a ton of nuts and seeds I ran out of. Those should last a while, but they're spendy all at once.
General household- some plastic lids for mason jars. Been dragging my feet on this for a long time, but we needed more. We store a lot in glass. Also getting a draft stopper for the front door. We've been using a towel, but the only spare towel is an incredibly ugly 'dog towel'. Downsides- needs to be picked up every time we wash the dog. Also ugly as sin. I probably would have kept with the towel or found a less ugly towel, but husband decided it was a Thing. He rarely does this, so I'm happy to oblige on this. All in all, it was just under $26. I got $25 amazon credit this week for completing a study, so well timed- less than $1 out of pocket.
Student loan payments- we decided to kill all the loans above 4% interest. Previously we'd been letting all the 4-5% interest rate ones ride. But we got a big lump of cash from selling the house, and already put shittons in the market ($11k IRAs, $10k brokerage, set up to add $2k brokerage per month, and we'll be doing 2019 IRAs soon- another $12k). So $7,525 later, we're down by 3 loans, ALL of my husband's loans are gone, and outstanding student debt is less than $10k, at 3.61%
-
we're down by 3 loans, ALL of my husband's loans are gone, and outstanding student debt is less than $10k, at 3.61%
That's awesome! I'd say that's a good use of the house money.
-
we're down by 3 loans, ALL of my husband's loans are gone, and outstanding student debt is less than $10k, at 3.61%
That's awesome! I'd say that's a good use of the house money.
Congrats! Must be a big relief to get rid of those debts. For me, 4% is also the cut-off point to pay off debt.
I kind of forgot I paid the mortgage on the first day of the month, but since these are automated payments I don't really count them as spending. I just want to track my descretionary spending, the payments I can influence, not mortgage / property tax / etc.
-
How does everyone track things when you sell things?
I.e. if I sell an old spare tire for $50 on Craigslist and then use that $50 on a date night, do I have to count that as income and spending, or could I use them to cancel each other out?
I ask because my goal this year isn’t so much income or even savings rate, but keeping my spending low. If I can sell some things and use the money to keep my spending “lower” then that’s a big help.
Hmmm...
-
How does everyone track things when you sell things?
I.e. if I sell an old spare tire for $50 on Craigslist and then use that $50 on a date night, do I have to count that as income and spending, or could I use them to cancel each other out?
I ask because my goal this year isn’t so much income or even savings rate, but keeping my spending low. If I can sell some things and use the money to keep my spending “lower” then that’s a big help.
Hmmm...
Use whatever works for you! I personally would enter that as an income and an expense, but this is a personal challenge, presumably in order to help the person posting, so I doubt that would be considered "cheating" by many.
-
I spent money today and it was totally unnecessary. I hardly got any sleep last night even though I went to bed early. I got up too late and didn't have time to eat my prepared breakfast as I had to run to the bus, then bought breakfast at the train station.
Spending 2019:
Food: €4,64
-
How does everyone track things when you sell things?
I.e. if I sell an old spare tire for $50 on Craigslist and then use that $50 on a date night, do I have to count that as income and spending, or could I use them to cancel each other out?
I ask because my goal this year isn’t so much income or even savings rate, but keeping my spending low. If I can sell some things and use the money to keep my spending “lower” then that’s a big help.
Hmmm...
I track it. This is relevant to me as I do get quite a few random amazon gift cards for participating in studies and the like. And before we moved I sold a fair number of things on FB marketplace. How I track in Mint: I'll put the income under "bonus". Spending I track as normal. The exception is a return or something- I'll specifically credit that to the category in Mint where the spending was. Likewise if I say buy something from Costco for a friend and they pay me back- that goes into the same category to cancel itself out.
As for what you do though, what will help you the most? Do you want the most accurate numbers, or do you think the 'hacking it' feeling will give you that 'win' feeling and motivate you more? Or will it make you complacent?
-
How does everyone track things when you sell things?
I.e. if I sell an old spare tire for $50 on Craigslist and then use that $50 on a date night, do I have to count that as income and spending, or could I use them to cancel each other out?
I ask because my goal this year isn’t so much income or even savings rate, but keeping my spending low. If I can sell some things and use the money to keep my spending “lower” then that’s a big help.
Hmmm...
I do not track this kind of thing unless the money I got from the item that was sold was put into the bank but I also do not track cash, I only track transactions that go through the bank/reward cards. When cash is taken out of the bank it is assigned a category (usually under somebody's allowance) and then what happens to it doesn't really matter to me, it is counted as spend under that person's allowance. If to much cash was taken out and the remaining cash is put back into the bank it is credited to whatever category it was originally removed from. When something is sold but then that cash is used for something else I think if it as exchanging one item for something different. If something is sold and the cash is put into the bank I rotate between counting it as income vs a credit to whatever category the sold item would fall under, this depends a lot on the item/$ amount and what our current monthly challenge/goal is. I use YNAB to track/budget.
-
How does everyone track things when you sell things?
I.e. if I sell an old spare tire for $50 on Craigslist and then use that $50 on a date night, do I have to count that as income and spending, or could I use them to cancel each other out?
I ask because my goal this year isn’t so much income or even savings rate, but keeping my spending low. If I can sell some things and use the money to keep my spending “lower” then that’s a big help.
Hmmm...
I track it. This is relevant to me as I do get quite a few random amazon gift cards for participating in studies and the like. And before we moved I sold a fair number of things on FB marketplace. How I track in Mint: I'll put the income under "bonus". Spending I track as normal. The exception is a return or something- I'll specifically credit that to the category in Mint where the spending was. Likewise if I say buy something from Costco for a friend and they pay me back- that goes into the same category to cancel itself out.
As for what you do though, what will help you the most? Do you want the most accurate numbers, or do you think the 'hacking it' feeling will give you that 'win' feeling and motivate you more? Or will it make you complacent?
I think you are correct to track it. Unfortunately, it’s going to be the best indicator to show overall spending for better future reference.
Here is my predicament. I’m looking at selling my motorcycle later this week in which I’ll net about $2500 and also save about $300/mo moving forward (plus I have some gear to sell).
My wife and I bought new phones last year. We had the option to pay cash or get 0% financing and get FREE Apple care (worth about $120/phone) so we “financed” them.
With the $2500 from the bike sale I’ve considered paying off our phones to lower our monthly expenses. However, paying off our phones will also likely put me over our monthly spending goals, which doesn’t appeal as much..
Unfortunately, I think the right choice is still going to have to be tracking sales of items and spending with that money.
-
How does everyone track things when you sell things?
I.e. if I sell an old spare tire for $50 on Craigslist and then use that $50 on a date night, do I have to count that as income and spending, or could I use them to cancel each other out?
I ask because my goal this year isn’t so much income or even savings rate, but keeping my spending low. If I can sell some things and use the money to keep my spending “lower” then that’s a big help.
Hmmm...
I track it. This is relevant to me as I do get quite a few random amazon gift cards for participating in studies and the like. And before we moved I sold a fair number of things on FB marketplace. How I track in Mint: I'll put the income under "bonus". Spending I track as normal. The exception is a return or something- I'll specifically credit that to the category in Mint where the spending was. Likewise if I say buy something from Costco for a friend and they pay me back- that goes into the same category to cancel itself out.
As for what you do though, what will help you the most? Do you want the most accurate numbers, or do you think the 'hacking it' feeling will give you that 'win' feeling and motivate you more? Or will it make you complacent?
I think you are correct to track it. Unfortunately, it’s going to be the best indicator to show overall spending for better future reference.
Here is my predicament. I’m looking at selling my motorcycle later this week in which I’ll net about $2500 and also save about $300/mo moving forward (plus I have some gear to sell).
My wife and I bought new phones last year. We had the option to pay cash or get 0% financing and get FREE Apple care (worth about $120/phone) so we “financed” them.
With the $2500 from the bike sale I’ve considered paying off our phones to lower our monthly expenses. However, paying off our phones will also likely put me over our monthly spending goals, which doesn’t appeal as much..
Unfortunately, I think the right choice is still going to have to be tracking sales of items and spending with that money.
*shrugs* my student loan payment put me over my spending goal. I just change my goals then. =) You can just say "spending other than debt repayment is below $6k" or whatever.
It's definitely not as fun to have that nice clean budget page, for sure. But I try not to let my "fun" of measuring things interfere with the optimal choices.
-
How does everyone track things when you sell things?
I.e. if I sell an old spare tire for $50 on Craigslist and then use that $50 on a date night, do I have to count that as income and spending, or could I use them to cancel each other out?
I ask because my goal this year isn’t so much income or even savings rate, but keeping my spending low. If I can sell some things and use the money to keep my spending “lower” then that’s a big help.
Hmmm...
I track it. This is relevant to me as I do get quite a few random amazon gift cards for participating in studies and the like. And before we moved I sold a fair number of things on FB marketplace. How I track in Mint: I'll put the income under "bonus". Spending I track as normal. The exception is a return or something- I'll specifically credit that to the category in Mint where the spending was. Likewise if I say buy something from Costco for a friend and they pay me back- that goes into the same category to cancel itself out.
As for what you do though, what will help you the most? Do you want the most accurate numbers, or do you think the 'hacking it' feeling will give you that 'win' feeling and motivate you more? Or will it make you complacent?
I think you are correct to track it. Unfortunately, it’s going to be the best indicator to show overall spending for better future reference.
Here is my predicament. I’m looking at selling my motorcycle later this week in which I’ll net about $2500 and also save about $300/mo moving forward (plus I have some gear to sell).
My wife and I bought new phones last year. We had the option to pay cash or get 0% financing and get FREE Apple care (worth about $120/phone) so we “financed” them.
With the $2500 from the bike sale I’ve considered paying off our phones to lower our monthly expenses. However, paying off our phones will also likely put me over our monthly spending goals, which doesn’t appeal as much..
Unfortunately, I think the right choice is still going to have to be tracking sales of items and spending with that money.
*shrugs* my student loan payment put me over my spending goal. I just change my goals then. =) You can just say "spending other than debt repayment is below $6k" or whatever.
It's definitely not as fun to have that nice clean budget page, for sure. But I try not to let my "fun" of measuring things interfere with the optimal choices.
At the very least I can pay them both in one month so as not to jeopardize future monthly goals lol.
At 0% there’s no monetary value added in paying off early. Just the good felling of less bills, but the bad feeling of exceeding budget. Decisions decisions.
-
At the very least I can pay them both in one month so as not to jeopardize future monthly goals lol.
At 0% there’s no monetary value added in paying off early. Just the good felling of less bills, but the bad feeling of exceeding budget. Decisions decisions.
Your monthly goal might be exceeded but won't your annual goal still be intact due to the lower monthly spending on all the following months?
-
At the very least I can pay them both in one month so as not to jeopardize future monthly goals lol.
At 0% there’s no monetary value added in paying off early. Just the good felling of less bills, but the bad feeling of exceeding budget. Decisions decisions.
Your monthly goal might be exceeded but won't your annual goal still be intact due to the lower monthly spending on all the following months?
It’s spread out over 24 months. But you’re correct, even though it’s spread over 2 years, it’ll still have a positive impact over this years annual spending.
Maybe I could sell my wife’s nice iPhone and get her a flip phone??
Jk :)
-
So far, I'm doing much better overall than I was before I had this thread lurking in the back of my mind...knowing I'm going to fess up at the end of the month does keep me a little more in line. My #1 weakness is spending money on and loaning money to my [newly] adult daughter. She would like to think she's a grown-up, but is very much still in teenager mode in so many ways, and as much as I'd like her to be ready to completely support herself, she just isn't there yet. Definitely a work in progress.
My confessions to date include taking an unscheduled day off (a pitfall of being one's own boss) because I was in a bad mood, and splurging ridiculously for a restaurant meal, during which I went completely bananas and also ordered an appetizer. At least I have the unfair advantage of being a light eater, so I did get three meals out of it...but still!
-
Our biggest monthly budget expense is food related but we don't separate out household supplies from groceries (maybe I should do that in 2020). We routinely outspend whatever I budget to those categories, no matter how much I budget towards them.
% of monthly budget spent as of Jan 10th
Household supplies/groceries: 62%
Eating out: 10%
The household supplies/groceries includes the monthly bulk shopping at Costco (21%) that last throughout the entire month and (hopefully) all of the groceries needed through next week. I will travel for work the following week, meaning SO and the kids will eat a bunch of stuff in the pantry that I can't eat due to food restrictions. On the one hand I am nervous that we have already used 62% of our grocery budget, on the other hand if we don't have to do any additional substantial shopping until the 25th(ish) maybe we might come in UNDER budget. Quick somebody find me some real wood to knock on!
As far as the eating out goes, I have brought my lunch to work all but 2 days this year and SO (who is extremely guilty of stopping to get a Coke) has been really really good so far. If we keep this up for a couple months, I would love to lower the monthly budget for this category!
-
Our biggest monthly budget expense is food related but we don't separate out household supplies from groceries (maybe I should do that in 2020). We routinely outspend whatever I budget to those categories, no matter how much I budget towards them.
% of monthly budget spent as of Jan 10th
Household supplies/groceries: 62%
Eating out: 10%
The household supplies/groceries includes the monthly bulk shopping at Costco (21%) that last throughout the entire month and (hopefully) all of the groceries needed through next week. I will travel for work the following week, meaning SO and the kids will eat a bunch of stuff in the pantry that I can't eat due to food restrictions. On the one hand I am nervous that we have already used 62% of our grocery budget, on the other hand if we don't have to do any additional substantial shopping until the 25th(ish) maybe we might come in UNDER budget. Quick somebody find me some real wood to knock on!
As far as the eating out goes, I have brought my lunch to work all but 2 days this year and SO (who is extremely guilty of stopping to get a Coke) has been really really good so far. If we keep this up for a couple months, I would love to lower the monthly budget for this category!
I like the thought of separating out, but I have a feeling most people’s room for improving is on groceries and not the toiletry type purchases. We’re only going to skimp so much on shampoo, razors, toilet paper, etc. I like to think those are mostly more fixed, but connected to the grocery budget.
Funny this is mentioned because I have a perfect example today. We aim for our $150/wk “grocery” budget. I needed more face razors. The standard 4 pack wasn’t in stock, so she had to get the 10 pack ($20). In turn, we went over our weekly budget by $10. Sucks, but we know what did it and not the end of the world.
-
This thread is about accountability so here goes - definitely have spent, but have not tracked yet. This thread does make me want to track weekly instead of monthly(ish) but I haven't had time yet.
Spending I can think of off hand:
Day care - not optional
Gymnastics for kid - health-related, not just an activity for the sake of Having Activities
Lunch out last week - eeeeeh. I know MM would say Thou Shalt Not Lunch Out Ever, but it was less than $4. I do plan on allowing myself one lunch out to get a sub each week, I make it last for two lunches so it's usually <$4/lunch. Reasonable?
Groceries last weekend - Ouch. $160. Husband tossed the receipt when he was putting away groceries, but going forward we're going to try to track that to figure out why it's so dang high for two adults and a preschooler. That includes non-food stuff like cleaning products and toilet paper, but still. I don't usually do the grocery shopping, not sure that husband would feel like taking on doing one of those price book things. I'm guessing probably not.
Took a few more days but finally had time to look at the latest discretionary expenses:
$22.62 on lunches due to a sale, but it's from the grocery store and should actually last me six lunches I think. It just happened to not be part of our weekly shop. I also batch cooked a bunch of lunches last weekend and have only eaten one of those, so I have five more in the freezer. We'll see if this actually decreases our food spend at all in the coming weeks.
$4 on Pandora to not have to listen to ads. I listen to it all day at work. This has been a recurring subscription for ages but I'm listing it here because accountability.
$6 on cough syrup, definitely a necessary item.
-
Our biggest monthly budget expense is food related but we don't separate out household supplies from groceries (maybe I should do that in 2020). We routinely outspend whatever I budget to those categories, no matter how much I budget towards them.
% of monthly budget spent as of Jan 10th
Household supplies/groceries: 62%
Eating out: 10%
The household supplies/groceries includes the monthly bulk shopping at Costco (21%) that last throughout the entire month and (hopefully) all of the groceries needed through next week. I will travel for work the following week, meaning SO and the kids will eat a bunch of stuff in the pantry that I can't eat due to food restrictions. On the one hand I am nervous that we have already used 62% of our grocery budget, on the other hand if we don't have to do any additional substantial shopping until the 25th(ish) maybe we might come in UNDER budget. Quick somebody find me some real wood to knock on!
As far as the eating out goes, I have brought my lunch to work all but 2 days this year and SO (who is extremely guilty of stopping to get a Coke) has been really really good so far. If we keep this up for a couple months, I would love to lower the monthly budget for this category!
I like the thought of separating out, but I have a feeling most people’s room for improving is on groceries and not the toiletry type purchases. We’re only going to skimp so much on shampoo, razors, toilet paper, etc. I like to think those are mostly more fixed, but connected to the grocery budget.
Funny this is mentioned because I have a perfect example today. We aim for our $150/wk “grocery” budget. I needed more face razors. The standard 4 pack wasn’t in stock, so she had to get the 10 pack ($20). In turn, we went over our weekly budget by $10. Sucks, but we know what did it and not the end of the world.
See, I definitely don't agree with that! Look into Dorco razors, and 'lazy' stropping and drying your heads to make them last longer. You can way cut down razor costs, even keeping with disposable heads (vs straight razors). And there's TONS of room in women's hair products especially for modifying cost. Not to even mention makeup sourcing, etc. You can fairly easily get this from $100+/month down to closer to $15/month for all household products. Definitely don't take these costs for granted as being fixed. Anyway, I like to split out 'general household' costs to be monitored in their own right.
-
Our biggest monthly budget expense is food related but we don't separate out household supplies from groceries (maybe I should do that in 2020). We routinely outspend whatever I budget to those categories, no matter how much I budget towards them.
% of monthly budget spent as of Jan 10th
Household supplies/groceries: 62%
Eating out: 10%
The household supplies/groceries includes the monthly bulk shopping at Costco (21%) that last throughout the entire month and (hopefully) all of the groceries needed through next week. I will travel for work the following week, meaning SO and the kids will eat a bunch of stuff in the pantry that I can't eat due to food restrictions. On the one hand I am nervous that we have already used 62% of our grocery budget, on the other hand if we don't have to do any additional substantial shopping until the 25th(ish) maybe we might come in UNDER budget. Quick somebody find me some real wood to knock on!
As far as the eating out goes, I have brought my lunch to work all but 2 days this year and SO (who is extremely guilty of stopping to get a Coke) has been really really good so far. If we keep this up for a couple months, I would love to lower the monthly budget for this category!
I like the thought of separating out, but I have a feeling most people’s room for improving is on groceries and not the toiletry type purchases. We’re only going to skimp so much on shampoo, razors, toilet paper, etc. I like to think those are mostly more fixed, but connected to the grocery budget.
Funny this is mentioned because I have a perfect example today. We aim for our $150/wk “grocery” budget. I needed more face razors. The standard 4 pack wasn’t in stock, so she had to get the 10 pack ($20). In turn, we went over our weekly budget by $10. Sucks, but we know what did it and not the end of the world.
See, I definitely don't agree with that! Look into Dorco razors, and 'lazy' stropping and drying your heads to make them last longer. You can way cut down razor costs, even keeping with disposable heads (vs straight razors). And there's TONS of room in women's hair products especially for modifying cost. Not to even mention makeup sourcing, etc. You can fairly easily get this from $100+/month down to closer to $15/month for all household products. Definitely don't take these costs for granted as being fixed. Anyway, I like to split out 'general household' costs to be monitored in their own right.
Oh yeah and I totally agree with all of this. My wife wears makeup once a week typically at most, and that’s only for our weekend date night, which we are cutting back on this year. Until last year she’d only ever bought cheap wal mart or drug store makeup. Last year she used some birthday money and asks for nicer makeup as gifts. Since she so rarely wears it, it lasts forever and I’m fine with that.
My Mach 3 razor heads last forever and I always dry them after and don’t store them face down. I shave about twice a week and probably get 4-6 weeks out of a razor head. That means that box of razors should last a year pretty easy. This week just had to be the week we needed more. She typically gets 4 packs but 10 is all they had. I’ve tried many different razors and these work best for me (less razor burn, ingrowns, etc). I also shave my arms/chest/stomach in the shower, and we use more of a disposable type razor there.
My wife gets her haircut around once a year, doesn’t dye it, and uses run of the mill wal mart shampoo (we use the same cheap stuff)
I definitely see where you’re coming from in that many people can certainly spend a ton on toiletries and beauty products, but I feel our choices are very, very, reasonable. I’m amazed that women can get their nails and toes done almost weekly and $150 hair/dye jobs almost every month. Best thing about my Mexican wife, long pretty black hair and dark features so she still look fine without makeup lol. I’m white and freckles, I envy her skin and lack of sunburn!
-
Spending 2019:
Food: €7
Travel card: €57
Home repairs: €80
Will probably have enough money on my card to last me for the rest of the month. Will do a big food shop today, we are totally out of options now.
-
Spending 2019:
Food: €7
Travel card: €57
Home repairs: €80
Will probably have enough money on my card to last me for the rest of the month. Will do a big food shop today, we are totally out of options now.
Nice job @Imma!
-
I spent way too much in the first 10 days of the year.
Southwest Airlines $105
Lunch Out w/ SO $24
Medicine $32
Gas $28
Happy Hour $8
Bagel $3
Happy Hour $21
Dinner out w/ SO $29
Beeeeer $8
Gym Membership $20
$278 Total Spend
-
Our biggest monthly budget expense is food related but we don't separate out household supplies from groceries (maybe I should do that in 2020). We routinely outspend whatever I budget to those categories, no matter how much I budget towards them.
% of monthly budget spent as of Jan 10th
Household supplies/groceries: 62%
Eating out: 10%
The household supplies/groceries includes the monthly bulk shopping at Costco (21%) that last throughout the entire month and (hopefully) all of the groceries needed through next week. I will travel for work the following week, meaning SO and the kids will eat a bunch of stuff in the pantry that I can't eat due to food restrictions. On the one hand I am nervous that we have already used 62% of our grocery budget, on the other hand if we don't have to do any additional substantial shopping until the 25th(ish) maybe we might come in UNDER budget. Quick somebody find me some real wood to knock on!
As far as the eating out goes, I have brought my lunch to work all but 2 days this year and SO (who is extremely guilty of stopping to get a Coke) has been really really good so far. If we keep this up for a couple months, I would love to lower the monthly budget for this category!
I like the thought of separating out, but I have a feeling most people’s room for improving is on groceries and not the toiletry type purchases. We’re only going to skimp so much on shampoo, razors, toilet paper, etc. I like to think those are mostly more fixed, but connected to the grocery budget.
Funny this is mentioned because I have a perfect example today. We aim for our $150/wk “grocery” budget. I needed more face razors. The standard 4 pack wasn’t in stock, so she had to get the 10 pack ($20). In turn, we went over our weekly budget by $10. Sucks, but we know what did it and not the end of the world.
See, I definitely don't agree with that! Look into Dorco razors, and 'lazy' stropping and drying your heads to make them last longer. You can way cut down razor costs, even keeping with disposable heads (vs straight razors). And there's TONS of room in women's hair products especially for modifying cost. Not to even mention makeup sourcing, etc. You can fairly easily get this from $100+/month down to closer to $15/month for all household products. Definitely don't take these costs for granted as being fixed. Anyway, I like to split out 'general household' costs to be monitored in their own right.
Oh yeah and I totally agree with all of this. My wife wears makeup once a week typically at most, and that’s only for our weekend date night, which we are cutting back on this year. Until last year she’d only ever bought cheap wal mart or drug store makeup. Last year she used some birthday money and asks for nicer makeup as gifts. Since she so rarely wears it, it lasts forever and I’m fine with that.
My Mach 3 razor heads last forever and I always dry them after and don’t store them face down. I shave about twice a week and probably get 4-6 weeks out of a razor head. That means that box of razors should last a year pretty easy. This week just had to be the week we needed more. She typically gets 4 packs but 10 is all they had. I’ve tried many different razors and these work best for me (less razor burn, ingrowns, etc). I also shave my arms/chest/stomach in the shower, and we use more of a disposable type razor there.
My wife gets her haircut around once a year, doesn’t dye it, and uses run of the mill wal mart shampoo (we use the same cheap stuff)
I definitely see where you’re coming from in that many people can certainly spend a ton on toiletries and beauty products, but I feel our choices are very, very, reasonable. I’m amazed that women can get their nails and toes done almost weekly and $150 hair/dye jobs almost every month. Best thing about my Mexican wife, long pretty black hair and dark features so she still look fine without makeup lol. I’m white and freckles, I envy her skin and lack of sunburn!
Well you are correct that typical household supplies are probably pretty low. I do not wear makeup, we buy Costco size shampoo/conditioner, deodorant, toothpaste, soap, lotion, toilet paper, laundry detergent, dishwasher soap, etc that last forever and Dollar Shave Club razors. However, there are 6 of us, so that could still add up and I simply do not know how much of our grocery budget these things take up. We also don't use paper towels or disposable diapers but I think occasionally the rest of the family would like to lock me in the closet and go buy some paper towels. I also am not currently able to track the more one off things that end up in the household supplies category, "I picked up some extra kitchen towels today" or "I bought this other type of cleaning supplies because I like the smell better" or "the little kids NEED more bubble bath stuff AGAIN".
Over the counter medicine usually end up in this category too, those probably should get their own category.
One of my struggles is that I can only occasionally convince SO utilize YNAB and he does most of the shopping. He will occasionally put his transactions into YNAB but asking him to split them up or tell me how to split them up, I am afraid would create unnecessary tension in the house. Maybe if I lay the ground work in 2019 I can split these all up in 2020 without too much tension.
-
Spending 2019:
Food: €7
Travel card: €57
Home repairs: €80
Will probably have enough money on my card to last me for the rest of the month. Will do a big food shop today, we are totally out of options now.
Nice job @Imma!
I'm now at
Food: €32
Travel card: €57
Home repairs: €80
Tonight we have a date night :) We rarely do special date nights, but it's our 5-year anniversary today so it's a special day. Turns out we both planned a surprise for the other (I planned to see a movie, he planned dinner) so we will have a long and expensive night doing both. I'm pretty sure we'll stay under €100 and we hardly ever do expensive things together, so we don't mind the cost at all.
We were still poor when we got together so we never got into the habit of spending money on expensive activities or gifts, even though we could afford it now.
-
Weeelll... I'm going over budget. Not regarding my regular expenses, but my holiday to Iceland in the summer. I had planned to spend 1500 euro all in for this 7 day holiday (per person), but now that I've booked everything, I'm already at 1450 euro! Ack!
Part of this is because I was perhaps a bit too optimistic on prices for the high season. Good luck finding a hotel for less than 150 (75 each). But another part... man, we did pack on the fun. A helicopter tour, whale watching, boat tour on the glacier lake with icebergs. Super fun and I don't really regret booking it... but holy hell, my budget is blown. That stinks. We kept piling on because we kept thinking 'well, we're only there once!'.
Still need to buy gas, food and drinks for the week so I'm guessing the total will go to 2000 per person, so 500 over budget. I did get an unexpected return on my gas bill for 442 euro so most of this will be covered, I'll tighten my budget this month to cover the rest.
Hope I'll remember this lesson in 6 months time and don't think "Oh what the hell" when I'm in full holiday spirit.
-
Weeelll... I'm going over budget. Not regarding my regular expenses, but my holiday to Iceland in the summer. I had planned to spend 1500 euro all in for this 7 day holiday (per person), but now that I've booked everything, I'm already at 1450 euro! Ack!
Part of this is because I was perhaps a bit too optimistic on prices for the high season. Good luck finding a hotel for less than 150 (75 each). But another part... man, we did pack on the fun. A helicopter tour, whale watching, boat tour on the glacier lake with icebergs. Super fun and I don't really regret booking it... but holy hell, my budget is blown. That stinks. We kept piling on because we kept thinking 'well, we're only there once!'.
Still need to buy gas, food and drinks for the week so I'm guessing the total will go to 2000 per person, so 500 over budget. I did get an unexpected return on my gas bill for 442 euro so most of this will be covered, I'll tighten my budget this month to cover the rest.
Hope I'll remember this lesson in 6 months time and don't think "Oh what the hell" when I'm in full holiday spirit.
Check out alternatives, air B&B and camping.
-
I had real craving for Taco Bell, and gave in but instead of eating a full meal I just bought one taco to get over it. Not the best solution, but better than I would have done before.
-
Had a close call yesterday near dinnertime, when we were all REALLY wanting to go out to eat, but we resisted and made dinner at home instead.
We don't normally eat out very often, but due to our crazy house construction (doing it all ourselves and living in the house while we're doing it), we have been making do with a temporary 'kitchen' in our basement with a hot plate and microwave for the past three months. It gets a bit challenging to (a) eat healthy and (b) not eat the same things every day.
If we make it another month like this (no kitchen) without eating out, that will be badass.
-
Had a close call yesterday near dinnertime, when we were all REALLY wanting to go out to eat, but we resisted and made dinner at home instead.
We don't normally eat out very often, but due to our crazy house construction (doing it all ourselves and living in the house while we're doing it), we have been making do with a temporary 'kitchen' in our basement with a hot plate and microwave for the past three months. It gets a bit challenging to (a) eat healthy and (b) not eat the same things every day.
If we make it another month like this (no kitchen) without eating out, that will be badass.
For three months! That is a very long time. I consider it acceptable if you get some form of healthy take-out once in a while and lots of otherwise preproduced foods. I have been it that situation myself, just for 1 month, I think. At that time we also occasionally ate warm-up in the microwave frozen lasagna from the grocery store. There is only so much you can do with a microwave and one stove.
You can always get a bag of mixed and washed salad to accompany a not so nutricious dish. Our store has bags of frozen pasta/rice meals with lot of vegetavles in them. Those seem very health and only require 5 minutes in a wok.
-
Had a close call yesterday near dinnertime, when we were all REALLY wanting to go out to eat, but we resisted and made dinner at home instead.
We don't normally eat out very often, but due to our crazy house construction (doing it all ourselves and living in the house while we're doing it), we have been making do with a temporary 'kitchen' in our basement with a hot plate and microwave for the past three months. It gets a bit challenging to (a) eat healthy and (b) not eat the same things every day.
If we make it another month like this (no kitchen) without eating out, that will be badass.
Oh we did this last year! Our food spending actually went down that month somehow (maybe we should never have a kitchen as a way to reduce our food costs...) We did a lot of grilled cheese and quesadillas on the George Foreman grill, burgers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches - like you said, not the healthiest. We moved our fridge out to the garage which was also stuff storage instead of car storage for a while, but having access to a fridge and grill was greatly helpful. We also had figured out the cheap eat out food in advance and allowed ourselves one per week I think, but it usually provided leftovers. We did eat lunch out a lot more often so leftovers were for dinner the next night instead of lunch, but it's cheaper to eat out for lunch than for dinner.
Good luck with the kitchen!
-
Use, we found out the hard way with AT&T that when one of our phones died after we paid them off early we had no recourse. They said if we hadn’t done that we would have gotten a new phone without paying much.
-
Use, we found out the hard way with AT&T that when one of our phones died after we paid them off early we had no recourse. They said if we hadn’t done that we would have gotten a new phone without paying much.
Thanks for the info. I can see that and something to keep in mind.
Last night my wife and I went out to dinner at our favorite (not cheap) Mexican place. Their food is amazing and we love their margaritas. The margaritas are expensive at $10/ea, and we often get 2 a piece. It’s easy to tell myself we’ll just get 1, but once we’re there and really want another, the first one makes it easy to talk ourselves into a second.
So... while we were getting ready at home, we made margaritas with stuff we already had! We said if we have 1 at home it’ll be easier to stick to 1 at dinner. We drank our margaritas at home, got to dinner, and didn’t even feel like having any with dinner! Also, we had a $25 gift card we got for Christmas. I also went with the enchiladas ($18) instead of my normal fajitas ($28).
We ended up with a $43 bill (+tip) minus our $25 gift card. There have been many a times where we left there $90-$100 lighter! Even better, we had enough left over for our breakfast this morning.
-
Slightly under budget half way through the month. Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $1658 after rent. 50% mark is $829 and we’re at $807.41. Woo!
Groceries & Personal Care: $299.82
Travel: $272 - Train tickets to go home in February and Thanksgiving.
Shopping: $125 - bulk cat food, 6 months of wet food.
Eating & Drinking Out: $67.16 - $10.92 drink w/friend; $56.24 Q1 wine subscription.
Internet, Phone, Electricity: $30 internet.
Other: $13.43 - $6.53 movie rental; $6.90 soda at movie theater.
The holiday train tickets were a big win, it’s normally 3x more even when booking months ahead. This time I booked so far in advance I got them less than base fare. Hurray! The quarterly wine subscription is from a small winery we like...did I mention we added some life style creep last year? Yet, I’m very excited for it to arrive, sooo...
The funny thing is we’re only slightly under budget, yet I’ve felt like we’ve been really frugal. I think it’s because we’ve done a lot of free or almost free activities this month. That and I’m furloughed so no coffee outs (feels like I’m spending no money). But the larger purchases have outweighed my lack of coffee apparently. More motivation to spend less the second half of the month!
-
Spending 2019:
Food: €7
Travel card: €57
Home repairs: €80
Will probably have enough money on my card to last me for the rest of the month. Will do a big food shop today, we are totally out of options now.
Nice job @Imma!
I'm now at
Food: €32
Travel card: €57
Home repairs: €80
Tonight we have a date night :) We rarely do special date nights, but it's our 5-year anniversary today so it's a special day.
Super impressive Imma! Especially the food budget. Congrats on your anniversary!
-
Okay. First week up.
Expected/Fixed:
Rent
Electric
Gym membership
Google Music
Food for the dog
Charity
(Debating sharing these costs specifically)
Variable/Elective:
Deposit for vet appointment (new vet since we moved. Pup's baby teeth haven't all fallen out, so we want to get those checked and plan for her getting fixed)- $60 deposit, appointment will be $170, then TBD on procedures
Groceries - $147 so far. We came home from Christmas out of town to an empty fridge. Includes a large haul of produce and some coffee coming tomorrow from Imperfect Produce. Also just replaced a ton of nuts and seeds I ran out of. Those should last a while, but they're spendy all at once.
General household- some plastic lids for mason jars. Been dragging my feet on this for a long time, but we needed more. We store a lot in glass. Also getting a draft stopper for the front door. We've been using a towel, but the only spare towel is an incredibly ugly 'dog towel'. Downsides- needs to be picked up every time we wash the dog. Also ugly as sin. I probably would have kept with the towel or found a less ugly towel, but husband decided it was a Thing. He rarely does this, so I'm happy to oblige on this. All in all, it was just under $26. I got $25 amazon credit this week for completing a study, so well timed- less than $1 out of pocket.
Student loan payments- we decided to kill all the loans above 4% interest. Previously we'd been letting all the 4-5% interest rate ones ride. But we got a big lump of cash from selling the house, and already put shittons in the market ($11k IRAs, $10k brokerage, set up to add $2k brokerage per month, and we'll be doing 2019 IRAs soon- another $12k). So $7,525 later, we're down by 3 loans, ALL of my husband's loans are gone, and outstanding student debt is less than $10k, at 3.61%
Second week summary here:
Groceries are artificially low, as one store we go to we're working through gift cards (got them on a cyber monday sale, bought $500 worth for $400, and got 6% on rewards CC still). Anyway, since that purchase was Nov or Dec, I haven't wanted to double count them.
Gas: $39 (one fill up)
Groceries: $183
Utilities: $96
Health spending (doc, pharmacy, acupunture): $173
Social spending (scone and coffee for me at book club, beers for husband with the guys at the same time): $25
Pets: $193 (vet appointment, dog food)
Hobby cost (rash guard for husband): $14
Total non-rent, non-student loan spending so far: $925
-
Had a close call yesterday near dinnertime, when we were all REALLY wanting to go out to eat, but we resisted and made dinner at home instead.
We don't normally eat out very often, but due to our crazy house construction (doing it all ourselves and living in the house while we're doing it), we have been making do with a temporary 'kitchen' in our basement with a hot plate and microwave for the past three months. It gets a bit challenging to (a) eat healthy and (b) not eat the same things every day.
If we make it another month like this (no kitchen) without eating out, that will be badass.
Oh we did this last year! Our food spending actually went down that month somehow (maybe we should never have a kitchen as a way to reduce our food costs...) We did a lot of grilled cheese and quesadillas on the George Foreman grill, burgers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches - like you said, not the healthiest. We moved our fridge out to the garage which was also stuff storage instead of car storage for a while, but having access to a fridge and grill was greatly helpful. We also had figured out the cheap eat out food in advance and allowed ourselves one per week I think, but it usually provided leftovers. We did eat lunch out a lot more often so leftovers were for dinner the next night instead of lunch, but it's cheaper to eat out for lunch than for dinner.
Good luck with the kitchen!
Thanks @meerkat! Yes we do have our fridge, so that is super helpful. Ooh -- a small grill would be really useful . . . Good idea!
-
Had a close call yesterday near dinnertime, when we were all REALLY wanting to go out to eat, but we resisted and made dinner at home instead.
We don't normally eat out very often, but due to our crazy house construction (doing it all ourselves and living in the house while we're doing it), we have been making do with a temporary 'kitchen' in our basement with a hot plate and microwave for the past three months. It gets a bit challenging to (a) eat healthy and (b) not eat the same things every day.
If we make it another month like this (no kitchen) without eating out, that will be badass.
Oh we did this last year! Our food spending actually went down that month somehow (maybe we should never have a kitchen as a way to reduce our food costs...) We did a lot of grilled cheese and quesadillas on the George Foreman grill, burgers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches - like you said, not the healthiest. We moved our fridge out to the garage which was also stuff storage instead of car storage for a while, but having access to a fridge and grill was greatly helpful. We also had figured out the cheap eat out food in advance and allowed ourselves one per week I think, but it usually provided leftovers. We did eat lunch out a lot more often so leftovers were for dinner the next night instead of lunch, but it's cheaper to eat out for lunch than for dinner.
Good luck with the kitchen!
Thanks @meerkat! Yes we do have our fridge, so that is super helpful. Ooh -- a small grill would be really useful . . . Good idea!
When we were remodeling our kitchen we lived off the crock-pot... we now have an instant pot and that would have provided so many more options.
-
Had a close call yesterday near dinnertime, when we were all REALLY wanting to go out to eat, but we resisted and made dinner at home instead.
We don't normally eat out very often, but due to our crazy house construction (doing it all ourselves and living in the house while we're doing it), we have been making do with a temporary 'kitchen' in our basement with a hot plate and microwave for the past three months. It gets a bit challenging to (a) eat healthy and (b) not eat the same things every day.
If we make it another month like this (no kitchen) without eating out, that will be badass.
Oh we did this last year! Our food spending actually went down that month somehow (maybe we should never have a kitchen as a way to reduce our food costs...) We did a lot of grilled cheese and quesadillas on the George Foreman grill, burgers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches - like you said, not the healthiest. We moved our fridge out to the garage which was also stuff storage instead of car storage for a while, but having access to a fridge and grill was greatly helpful. We also had figured out the cheap eat out food in advance and allowed ourselves one per week I think, but it usually provided leftovers. We did eat lunch out a lot more often so leftovers were for dinner the next night instead of lunch, but it's cheaper to eat out for lunch than for dinner.
Good luck with the kitchen!
Thanks @meerkat! Yes we do have our fridge, so that is super helpful. Ooh -- a small grill would be really useful . . . Good idea!
When we were remodeling our kitchen we lived off the crock-pot... we now have an instant pot and that would have provided so many more options.
IP allows so many easy meals. I do a pork ramen in there often, and one of my favorite lazy meals (egg drop soup) could easily be done in there as well. The saute function really opens up SO many options!
-
Yes, during our kitchen build we have used the crock pot a couple of times. And I have wondered about the Instant Pot. People seem to love them, but I don't get it -- probably because I haven't used one! :)
Second grocery trip of the month came in at $151 for the 4 of us (two adults, two teenagers). Continuing to try to push that down.
-
Mid month update:
Food: €90
Travel: €63
Fun: €30
Home repairs: €80
Date night ended up cheaper than expected because we didn't make it to the cinema in time. Instead we bought drinks and snacks on the way home and watched Netflix. I paid the monthly fee for my sewing class. The annual maintenance of the central heating system is coming up, so this will be an expensive month for home repairs. We like to make sure our home is well maintained - we used to live in a rental and the landlord didn't believe maintenance was cost effective. We learned valuable lessons there and nr 1 was outsourcing maintenance of important things (like central heating) if you can't DIY it is well worth the money and convenience.
Our food budget is fairly low, because there's just 2 of us and we live simply: oats for breakfast, bread for lunch and seasonal veggies for dinner. We don't eat a lot of meat or exotic food and honestly, during the week we are sometimes just so exhausted when we get back from work we end up eating grilled cheese sandwiches, soup or pancakes.
-
Welp, there goes my goal to have a below-average spending month. I went to the dentist yesterday and I have to have a crown put on. Hopefully that will do the trick and I won't have to proceed to a root canal. The $ is the least of it. I have very serious dental phobia and this all makes me ill. I barely slept last night, but fortunately they were able to fit me in today for the crown. So at least I won't have days of this dread. Just want to get through it, pay the bill and move on.
-
@Trifele Ugh, my sympathies. I really hate the dentist too. Cleanings aren't so bad but any kind of other work is awful. Does your dentist do nitrous oxide? I have to pay extra for it but it is 100% worth it. Makes it way more manageable. Either way, sending good thoughts to you today! I hope the crown placement goes well and that you can avoid the root canal.
-
2018 finances finished up:
Things that really stood out that I will be monitoring in 2019 include:
Cell phone ($75/mo): Late 2018 I switched to Sprint to take advantage of the 1 free year unlimited data/talk/text. I expect this to average out to less than $10/mo. SAVINGS: $65/mo
Gas/Fuel ($160/mo): Ouch. Lots of driving and travelling. Plan on biking more, doing fewer road trips. Hoping to average less than $50/mo. SAVINGS: $110/mo
Restaurants/Bars ($540/mo): Double ouch. This is clearly where I bled the most. Love trying out new food and craft beer.. I think overall I do pretty well budget wise, but looking back I can't help but be disappointed I spent quite this much. This is where I get a lot of pleasure in my life, so aiming for $300/mo is still ridiculously generous but a little more mustachian. SAVINGS: $240/mo
"Shopping" ($420/mo): Unfortunately in trying to keep mint somewhat simple, I tend to lump miscellaneous things into "shopping".. Kinda wish I had separated the category into more sub-categories for better analysis. Regardless, I can recall some purchases that weren't quite necessary.. I'll aim to keep this leftover/miscellaneous category to under $150/mo. SAVINGS: $270/mo
Car ($445/mo): This will be an easy one. The bulk of this was tied up in the purchase of a new (used) vehicle. So I would anticipate need for one oil change (which I do myself), car registration, then maybe a couple unexpected repairs... $100/mo would be plenty to budget. SAVINGS $345/mo
If I can tackle those categories, there is potentially $1030/mo that I can save, for $12,360 more post-tax dollars in my pocket. Fingers crossed.
-
@Trifele Ugh, my sympathies. I really hate the dentist too. Cleanings aren't so bad but any kind of other work is awful. Does your dentist do nitrous oxide? I have to pay extra for it but it is 100% worth it. Makes it way more manageable. Either way, sending good thoughts to you today! I hope the crown placement goes well and that you can avoid the root canal.
Thanks @zygote! Crown is on. My insurance paid half, so out of pocket cost was $675. The tooth was in worse shape than I realized and it took them 2 1/2 hours to do the repair. The dentist was very kind. They don't have gas, but they gave me a couple Ativan beforehand. I was still a shaking wreck, but at least I got through the door and got it done.
I'll wear the crown for a few weeks, and see if the pain goes away. If it does, then I won't need the root canal. ($$$$$) Fingers crossed.
-
Food: €100
Travel: €63
Fun: €55
Home repairs: €80
Phone bill: €20
Clothes: €70
I spent €70 on clothes for a special occasion, but I made sure to buy versatile items that I can wear to work and parties. I don't have a lot of clothes and most of what I have is pretty casual, so unsuitable for this occasion. I spent €25 getting 5 years' worth of pictures printed. I have been meaning to do this for forever and now I had a coupon.
The special occasion will be in Feb but I'm planning to make an appointment at the hairdresser and with a photographer that day too. I have very long hair and I'm not good at doing my own hair, so when I have special occasion I usually pay the hairdresser to do my hair (which costs €25 and happens maybe twice a year). I need new pictures for my business website, so I'm planning to have some pictures taken in the morning. That way, I don't have to get dressed up twice. I don't have any friends who can do my hair unfortunately (we're all the ponytail-type) but at least my hairdresser is not that expensive.
-
We’re crushing our budget so far this month. Our spending is $1200 under where we were last month at this time, and last month we were very near our budget.
Next month will be a little more challenging. I have a work trip where my cousin lives so I’m going to spend a few extra days with him. He’s been one of my closest friends my whole life (same age, grew up in same small town) and we don’t see each other as much anymore. We’ll go out to eat some, bars, renting snowmobiles for a day, etc. won’t be cheap but worth it, and may still make our budget. In turn, since my wife will be home alone and doesn’t work she will be pretty bored. We just moved to a new city so don’t know many people. I offered to pay for her sisters gas and their food and entertainment for her and her two sisters if they make the few hr drive to come visit. Her sister doesn’t make much (literally about 1/15 of my income) and her other sister is only 4 years old, so I have no problem contributing to them having an enjoyable weekend.
-
Jumping in on this.... A little more than halfway through the month, and I'm a little more than halfway through my budget, so that's not bad. On the other hand, I was trying to do the Frugalwoods' Uber Frugal January, and I really blew it out with a couple of unbudgeted things that are probably worth at least two face-punches each. One was a birthday lunch and gift for my best friend, and I spent way more than I usually would on that, but her life has been a disaster for the last year+, and I wanted to give her something nice. The other was a long-planned reward for hitting a major weight loss goal: a massage. At least I got an intro rate on it.
Other than those, I'm pretty much on track with everything. No "miscellaneous spending" aside from those two things (miraculous!). The cats' annual checkup came in at about $82 less than I'd set aside for it, so that was nice. I should squeak just under budget for groceries, and I got a bunch of things that will last me well into next month. And I budgeted $0 in my "eating out" category--I did give myself $100/mo for "spending money," and some of that has gone toward eating out this month, but I used to give myself spending money *and* eating out money (and I usually went over budget on the latter), so this has cut those two categories together by at least half.
The Splurge is my biggest expense category so far, with gas/electric second and groceries/goods third.
Let's see how the rest of the month goes....
-
% of monthly budget left (as of 1/21)
Household supplies/groceries: 25%
Eating out: 60%
There SHOULD be only small grocery purchases the rest of the month. I leave tomorrow for a 4 day work trip and the family will be eating stuff in the pantry/freezer that is outside of my diet limitations, I am hopeful that will equal almost 0 grocery spend for this week. I do think they will probably utilize some of that remaining eating out budget but I feel DH has an excuse. Juggling all 4 kids by oneself is difficult so I will be happy if they can just manage to keep that within the budget. My expenses will be reimbursed.
-
I just barely managed to close the freezer door yesterday, so this week will be cheap in groceries: we're trying to not buy anything until we have at least two empty drawers. Also got a small tax return and a potential new customer, so doing ok on the income side too :)
-
1/21/2019 update on my "key categories"
Cell phone (2018: $75/mo | 2019 GOAL: $10/mo): $24. Won't be any more this month, had some roaming charges from trip out of country.
Gas/Fuel (2018: $160/mo | 2019 GOAL: $50/mo): $0. Expecting a $30 fill-up this weekend.
Restaurants/Bars (2018: $540/mo | 2019 GOAL: $300/mo): $0. Really trying hard this month. Have a planned brewery trip this weekend but aim to keep it <$30.
"Shopping" (2018: $420/mo | 2019 GOAL: $150/mo): $128. Some spontaneous purchases, some required. More than I was hoping for this month.
Car (2018: $445/mo | 2019 GOAL: $100/mo): $54. Did my first oil change by myself, full synthetic. Couple tools i didn't have so should be cheaper moving forwards.
-
Here is the graphic of my 2019 spending so far. Divide the numbers by 10 to make Euro's and by a little more than 10 to make $.
The big grey bar is "home". This month we had a high electricity bill, because it is winter. We also had to pay the half-year bill for the state TV. The green bar is food. Over the entire year my expenses of home and food often end up equal.
Handel = buying stuff
Helse = health
Hjem = home
Hytte = cabin
Klær = clothes
Mat = food
The "handel" amount is negative, because I got paid back a Christmas present that I gave to someone else. It didn't fit her.
-
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 92%
Eating out: 63%
There are less than 2 full days left for Jan so these numbers should be pretty accurate but might need to be edited slightly. I know DH plans to pick up some tortillas today and maybe a few other small items.
WE ARE UNDER BUDGET!! That almost never happens and I need to make sure that DH gets almost all of the credit for this. He hates budgeting and hates staying in the budget and does most of our food shopping so I am really excited that he seems to be understanding how stressed out I was because we were always over budget. Hopefully this continues to get better. Now my dilemma is that if I tell him how excited I am and how much is left in the budget, he will probably want to get take out tonight for dinner.
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Success so far. Groceries were $250, eating out was $66!! The eating out number is artificially low because my wife paid for some meals she wanted that I still got to enjoy, but even if I had paid my half I'd still be way under last year's average.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Generally a success. Spent <$450 on 8 tickets. Some for this month, some for future dates. Put a lot of effort into getting lowest prices possible between rush, discounts, and buying in person to avoid fees.
-I also spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Definitely a success! Only bought more of the deodorant I love this month.
Spent $2900 this month, including a $500 vet bill. That's a huge reduction in my monthly average of $3500 from last year. I don't think I can keep that up every month due to some upcoming lumpy expenses (mostly travel), though I did manage it even with the unexpected pet illness. It feels great to know I can get under $3000 if I'm really paying attention.
-
I’m getting pretty excited for this month end! Unfortunately my credit card lags 3-4 days so I won’t have a final tally until a few days after the month is over. My goal is $6000 in spending and I think I’ll be around $5200, which is great (for me).
Next couple months will be hard. Expensive trip in February and moving in March and will be paying 19 days rent on current place and a full month on the new place while we move.
-
I'm in. Current spending per month (for the last 12 months) is as follows:
Food: $598
Non-Food: $441
Eating out: $570
Medical: $603
Kids: $2806
Mortgages: $5122
Utilities: $2045
Transport: $1819
Holidays: $487
Total: $14,491 per month
My aim is to drop this by 10% overall. Some are fairly fixed, such as the kids money which is for accommodation at university, or mortgages, which won't change until the end of the year 2019 when we sell a property we are renovating.
Things that should reduce the most are:
- Transport - as we shouldn't need to buy a vehicle like last year, and will drive a lot less.
- Utilities - which should reduce for a number of reasons, but our son taking on some expenses and a house being mothballed as holiday home will reduce these.
- Food - aiming for under $500 per month.
- Non-food - there will be less clothes purchases as we are set up for the colder climate we are now in. :(
- Eating out - this has jumped around this year depending on when our adult kids are visiting. Meals out and visits to the pub seem to be the main culprits. Coffee adds up too. Aiming to halve this one.
I'll check in later to see how it works out.
January spending will be very close to this. Last year averages in brackets for reference:
Food: $777 (598)
Non-Food: $337 (441)
Eating out: $656 (570)
Medical: $687 (603)
Kids: $1257 (2806)
Mortgages: $4962 (5122)
Utilities: $872 (2045)
Transport: $1193 (1819)
Holidays: $1459 (487)
Total: $12,037 (14,491) or a drop of 17%.
Some notes:
- Food and eating out were higher than they should have been due to having extra bodies in the house (at least one extra all month), and being on holidays.
- Kids expenses were down, but will go back to normal levels next month. They were reduced as we had the extra kid at home, rather than at university.
- Utilities were cheap this month, which was good as it included electricity bills, but will be up next month as one properties rates are due then.
- I'm hoping to get transport and but some repairs are due and that may make the costs about the same
- We booked a holiday for April and have paid for some of it, but not all. We will also have a holiday in July that we need to start booking. Holiday costs will be up for a little while.
Overall I'm reasonably happy, but really want to see some of the more discretionary spending brought back down.
-
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 92%
Eating out: 63%
There are less than 2 full days left for Jan so these numbers should be pretty accurate but might need to be edited slightly. I know DH plans to pick up some tortillas today and maybe a few other small items.
WE ARE UNDER BUDGET!! That almost never happens and I need to make sure that DH gets almost all of the credit for this. He hates budgeting and hates staying in the budget and does most of our food shopping so I am really excited that he seems to be understanding how stressed out I was because we were always over budget. Hopefully this continues to get better. Now my dilemma is that if I tell him how excited I am and how much is left in the budget, he will probably want to get take out tonight for dinner.
Maybe your husband is right. Budgets are supposed to restrain you from spending too much. But they also allow you to spend more than you need, if there is anything left in the budget (like the takeout you mention). Maybe your husband just buys no more than enough in quantities and focuses on cheap ingredients. Maybe he should do most of the shopping from now on. And don't tell him there is anything left on the budget.
-
Under budget! Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). Total for month is $2951; under by $382.
Rent: $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $576.61
Travel: $272 - Train tickets to go home in February and Thanksgiving.
Shopping: $125 - bulk cat food, 6 3 months of wet food.
Eating & Drinking Out: $124 - $10.92 drink w/friend; $56.24 Q1 wine subscription; $8.69 drink w/coworkers; $47.49 drinks (for 2) at going away party
Internet, Phone, Electricity: $71.33 - $30 internet; $41.33 electric
Other: $107.45 - $6.53 movie rental; $6.90 soda at movie theater; $14.99 HBO; $11.98 Netflix; $66 annual website fee; $1.05 in-app game purchase
Groceries are still higher than I would like. It’s not my realm though so hard to keep down.
-
Well under budget.
$995 in spending if I don't count vehicle depreciation ($200).
-
Well, I've been all excited to report spending numbers I was really happy with, but today, on the LAST DAMNED DAY OF THE MONTH, I unexpectedly had to make $657 worth of repairs to my car. That changed a month with a surplus of more than $400, which would have been a huge step in the right direction, to a negative month. HUMBUG.
Kid-4 started working a temporary job at a really nice wage about two weeks ago, so she's picking up more of her expenses. It's a huge relief! This job will last until mid-April. I'm still covering her car insurance, half of her car payment, and for the first half of the month, I paid for her food and gas. She's taken over food and gas now that paychecks are coming in.
Food and grocery is over budget (I try for $10/day, so $310 for January), partly because of that meal out early in the month that I confessed to in a previous post, but partly because about a week ago I started stocking up my kitchen to start making food at home again. I've been sustaining myself on takeout and restaurant food since I first got too sick to cook, about two years ago. It's time! I've been back in the kitchen for about a week now, and it's kind of fun again. I've gained a pound, though. Oops.
Some of my spending is high by mustachian standards, but overall I'm happy with it. Here's to a frugal February!
-
@TNT -- this is a really nice layout.
For the general group, I am wondering how you figure post-tax investments into your budget. For example, Roth IRA contributions. Do you take that out before your net income for budget purposes, essentially reducing your paycheck by your investments before adding it to your spreadsheet? Or is Investments a budget category for you?
These categories that most have are very similar to mine, but I have a also an "Investments" category for those post-tax items that I DCA to each month.
-
@TNT -- this is a really nice layout.
For the general group, I am wondering how you figure post-tax investments into your budget. For example, Roth IRA contributions. Do you take that out before your net income for budget purposes, essentially reducing your paycheck by your investments before adding it to your spreadsheet? Or is Investments a budget category for you?
These categories that most have are very similar to mine, but I have a also an "Investments" category for those post-tax items that I DCA to each month.
I have "investments" listed in YNAB as a budget item, but I have it set to be excluded from my income and expense report (shown above). Having it as a budget item creates a credit to balance the debit from my checking account when I invest, but I don't really consider it spending.
-
We were way over target for January. :( Target was $2700, and actual spend was $3869 = 143%. Most of the overage was emergency dental work. Booooo.
My main focus for the challenge was to get grocery and utility costs down from last year's average. Succeeded on the groceries and came in $95 lower than last year's average. Utility costs were only slightly lower than last January. As our house build progresses, the house tightens up, and the weather warms up, the utility bill will drop so there's that to look forward to.
Wins from the month were (slightly) lower food and utilities, and ZERO spending on clothes, eating out, and alcohol.
Top 10 spending categories for January:
Medical/Dental: $ 687
Groceries: $ 656
Utilities: $ 539
Kids: $ 309
Taxes: $ 200
Donations: $ 180
Insurance: $ 175
Household: $ 172
Memberships: $ 163
Gas: $ 140
-
My monthly spending is almost always consistently the same. Electricity costs more during the summer here in AZ, but the rest of my bills stay the same. Here's a breakdown by month on average:
Property tax - $100
Homeowners insurance $35
Car insurance - $100
Gasoline - $80
Car maintenance - $50
Food - $250
Electricity - $75
Water/Trash - $65
HOA - $65
Phone -$40
Internet - $50
Gym - $20
Netflix - $12
That adds up to $950 and those bills are about as low as I can get them without forgoing basing needs or choosing cheaper unhealthier foods.
Last month my take home income was $6,350. I worked a lot of overtime at the end of December, usually it's closer to $5k. My savings for January was $4,800. So I still managed 75% savings rate. I was trying to figure out where the additional $600 went and looked back and saw I paid off the credit card I used for all the Christmas gifts.
I typically track my monthly income and spending and at the end of every month I write everything down in a composition notebook. It's fairly consistent that I save closer to $4k of the typical $5k income but I never make an effort to pay much attention to the percentage of income I'm saving. After reading this thread I think I can do better in 2019.
I'm going to pay closer attention to where I'm at during the month and set a goal of 80%+ each month and if I'm not hitting that target I either need to reduce spending somewhere else or work more hours. I'll admit, I get lazy with work sometimes. There are weeks where it's hard to get motivated to work more than 40 hours. I think having a goal like this will boost my motivation to save more.
-
January Update
Cell phone (2018: $75/mo | 2019 GOAL: $10/mo): $24. Went over due to roaming charges from trip back home to Canada
Gas/Fuel (2018: $160/mo | 2019 GOAL: $50/mo): $32. One fill up, still nearly full to start February.
Restaurants/Bars (2018: $540/mo | 2019 GOAL: $300/mo): $13. One trip to In-N-Out :)
"Shopping" (2018: $420/mo | 2019 GOAL: $150/mo): $426. Man this hurts. $150 for work-visa-related documentation, $100 for bike parts/tools, 176$ in miscellaneous, including multiple reserve collection BBA stouts from previous years that I stumbled upon and couldn't help myself (I have a beer "cellar" with some stuff aging.. it's a relatively expensive hobby but makes me very happy)
Car (2018: $445/mo | 2019 GOAL: $100/mo): $54. Self-performed synthetic oil change
Pretty average start to the year (a lot of you are off to a great start!!). Looking at my key categories, I did well in all but two. $150 of the shopping was necessary, about $100 of the shopping was important and needed to be done eventually, and the rest was no where near necessary. I'm happy with my restaurants/bars, somewhat made up for the shopping issue. Looking forward to February, I'm hoping to see car, gas/fuel at 0$ (the $100 important shopping was new tires, inner tubes, brake pads and bike repair tools that I'll be using this weekend to fix up a bike I got free on Craigslist!); and to see cell phone at <5$. My girlfriend and I already agreed to no gifts for Valentines day for the purposes of diet, financial and consumerism.
Overall, spent $549 in the key categories, down $1091 from my $1640 average in 2018. With plenty more room for improvement.
Love reading everyone's updates, inspirational and a reminder that I have a lot of work to do!
-
January was a great month! I had a lot of fun, and I feel like it was very productive. I spent quality time with my wife and friends, called my parents more than usual, recorded a song with a friend, increased my fitness level, and took care of myself with physiotherapy, massages, acupuncture, and cupping. And all of this didn't cost much. Here's all my January spending:
Library late fees: $0.75
Haircut: $40
Movie theatre: $3.60
Groceries: $22.51
Drinks out: $20
Restaurants: $41.30
Total variable spending: $128.16
Total fixed expenses: $485*
Total of all January expenses: $613.16
I had initially challenged myself to spending $1,000 or less per month, but after January I'm thinking that's not much of a challenge. To make this more interesting, I'm changing my goal to less than $700 per month. Looking forward to February!!!
__________________
*FYI, here are my fixed expenses that will stay the same each month (note that these are just my own personal costs, so if they seem like half of what you'd expect it's because I split the bill with my wife):
Rent: $425
Tenants insurance: $5
Electricity/heat: $30
Internet: $20
Mobile: $0
Netflix: $5
Total fixed costs per month: $485
-
The January numbers are in! My spending is very high, but does include a trip of a lifetime :) that aside, my spending on eating out is ridiculous and needs to go right down. Groceries are a little high, I'd like to have this in the 175 range. Everything else was below/on budget, so pretty happy overall!
Incoming: 3805
Outgoing: 3474
Investing/saving: 331
Breakdown of spending:
The big one: 1650 toward my summer holiday to Iceland!! I'm also paying half of my mom's expenses in exchange for crossing off an old debt that was gathering dust, but weighed on my soul nonetheless.
Fixed expenses (mortgage, insurance etc) 1325
Variable spending: 498
- groceries 193
- going out/eating out: 114
- personal: 22
- gifts: 50
- cats: 30
- gas/parking: 89
-
January was a great month! I had a lot of fun, and I feel like it was very productive. I spent quality time with my wife and friends, called my parents more than usual, recorded a song with a friend, increased my fitness level, and took care of myself with physiotherapy, massages, acupuncture, and cupping. And all of this didn't cost much. Here's all my January spending:
Library late fees: $0.75
Haircut: $40
Movie theatre: $3.60
Groceries: $22.51
Drinks out: $20
Restaurants: $41.30
Total variable spending: $128.16
Total fixed expenses: $485*
Total of all January expenses: $613.16
I had initially challenged myself to spending $1,000 or less per month, but after January I'm thinking that's not much of a challenge. To make this more interesting, I'm changing my goal to less than $700 per month. Looking forward to February!!!
__________________
*FYI, here are my fixed expenses that will stay the same each month (note that these are just my own personal costs, so if they seem like half of what you'd expect it's because I split the bill with my wife):
Rent: $425
Tenants insurance: $5
Electricity/heat: $30
Internet: $20
Mobile: $0
Netflix: $5
Total fixed costs per month: $485
I'm impressed. Friendly reminder that I'm living a shockingly luxurious life even while trying to be Mustachian. Can I ask you how you manage to have a 22$ grocery budget? Was this an anomoly this month?
Would kill for a grocery budget that's about half my haircut budget :)
-
Great to see so many detailed responses here! Using some of the information to compile my own month end data. I have a couple final expenses from 1/31 (groceries, haircut) I’m waiting to go through then I’ll give it the full shakedown.
I’ve honestly thought about this thread quite a bit this month knowing I’m gonna have to justify why, If I don’t meet my budget!
-
Okay, Jan numbers are in! Not including the more than $7k in student loan pay off we did, we spent $5300. $600 of that was medical expenses, so all in all this was a good month for us.
Unusual expenses this month:
$150 in professional expenses
$193 in pet/vet
Aforementioned $593 of OOP medical expenses
The next two months will be hot steaming budget hell since I'll be paying for a ton of testing, meds, and another IVF cycle. That should add a good ~$28k, but some of those bills trickle in (UGH), so it'll probably work out to an extra $5-15k per month for the next 3 or 4 months.
I think I'm going to track my 'core' expenses also, which is my expenses excluding medical spending or 'over and above' debt repayment. That would be $4,715 for January. I think my goal will be to try and keep these core expenses below $5k/month.
-
We seriously over spent on going out. Partly because my husband was out of town, partly because I had to stay overnight in my work town and majorly because we ate out at sit down restaurant twice instead of once. We do have enough to make up for based on gas we did not use after the polar vortex, but I'd prefer to see if I can just make up over the next two months by cutting our eating out. I'll see how that works.
-
Food: €100
Travel: €63
Fun: €55
Home repairs: €80
Phone bill: €20
Clothes: €70
Ended the month at this:
Final spending for Jan 2019.
Food: €170
Travel: €113
Fun: €55
Home repairs: €80
Phone bill: €20
Clothes: €70
Total: €508
We took a short trip with friends this weekend, but kept it pretty frugal. We went to a gig that we already bought tickets for last year, we had a cheap dinner, I had two drinks and we shared a cheap hostel room with the whole group that ended up costing €20 per bed. I don't mind sharing a room with friends at all, but now I can afford a private room I'll never share with strangers again. In the morning we got breakfast from the grocery store before driving home.
Spending Feb so far:
Food: €37
Travel: €40
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €40 (estimate, we'll split the fuel costs and I'm waiting for them to let me know how much I owe them)
-
January was a great month! I had a lot of fun, and I feel like it was very productive. I spent quality time with my wife and friends, called my parents more than usual, recorded a song with a friend, increased my fitness level, and took care of myself with physiotherapy, massages, acupuncture, and cupping. And all of this didn't cost much. Here's all my January spending:
Library late fees: $0.75
Haircut: $40
Movie theatre: $3.60
Groceries: $22.51
Drinks out: $20
Restaurants: $41.30
Total variable spending: $128.16
Total fixed expenses: $485*
Total of all January expenses: $613.16
I had initially challenged myself to spending $1,000 or less per month, but after January I'm thinking that's not much of a challenge. To make this more interesting, I'm changing my goal to less than $700 per month. Looking forward to February!!!
__________________
*FYI, here are my fixed expenses that will stay the same each month (note that these are just my own personal costs, so if they seem like half of what you'd expect it's because I split the bill with my wife):
Rent: $425
Tenants insurance: $5
Electricity/heat: $30
Internet: $20
Mobile: $0
Netflix: $5
Total fixed costs per month: $485
I'm impressed. Friendly reminder that I'm living a shockingly luxurious life even while trying to be Mustachian. Can I ask you how you manage to have a 22$ grocery budget? Was this an anomoly this month?
Would kill for a grocery budget that's about half my haircut budget :)
lols yeah, it was an anomaly this month. Our usual grocery spend is about $150 per month split with my wife, so $75 each. But in January we decided to raid our freezer and pantry. We tend to forget about that food, and sometimes it sits there for a year. So we thought we might as well deliberatly eat it haha. So yeah, groceries in January were just for the fresh things we needed to supplement our freezer and pantry food.
I'm impressed with your breakdown too! You did really well with the restaurants/bars!! Your number for shopping looks like a lot, but I think most of it is well spent, like the bike stuff :)
Good luck in February!!
-
lols yeah, it was an anomaly this month. Our usual grocery spend is about $150 per month split with my wife, so $75 each. But in January we decided to raid our freezer and pantry. We tend to forget about that food, and sometimes it sits there for a year. So we thought we might as well deliberatly eat it haha. So yeah, groceries in January were just for the fresh things we needed to supplement our freezer and pantry food.
I'm impressed with your breakdown too! You did really well with the restaurants/bars!! Your number for shopping looks like a lot, but I think most of it is well spent, like the bike stuff :)
Good luck in February!!
Ah gotcha, makes sense. Smart to do a pantry raid, did that a couple of months ago and it was a fun challenge. Thanks for the support! This type of challenge is always easier with some external eyes on you for accountability. Hoping I can deliver better on the shopping this month :) Good luck to you too I'll be looking forward to the updates!
-
January Numbers
Home (PITI & Utilities): $2,277/$2,200 $77 over. Had some home maintenance expenses that were higher than expected.
Auto (Gas, Ins, Maint): $1,252/$500 $752 over. My car had a blowout and when I took it in, the tread on all the other tires was <2. New tires are expensive.
Subscriptions (Internet, Phone, Streaming, Gaming): $209/$200 $9 over. Used a little more data than we should have.
Food (Groceries, Restuarants, Vitamin A): $561/$500 $61 over. Stocked up on some meat for the freezer.
Pets (Sitter, Vet, Food): $315/$200 $115 over. Curly girly needed her quarter annual hot spot shot and we had already bought some treats and toys for the month.
Shopping (Furniture, Home Décor, Toys, Clothes): $1,108/$200 $908 over. :< Explained below.
Travel: $0/$400. No travel this month.
Giving: $500/$500
Total: $6,222/$4,700 $1,522 over.
I really didn't want to post this but since it is about holding myself accountable, I gritted my teeth and did it. I don't regret any of the spending we did but it is clear to see we went a little hog wild on our shopping. The other categories we went significantly over on were auto and pet which both were unexpected costs that couldn't really be avoided. The biggest impact on our shopping was that I bought an espresso machine. A $600 espresso machine. It was a refurb off ebay that was about 50% off the cost of new but still. I love it very much and use it every day, sometimes multiple times a day, but that doesn't change the fact that it was a completely extravagant/unbudgeted purchase. The rest of the overage in shopping was due to fridge water filter and a couple things that made our house more livable but weren't really home improvement including a outdoor wood rack + cover, a fancy baby gate to keep the dogs out of the kitchen (RIP half chewed/swallowed steak that was stolen from the counter on 1/13), and a mirror for our master bathroom which we had never replaced after we flooded.
I'm embarrassed by how far over budget we are but I don't regret anything we purchased except for some bad chinese takeout from a new place we tried. All in all though, an ugly month as far as budget numbers.
-
Final totals for the month are in:
January 2019
Total spending:
$5231 (goal $6000)
Savings Rate:
68.3%
Notes:
Rent: $1384
Groceries: $765 (goal $750)
Pets: $351
Electronics: $290
Restaurants: $138 (goal $150)
I am glad I started this challenge and am deciding to hammer down on my budgeting again. I used to track every dollar but slowly got away from it. Need to get it back in check.
Overall we were $769 under budget so that’s fantastic. Our grocery budget goal is $150/wk. we had 5 Thursday’s so 5 grocery store trips. We were $19 over budget, so that’s good.
We were slightly under our grocery budget.
We had high pet costs switching diets and an allergy test. Going to go up even more in February as we have another $500 test for our dog. Oh well, better than other alternative options.
We sold a bunch of hobby items for around $600ish. We bought an Xbox 1 we’ve been enjoying for $290 (we tracked that expense with our budget).
Overall I’m very pleased. February and March are going to be insanely hard to hit our budget. This week I have a work trip, and then Saturday I’m renting snowmobiles with friends then skiing Sunday. All in that’s going to be around $600, then as mentioned, the dogs $500 vet test.
In April we’re moving and will be paying rent at two places for 19 days, so that’s an extra $1200 or so.
A few good notes, however. This month we should be getting back a $6500 tax return. Also, for a work super bowl party we got these gambling squares. I’m absolutely not a gambler but wanted to be part of the “team.” We spent $60 on squares and won $500 lol. Will use $250 of that to go towards this weekends trip which I can justify. Deposited the rest.
Also, next month is a 3 paycheck month which should put us near an 80% savings rate. All that’s good, but this year’s goal is primarily spending related as opposed to savings.
-
Here is the graphic of my 2019 spending so far. Divide the numbers by 10 to make Euro's and by a little more than 10 to make $.
The big grey bar is "home". This month we had a high electricity bill, because it is winter. We also had to pay the half-year bill for the state TV. The green bar is food. Over the entire year my expenses of home and food often end up equal.
Handel = buying stuff
Helse = health
Hjem = home
Hytte = cabin
Klær = clothes
Mat = food
Here is the final picture for January 2019. Total amount of spending (only me, not DH) is 15.109 NOK (Norwegian crowns).
-
2019 goal
$3,610.70$25,000
$21,389.30 remaining for the year.
Spending for January was way higher than expected due to some unforeseen expenses (Vet mostly) but so far February is looking good. I'll need to really work on keeping the remaining months down in order to make up for January being over by $1,500!
-
I'm in.
2019 goal is to spend sub-$24K. That shakes out to $2K per month.
January
Total Take-Home: $4,383.18 (+$2,167.00 tax return)
Rent: $895.00
Electric: $90.75
Internet: $44.99
Phone: $20.44
Groceries: $403.49 (big re-stock)
Home goods/maintenance: $69.41
Health/beauty: $108.77
Gifts/holiday: $59.54
Fitness: $139.00
Restaurants: $68.06
Date Night: $90.68
Misc.: $446.08
Total expenses: $2,569.95
Net: +$1,821.46 (+$3,988.46 with tax return)
Savings rate: 41% - not great.
2019 Budget Remaining: $21,430.05
January was a SUPER spendy month. Electric is high because my apartment has zero insulation (built in 1925 and one of my exterior walls is just a french door, plus only a window unit, so...). Groceries/date night/misc were big categories this month because I ended up buying a lot of groceries that got left after a breakup and had to re-shop. My fitness category is always this high, but it's the only program that I've stuck with long-term and I consider it a major investment in my mental and physical health. I go very consistently due to the price tag, and it keeps my stress levels way down and helps me cope with my high-stress job.
Although we are only 1 week into this month, I anticipate that it will be a much lower-spend month which should even me out to my goal pace.
-
2019 goal
$3,610.70$25,000
$21,389.30 remaining for the year.
Spending for January was way higher than expected due to some unforeseen expenses (Vet mostly) but so far February is looking good. I'll need to really work on keeping the remaining months down in order to make up for January being over by $1,500!
I like the "remaining for the year" line and added it into my post as well. This is a really cool way of looking at it and I feel like it will help me put a hard-stop on more frivolous spending. Thank you!
-
2019 goal
$3,610.70/$25,000
$21,389.30 remaining for the year.
Spending for January was way higher than expected due to some unforeseen expenses (Vet mostly) but so far February is looking good. I'll need to really work on keeping the remaining months down in order to make up for January being over by $1,500!
I like the "remaining for the year" line and added it into my post as well. This is a really cool way of looking at it and I feel like it will help me put a hard-stop on more frivolous spending. Thank you!
You're very welcome. I think it'll be very helpful to know how much I have to spread out throughout the year. Instead of thinking nothing can be done about January I can look at it like this is now my budget for the next 11 months and figure out how to cut a few corners to still hit my goal.
-
Uuuuugh. This morning I was looking online for tips on how to clean upholstery, and I came across a blogger who was talking up her fancy steam cleaning machine, which cleans nearly everything one can think of to clean. I remembered that once upon a time (pre-divorce), I owned such a thing, and I liked it very much.
NOW I WANT A FANCY STEAMING MACHINE. I have been looking at them all day. But if I buy one, I will have to report it to you people and hang my head in shame over this ~$120 thing. I will think of this gauntlet every time I use it.
This thread might just save me money!
-
I almost joined this thread earlier this week, typed up most of a report for January spending, and then I chickened out. It's too much work being totally honest about my spending, all those complainypants excuses don't write themselves. So here's the summary instead
January: $269 over budget, insert waahh, waahh and excuses, excuses
-
I almost joined this thread earlier this week, typed up most of a report for January spending, and then I chickened out. It's too much work being totally honest about my spending, all those complainypants excuses don't write themselves. So here's the summary instead
January: $269 over budget, insert waahh, waahh and excuses, excuses
Did you have any particular trouble area? Would it benefit from a plan of action to help that one category next month? One category to focus on is usually less overwhelming than a tiny bit over in a whole bunch of them =)
Life happens! That's part of budgeting, you know?
-
January spend
Council tax and utilities £303.16
Groceries £100.45 (see also: cash)
Dog £95.58 (worth every penny and more)
House and garden £384.45 (mostly fabric for new curtains)
Books £18.56 (surprisingly low)
Cash £250.00 (groceries, petrol, quilting supplies, WI membership, new wellies, etc. Some cash still on hand.)
Total £1,152.20
Looks about right. Routine costs are reasonable but more "lumpy" expenditure is likely to be what catches me out. Big recent expenditures on house improvements are coming to an end but will include some spending in the spring to finish things off.
-
I almost joined this thread earlier this week, typed up most of a report for January spending, and then I chickened out. It's too much work being totally honest about my spending, all those complainypants excuses don't write themselves. So here's the summary instead
January: $269 over budget, insert waahh, waahh and excuses, excuses
Did you have any particular trouble area? Would it benefit from a plan of action to help that one category next month? One category to focus on is usually less overwhelming than a tiny bit over in a whole bunch of them =)
Life happens! That's part of budgeting, you know?
@Bracken_Joy That's true, both my income and spending are quite variable throughout each year, but my back-of-the-napkin math for budgeting is usually extremely close. There were a few categories that went over, but most involved (warning: excuses ahead) the fact the we moved to a new house about 5 min from our old one which involved a lot of extra driving (fuel) as I did the move myself rather than hire movers/rent a truck. Yup, a 13 year old Hyundai with a small utility trailer really can move a whole house, it just takes a lot of trips. This also lead to us eating out more because we were busy. Lastly, we bought some items for the new place, curtains and bathroom fixtures etc. Also paid upfront for 6 months of piano lessons for DD. Not moving again anytime soon would be a good plan of action for me, haha.
-
Total Jan: €508
We took a short trip with friends this weekend, but kept it pretty frugal. We went to a gig that we already bought tickets for last year, we had a cheap dinner, I had two drinks and we shared a cheap hostel room with the whole group that ended up costing €20 per bed. I don't mind sharing a room with friends at all, but now I can afford a private room I'll never share with strangers again. In the morning we got breakfast from the grocery store before driving home.
Spending Feb so far:
Food: €37
Travel: €40
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €40 (estimate, we'll split the fuel costs and I'm waiting for them to let me know how much I owe them)
Food: €72
Travel: €59
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €30
Maintenance: €30
Shopping: €4
I bought two new jars with lids to take breakfast with me on the go when I'm in a hurry in the morning. Maintenance is something that I spend more on than I'd like, but it's mostly parts/tools. Owning an old home and being cheap means lots of DIY.
-
February Update
Cell phone (2018: $75/mo | 2019 GOAL: $10/mo): JAN: $24. | FEB: $0
Bill hasn't come in yet but I'm anticipating around 3$ (Sprint 1yr free promotion)
Gas/Fuel (2018: $160/mo | 2019 GOAL: $50/mo): JAN: $32. | FEB: $0
Still about 3/4 tank full, bike is now put together so hope I won't need to fill up
Restaurants/Bars (2018: $540/mo | 2019 GOAL: $300/mo):JAN: $13. | FEB: $0
Nothing yet. Next weekend doing some brewery hopping but would love to keep it under $50
"Shopping" (2018: $420/mo | 2019 GOAL: $150/mo): JAN: $426. | FEB: $131
Problematic category again. Hopefully last month with relatively high spending? Had to order more bike related parts, but the good news is the bike is FINALLY in riding condition.
Car (2018: $445/mo | 2019 GOAL: $100/mo): JAN: $54. | FEB: $0
Nothing needed for the car, don't anticipate needing anything this month.
Looks like shopping is going to end up being my difficult category this year (I thought it would be cutting back on restaurants..). 96 of it towards the bike, 35 on some pieces for the beer cellar. Unless something unexpected comes up, should be able to slide under the $150. Will need some big months later to start bringing that average down.
-
This months budget was blasted away by skiing, snowmobiling, and strip clubs. Going to be an interesting month end. Was a very good, much needed vacation, however.
-
Accountability - I have not had time to properly do our numbers for January yet and we're already ten days into February. Also I'm looking at spending money on improving an area of our house, I'll probably spend the money anyway to attempt to improve the flow of stuff through a major traffic area but it's not strictly necessary. Also also, looking at getting new pots and pans but that's been a planned expense for ages, I just need to find the time to figure out what brand is decent for nonstick and make the order.
On the upside, I don't think I ate out at all for lunch last week which is unusual for me. Need to make time to batch cook lunches next week so I can keep this up.
-
Total Jan: €508
We took a short trip with friends this weekend, but kept it pretty frugal. We went to a gig that we already bought tickets for last year, we had a cheap dinner, I had two drinks and we shared a cheap hostel room with the whole group that ended up costing €20 per bed. I don't mind sharing a room with friends at all, but now I can afford a private room I'll never share with strangers again. In the morning we got breakfast from the grocery store before driving home.
Spending Feb so far:
Food: €37
Travel: €40
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €40 (estimate, we'll split the fuel costs and I'm waiting for them to let me know how much I owe them)
Food: €72
Travel: €59
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €30
Maintenance: €30
Shopping: €4
I bought two new jars with lids to take breakfast with me on the go when I'm in a hurry in the morning. Maintenance is something that I spend more on than I'd like, but it's mostly parts/tools. Owning an old home and being cheap means lots of DIY.
Some impulse purchases today :( had to wait on the train station for a long time and it was cold, so I treated myself to a coffee then went into a bookstore to get warm. Spent €13,75. On the upside:the book I bought was 50% off and I've been wanting to read it for a long time, so it's not a complete impulse purchase.
Still, I should look like into getting a library card again. I looked into that a few years ago and back then the subscription fee was too expensive, but my income is much higher now + I think libraries are important. They need paying members to continue to exist. They've already downsized quite a bit in my city. I don't think I would be where I am now if it wasn't for the library in my hometown where I basically lived as a kid.
-
Hi all!
I want to jump on the band wagon! I am diagnosed with bipolar disorder and the last year was absolutely horrifying in terms of money. Things are quite a bit better on that end now, so it's time to start remedying the havoc wreaked. I'll be starting to track stuff now, as I was just recently paid, so I'll definitely keep you all updated!
-
Total Jan: €508
We took a short trip with friends this weekend, but kept it pretty frugal. We went to a gig that we already bought tickets for last year, we had a cheap dinner, I had two drinks and we shared a cheap hostel room with the whole group that ended up costing €20 per bed. I don't mind sharing a room with friends at all, but now I can afford a private room I'll never share with strangers again. In the morning we got breakfast from the grocery store before driving home.
Spending Feb so far:
Food: €37
Travel: €40
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €40 (estimate, we'll split the fuel costs and I'm waiting for them to let me know how much I owe them)
Food: €72
Travel: €59
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €30
Maintenance: €30
Shopping: €4
I bought two new jars with lids to take breakfast with me on the go when I'm in a hurry in the morning. Maintenance is something that I spend more on than I'd like, but it's mostly parts/tools. Owning an old home and being cheap means lots of DIY.
Some impulse purchases today :( had to wait on the train station for a long time and it was cold, so I treated myself to a coffee then went into a bookstore to get warm. Spent €13,75. On the upside:the book I bought was 50% off and I've been wanting to read it for a long time, so it's not a complete impulse purchase.
Still, I should look like into getting a library card again. I looked into that a few years ago and back then the subscription fee was too expensive, but my income is much higher now + I think libraries are important. They need paying members to continue to exist. They've already downsized quite a bit in my city. I don't think I would be where I am now if it wasn't for the library in my hometown where I basically lived as a kid.
Wait - libraries cost money to belong to in Europe? Ours (Australia) are free, except when you return a book late or lose it.
-
At least in my country (NL) they do unfortunately. They are funded by local authorities and I think kids are free everywhere, but adults pay. They always had to pay but it used to be a token amount like €10/year but due to budget cuts over the last 10 years library memberships have become pretty expensive so there are less members every year.
Politically, organizations that are 100% dependent on government money are controversial, especially when they are considered to be only for the elite, like libraries, theatres, museums etc.
Those organizations are told to "work on their entrepreneurship" and if they don't bring in enough of their own money their budget will be cut. That's why my city's library has closed all of its locations except the big library downtown, rented out half of their downtown building and installed a coffee bar. The no-frills membership is €40, the full membership €70 and a very basic membership that only gives you internet access at the library (so you can't borrow books) is €20/year.
I don't spend €70 on books a year now, so my total costs would go up, but I do feel the library could use the support.
-
At least in my country (NL) they do unfortunately. They are funded by local authorities and I think kids are free everywhere, but adults pay. They always had to pay but it used to be a token amount like €10/year but due to budget cuts over the last 10 years library memberships have become pretty expensive so there are less members every year.
Politically, organizations that are 100% dependent on government money are controversial, especially when they are considered to be only for the elite, like libraries, theatres, museums etc.
Those organizations are told to "work on their entrepreneurship" and if they don't bring in enough of their own money their budget will be cut. That's why my city's library has closed all of its locations except the big library downtown, rented out half of their downtown building and installed a coffee bar. The no-frills membership is €40, the full membership €70 and a very basic membership that only gives you internet access at the library (so you can't borrow books) is €20/year.
I don't spend €70 on books a year now, so my total costs would go up, but I do feel the library could use the support.
Wow. Thanks for explaining. I'm happy to live somewhere that sees libraries as a right.
-
Wait - libraries cost money to belong to in Europe? Ours (Australia) are free, except when you return a book late or lose it.
Not everywhere in Europe. In Norway libraries are free, also when you order a book from another library.
-
Divide roughly by 10 to make euros:
So far in February:
Home: 5136 (electricity, insurance, my cell phone)
Hobby: 1230 (Membership and event. I have requested 750 of the event to be refunded as promised)
Bonus program income: 156
Clothes: 458 (Replacement for sports shirt with holes)
Food: 1391
Savings: 10.000
Transport: 752 (this is only fuel, it included a trip)
Total spent: 8811
-
At least in my country (NL) they do unfortunately. They are funded by local authorities and I think kids are free everywhere, but adults pay. They always had to pay but it used to be a token amount like €10/year but due to budget cuts over the last 10 years library memberships have become pretty expensive so there are less members every year.
Politically, organizations that are 100% dependent on government money are controversial, especially when they are considered to be only for the elite, like libraries, theatres, museums etc.
Those organizations are told to "work on their entrepreneurship" and if they don't bring in enough of their own money their budget will be cut. That's why my city's library has closed all of its locations except the big library downtown, rented out half of their downtown building and installed a coffee bar. The no-frills membership is €40, the full membership €70 and a very basic membership that only gives you internet access at the library (so you can't borrow books) is €20/year.
I don't spend €70 on books a year now, so my total costs would go up, but I do feel the library could use the support.
Wow. Thanks for explaining. I'm happy to live somewhere that sees libraries as a right.
Woah, that’s really interesting since here libraries are often seen as for the poor who can’t afford books. (They are free except fines.) When I enthuse about the Chicago Public Library and encourage people to use their branch, I sometimes see people actually wrinkle their nose! I don’t hear too many complaints about spending on public libraries though...but then again how would people complain about the unemployed without being able to say there are plenty of resources at the library for them to look for jobs? Ours have free internet/computers and you can also check out movies, music, ebooks, audio books etc. Plus free tax prep and other classes/workshops. On really cold day (like recently when it was -50 F) they also serve as warming centers for those who need it.
-
We tell unemployed people to go to temp agencies because they always have plenty of jobs advertised in their windows :)
In my city's library homeless people are welcome to spend the day and they can get free coffee in the cafe.
I think the line of thinking is that only educated/rich/elite people read books. And considering the lack of protests I guess a large part of the population indeed don't care much about libraries. The thing about budgets is you have to make choices, and when local authorities need to make choices about spending, culture is not considered as important as health care, welfare or infrastructure. And within the culture budget, a pop music venue or something that attracts expats or tourists is more important than boring stuff like libraries or classical music or drama (that politicians like to call left-wing hobbies)
I'm extremely thankful to have had access to a great library when I was a kid. They gave me access to so much information, so many things I'd never heard of. They would have free summer reading programs that I participated in, they invited authors to talk about their work, offered all kinds of classes, I even had cheap music lessons there (that my parents couldn't have afforded otherwise).
-
I'm extremely thankful to have had access to a great library when I was a kid. They gave me access to so much information, so many things I'd never heard of. They would have free summer reading programs that I participated in, they invited authors to talk about their work, offered all kinds of classes, I even had cheap music lessons there (that my parents couldn't have afforded otherwise).
+1. I'm very grateful to have had access to good library as a kid. I grew up fairly poor, and would probably not be where I am without that library. @Imma -- just curious, did you grow up in the Netherlands?
-
I'm extremely thankful to have had access to a great library when I was a kid. They gave me access to so much information, so many things I'd never heard of. They would have free summer reading programs that I participated in, they invited authors to talk about their work, offered all kinds of classes, I even had cheap music lessons there (that my parents couldn't have afforded otherwise).
+1. I'm very grateful to have had access to good library as a kid. I grew up fairly poor, and would probably not be where I am without that library. @Imma -- just curious, did you grow up in the Netherlands?
Yes, I did :)
-
Mid month update. Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). $829 is our half way mark, and our total so far is $886. Over budget, boo. Mostly due to high upfront travel costs and one fairly large goof. Not too bad, I think we can still come in under budget at end of month, but also not in align with “Frugal February.”
Blue = last month| Green is this month (so far..)
Rent: $1675| $0
Groceries & Personal Care: $577| $182
Travel: $275| $541- $115 friend’s (July) bridal shower lodging & activity fee; $425.81 (5 night) apartment rental for part of June vacation
Shopping: $125| $0
Eating & Drinking Out: $124| $133 - $8 water (@Hamilton!); $17.33 drinks w/coworkers; $92.94 nice dinner out (we splurged b/c we had a giftcard, but then we forgot the giftcard!); $14.49 lunch & coffee w/coworkers
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $71.33| $30 internet
Other: $107.45| $0
I’ve been pleased with my progress on trying not to get coffee out since going back to work. Pre-shutdown, coworker and I got a French press set up cobbled together at work and that has really helped. I cringed a little when I got coffee after lunch with the coworkers. First coffee out in two months...and my initial reaction was wow, this is so much better than the coffee I make. No wonder I’m addicted.
While we were under budget until the apartment rental posted, I was super excited that it did. I thought we weren’t going to be charged until April and it’s more useful to us now for cc points. We already used points for flights (paid $100/each in taxes in Nov) and 5 nights of hotel for our June vacation. I’m hoping to have enough points soon to book the remaining 5 hotel nights with points as well.
I have to say the idea of posting my expenses has definitely made me rethink a purchase or two. And the more regular, granular checks in keep me honest with myself, especially with the eating/drinking out category.
-
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 94%
Eating out: 79%
Mid Feb 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 66%
Eating out: 69%
3 of 6 of us had to attend an out of state funeral that was not planned for so the eating out budget is mostly shot for the rest of the month. The grocery budget is over 50% because the monthly Costco trip happens in the 1st half of the month but last throughout the rest of the month.
-
Halfway through the month. February grocery spending so far is $318, or 53% of our target $600 for two adults + two teenagers. With a little effort we should be able to come in under $600 for the month.
Gas spending is way down this month because I retired and am not commuting any more. And still nothing spent this year so far on (1) eating out or (2) alcohol. Wins! I did have to buy some kids' clothes this month as they are growing. Nothing spent so far this year for any clothing for the adults though.
Marching on!
-
Yesterday I spent over 200$ on a dentist visit. It was my annual control. Monday I felt pain in a part of my teeth. In that area the dentist found a starting hole with some bacterial growth, under an old filling. She said it would be best to remove and fill it now, instead of waiting and risking that the whole filling will have to be replaced later. Therefore the cost of an investigation, x rays, drilling and filling. Here in Norway we don't have such a thing as health insurance with dental coverage. Luckily I don't normally have a hole.
-
Well, to be fully accountable, I done effed up budget-wise. Went to a local wholesale/liquidation place today because they had a clothing sale. Their clothing is new, mostly quality brand name stuff for 10-30% off the original price which doesn't get me excited, but they had a special sale and stuff was like 80+% off the markdown price, so we basically loaded our car for like $200. I bought a bunch of new Levi's jeans for $5 each. Anyway, clothing budget is blown for the month (most of the year actually) but on the bright side I won't have to buy much for clothes for the better part of the next decade. I'm thinking I might get my side-hustle on and go back tomorrow for the rest of the jeans, should be able to triple my money pretty quick on Facebook selling those..
-
Total Jan: €508
Food: €108
Travel: €106
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €30
Maintenance: €30
Shopping: €18
Fun: €25 (lunch for two during a bike trip on the first spring day)
Tuition: €486
This month will be a lot more expensive due to the tuition, but other than that I'm not dissatisfied. Shopping is two jars with lids for breakfast on the go and a book.
-
Mid-month check in...
This thread is really helping curb my food spending! I'm well under budget for groceries and restaurants because having to report my numbers at month's end is definitely motivating me to behave. Unfortunately, last month's phenomenon of cooking at home leading to gaining weight has become a trend. The budget looks good but the scale does not. :(
Miscellaneous will be a bit high because I paid my annual membership fee for Costco. Next month I'll get my Costco Citibank reward, which will pay me back for the membership fee plus about $120. Huzzah!
Now...ahem...(ducks behind computer screen)
I booked myself and Kid-4 plane tickets to Madrid last night! This is my big spend item for 2019. It's been planned for a long time, and my tax refund will cover the majority of the trip, and it's totally conscious spending. Why do I feel sheepish about posting it here?
This thread really does its job, I tell ya.
-
I've spent about $400 since the beginning of the month so far, between electric bill, water bill, internet, phone, and catching up on medical bills I've been behind on since last June...ready for Friday when I get paid again from both jobs!
-
Now...ahem...(ducks behind computer screen)
I booked myself and Kid-4 plane tickets to Madrid last night! This is my big spend item for 2019. It's been planned for a long time, and my tax refund will cover the majority of the trip, and it's totally conscious spending. Why do I feel sheepish about posting it here?
This thread really does its job, I tell ya.
Way to keep on track!! I definitely agree on the accountability thing around here! Planned or not, there’s certainly a small amount of “guilt” for much past bare bones spending! I leave a TON of room for fluff in our budget but even this month we won’t hit it. Next month will be just as hard paying rent for two places for 19 days while we move.
-
I'm in too! My partner and I averaged $2,861/month combined expenses in 2018. Goal for 2019 is to spend a maximum of $24,000 next year ($2,000 per month).
In January our expenses were $1,964. Most of that went to food and rent. We were on target last month (although quite close!), which is interesting because I felt like we were being spendy. For example we ate out a few times to celebrate my birthday, and we bought a lot of pet supplies because our angelfish started spawning and we got all excited about raising the baby fish.
We just started working towards FIRE last summer, and are enjoying brainstorming ways to be more frugal and make more money. In early February I accepted an offer for an $85/hr side gig that I'm excited about.
I hope that February is going well for everyone! I am hopeful for a sub-$2,000 month, we seem to be mostly on the right track so far.
-
Accountability - I have not had time to properly do our numbers for January yet and we're already ten days into February. Also I'm looking at spending money on improving an area of our house, I'll probably spend the money anyway to attempt to improve the flow of stuff through a major traffic area but it's not strictly necessary. Also also, looking at getting new pots and pans but that's been a planned expense for ages, I just need to find the time to figure out what brand is decent for nonstick and make the order.
On the upside, I don't think I ate out at all for lunch last week which is unusual for me. Need to make time to batch cook lunches next week so I can keep this up.
I've gotten the data imported and categorized last night but didn't have time to look at January's numbers specifically. I did have a burst of purchases from Amazon and Target (emergency pants purchases plus some other stuff) so I don't expect it to be pretty. Totally forgot about meal prepping lunches this weekend, boo.
In good news, the planned expense for improving the high traffic area of our house decreased by $70 because we found some old shelves we had stashed in the garage. They're in place now, if they work out they'll need sanding and repainting and if they don't work we will either figure out what would work better or just have nothing in that space. I still need to pick up one more item for that area though, it's probably going to involve ordering multiple things and returning whatever doesn't work in the space since none of the options I like are available locally - I just want to see it in person to get a better sense of scale and weight but apparently that's too much to ask for. One other good thing, I realized an old recurring charge I cancelled a year ago popped up randomly and I was able to dispute it before it sat around for too long.
-
One Week To Go Update
Cell phone (2018: $75/mo | 2019 GOAL: $10/mo): JAN: $24. | FEB: $3
As expected.
Gas/Fuel (2018: $160/mo | 2019 GOAL: $50/mo): JAN: $32. | FEB: $0
Down to about 1/3 full, still hoping I can make it through the month!
Restaurants/Bars (2018: $540/mo | 2019 GOAL: $300/mo):JAN: $13. | FEB: $84
Splurged a little bit on the weekend, expecting one more dinner out this coming weekend. Should be well under $150, easily in the green.
"Shopping" (2018: $420/mo | 2019 GOAL: $150/mo): JAN: $426. | FEB: $173
Gonna try to break it down a bit more for you guys (and myself) for more clarity/accountability. 45$ spent on bike equipment (helmet, lights, chain lube), 11$ spent on cloth materials to sew some produce bags, 30$ spent on brewing ingredients for a Hazy IPA (grains, hops, yeast), $20 to e-file my tax return, 56$ on some barrel aged brews... So I'd say about 45$ necessary, 61$ not-necessary but not splurging, 56$ complete splurge :(
Car (2018: $445/mo | 2019 GOAL: $100/mo): JAN: $54. | FEB: $0
Nothing else anticipated!
Shopping again! Bike-related purchases should be done for now.. Will not buy any beer in March given that I'll have a 5 gallon batch of tasty brew to sip on.
EDIT: Messing around with some different formatting..
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | JAN | FEB |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 24 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 32 | $ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 13 | $ 84 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 426 | $ 173 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 54 | $ 0 |
---------------------------------------------------------
Total $1630 | $ 610 | $ 549 | $ 260 |
-
I thought I would also do an update, as most of our expenses are done for the month.
Feb so far Jan 2018 average
Food: $261 $777 (598)
Non-Food: $129 $337 (441)
Eating out: $302 $656 (570)
Medical: $437 $687 (603)
Kids: $1561 $1257 (2806)
Mortgages: $4982 $4962 (5122)
Utilities: $3219 $872 (2045)
Transport: $1208 $1193 (1819)
Holidays: $106 $1459 (487)
Total: $12205 $12,037 (14,491) or a drop of 16%.
Utilities were horrendous this month, as rates ($1800) and many other bills all arrived at once. We are paying the utilities on 3 properties, and have just reduced that two through a rental arrangement with our son.
We may still blow the holiday budget, as we are planning a holiday to see out son in a couple of weeks time (it's a significant birthday for him), which will leave a $1000 hole in the budget. Planned spending is why we save, right?
Transport - a speeding fine for 10 km/h over (110 in a 100 zone, not far from the end of 110 section) for $322. Ouch. My wife will be more careful in the future she tells me.
The kids expenses are ticking back up. Uni accommodation will add to it and it will be back to around $2000 a month from now on, with some extras for books ($600 coming up).
Eating out is still an issue.
We have cut our recurring telecommunications costs by around $150 per month over the last few weeks, so we should see that flow through shortly too.
Not as bad as I feared, not as good as I hoped.
-
Total Jan: €508
Food: €165
Travel: €156
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €30
Maintenance: €30
Shopping: €24
Fun: €25 (lunch for two during a bike trip on the first spring day)
Tuition: €486
Summer vacation: €160
I bought (another) new book, but I had a gift voucher so only spent €6. We bought tickets for our trip in July. For me this is an expensive month but other than the tuition and the summer trip I'm not really doing too badly. Due to family circumstances my travel costs will likely increase over the next month and so will my eating out costs. I'm just thankful that I can make the choice to spend more when necessary without getting into financial difficulties.
-
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 94%
Eating out: 79%
1 week left Feb 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 87%
Eating out: 105%
3 of 6 of us had to attend an out of state funeral that was not planned for so the eating out budget is shot and I already had a lunch date with an old friend planned for today. I am not going to skip that time with her because I need (mentally/emotionally) the friendship.
-
3 of 6 of us had to attend an out of state funeral
I'm so sorry <3
-
And that's a wrap on February. Good month, spending wise. It helps that it's a short month.
Our goals are total monthly spending of $2700 for our family of four -- two adults + two teenagers, and keeping the total food spend under $600. ($600 on food for a month is an aggressive target for us; last year we averaged $750.) This month we met both targets. :) Other highlights of the month: Nothing spent this year so far on eating out or alcohol. Low point of the month: Utilities continue to be VERY high. We don't have a specific number goal (since utility usage fluctuates so much with the weather), but this is too high! [punching self in face] We need to redouble our efforts.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 (144%) $656 (109%) $539
February $2223 (82%) $593 (99%) $558 (ouch)
-
Two of my credit card accounts show purchases very late. I don't see the purchases I made yesterday. Maybe the places where I spent it send it in with some delay. So my February wrap-up will have to wait some days.
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Success again! Groceries were pretty steady at $260, eating out was $150.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Success. Spent less this month, $230. That was for 6 tickets, so my average price is also better (<$40).
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Definitely a success! Only replaced a toner I love that was completely gone.
Spent $3100 this month, including $800 towards a long-planned vacation. More than last month, but it's still a huge reduction in my monthly average of $3500 from last year. I'm also well on pace to hit my goal of $40k for the year.
-
February now done, have to say it was a successful month. Looking forward to starting anew in March, target obviously going to be minimizing that awful shopping category. Thank you all for the motivation and inspiration!!
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 14 | $ 24 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 16 | $ 32 | $ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 49 | $ 13 | $ 84 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 301 | $ 426 | $ 175 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 54 | $ 0 |
---------------------------------------------------------
Total $1630 | $ 610 | $ 407 | $ 549 | $ 262 |
-
Final February numbers:
Feb so far Jan 2018 average
Food: $376 $777 (598)
Non-Food: $110 $337 (441)
Eating out: $310 $656 (570)
Medical: $496 $687 (603)
Kids: $2385 $1257 (2806)
Mortgages: $5013 $4962 (5122)
Utilities: $3219 $872 (2045)
Transport: $1476 $1193 (1819)
Holidays: $1307 $1459 (487)
Total: $14692 $12,037 (14,491) or an increase of 1%
Utilities and holidays busted our budget. We booked a holiday to see our son on his 25th birthday, for a short fly-in overnight and fly out the next day.
Next month will be better. Promise.
*Edit - total expenses so far $26729. Last year (on averages) $28982 . This is still down 8% so far for the year. Aim is at least 10%.
-
Final February numbers:
Feb so far Jan 2018 average
Food: $376 $777 (598)
Non-Food: $110 $337 (441)
Eating out: $310 $656 (570)
Medical: $496 $687 (603)
Kids: $2385 $1257 (2806)
Mortgages: $5013 $4962 (5122)
Utilities: $3219 $872 (2045)
Transport: $1476 $1193 (1819)
Holidays: $1307 $1459 (487)
Total: $14692 $12,037 (14,491) or an increase of 1%
Utilities and holidays busted our budget. We booked a holiday to see our son on his 25th birthday, for a short fly-in overnight and fly out the next day.
Next month will be better. Promise.
*Edit - total expenses so far $26729. Last year (on averages) $28982 . This is still down 8% so far for the year. Aim is at least 10%.
Sounds like a front-loaded year.. here's to a good couple of months to bring those numbers down!! If not, you're still down on total expenses AND your listed expenses (accounting for inflation) :)
-
February is a done deal. The numbers look pretty, but that's mostly because my income taxes came through, so the "Financial" category shows an income tax expenditure of -$1,818. The federal government, it seems, pays me to live here.
I have to admit that as the numbers started to gel as the month came to a close, I very nearly decided to abandon this challenge. I looked back on my spending, and even though it's higher in a lot of areas than any good mustachian should allow, there really aren't any decisions I regret making. After a week or two of contemplation, I did go ahead and buy the steam cleaner I mentioned upthread. I'm not sorry.
What's really holding me back from the SR I'd like to have is the fact that my 18-year-old is still costing me a significant amount of money, even though she's technically an adult. It does show up as a big spending category, but in reality it's much more of a parenting issue than a spending issue. I'm trying to be patient and hope that she gradually takes over more of it, or all of it, and stops...ummm...doing dumb things with her money.
BUT with all that said, I've also realized that this challenge is REALLY helping with my grocery budget. I came in under budget for the first time in [many, many months], just because I want the number to look nice for you people. :)
ETA: I’m taking the spreadsheet down because the name changes didn’t save and this version showed our first names. Too lazy to start over.
-
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 94%
Eating out: 79%
Feb 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 97%
Eating out: 99%
Eating out was showing as over budget earlier this week but there were a few things that were int he wrong category or double counted. We are just barely under budget but we are under. Some people eat when they are grieving, a lot.
3 of 6 of us had to attend an out of state funeral
I'm so sorry <3
Thank you.
-
February was another great month! My work flew me to Toronto, so I left a couple days early to spend a weekend hanging out with some relatives in the 6ix. We went to a community event with a free plant-based dinner, got our asses kicked at a boxing class (also free b/c it was a PR event), and played some fun board games (Splendor and Settlers of Catan). Other highlights in February were taking a 'healthy desserts' cooking class on Valentine's day, singing my heart out in a tiny karaoke booth at a cute little Korean bar (twice!), and watching iskwē perform at the Mod Club in Toronto. I've been finding cool free or cheap events by browsing Eventbrite and just googling. Anyways, here's the damage for the whole month:
Restaurants/bars/karaoke: $46.24
iskwē: $24.40
Cooking class: $11.06
Groceries: $42.16
Movie theatre: $3.60
Tickets for future event @ waterpark: $23.34
Subtotal of variable spending: $150.80
Subtotal of fixed expenses (rent, insurance, utilities, interwebs, phone, and Netflix): $485
Grand total of all February expenses: $150.80 + $485 = $635.80
Feeling good about beating my $700 challenge for the first two months of 2019 :)
-
February is a done deal. The numbers look pretty, but that's mostly because my income taxes came through, so the "Financial" category shows an income tax expenditure of -$1,818. The federal government, it seems, pays me to live here.
I have to admit that as the numbers started to gel as the month came to a close, I very nearly decided to abandon this challenge. I looked back on my spending, and even though it's higher in a lot of areas than any good mustachian should allow, there really aren't any decisions I regret making. After a week or two of contemplation, I did go ahead and buy the steam cleaner I mentioned upthread. I'm not sorry.
What's really holding me back from the SR I'd like to have is the fact that my 18-year-old is still costing me a significant amount of money, even though she's technically an adult. It does show up as a big spending category, but in reality it's much more of a parenting issue than a spending issue. I'm trying to be patient and hope that she gradually takes over more of it, or all of it, and stops...ummm...doing dumb things with her money.
BUT with all that said, I've also realized that this challenge is REALLY helping with my grocery budget. I came in under budget for the first time in [many, many months], just because I want the number to look nice for you people. :)
Nice work! I dig your fancy spreadsheet. I certainly think of this thread with plenty of my regular spending decisions, but still have no problem “not being sorry.” Somethings just do seem worthwhile even if they aren’t “mustachian.” I went skiing and rented snowmobiles in February. Put a HUGE dent on my budget. However it was at the end of a work trip in a beautiful mountainous part of the country I had never been, and likely won’t be back for a long time. I grew up doing those things but living in the crappy south due to work, has me missing them terribly. As such, I won’t turn down the very rare chance that I have to enjoy those things.
-
Right, here goes, the February numbers. Big expense this month: taxes. This is everything together: income, property, city, sewer&watersystem taxes. However, this'll be everything for the entire year.
Taxes: 869
Holiday: 118 (a forgotten payment for Iceland and a tickets to get on the Hogwarts Express in Scotland... worth it!)
Groceries: 212 (over budget by 32... must do better)
Going out: 107
Personal: 39
Gifts: 25
Cat/vet: 76 (Stocking up on food + new litter box)
House: 307 (I had some saved up in this fund, thankfully. This one sucks! Electricity went haywire, had to get an electrician and replace some stuff)
Car: 86
-
Looks like our final spending for February is in. We are in the process of moving and I had to finagle a few things around to meet our monthly budget lol. We had $100 in moving expenses which we’ll be reimbursed for next month, so I decided to mark them as reimbursed.
I sold our motorcycle this month as well which was our only debt (I had a low interest rate so no desire to pay it off). We profited about $500 off the sale and it also reduced our expenses about $300/mo. I should really lower our monthly budget down $300, but not quite there yet :-)
February:
Total Spending: $5976
Savings Rate: 78.3%
A few notes:
Groceries: $689 - just over budget
Pets: $731 - wayyyy over normal, our young dog has bad allergies and had to do an allergy test, will be cheaper in the long run than his current prescription
Entertainment - $794 - had a work trip in the mountains. Stayed a couple extra days to snowmobile and ski. Expensive, out of norm, but WORTH IT. During that time the wife also had some family come visit and they did some activities as well.
Overall, I’m amazed that we made our budget (under $6000) but we leave a LOT of float in our budget, which I’m fine with right now. This month we are moving, and paying rent at two places for 19 days during the moving period. Will also have some extra vet bills. Fortunately work will be reimbursing some more of our moving expenses, but it will still be a challenging month. When we move our rent will go up, however other costs such as commuting will go down, so it will mostly be a wash.
March is a 3 paycheck month so I’m hoping to have around $23k in savings for the month.
One of these months we plan to do an “ultimate low spending month” in which I think we can be in the $4000-$4500 for overall spending. It’ll have to be a month which we don’t have our “miscellaneous BS” come up though.. I.e. moving.. travel.. medical.. vet.. etc..
-
Count me in! I missed the first two months. I'm going to post my budget and my spending. My goal's are to see where each of my pennies are going.
-
Finally caught up so here's January and February's variable expenses.
January Variable monthly expense:
Gas: $62
Utilities: $200
Dog grooming: $30
Food and Dining: $821 (or $26.48/day)
January Non-monthly expenses:
Car service and parking: $19
Kid clothing: $24
Video games: $15
Gifts: -$18 (returned work swap gift)
Dental: $382
Therapy: $414
Dog food: $95
Gymnastics registration: $20
February Variable monthly expense:
Gas: $47
Utilities: $144
Dog grooming: $15
Food and Dining: $689 (or $24.60/day)
February Non-monthly expenses:
Mr. Meer clothing: $30
Meerkat clothing: $107 (Betrayal of the Pants 2019)
Tax dude: $100
Gift: $40
Therapy: $276
House stuff: $26
Household stuff (shelves, a rug, Valentines stuff for kid, misc.): $252
Diapers and other kid stuff: $50
Software: $50
----
Household was one of the biggest black hole categories when I first came to MMM along with "Shopping", which was a catch all for Amazon/Walmart/Target. It gets broken out better now but still feels like a catch-all when viewed as a category.
The money I spent on clothes is due to all my work appropriate jeans deciding to get holes within two weeks of each other, so I had to do some panic shopping. Panic shopping is not cheap. I'm still kind of bitter at my old jeans, I hate clothes shopping to begin with.
I'm working on figuring out what realistic budget numbers would even be for us, redoing my categories into "Fixed monthly", "Variable monthly", and then everything else is actually way more helpful than I had expected even though I just started it within the last hour.
Too sleepy to dig into the rest of it right now. Opine if you like.
-
Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). Spent
$3,478 $3549 or $145 $216 over budget in February. Not great, especially considering it’s a short month. Mostly over budget because of prepaying travel, drinks out, and new shoes. Most of shopping, other than the small goodwill purchase, was preplanned and delayed 4-9 months, so it sucks but at least it wasn’t spontaneous spending. For eating and drinking out, two splurges really killed us.
Blue = last month| Green = this month
Rent: $1675| $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $577| $440
Travel: $275| $678 - $115 friend’s (July) bridal shower lodging & activity fee; $425.81 (5 night) apartment rental for part of June vacation; $54.58 megabus tickets to bridal shower; $82.47 megabus tickets to friend’s August wedding
Shopping: $125| $296 $366 - $6.84 goodwill cardigan & blouse; $56.31 baselayer (finally went on sale!); $50.15 sneakers (old pair had holes); $79.99 $154.35 hiking shoes; $97.82 hiking shoes (we never had hiking shoes, realized last year after hiking in sneakers we needed some, but waited until this year to buy).
Eating & Drinking Out: $124| $252 - $8 water (@Hamilton!); $17.33 drinks w/coworkers; $92.94 nice dinner out (we splurged b/c we had a giftcard, but then we forgot the giftcard!); $14.49 lunch & coffee w/coworkers; $23.24 drinks w/coworkers; $95.89 drinks w/friend (paid full tab b/c she picked up last time).
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $71| $80 - $30 internet; $50.50 electric
Other: $108| $57 - $14.99 HBO; $11.98 Netflix; $30 transit card refill
*We’re still buying and returning shoes, so I figure I’ll come back and update final shoe purchase prices even though last round will actually be bought in March. Unfortunately, we started with what I thought were the cheapest versions that would do the trick and final picks will probably be higher...hopefully not by too much.
**edited for final shoe prices.
Nothing to do now but try again at staying under budget in March!
January: $2951 February: $3478 $3549
-
Final Feb numbers are in.
I didn't report on January beyond my own journal so will do that too. Last year my average monthly expenses were €960/month. Both months this year have so far been higher than that.
Total spending for January was €1175, so about €200 higher than normal.
January's facepunch worthy categories:
Groceries 158.18 (buget: 100)
Eating out/Bar 118.85 (budget: 50)
Travel 270.86 (budget: 200 - yes that's crazy high I know. This was a flight to Asia)
Total February spending was a bit better at €1110. Still €150 over my normal budget though.
February's facepunch worthy categories:
Groceries 124.15 (better, but still too high)
Uiteten/Bar 50.8 (nicely around normal budget)
Travel 309.97 (trip to Germany)
Presents 62.5 (present for parents)
Stuff/clothes 131.59 (electric toothbrush + bras)
-
Handel = Trade, buying stuff
Helse = health (this month: dentist and a filling)
Hjem = home
Hytte = cabin
Klær = clothes
Mat = Food
Divide the sums by 10 to make euros.
-
Final February numbers:
Feb so far Jan 2018 average
Food: $376 $777 (598)
Non-Food: $110 $337 (441)
Eating out: $310 $656 (570)
Medical: $496 $687 (603)
Kids: $2385 $1257 (2806)
Mortgages: $5013 $4962 (5122)
Utilities: $3219 $872 (2045)
Transport: $1476 $1193 (1819)
Holidays: $1307 $1459 (487)
Total: $14692 $12,037 (14,491) or an increase of 1%
Utilities and holidays busted our budget. We booked a holiday to see our son on his 25th birthday, for a short fly-in overnight and fly out the next day.
Next month will be better. Promise.
*Edit - total expenses so far $26729. Last year (on averages) $28982 . This is still down 8% so far for the year. Aim is at least 10%.
I just realised that while February was expensive for us, it was still down by $1000 from last year. So that is a positive also.
-
Goal for 2019 is to spend a maximum of $24,000 next year ($2,000 per month).
In January our expenses were $1,964.
February total expenses were $1,961! Yay!
I'm surprised the number is that consistent. I'd like to get it a little lower so that we have wiggle room for travel this spring and summer.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: €1105
Food: €195
Travel: €130
Hairdresser: €25
Trip: €30
Maintenance: €30
Shopping: €24
Fun: €25 (lunch for two during a bike trip on the first spring day)
Tuition: €486
Summer vacation: €160
Total February: €1105
March:
Food: €45
Travel: €56
Shopping: €13
Shopping is a skirt for €10 and a pack of hair elastics for €3.
-
March update. Also added a total overall $ figure, as one of my goals this year has been to keep monthly spending (ALL, including rent/utilities/insurance/etc.) under 2k/mo.
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 14 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 16 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 49 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 50 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 301 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 407 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 50 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1848 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 861 |
GREAT start to the month (only 8 days in, I know..). Friends from out of town visiting this weekend hence $50 going out yesterday, and likely another 30$ today. But then I plan on shutting it down for the rest of the month. Shopping I made my focus this month. Cell phone will be 3$ again, and there's a 50/50 chance I have to put 30$ or so in the tank this month.. Regardless, should be the best month yet if all goes to plan (big IF...). Would not be making this great of progress if it weren't for you guys!
-
Well, to be fully accountable, I done effed up budget-wise. Went to a local wholesale/liquidation place today because they had a clothing sale. Their clothing is new, mostly quality brand name stuff for 10-30% off the original price which doesn't get me excited, but they had a special sale and stuff was like 80+% off the markdown price, so we basically loaded our car for like $200. I bought a bunch of new Levi's jeans for $5 each. Anyway, clothing budget is blown for the month (most of the year actually) but on the bright side I won't have to buy much for clothes for the better part of the next decade. I'm thinking I might get my side-hustle on and go back tomorrow for the rest of the jeans, should be able to triple my money pretty quick on Facebook selling those..
Well, I did end up going back and cleaning them out of Levi's jeans. I've sold most of them and am on track to make around $200 in profit in just a few hour of work
-
I'm trying to game this from the other direction and see how much I can save out of take home pay. So in round numbers we make about $15k per month in gross income. About $3,500 per month comes out as tax-deferred contributions to 401(k)/403(b)/457 accounts. Another $3,500 or so comes out in various payroll deductions including FICA, withholding, health insurance premiums, FSA, et cetera. That leaves us a net take-home of about $8k per month. Out of that number, we have about $3,000 in fixed expenses that I cannot change. (Technically, the principal portion of the mortgage payment, around $900 per month, is a savings rather than an expense, but whatever). Lucky for me, a substantial portion of that recurring $3k will sunset before we FIRE. In any event, that leaves me about $5 grand per month to play with as it pertains to variable expenses vs. savings. In the last six months, I am averaging about $1,800 to $2,000 in additional savings from that $5,000, meaning our variable spend has averaged $3,000 to $3,200. There is room for improvement!
-
Halfway through the month update:
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 14 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 16 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 49 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 301 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 407 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 112 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1848 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1033 |
Halfway through the month, I am pretty pleased.
Had a small victory earlier this week. My phone bill is 3$ as I am taking advantage of Sprint's 1 year free data/talk/text promotion after switching from Verizon.. I received my bill and it was 12$ - turns out that international calls are not included, and I didn't even think about that as I was never charged while with verizon. I had made a single 14 minute call to my parents in Canada earlier in the month. I figured it wouldn't hurt to contact Sprint and explain the situation, and they generously forgave the charge. Thumbs up for my first Sprint customer service experience.
The 9$ is savings is nothing in the long run, but I'm still glad I spent the 10 minutes.
Overall, I should come out under $100 for restaurants and I would LOVE a big fat zero in spending for this month. This will serve as excellent momentum going into April, a month I previously targeted for a complete non-essential spending month. We'll see!
-
Checking in a week or so before the end of March: it looks like it'll be just about a break-even month. It's disappointing because I wanted a little extra runway for what will be a spendy end of April/beginning of May, but once again, a car repair got in the way.
I can say that I'm really on target with my grocery budget (and have even lost about 2 pounds) and am looking good in most other categories. I did cave in to my daughter's pleading to take her and her friend out for Chinese food today. I was annoyed with myself even before we got to the restaurant, but still did it. At least I will get a few meals out of it, since that restaurant's portions are huge, and I'm trying to eat carefully.
-
One week to go update:
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 14 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 16 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 49 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 301 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 15 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 407 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 127 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1848 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1211 |
Not a big fat zero in shopping, but still pretty good. 5$ on a March Madness bracket entry, 10$ on some customized beer caps and labels for our latest homebrew.
Don't expect any of these to change for the rest of the month (except for total expenses). Overall a great month, I have something even greater planned for April though!
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: €1105
March:
Food: €171
Transit: €136
Shopping: €53
Hairdresser: €31
Fun: €113
Total: €504
Shopping is a skirt, a pack of hair elastics, big pack of tights, printing paper, underwear. Fun is sewing classes and some fabric. This seems like a lot of money but I only buy fabric once or twice a year. Sewing classes are €7.50 per lesson. Food should be much lower, I bought way too much convenience food this month. I've been super busy and tired. I try to meal prep during weekends but it doesn't always work out. I have a relative who's been going in and out of the hospital for a months and when I visit them after work it's very convenient to make a quick stop at MacD who have a restaurant right next to the hospital (and, I have to say, great veggie burgers these days!). Relative will be going home soon luckily.
-
Doing ok in March so far, but we're going to go over our food target of $600 (family of four) . . . I switched up our grocery shopping routine to include a new store (salvage/discount grocery). I've come across some really good deals there on things we eat every week, so I've been stocking up.
We normally don't have much food in our pantry; we eat week-to-week and by the end of the week our fridge is empty. I know this stocking up on non-perishables is good and will save money in the long run, but it bothers me to miss our monthly spend goal. It'll be interesting to look at the numbers at the end of the year and see how they average out! I think we'll be well under last year's numbers, so we're making progress.
-
My food spending has gone down. Partly because we are emptying the freezer. Amd partly because DH shops the groceries, and he doesn't track his spending. :-(
I have bought a few things. Amongst others a LED headlight, to replace my old, but still working headøight on old fashioned type of lamp. The new one should last much longer on a full battery and it takes less space in my bag if I don't wear it. The old one was approx 20 years old, but I still fell guilty forvreplacing an item that still works.
I also bought new spike soles. I need these in the winter to walk on icy roads. My 20 year old ones are loosing their screws and even the replacement screws don't stay in them. I guess this was a good investment.
-
My food spending has gone down. Partly because we are emptying the freezer. Amd partly because DH shops the groceries, and he doesn't track his spending. :-(
Can you have your husband use a credit card or debit card? I find that makes tracking spending much easier. We categorize everything through personal capital.
-
My food spending has gone down. Partly because we are emptying the freezer. Amd partly because DH shops the groceries, and he doesn't track his spending. :-(
Can you have your husband use a credit card or debit card? I find that makes tracking spending much easier. We categorize everything through personal capital.
He uses his own card, but he has his own bank account which I cannot look it. Once a year I ask for and get his numbers for who much he got in, hos much he spent and how much he saved. Then I calculate our total savings rate and spending level.
-
My food spending has gone down. Partly because we are emptying the freezer. Amd partly because DH shops the groceries, and he doesn't track his spending. :-(
Can you have your husband use a credit card or debit card? I find that makes tracking spending much easier. We categorize everything through personal capital.
He uses his own card, but he has his own bank account which I cannot look it. Once a year I ask for and get his numbers for who much he got in, hos much he spent and how much he saved. Then I calculate our total savings rate and spending level.
I’m sure you guys are probably pretty set on your system, but have you thought of using something like mint where you connect all the accounts so you can “view” what’s going on without having access or getting one card for all joint expenses?
-
I would like to participate and actually have been tracking my spend over the last 2 years. Prequel: I really wish I had found out about MMM before I went on a spree. I made a decent living but also squandered away the majority of it without accountability through a combination of errors. So I decided that in 2019 I would start anew and really plan in earnest. A fast recap on 2018 which was the year with the most complete info in terms of monthly breakdown and where they went. A note about the income: it's post-tax:
(https://i.imgtc.com/N9KwqE5.png)
Not impressed overall with the financial performance through savings last year, and it showed. I barely made an impact long-term. Keep in mind I live in CA where the housing market is absolutely atrocious and so due to having to make a decision and live close to where I work I'll have to fork significant money to rent instead of buying. This is the most pressing issue.
Now, the current 3-month breakdown:
(https://i.imgtc.com/V1FhVZH.png)
January was negative as I was essentially forced to accompany my wife overseas to attend her sister's wedding. The total financial impact of that trip was close to $5-6K with tickets being the most expensive.
(https://i.imgtc.com/mLM8F5u.png)
February was better as I was able to cash out on some sales and also reign in spending more strictly.
(https://i.imgtc.com/4vZVM52.png)
March was less impressive as I was hit with multiple vehicle maintenance expenses as well as minute medical bills as my wife's also now expecting... I can see a LOT of things coming down the pipeline that will impact the bottom line. I am still planning out how I will respond to this new challenge. In addition, we are cutting spending all across the board from February, with shopping and grocery costs down overall.
Things I am expecting to make a more positive impact in April: cellphone bill reduction ($130 for 2 plans, now down to $60 by consolidating), switching our current gym membership ($100/month down to $50), exiting pet wellness plans ($120/month down to $0), and continuing to control leisurely spending.
I am also participating in the $0 -> $10K savings challenge in the other section. Currently am socking away around $2,170 a month into 401K as well as general investing/emergency money. Starting in April I will be following the MMM =<$5K in bank doctrine and diversifying my cash into other investments. I used to be very skittish whenever I saw my bank balance fall below $10,000 but it made sense after reading that money in actual banks was the worst thing I could do with my assets.
Starting in week 14 (April 1st) I will be updating Sunday night on a weekly basis.
-
Monthly check in.
Our main goals are keeping our total spend under $2700 for our family of four (two adults + two teenagers) and keeping the total food spend under $600. ($600 on groceries for a month is an aggressive target for us; last year we averaged $750.) We're also trying to get our utilities down. Food and utilities are our two biggest expenses by far.
We went way over on the food spend this month mostly due to stocking up on staples. Hopefully we'll see that pay off in the coming months!
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 (144%) $656 (109%) $539
February $2223 (82%) $593 (99%) $558 (ouch)
March $2877 (107%) $843 (141%) $444 (better)
-
Not impressed overall with the financial performance through savings last year, and it showed. I barely made an impact long-term. Keep in mind I live in CA where the housing market is absolutely atrocious and so due to having to make a decision and live close to where I work I'll have to fork significant money to rent instead of buying. This is the most pressing issue.
Welcome!! With that income you'll be able to make some great progress. Hope this thread helps to serve as some motivation and accountability as it has for so many of us.
Specifically to your case, I am also in CA, also paying 2,150/mo for rent. Not sure if it is possible for you (you mentioned your wife), but my girlfriend and I make this work by having 3 other roommates. We don't spend much time at the house during the week. Roommates are frustrating in a lot of ways, especially when they are not mustachian. We battle over the thermostat, they leave dishes and a mess very often that we clean up, and our sleeping/waking hours aren't exactly synched.
However, in this arrangement I pay 325/mo in rent due to our roommates. Utilities are also split 5 ways. It is an easy decision at this point due to the savings, and dealing with the roommate issues is made easier with the understanding that it is temporary and we'll have our own place in the future.
Anyways, roommates might not be possible for you at all, but I thought I'd mention since we likely have similar expenses. Once again, welcome!
-
Time for the March numbers! Here's what I spent. In brackets is, first, my average over 3 months. After that is what I put into the account monthly. As you can see, I need to crack down on some categories, others will sort themselves out over time.
Groceries: 222 (209/180)
Going out: 133 (119/100)
Personal: 105 (55/50) (new dresses, yay!)
Gifts: 72 (49/50)
Cat/vet: 0 (35/50)
House: 15 (107/100)
Car: 60 (78/100)
Holiday: 232 (Scotland airfare, car rental and hotels all booked and paid!)
Going out & groceries are catergories where I needlessly overspend. Hello binge eating disorder, please get out... No, I don't need to increase the budget, I need to decrease the food intake...
-
Final March Numbers in for me. Last day of March had an unexpected ~50$ shopping that turned an outstanding month for me into a pretty damn good month. Still very happy, and its the first month that all 5 of my categories are in the green.
April I am planning on a non-essential spending month. Overall goal of expenses <750$, and a big fat 0$ in all of my big 5 categories, with exception of cell phone (3$). If I am successful, it'll be my first ever non-essential spend month. I am excited!
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 10 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 22 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 58 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 222 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 18 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 329 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1642 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 |
-
Whew! March is in the books. I sure did call this one. Breakeven -- almost spot on. I was in the black by about $8, so I decided to throw $5 at a 2020 candidate, leaving me at positive $3.
Grocery spending is looking really good. I'm very happy with the way this thread has curbed my spending in that area. Fuel cost is a little below budget (it's not broken down in the screen snip, but it's the majority of the transportation category), which is partly due to gas prices staying below $3.50/gal and partly due to a little less work than would have been ideal.
Spending on Kid-4 this month was high. I got her a new passport ($145) and paid for $320 worth of repairs and maintenance on her car, in addition to the normal expenses I'm still supporting.
In discretional spending, I bought a pair of running shoes, a pair of jeans, a bra, underwear, socks, a t-shirt, and an electric toothbrush. I'm pleased with all of those purchases, minus the underwear, which have apparently declined in quality since the last time I bought this brand.
April and May are going to be expensive months, with the trip to Madrid and then a bunch of back to back birthdays, plus Kid-1's baby shower. Then I'll be able to spend a few months catching up.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
March:
Food: €211
Transit: €255
Shopping: €70
Gift: €30
Health insurance deductible: €248
Hairdresser: €31
Fun: €113
Funeral insurance: €13
Total: €971
Shopping is a skirt, a pack of hair elastics, big pack of tights, printing paper, underwear, flat shoes. Fun is sewing classes and some fabric. This seems like a lot of money but I only buy fabric once or twice a year. Sewing classes are €7.50 per lesson. Food should be much lower, I bought way too much convenience food this month. I've been super busy and tired. I try to meal prep during weekends but it doesn't always work out. Relative still in hospital, had two checkups in hospital myself (train ticket €25 each time) and visited a friend who recently gave birth + gift.
Funeral insurance is for my partner and is €13 every 3 months. It's through a very old non-profit society. The insurance is not a cash based insurance but service-based, so they provide the entire funeral service. My family has been insured through them for generations. Funerals are expensive and our families don't have money. Whatever happens, no matter how broke we die, it's important to not get our relatives in debt for our funeral. €50/year each is also an extremely good deal from a financial point of view. One of my parents is generously paying for my insurance.
-
March was a rough one and unfortunately April and May won’t be much better. Some of it was my own fault, others unexpected.
Our final numbers will come through on our credit card over the next few days, so I’ll do the final summary then. We spent about $450 on tools. We have a garage for the first time in nearly ever, so we got a chop saw, circular saw, and a few other things to start building some items for the apartment. I have a welding machine already and can weld, so we are planning to build some metal furniture. The chop saw will cut the amount of time it takes by about 75%.
We moved, so had 3 weeks of rent in two places, non refundable pet fee at new place ($400) etc. Work reimbursed some, but not to cover all.
We had an extra $300 in vet bills, the final step for the dogs allergy treatments (regular shots he’ll be getting) which will be way cheaper (and healthier) in the long run than the medication he’s been taking.
My wife bought me about $500 in gifts for my birthday in April, including an expensive backpack I had wanted that’s made in the US with US canvas/leather. It should be a “buy it for life” backpack. Not mustachian, but whatever.
My running I started last year has picked up a TON. As such I needed some more running shorts, socks, and to replace my last running shoes as they had over 400 miles on them. Clothing for the month was $295.
All in all - I think we’ll be around $1300 over our budget.
Our saving grace was that it was a 3 paycheck month, so I think our total savings for the month of March will probably be around $25,000. While this is fantastic, and absolutely makes me more willing to spend, I do get a bit disappointed I didn’t hit our budget, which is the point of this thread.
In the upcoming months we are going to have about $2000 in medical expenses, in April I’m prepaying our car insurance for 6 months (around $600) amongst other miscellaneous things. I’m going to keep making a strong effort, but I have enough going on with work that I don’t want to stress myself out too much over the spending. I think after this month we’ll still be over 75% savings rate for the year.
-
Welcome!! With that income you'll be able to make some great progress. Hope this thread helps to serve as some motivation and accountability as it has for so many of us.
Specifically to your case, I am also in CA, also paying 2,150/mo for rent. Not sure if it is possible for you (you mentioned your wife), but my girlfriend and I make this work by having 3 other roommates. We don't spend much time at the house during the week. Roommates are frustrating in a lot of ways, especially when they are not mustachian. We battle over the thermostat, they leave dishes and a mess very often that we clean up, and our sleeping/waking hours aren't exactly synched.
However, in this arrangement I pay 325/mo in rent due to our roommates. Utilities are also split 5 ways. It is an easy decision at this point due to the savings, and dealing with the roommate issues is made easier with the understanding that it is temporary and we'll have our own place in the future.
Anyways, roommates might not be possible for you at all, but I thought I'd mention since we likely have similar expenses. Once again, welcome!
Wish my rent was that low... but we chose to live in a better city next to the office in comparison with the other options next to us and so that's just the price to play. Good to hear you're able to split the rent into such minimal amounts - I have a friend in the same situation: living off of an extended "shack" that doubles as a single occupancy room with a bathroom and separate entrance. He's paying $430/month... basically pocking around $1,600 of additional income that would have went to rent as well.
I am currently debating whether to relocate the family east to get the rent level down to a more manageable level - I'll need at least a $500-700/month saving against what I am paying right now to make it worth something.
-
March
Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). Spent $3,394 or $61 over budget in March. No clue why our groceries are so much higher than normal this month, especially since we had a pretty outrageous spend on eating and drinking out.
Blue = last month| Green is this month
Rent: $1675| $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $440| $702
Travel: $678| $240 - 3 nights hotel June vacation (sadly not enough points to cover entirely)
Shopping: $366| $64 - $10.80 water bottle (lost mine); $19.99 bulk cat dental treats; $13.79 bulk dishwater detergent tablets; $9.29 pho crea clip (to make cutting my hair easier); $10.68 clipper guide combs (longer than those in original set to cut DH hair).
Eating & Drinking Out: $252| $507 - $6.65 snacks at work; $150.49 night out w/ in-laws for DH bday (wince); $148.09 weekend of going out with out of town friends; $59.04 Q2 quarterly wine subscription; $21.07 coffees w/coworkers; $113.03 drinks w/coworkers (x3); $8.34 forgot lunch at home
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $80| $65 - $30 internet; $34.74 electric
Other: $57| $140 - $14.99 HBO; $11.98 Netflix; $1.05 in app game purchase; $25.69 postage (ugh trying and returning shoes not available in store where we didn’t realize return shipping not free); $45.50 tickets to play (Sweat); $18 website domain; $23.3 coworker going away gift pool + card
January: $2951 | February: $3549 | March: $3394
Doesn’t feel good to have overspent the last two months, but I felt better when I realized that because January was low we’re still under by a smidge for the quarter. (3 month budget is 10k, spent $9894.)
This project has really made me realize just how much fat and money on entertainment is in a 40k budget (for 2). Even though I see the monthly pie charts, skim itemized expenses, and tally category totals at end of year through mint, it hasn’t hit home like listing out the details here has.
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Um, I guess this was technically a success? I spent $532 eating out this month due to some special occasions, but I spent a whopping $615 in groceries because it was time to sign up for my summer CSA.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Success. Only spent $220 this month.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Good here too. I replenished some empty, well-loved products and used some gift cards to do it.
This month was, well, yikes. I spent almost $4500. It was partly due to some carefully-considered splurges and partly due to some lumpy expenses all happening at the same time. I don't regret any individual purchases, but wow it all added up.
My total for the first quarter of 2019 is ~$10.6k. I'm over pace to spend $40k for the year, but it's still doable.
-
Final March numbers:
March Feb Jan 2018 average
Food: $470 $376 $777 (598)
Non-Food: $180 $110 $337 (441)
Eating out: $566 $310 $656 (570)
Medical: $459 $496 $687 (603)
Kids: $2153 $2385 $1257 (2806)
Mortgages: $5561 $5013 $4962 (5122)
Utilities: $1287 $3219 $872 (2045)
Transport: $710 $1476 $1193 (1819)
Holidays: $921 $1307 $1459 (487)
Total: $12406 $14692 $12,037 (14,491) or a decrease of 14%
Food was up a little, but also a longer month. We also have a well stocked cupboard, so may be less next month.
Eating out was up - two brunches out with kids interstate, and a birthday celebration at a restaurant for a relative were $300 in total.
Transport was down, but included an insurance and a rego which we only paid a 3 months on. We may de-register that vehicle. Still undecided.
Holidays again busted our budget. A portion of that was flying our dog over, so hopefully these expenses will now drop.
Total expenses so far $39135 Last year (on averages) $43473 . That's $4000 more in our pockets, or down 10% so far for the year. Aim is at least 10%, so on target at the moment.
-
Food (green): lower than normal, because DH has bought food several times, instead of me.
The cabin (yellow) is expensive because I had to pay the yearly property taxes.
Trade (blue): new headlight and some other new stuff.
Divide by 10 to get euros.
-
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 94%
Eating out: 79%
Feb 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 97%
Eating out: 99%
Eating out was showing as over budget earlier this week but there were a few things that were int he wrong category or double counted. We are just barely under budget but we are under. Some people eat when they are grieving, a lot.
March 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 110%
Eating out: 117%
March was horrible for the food budget! We had 2 birthdays, family visiting, and I don't think either of us adults had our head in the game when it came to food budgeting.
-
Have our total spending together for the month.
Goal spending $6,000. Actual Spending $7,228 for the numerous reasons I mentioned above. Blah.
Savings Rate for the month was still 77%, Savings rate for the year is 75.56%.
-
As I have several accounts and some transactions ta several days before becoming visible, I found some more transactions for March. Therefore an update from my previous post.
-
Another not-so good month here. I was on track for a low spend month that would've catapulted me right back to my regular average, then had some stupid expenses to the tune of €250 last week. Still the best month of the year though.
Jan: €1175
Feb €1110
Total expenses of March: €1060
Facepunchable categories:
Groceries: €140 Work stress has been high so lots of convenient and comfort foods.
Eating out: €125 Work stress led to more drinks/foods out I guess? Few work lunches (max €15), all others were social activities.
One-offs: €200 I categorized most of the 'stupid expense' money as a one-off.
-
Week one of update. April goal is <650$ total spend with 3$ total spend in big 5 categories.
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 10 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |$ 0 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 22 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |$ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 58 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |$ 0 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 222 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 |$ 0 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 18 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |$ 0 |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 329 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 |$ 0 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1642 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 |$ 506 |
Great start to what will be a challenging month.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
April:
Food: €250
Transit: €66
Fun: €8
Bought myself a gardening magazine. Food spending is high because I'm still busy and bought take-out food several times while I was far from home.
-
1st week of April report (W14):
Up against a monthly budge of $1562 for total spending, we've spent as of 4/7: $256.20 vs. $364.28 available (70.33% to budget limit) which puts us in satisfactory condition. At this rate of controlled spending, I'll be on track to meeting all marks for the month.
-
Here's my March report! I was away for half the month.
I spent 12 days in the Philippines for a funeral. It was good to spend time with family in the Philippines celebrating my grandma-in-law's life. My father-in-law generously paid for his family's flights (including mine).
For my Ottawa trip, I managed to make $1,000. Thanks to the whole Boeing incident, my flight was way overbooked, and the airline gave me $800 cash to volunteer my seat. It was a work trip, so flights, hotel, and meals were all paid for. I brought my own food rather than spending my meal stipends, so I pocketed another $200. Whenever I wasn't in work meetings, I spent time visiting a friend. We played board games and my friend cooked delicious dishes from his home province in India. When I had a free afternoon, I visited the Ottawa Art Gallery, which has some really interesting installations, and unlike the more popular art gallery in Ottawa, it's free.
Back home in Alberta, I celebrated my 6-monthiversary with my wife by going for all-you-can-eat sushi and a movie. We used up most of our food in the pantry and the freezer, so our grocery bill is going to start looking a bit more normal now.
Here's my spending breakdown:
Philippines: $282.02 (mostly giving cash gifts to my wife's nieces and nephews, and a bit on food)
Restaurants: $23.51
Movie theatre: $3.60
Groceries: $114.8 (including $21 worth of pecans haha)
Social committee at work: $60 (for full year)
Subtotal of variable spending: $483.93
Subtotal of fixed expenses (rent, insurance, utilities, interwebs, phone, and Netflix): $485
Grand total of all March expenses: $483.93 + $485 = $968.93
That's a lot spendier than my previous two sub-$700 months, but at least I made $1,000 extra during my Ottawa trip to make up for it!
-
April is going to be rough. 6 months car insurance paid $600, took my boss and his wife out to dinner $200, medical expense $1600, bed for spare bedroom $450...
Lots of irregular spending. I am fortunate because my income is high, but dang it still sucks when I am focused more on a spending goal than a savings goal..
-
I thought april was going to be an expensive month, because I had to travel abroad for a cremation. But FIL has offered me to pay me back my plane ticket. :-)
-
Two weeks in, still as I was hoping. No more to be spend in the big 5 this month, and the goal of <$650 total spend is very much on track.
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 10 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |$ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 22 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |$ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 58 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |$ 0 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 222 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 |$ 0 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 18 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |$ 0 |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 329 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 |$ 0 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1642 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 |$ 555 |
Hope the second half of the month goes as well as the first.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
April:
Food: €105
Transit: €92
Fun: €8
Shopping: €3
Mid-month is looking quite good! I have ordered work clothes but al far I haven't kept anything, so I haven't really bought yet. I'm still waiting for some items to arrive and I hope I can keep them.
-
Only tracking food for this challenge because it is our downfall. I will be pretty excited if we can just stay in our budget, so even 100% of budget would be better than what it has been in the past!
Consolidating all the previous post so there isn't a ton of quoted text each month.
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 94%
Eating out: 79%
Feb 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 97%
Eating out: 99%
March 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 110%
Eating out: 117%
Mid-April 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 65%
Eating out: 33%
Year to Date 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 91.5%
Eating out: 88%
-
Only tracking food for this challenge because it is our downfall. I will be pretty excited if we can just stay in our budget, so even 100% of budget would be better than what it has been in the past!
Consolidating all the previous post so there isn't a ton of quoted text each month.
Jan 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 94%
Eating out: 79%
Feb 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 97%
Eating out: 99%
March 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 110%
Eating out: 117%
Mid-April 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 65%
Eating out: 33%
Year to Date 2019
% of monthly budget spent
Household supplies/groceries: 91.5%
Eating out: 88%
Table format seems like it might be easier to read going forward.
Month End Groceries Eating out
Jan-19 94% 79%
Feb-19 97% 99%
Mar-19 110% 117%
Apr-19 65% 33%
YTD-19 91.5% 88%
-
Late reply... but a quick update on weekly spending:
Spending is still under control. As of 4/15: $536.40 has been spent against a $1729 monthly target (31% to budget) with 2 weeks left in the month. Good progress but more could have been done in the entertainment tab - had friends come from out of town and so the expense was unavoidable. But not expecting more large entertainment budgets up to month end.
-
As of 4/21 I am still on track to meeting or going below the target budget - $917 spent vs $1210 budgeted, $1729 for the month.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
April:
Food: €154
Transit: €140
Fun: €8
Work clothes: €162 (summer coat, skirt, dress)
Shopping: €5
I hate shopping and especially buying new, but I really needed to update my professional wardrobe. I will likely buy a few more things over the next couple of months.
-
Approximately one week to go update:
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 10 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |$ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 22 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |$ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 58 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |$ 0 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 222 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 |$ 0 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 18 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |$ 0 |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 329 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 |$ 3 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1642 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 |$ 630 |
I'll hit my goal if I keep grocery shopping <$20 this weekend (challenge accepted!).
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 8 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |$ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 16 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |$ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 43 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |$ 0 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 167 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 |$ 0 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 14 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |$ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 248 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 |$ 3 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1392 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 |$ 641 |
Obviously very pleased with this month. Needed it, because next month I have two big trips out of state on vacation. Fortunately travel accommodations were paid for in previous months, but there will be a lot of breweries and restaurants in May (glad I carved myself a little room in Restaurants average!)
Thanks as always for holding me accountable, whether you want to or not!
-
I am deferring this Sunday's update to 4/30 to accommodate month-end activities. More to come.
-
Monthly check in.
Our goals are keeping our total spend under $2700 for our family of four (two adults + two teenagers) and keeping the total food cost under $600. ($600 on food for a month is an aggressive target for us; last year we averaged $750. Our "Food" category includes both groceries and eating out.) We're also trying to get our utilities down. Our house is paid off, so food and utilities are our two biggest expenses.
Pretty good month, especially since it includes a ten day cross country road trip to visit family, and we ate out several times.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
-
Been a rough few months for this thread! I should be setting an example as the thread starter, but instead failing. This month I had $1600 in medical bills and my wife and I decided to take an impromptu 3 day vacation as I had the days off work and I had worked 6 days/wk nearly every single week this year otherwise. Add that to various other things, and it wasn’t a great one.
Next month my wife is likely getting her wisdom teeth out, which will set us back another $1600 or so..
A downside of my work is that we live in a part of the country I really don’t enjoy. I’m not a fan of the heat, and there’s no outdoor activities I care for. The upside is a much, much larger income. I’m starting to get to the point that if the trade off for enjoying life a bit more means a long weekend trip every few months, even taking a hit to the budget, I think it’s justified. As such, we just booked a small 1 bedroom cabin for 4 nights over the 4th of July, and that will also be a good break before getting back at it.
I’ll post up final numbers later this week once all my bills have came through for the end of April.
-
Ugh! I really need to start posting here. My biggest vice in spending is food. Stress eating has been crazy recently. We`ve budgeted $300 bi-weekly for food, but the last couple of months we`ve been spending closer to $500.
-
Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). Spent $2,944 or $389 under budget in April!
Biggest splurge was decent seat theatre tickets for May (special occasion). We successfully transitioned our cat to cheaper food. Now I’m very excited that Chewy.com has better prices on this brand than amazon, so we will be able to track cat purchases separate from shopping on mint going forward. But I started with it in shopping on here, so I’m just going to keep it in that category for this project. While not in the spend bucket, I’m happy to report I also put my small bonus and pay raise lump sum back pay directly into savings.
Blue = last month| Green is this month
Rent: $1675| $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $702| $550
Travel: $240| $106 train tickets to in-laws for Easter/BIL bday
Shopping: $64| $119 - $82.12 cat food & litter; $36.42 charging cords
Eating & Drinking Out: $507| $168 - $4.71 coffees at work; $40 coworker welcome lunch; $38.8 drinks w/friends; $4.45 lunch w/ coworkers; $8.45 dessert out; $71.36 drinks w/ friends
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $65| $62 - $30 internet; $31.29 electric
Other: $140| $264 - $14.99 HBO; $11.98 Netflix; $140 Chicago musical tickets (for May); $27 Classpass subscript; $63.36 gift (10 year old BIL); $7 shipping
January: $2951 | February: $3549 | March: $3394 | April: $2944
-
Ugh! I really need to start posting here. My biggest vice in spending is food. Stress eating has been crazy recently. We`ve budgeted $300 bi-weekly for food, but the last couple of months we`ve been spending closer to $500.
Do it! It’s amazing how much posting here makes me think twice before purchasing, even though nobody is telling me things like geez Peachtea hope that night out was worth it. Keeping a much closer tab on our spending throughout the month than normal really does result in us spending less in general too.
-
April was my first proper low-spend month of the year. Total expenses were €690.
Jan: €1175
Feb: €1110
Mar: €1060
Facepunchable categories:
Groceries: €150 Work stress has greatly reduced so I honestly have no clue how this one remained so high. I've kept my receipts the whole month to do some further digging. I did buy too much food waiting at the train station so maybe that's the reason.
Food/drinks out: €100, stopped work lunches and coffees. One cocktail night blew the budget though.
Other categories were all normal or low.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
April:
Food: €212
Transit: €195
Fun: €45
Work clothes: €162 (summer coat, skirt, dress)
Shopping: €30
Total: €644
Best month so far, food spending is still way too high. There's a lot of food on the go in it because I've just been so busy running around. There's a correlation between high food costs & high transit costs. I'm afraid it will be difficult to get either one down in May but I'll try.
-
Only tracking food for this challenge because it is our downfall. I will be pretty excited if we can just stay in our budget, so even 100% of budget would be better than what it has been in the past!
Month End Groceries Eating out
Jan-19 94% 79%
Feb-19 97% 99%
Mar-19 110% 117%
Apr-19 108% 102%
YTD-19 103% 105%
Another horrible month. Out of state funeral in late Feb early Mar and surgery for my other half in late April have totally messed up the FOOD budgets the last 2 months. We both set down and committed to sticking to the budget for May (partly due to limited income from the one that is recovering from surgery) so hopefully we will be able to get this ship going back in the right direction!
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Nope. I was on vacation with my parents for the first week of the month, and they picked up the tab on just about everything. I treated them to dinner one night as a thank you. So my grocery spending was artificially low and my restaurant spending was high. But it was worth it.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Success-ish. I bought fewer, more expensive tickets to some shows I couldn't get for cheap. But my overall total was normal.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Good here too. I replenished a near-empty product I use daily during a 20%-off sale.
This month was certainly better than last month's $4500 disaster. I only spent $2800 total. Onwards and upwards! (Or, downwards as the case may be.)
-
Update for April:
Apr Mar Feb Jan 2108 ave
Food 507 470 376 777 598
Non-food 125 180 110 337 441
Eating Out 449 566 310 656 570
Medical 399 459 496 687 603
Kids 2000 2153 2385 1257 2806
Mortgages 5025 5561 5013 4962 5122
Utilities 1187 1287 3219 872 2045
Transport 1004 710 1476 1193 1819
Holidays 1714 921 1307 1459 487
Totals 12411 12406 14692 12037 14491
So far this year we are at $51546, compared to a pro-rata last year of $57964
That is, 11% down from last year. Goal is 10%
Lowlights: Holiday spending, on our midyear holiday airfares, and some of our September holiday. Also, our eating out and alcohol spending was again too high. Transport was high because of repairs I did to my daughters car, which we maintain for her. (She is a uni student and would not have fixed the brakes herself. We now have peace of mind)
Highlights: Food was still good, as we had another mouth to feed for most of April. Medical costs will always be around $400 due to our health insurance costs, so this was a good result. Utilities are trending downwards.
I'm hoping that posing my numbers makes everyone feel better about theirs.
Edit - now the table shows! Sorry about the wonky lists.
-
April ended on a positive note - spending is down across the board but we can do better in the entertainment and grocery category. Currently not expecting large expenses for the coming month and so we will maintain the current savings rate of ~$2000 a month.
-
Goal for 2019 is to spend a maximum of $24,000 next year ($2,000 per month).
In January our expenses were $1,964.
February total expenses were $1,961! Yay!
I've been avoiding this thread because March expenses were $2,933 (car insurance, traveling for a wedding, and professional expenses were the bulk of the extra spending)!
April was also not on target, but closer, at $2,285.
-
This month did not go well, but I’m mostly ok with it given the circumstances.
April:
Total Spending: $9231
Notes:
$1840 medical expenses
$800 restaurants - 3 day vacation with lots of delicious food. Also took boss and his wife out to a nice dinner.
$500 travel - half of AirBnB reservation for this coming July
$600 this was 6 months of our vehicle insurance
2019 Totals through April:
Total Saved: $68,045
Total Spent: $27,666
Total Savings Rate: 71.09%
-
The amounts need to be divided by 10 to show euro's.
In April we had to travel to our home country to attend a funeral. That cost us 2 plane tickets, 2 train tickets, a rental car and parking at the airport. But FIL offered us to pay for it. He transferred the money to my account, both my and DH's expenses, so therefore my travel expensive this month looks negative.
The Entertainment post is buying alcohol in bulk. Currently I am not drinking any of it.
-
I return to the thread! This year has been WILD you guys. WILD. I had already paid the money for our third IVF cycle when... my cycle didn't show... somehow we got pregnant spontaneously? You know the old saying, 31st time's the charm. *eye roll*. ANYWHOOO after getting our $28k refunded, I've been enjoying the glories of first trimester of pregnancy and all the spending woes that brings. I'm now 13 weeks and a slightly more functional human being, so I'm trying to refocus on our spending! Especially because my husband is seriously looking at changing jobs (fingers crossed, his second interview is next week), and it'll be a pay cut. But a major QOL improvement.
So, main spending challenges lately:
*Food. This is the biggie. Eating out because cravings. Insane grocery spending because I'm a bottomless pit, plus I would buy something then get an intense aversion to it and not be able to eat it. So on. This is finally calming down, so hoping May is a lower spend than March or April were.
*Medical. While much much cheaper than $28k, I did have some weird health shit pop up and needed to go see a couple specialists. We both also got our teeth cleaned, and have no dental insurance. TBD how much this will calm down, pending being billed for some scans and so on.
*Clothing. While I have had some luck on Buy Nothing, the simple truth was I ballooned pretty quickly and just needed clothing now. Shopped sales and a resale store, but it was a $250 spend in the course of one month. Which is almost half of what we spend for both my husband and I on normal years! This should be calmer for a couple months I'd think? Depends how much my body keeps changing though. At least now I have some basics, so it's not a "shit am I going to be naked??" panic now.
Plans over the summer will include sourcing cheap or free baby gear. May be a bump in cost if we can make a Hawaii trip happen. A pre-baby trip would be nice and we have tons of points from our previous IVF cycle rewards. We'll see!
-
Congrats @Bracken_Joy! That’s great news re the baby!
-
Congrats @Bracken_Joy! That’s great news re the baby!
Thank you so much! I’m still a little bit in disbelief, but pretty damn thrilled.
-
Wow @Bracken_Joy good for you! I had been reading many of your posts in the main pregnancy thread. Way cool! Hoping to be in the same position in the next couple years and I know we’ll have some struggles.
-
@Bracken_Joy congratulations!! I'm thrilled for you!
My April numbers:
Groceries: 235.55 (too high... stress eating)
Eating out: 120.98 (too high... stress eating)
Personal stuff: 372.22 (new phone + new bike + misc)
Gifts: 34.33
Garden: 109
Gas: 87.08
-
April was a fun month! Took a road trip to Saskatoon for the long weekend, where learning how to hoop dance at Wanuskewin Heritage Park was the highlight. Visited Calgary for work where I caught a secret screening (they didn't tell us what movie it was going to be). Celebrated a friend's engagement by playing board games and another friend's birthday by going to a waterpark. I started making a deliberate effort to eat only healthy, high-quality whole foods, so my grocery bill is a lot bigger than previous months.
Here's my spending breakdown:
Board game cafe: $33.20
Swimming shorts: $25.10
Groceries: $301.80
Wine (gift): $16.05
Calgary Underground Film Festival: $11.39
Uber: $8.84
Saskatoon road trip: $66.19
Subtotal of variable spending: $462.57
Subtotal of fixed expenses (rent, insurance, utilities, interwebs, phone, and Netflix): $485
Grand total of all April expenses: $462.57 + $485 = $947.57
Failed my $700 challenge for the 2nd month in a row :(
-
I changed my april diagram. The travel expenses that were covered by FIL have been taken out. Now the numbers should be more correct.
Divide by 10 to get euros.
-
We have car expenses this month. May will be more ugly than normal.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 8 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |$ 3 | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 16 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |$ 0 | $ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 43 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |$ 0 | $ 281 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 167 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 |$ 0 | $ 5 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 14 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |$ 0 | $ 0 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 248 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 |$ 3 | $ 286 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1392 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 |$ 641 | $ 1160 |
Yeah, this will be an expensive month for me in restaurants! Hoping to keep total expenses under 1.5k and restaurants under 400.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
Total April: € 644
May:
Food: €120
Transit: €55
Fun: €61
Shopping: €7
Total: €243
Food includes a restaurant meal for 2, shopping is a photo frame and soap. Fun is yarn and a book.
-
Just realized I did not check in the first week of May. BAD! Summary below:
1. Still determining my new budget starting in May due to new expenses with a baby on the way (increased medical costs).
2. Some expenses hit the budget the first 2 weeks (maternity things, upgrading to a king-sized bed).
-
Yesterday when driving, I heard a strange noise coming from the right front wheel. We think it might be the wheel bearing that is starting to make noise. It was to be expected to happen some time with a car that has driven 180.000 kms. Our previous cars had this problem much earlier.
-
Welp, May's going to be ugly for us. Family emergency in another state/short notice plane ticket + laptop died = $$$. Well, it's still good to track all spending closely for a year. We should end up with some good data on how often "the unexpected" happens.
-
This is gonna become extra important! Since my husband is taking a new job, gasp! It's a bit of a pay cut, but should be a huge improvement in quality of life, and long term may ultimately earn him more. But, we were already pushing it on how much we spend on housing costs, really. We love, love, love this apartment though, it's so quiet and will be *perfect* to bring the baby home to. So we're gonna try to make everything else fly a little leaner to justify staying here a while longer! (If we can't, we'll probably move to a smaller unit in the same building when our lease is up at the end of the year).
The glaring exception to that is that we're going to take a "babymoon" to Hawaii before he starts up at the new job. We have a ton of rewards points from our IVF cycles, and we want to use 'em dangit. Plus, time together before he spends a ton of time orienting to the new role. It'll involve a lot more travel during ramp up then it will once he's established, so it'll be back to 'work widow' status for a bit for me. At least he'll definitely have weekends off =) That will be novel and delightful. Anyway, I'm rambling.
What to reduce?
-restaurants and coffee. These have really crept up the past few months. Between pregnancy cravings and being social with people, we've been dining out more than ever before. I think a non zero part was also that for a while I couldn't cook anything (hurk), so when Husband was tired/stressed from work, we'd go out instead. $174 on this last month, already at $150 this month.
-groceries. This is higher than I'd like right now. We definitely walk over to groceries when we're bored and want a cheap outing, but this frequently results in grabbing a kombucha or some "little" treat we don't need. Those add up! This should also go down for a while as I'm less "fussy" about food.
-I'm *hoping* clothes budget goes down soon, since I have some maternity items now. This will still be around some though, I'm sure =\
-gas for car. May or may not want to reduce this? It's been higher because we've visited friends, gone to the coast, stuff like that. All good uses. Need to decide the cost vs reward side of this more, a la Your Money or Your Life.
-
I find it hard to know whether expenses that went up are inflation, me spending more or another division of spendings. I am the only one at home tracking expenses and I buy most groceries and pay most of the fixed bills (utilities, insurances, etc). Occasionally DH buys groceries as well. Last year my groceries went 10% up from the year before, while in the year before, I bought almost 100% of the groceries. So what made the difference? Did I buy more expensive ingredients? Did prices go up?
This year we are eating more vegetarian, approximately twice a week. I notice that I buy very little meat now. I hope that will be noticeable at the end of the year. Also, I pick greens outside that are edible. Some can only be used as herbs to set flavour. But others can be used as vegetables. I still have trouble seeing an empty vegetable drawer in the fridge. But I have enough portions in the freezer and some outside the freezer that I could eat for more than a week. I guess I should be planning a bit on using it. In 1,5 week we will be visiting Sweden for a canoeing trip, and there we can shop groceries, and in particular meat, for a reduced price. We need to make some place in the freezer, eating up some of the portions we have.
-
Consumer organisations might have infirmation about grocery cost inflation on their website. Ours went up quite a bit as well but we checked the websites of several of those organisations (Nibud, Consumentenbond in NL) and our increase is probably mostly inflation. If you spend much more than can be explained by inflation, either you're experiencing lifestyle creep or one particular item you buy often has increased a lot. We found out for example that my oats are way more expensive now - from €0,35/pound to €0,50/pound in 2 years. Still cheap but a massive increase in price.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
Total April: € 644
May:
Food: €170
Transit: €160
Fun: €61
Shopping: €65
Tuition: €493
Total: €949
Shopping is a gift for a baby and a new bullet journal. Tuition months are high spend months but in the end it's more of an investment than an expense.
-
Consumer organisations might have infirmation about grocery cost inflation on their website. Ours went up quite a bit as well but we checked the websites of several of those organisations (Nibud, Consumentenbond in NL) and our increase is probably mostly inflation. If you spend much more than can be explained by inflation, either you're experiencing lifestyle creep or one particular item you buy often has increased a lot. We found out for example that my oats are way more expensive now - from €0,35/pound to €0,50/pound in 2 years. Still cheap but a massive increase in price.
Thanks for the tip. We also have an organization that makes reference budgets. They calculate the normal cost of to live a non luxury life in Norway. They calculated food cost. From 2017 to 2018 it went up by 3,2%. I had 10% increase, so it must have been lifestyle inflation (expensive cheese). In 2019 it went up with 2%.
I see that my spending on food per month is well below what they calculate for 2 adults per month. And their food category does not include stuff like washing detergents, while my food category contains some of that stuff. So I am well within the referenced frugal lifestyle. -> Not. I don't included DH's lunch that he buys at his job. So maybe we spend more than the budget. But I can only watch my spending, as DH does not want to do detailed tracking. At least that has been the same each year.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 8 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 |$ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 16 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 |$ 0 | $ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 43 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 |$ 0 | $ 350 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 167 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 |$ 0 | $ 60 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 14 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 |$ 0 | $ 0 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 248 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 |$ 3 | $ 413 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1392 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 |$ 641 | $ 1411 |
Upcoming trip to Hawaii, then that should be it for the month. Don't think I'll hit total expenses <1500 or restaurants <400.. but I'll update it to total <2000 and restaurants <500.
-
Consumer organisations might have infirmation about grocery cost inflation on their website. Ours went up quite a bit as well but we checked the websites of several of those organisations (Nibud, Consumentenbond in NL) and our increase is probably mostly inflation. If you spend much more than can be explained by inflation, either you're experiencing lifestyle creep or one particular item you buy often has increased a lot. We found out for example that my oats are way more expensive now - from €0,35/pound to €0,50/pound in 2 years. Still cheap but a massive increase in price.
Thanks for the tip. We also have an organization that makes reference budgets. They calculate the normal cost of to live a non luxury life in Norway. They calculated food cost. From 2017 to 2018 it went up by 3,2%. I had 10% increase, so it must have been lifestyle inflation (expensive cheese). In 2019 it went up with 2%.
I see that my spending on food per month is well below what they calculate for 2 adults per month. And their food category does not include stuff like washing detergents, while my food category contains some of that stuff. So I am well within the referenced frugal lifestyle. -> Not. I don't included DH's lunch that he buys at his job. So maybe we spend more than the budget. But I can only watch my spending, as DH does not want to do detailed tracking. At least that has been the same each year.
Dairy products have increased massively in price over the past few years so the cheese is probably a factor if you buy significant amounts. My s/o doesn't want to track either, he's naturally frugal and that's enough for him. I guess he's not as big of a control freak which is probably in itself pretty healthy :)
-
Dairy products have increased massively in price over the past few years so the cheese is probably a factor if you buy significant amounts. My s/o doesn't want to track either, he's naturally frugal and that's enough for him. I guess he's not as big of a control freak which is probably in itself pretty healthy :)
We do not like the tasteless Norwegian cheese. So we mostly buy Dutch cheese, which is only available in a few shops. Usually at 13 euro per kilo. Or I buy the fancy, well matured Norwegian cheese and they cost a lot more.
We also don't like the standard blue cheese and buy the French variants. They also cost a lot. Even for feta, we buy the Greek version instead of the tasteless Danish imitation.
My DH has the bad habit to snack from the French blue cheese, while I usually buy it to use in a dinner. Sometimes we use it instead of eating meat. But cheese per kilo is pretty similar or even higher than meat would be. I some meals we use both meat and cheese and I try to cut back on that. For the Dutch cheese, that we what we eat on our sandwiches for lunch.
It is a lifestyle choice and a deliberate one. We really don't like the other cheeses. Maybe one day (during FIRE) we will have the time and energy to start learning to make our own cheeses. I heard from a co-worker who did make his own yellow cheese that it can also go wrong and end up tasting badly.
-
I just had a look at our May numbers. I think I will be over last years average, and no where near the down by 10% I am aiming for. Car repairs and animal costs have pushed us significantly higher.
But I will post so everyone else can feel better about themselves. :)
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
Total April: € 644
May:
Food: €322
Transit: €200
Fun: €63
Shopping: €72
Tuition: €493
Healthcare: €31
Total: €1181
I have no idea what's going with that grocery spending.
-
I spent $70 on alcohol this past weekend, and I feel shame. My judgement and my mustache becomes much weaker, and suddenly having one or two drinks at a bar becomes 6 margaritas. I think in the future, I will try to limit drunk me by only using cash in the bars and taking out exactly what I intend to spend ahead of time. Stupid booze....
-
I spent $70 on alcohol this past weekend, and I feel shame. My judgement and my mustache becomes much weaker, and suddenly having one or two drinks at a bar becomes 6 margaritas. I think in the future, I will try to limit drunk me by only using cash in the bars and taking out exactly what I intend to spend ahead of time. Stupid booze....
Don’t worry I’m about to post my monthly results and our booze category will make you feel better. I think I actually blushed when I added up our May going out expenses. This past weekend we fell prey to the charms of a scenic patio bar.
-
Posting now to keep myself from spending any more before end of month. Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). Spent $3278 or $55 under budget in May. It was a decadent month to be sure...
Blue = last month| Green is this month
Rent: $1675| $1886 - $1675 rent; $50 lease renewal fee; $161 renters insurance
Groceries & Personal Care: $550| $390
Travel: $106| $0 -
Shopping: $119| $183 - $17.12 iPad case (old one broke); $11.55 mortar & pestle (b/c grinder now lives at work for coffee); $53.55 bulk dish soap (hopefully several years worth); $50 headphones (old ones broke); $45 headphones (DH’s also stopped working); $5.51 deodorant
Eating & Drinking Out: $168| $419 - $35.51 dinner out; $10 drinks w/coworkers; $9.79 work lunch; $75.87 Q3 wine subscription; $4.21 coffees at work; $145.5 drinks w/ friends; $65.57 drinks/ coworkers; $72.27 drinks out
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $62| $60 - $30 internet; $29.49 electric
Other: $264| $343 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $49 Classpass subscription; $95 cc annual fee; $20.91 Mother’s Day cards; $55.13 bday gift; $56 tickets to Rent; $25 transit; $6.53 movie rental; 6.45 ATM fees
January: $2951 | February: $3549 | March: $3394 | April: $2944| May $3278
-
I spent $70 on alcohol this past weekend, and I feel shame. My judgement and my mustache becomes much weaker, and suddenly having one or two drinks at a bar becomes 6 margaritas. I think in the future, I will try to limit drunk me by only using cash in the bars and taking out exactly what I intend to spend ahead of time. Stupid booze....
Don’t worry I’m about to post my monthly results and our booze category will make you feel better. I think I actually blushed when I added up our May going out expenses. This past weekend we fell prey to the charms of a scenic patio bar.
I’ve definitely felt the wrath of the scenic patio bar! Overall, my booze spending has gone way down after taking a month off from drinking, but this past weekend was a moment of weakness, for sure.
-
[/size]
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 13 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 120 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 144 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 11 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 295 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1445 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 |
All things considered, I'm okay with how this month went. Had two crazy, extravagant trips (Denver, Hawaii) with lots of friends, food, drinks. Still managed to save a good amount, and feel refreshed to return to the hustle in these next couple of months.
Also, all my 5 target categories are in the green for 2019 average (under my goal). Took a while for shopping after a rough January.
-
Piecing together spending for the month will be a shit show, since Mint is being awful and tanked my main bank account data. GODDAMMIT MINT. It's like it's on a yearly timer for self destruction. Biggest downside to banking with a small credit union.
-
I'm continuing to post to hold myself accountable. But it was a bad month for us.
Lowlights:
- Eating out took a hit when my wife went out with her work crowd. $22 Margherita. $100 meal.
- Kids were higher - but mainly due to expenses being fortnightly and getting hit 3 times for accommodation
- Home Utilities were higher - as we copped two lots of strata levies. Otherwise this would have been down a lot.
- Transport - Ouch. Repairs and maintenance was $1424. Registration and insurance $1136. Fuel costs were OK
- Holiday expenses are high as we plan and spend in advance on our mid-year trip. Kennels for pets and airfares.
Positives:
Food and non-food was OK.
Currently down about 8.5% from last year, but aiming for 10%.
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Yiiiiiikes. I spent almost $600 dining out this month. Mostly a big dinner I had promised as a treat for my wife, and then a bunch of different times going out with both local and visiting friends.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Success-ish. I bought a few more expensive tickets to some shows I couldn't get for cheap and spent over $600 for the months. But I also got some really good deals in there and got a lot of tickets overall for events in the future.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Sort of. My spending was high-ish this month ($200) due to running out of a bunch of stuff at once, but got replacements on sale. It really kills my budget that I care about getting cruelty-free products, because I often can't find any low cost options that work.
This month was a slow, painful bleeding of money. Total spending was $3700. No major issues, but a ton of little things kept coming up. My wife's cash flow has gotten tighter so I've paid for more things that we used to split, too. I don't regret any of the individual transactions. It's been a good, fun month. But it certainly adds up.
-
I like how my monthly spending becomes gradually smaller. May is very low. I had a look at the transactions, but there aren't any big thinks. Mostly food, some fuel, some insurance, but no big bills. I know my DH paid 2 bills for the private roads around our house, so that would have been a big one.
I have one "uncategorized" transaction. That was taking out some Swedish cash, to pay for a fishing license or our last trip. They only want to be paid in cash for that.
Our food is still quite big, despite eating from the freezer.
I did buy a lot of food while in Sweden, because stuff is cheaper there. We found good reindeer beef for a really low price. This is registered in the June transaction. As well as a grey area that stands for alcohol. We bought some wine and whiskey there, which is also cheaper than at home.
Numbers are shown in Norwegian Crowns. Divide by 10 to make Euros.
-
May expenses were right on my 'average' (around €950) ending up at €947.
Jan: €1175
Feb: €1110
Mar: €1060
Apr: €690
Facepunchable categories:
Groceries: €130. A bit better again but still more than I'd like. I don't seem able to get it down consistently to last year's average of €100. There IS still plenty of fat (both literally and metaphorically) in the budget so I may do a 'only whole foods' challenge or so over summer.
Food/drinks out: €75. One movie night and one proper night out. About €15 worth of fluff that could've been avoided.
Memberships: €50. This is an organization that paid my grant to study abroad. Their membership could result in more grants for conference travel etc, however I kind of shifted field and my current research is much less chemistry prone so less likely to be sponsored by them. I should look into canceling this one as I have two other scientific organization membership that are paid for by work. On the other hand, they paid me €4k to study abroad so I may also see it as a 'pay it forward' thingy.
Charity: €135. The gifting itself isn't facepunch worthy, but I included it because it is to offset air travel.
Gifts: €60. Mother's day + a birthday in one month adds up.
-
Only tracking food for this challenge because it is our downfall. I will be pretty excited if we can just stay in our budget, so even 100% of budget would be better than what it has been in the past!
Month End Groceries Eating out
Jan-19 94% 79%
Feb-19 97% 99%
Mar-19 110% 117%
Apr-19 108% 102%
May-19 99% 90%
YTD-19 102% 102%
March and April were killers are are causing an overage for the YTD totals but hopefully we can get everything back in check. I am shocked that we stayed in budget in May, we had 3 graduations, 3 birthdays, family visiting, and the start of summer.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
Total April: € 644
Total May: €1276
May:
Food: €338
Transit: €260
Fun: €63
Shopping: €91
Tuition: €493
Healthcare: €31
Total: €1276
€100 of the food budget is eating out. Still 238 is too much for groceries. We had a few days off together and went out for dinner, treated ourselves to food from the Italian deli, did some shopping in Germany (which is way cheaper than NL) but still there's no excuse. We'll be doing an uber frugal grocery month this month and will try to eat all the food in the house.
Transit is high because we visited family nearly every week and will continue to do so over the next couple of months.
I paid tuition this month but even excluding that, this was an above average spendypants month.
Next month will also be expensive as we're renovating our garden, which will cost a lot. It's completely overgrown and full of rubble. We've been postponing this for a few years because it's so much work and so expensive, but we had to renovate it eventually. We'll hire some work out to a construction guy with a digger but we'll be putting in a lot of DIY as well. It's just so extremely expensive - we're expecting a 4-figure sum for just the removal of the rubble and we need fencing and some form of paving as well. We're just going to build a small patio and a path to the shed but that's another 4-figure sum right there.
-
May spending/budgeting:
Total spending - $7,452 (Goal $6000)
Wife had wisdom teeth out ($1534)
Vehicle Registration ($350)
Total yearly spending - $35,118 (Should be at $30,000 at this point)
Total yearly savings - $83,374
Total yearly savings rate - 70.3%
Another not great month, but I did work an extra day which kept our savings high for the month (a bit over $15k).
Onward and Upward.. Time to keep on truckin’...
-
Monthly check in.
Our goals are keeping our total spend under $2700 for our family of four (two adults + two teenagers) and keeping the total food cost under $600. ($600 on food for a month is an aggressive target for us; last year we averaged $750. Our "Food" category includes both groceries and eating out.)
May food costs were high because a family emergency took me out of state (lots of unplanned eating out), and we had a kid birthday. May's total spend was actually pretty good, since that includes plane tickets and other travel expenses. Not bad. Aiming to do better in June though.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
May 3242 771 323
-
My spending in May was an all time low. But my spending in June (including the bills waiting to be paid on due date) is already now higher than May was. That was the frivolous spending on cheaper food and booze in Sweden. (embarrased emoticon)
-
June is looking like a disaster for us. Maily due to unexpected expenses to do with our youngest. She needed a new laptop, which we paid half of, and then she got into a state sports team, to play in the nationals. $2000 was our contribution. She paid the rest.
And I haven't even started my holiday to Broome.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
Total April: € 644
Total May: €1276
June:
Food: €78
Transit: €128
Fun: €135
Shopping: €0
Tuition: €0
Healthcare: €9
DIY: €17
Renewed my rail discount card for another year (€52) and took some extra hobby classes that were a lot of fun. Otherwise doing pretty well this month so far.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 13 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 41 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 120 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 45 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 144 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 11 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 295 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 86 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1445 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 1382 |
All in the green so far. Expensive month for me overall with $650 in professional dues, big trip to San Diego upcoming as well so month will end up being pretty expensive.
Eyes are already set on July, hoping to have a month similar to April
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Continuing to fail at this one. I'm still doing a good job cooking instead of buying fast casual food for daily meals, but a birthday meal and some meals out with friends turned this into a big number.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Normal this month.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Good here too. I stocked up on some empty products at a steep discount.
Total spending was $3300. This was a weird month. It was my birthday and I mostly got cash. My dad specifically said don't just put it in the bank.... I spent it on some useful wants, like a new Dyson stick vacuum and a purse to replace my current one that was ripped and peeling. I also got paid back all in one chunk for some past and future spending. So my spending looks both artificially high and artificially low for different reasons.
Halfway through the year I'm on pace to spend $41k. That's probably the more realistic goal, since I have some known expenses coming up later this year, including travel next week. It's a group trip so there's only so much I can do to keep the costs down; I don't have as much control as I'd like. While it's unlikely I'm going to hit my original $40k goal, $41k would still be a decrease of $2k from last year's spending. We'll see.
-
Spent $18,500 on a new (to us) Casita camping trailer yesterday. This month end total is gonna get ugly lol.
Thank to the market well still be up around $15k this month I’m hoping.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 34 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 198 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 136 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 9 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 383 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1610 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Brutal month. Worst expenses and savings rate YTD. First time this year spending over $2k. But so worth it. Basically got smacked with a bunch of professional dues, and my childhood best friend came to visit from out of country and we had a blast with no regards to spending. Long road trip with a lot of beer and food. Hurts, but lots of memories were made and lots of catching up was done.
Could definitely have had just as good a time and made just as many memories without spending as much, so I won't use it as an excuse. It was completely facepunch worthy, but at least it wasn't for nothing.
Eyes are now on July, should be a better month.
-
I'm not even gonna try to recite the accounts this month! Insanity. Vacation, husband switching jobs (so a weirdly large paycheck, but then only a tiny paycheck next month), paying off my student loans and our car loan (nealry $20k there), pup having a surgery, medical expenses (a couple ultrasounds, etc). On top of all that, Mint and my bank decided they don't like each other anymore, and so it's been endless syncing problems, first triplicate transactions then no transactions, on and on.
Time to burn it down and start over, haha. I'll do my usual end of the month accounts recording and net worth calculation and call it a day!
In the 'wins' category though, we've decided to sell our second car and go down to one car. This feels very much the opposite of what most people do when prepping for a baby! But we have a ton of car shares around, and we wouldn't be able to get a car seat into the truck anyway. Selling it to my brother at a good price- he desperately needs a new car, and I will retain rights to borrow it for camping/hunting/moving as needed. Win-win. And no insurance costs and me stressing about it sitting on the street getting damaged or stolen.
-
In June, I am back to normal spending, after May that was extremely cheap. (divide by 10 to make euros)
I had to pay upfront for the next 3 months of internet (grey).
We spent a lot on food (green) when we were on a trip to Sweden. Most of the meat is still in the freezer, so it is an investment.
Quite a few bills for the toll roads (light blue), caused by our trips to Sweden and to our cabin.
The yearly bill for the private road at our cabin (yellow/orange). DH paid the 2 much larger bills for the private roads around our home.
And I registered for an event (salmon colour) in autumn and had to pay now.
Otherwise nothing special.
-
Only tracking food for this challenge because it is our downfall. I will be pretty excited if we can just stay in our budget, so even 100% of budget would be better than what it has been in the past!
Month End Groceries Eating out
Jan-19 94% 79%
Feb-19 97% 99%
Mar-19 110% 117%
Apr-19 108% 102%
May-19 99% 90%
Jun-19 93% 95%
YTD-19 100% 101%
Groceries spending was GREAT in June but this table also shows me that my goal of 85% for July is probably too aggressive :(
We have almost recovered the YTD totals from our crazy March and April. We are planning a trip in July but food during the trip will be assigned to the vacation budget.
-
Posting to update, but it's not pretty. Our goals are total spend under $2700, all-in food spend under $600 (family of 4, 2 teenagers), and utilities as low as possible. We failed on all counts. The major cause was we traveled to see family and got slaughtered with hotel costs and eating out. Major face punch. We should be able to do much better, and stay in campgrounds if we need to. Well, we will try for a frugal July and get back on track.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
May 3242 771 323
June 4117 822 337
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 34 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 198 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 136 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 9 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 383 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1610 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL |
Cell Phone | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 0 |
Restaurants | $ 61 |
"Shopping" | $ 0 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 |
----------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 61 |
Total Expenses | $ 570 |
First update. Hopefully most of my big 5 expenses are done for the month, I will have a couple of big (mandatory) expenses later in the month that'll pop up in my total expenses.
-
I'm not tracking all these categories from month to month. I just look over my bills to make sure everything looks like it's in line with my budget, and so far so good, but I have been tracking discretionary spending for any money spent on anything I don't need, entertainment, eating out, etc.
So far, I'm at $76 for the year on discretionary spending, from eating out and snagging ice cream or a doughnut on occasion in the drive-through. That's about $12/mo on discretionary. Funny, my planned FIRE budget allows for discretionary spending up to $2500/mo!
I had some car maintenance done early in the year and paid some large annual bills, so I'm probably closer to 70% savings rate at this point vs 80%+ that I had last year.
Edit:
I paid off my property taxes early for the year, paid for the year's homeowner's insurance earlier this month, and my car insurance is paid for the year, so my base expenses should only be about $700/mo for the rest of the year including health insurance, so I should get that savings rate up some more.
-
June was ugly. Like I mentioned above. We paid cash for a Casita camping trailer that came out to be about $18.5k with TTL. I’m happy with the purchase, though. We will get good use out of it. We lived full time in a 42’ 5th wheel for 5 years, and spent 60 days straight camping in an off-road military trailer/roof top tent, so we’re all to familiar with it already. I’m dying for another layoff/sabbatical (I’m a contract worker) but it’s looking like I have 2+ years minimum left in my current contract. I did negotiate 2 weeks paid vacation last month and 9 paid holidays, so it’ll make my typical 6 day weeks more bearable. Hopefully the trailer will give me incentive to take more time off, we’re already planning a 2 week trip throughout the southwest US over Christmas. Also, we will be selling our off road camping trailer and should get about $4500, which should re-coup a chunk of those costs.
Total June Spending:
$28,069 (our spending sucked beyond just the trailer, we were preparing for a long 5 day vacation over 4th of July) Really, no good excuse beyond the trailer, work has been insane, I’m ready for a sabbatical but I’m making far too much to leave, and the extra spending is enjoyable not stressing about pinching pennies when we want to do things.
Total June Take Home:
$20,806
Yearly totals:
As of July 1st:
Total Yearly Income (post tax, plus 401k/vested match, incl tax return): $139,298
Total Spending: $62,787 (incl Casita)
Total Saved: $76,111
Total Savings Rate: 54.6%
-
So far, I'm at $76 for the year on discretionary spending, from eating out and snagging ice cream or a doughnut on occasion in the drive-through. That's about $12/mo on discretionary. Funny, my planned FIRE budget allows for discretionary spending up to $2500/mo!
Isn't that a zero too many? Or does it include a lot of things, like saving for remote vacations and buying a new car occasionally?
-
Our June was bad, as expected. The spreadsheet is below. Some of the factors in the numbers are:
- Kids expenses - as said earlier my daughter got into a state sport team, so $2000 extra for us here. Also she needed a new computer.
- Transport expenses - a couple of unusual factors here. $1150 in registrations, $680 in maintenance. We have derigistered 2 vehicles recently, so this will be lower in future. Also, a taxi fare for $118, as we live a looong way from the airport.
- Holidays - expected as we went to Broome. I rode my motorbike 12,000 kms on this trip. Accommodation (camping) kept the costs down.
- Our utilities were down, and we are ahead on our electricity bill due to circumstances beyond our control. Hopefully this will keep the utilities down for a while, but our rates are due in August...
We are now down only 4% for the year to date, and my target was 10%. It is getting to be more of a challenge than I hoped it would be.
-
So far, I'm at $76 for the year on discretionary spending, from eating out and snagging ice cream or a doughnut on occasion in the drive-through. That's about $12/mo on discretionary. Funny, my planned FIRE budget allows for discretionary spending up to $2500/mo!
Isn't that a zero too many? Or does it include a lot of things, like saving for remote vacations and buying a new car occasionally?
I know it looks like it, but no, it's the correct 0's. The "up to" $2500/mo ($30K/yr) is not budgeted for anything specific, but it's what is left over after required expenses + taxes on a 3.7% drawdown (I may use a lower WR). My required expense budget includes long term expenses averaged out and already includes a sinking fund for a future car replacement to avoid having to tap (or minimize using) discretionary dollars for a future car.
$2500/mo will just be the amount that I'm allowed to spend on traveling, entertainment, optional home improvement, things I want but don't need, etc. I plan to start traveling some when I FIRE, but until I'm living it, I won't know how much I'll actually spend. Maybe I won't enjoy it that much and will end up spending far less on discretionary, effectively lowering my WR. If my traveling is limited, I can't see spending that much elsewhere year after year. Relocation is possibility, and that could shift some of my budget dollars out of discretionary to required expenses. At least there's enough padding to give me options.
-
I’m way behind and over budget because we went on vacation end of June/beginning of July and are traveling for family and weddings nonstop the next couple months. I realized I didn’t really calculate the expenses of being on vacation in my budget. The fairly minimal hotel/airfare was accounted for in the months we bought them, but not the projected daily local spending. We have a monthly auto deposit to a savings account for travel and didn’t really need to touch it when booking flights and hotel (used a lot of cc points), so there was plenty of money specifically allocated to cover the expense (and buying a couch in July...). I just now feel I should have lowered my monthly budget goal to account for the extra spending on vacation in order to make the meeting the annual budget goal easier. Hopefully I can recalibrate us for the rest of year to still make our 40k goal.
Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). Spent $4246 or $913 over budget in June.
Blue = last month| Green is this month
Rent: $1886| $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $390| $436
Travel: $106| $1427 food, transit, sight seeing on vacation
Shopping: $183| $401 - $17.74 friend’s bachelorette shirt; $102.78 hiking shoes take 2; $104.16 walking sandals & gym shoes; $11.15 bloomers, $8.81 gym tank; $25 T-shirt & gym shirt; $131.04 cat food & litter
Eating & Drinking Out: $419| $119 - $38.95 dinner out; $17.53 coffees at work; $18.84 drinks w/friends; $43.80 dinner out
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $60| $84 - $30 internet; $31.89 electric; $22 international roaming
Other: $343| $104 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $49 Classpass subscription; $11.2 shipping; $15 networking event
January: $2951 | February: $3549 | March: $3394 | April: $2944| May: $3278| June: $4246
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 34 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 198 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 136 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 9 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 383 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1610 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL |
Cell Phone | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 |
Restaurants | $ 117 |
"Shopping" | $ 0 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 |
----------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 160 |
Total Expenses | $ 771 |
2/3 update. Really failing in restaurants but otherwise looking like a good month. Will get hit with a big moving truck bill but otherwise shouldn't be too bad.
-
I want to play too. I just entered accounts into Mint and was blown away at being able to see everything in one place like that. A little concerned about having all passwords in one place like that though. And the ads are huge. someone else said they like Personal Capital for this. Which do you guys use?
Right now I'm getting everything organized in Mint and under the right headings. So far though I seem to be saving about half, but that can't be. And my NW is about half mil. Sweet.
-
I want to play too. I just entered accounts into Mint and was blown away at being able to see everything in one place like that. A little concerned about having all passwords in one place like that though. And the ads are huge. someone else said they like Personal Capital for this. Which do you guys use?
Right now I'm getting everything organized in Mint and under the right headings. So far though I seem to be saving about half, but that can't be. And my NW is about half mil. Sweet.
I use both Mint and Personal Capital. Mint for tracking all expenses and for my budgeting. Personal Capital for tracking investments, looking at AA, tracking net worth, etc. I'll check mint at the very least daily, personal capital once or twice a month.
-
I want to play too. I just entered accounts into Mint and was blown away at being able to see everything in one place like that. A little concerned about having all passwords in one place like that though. And the ads are huge. someone else said they like Personal Capital for this. Which do you guys use?
Right now I'm getting everything organized in Mint and under the right headings. So far though I seem to be saving about half, but that can't be. And my NW is about half mil. Sweet.
I use both Mint and Personal Capital. Mint for tracking all expenses and for my budgeting. Personal Capital for tracking investments, looking at AA, tracking net worth, etc. I'll check mint at the very least daily, personal capital once or twice a month.
I'd like to somehow capture my payroll deductions. I know that Mint only knows how much was deposited into my account but I thought I could change that amount and separate out the deuctions so the bottom line was still the same, but it only lets me put in positive numbers and they have to add up to the deposit amount. So if I got paid 2K but I really got paid $3,500 and 1,500 were ddecuted, I can't seem to change the deposit to 3,500 and enter negative 1,500 to total 2K. How can you track health ins, life ins, taxes, tsp/401k contributions, when they all come out of your paycheck? I mean I know it's captured on the investment end, but it looks like I make pittance and am somehow saving thousands. Like I didn't make 2K and save 1K for a savings rate of 50%. I made 3K, saved 1K, and got paid 2K, for a total savings rate of 33%. (numbers made up)
-
I'd like to somehow capture my payroll deductions. I know that Mint only knows how much was deposited into my account but I thought I could change that amount and separate out the deuctions so the bottom line was still the same, but it only lets me put in positive numbers and they have to add up to the deposit amount. So if I got paid 2K but I really got paid $3,500 and 1,500 were ddecuted, I can't seem to change the deposit to 3,500 and enter negative 1,500 to total 2K. How can you track health ins, life ins, taxes, tsp/401k contributions, when they all come out of your paycheck? I mean I know it's captured on the investment end, but it looks like I make pittance and am somehow saving thousands. Like I didn't make 2K and save 1K for a savings rate of 50%. I made 3K, saved 1K, and got paid 2K, for a total savings rate of 33%. (numbers made up)
I see what you're saying. If you don't like calculating your savings rate separately, you can always add extra transactions manually in mint:
1) Under the 'transactions' tab, click the box '+ transaction'
2) Enter 1500 in the amount, choose the category of income, make sure the option "income" is selected instead of "expense"
3) Now you have your 3500 total income
4) You can also make a separate transaction(s) to reflect the 1500 in pre-tax deductions (-300 health insurance, -50 health insurance, -700 taxes, -450 401k)
As I mentioned before, I don't use mint for tracking net worth, savings rate, etc. I primarily use it for tracking expenses, budgeting, etc. Personal capital for investments and net worth, and then I use a spreadsheet with very simple manual inputs for gross income/net income/expenses/retirement contributions in order for me to calculate monthly savings rates. The data for the spreadsheet is an easy pull from mint (takes 5-10min) at the end of each month.
-
I put in my payroll deductions as recurring bills every two weeks paid automatically. So I guess I will put in that amount as income under transactions. Don't see how to make that recurring though. Definitley a flaw in the program that you can't upload your pay stub without a huge workaround. My take home is way less than half of my pay--not only do my 401k contributions come off the top but my 401K loan payments that I'm really hammering away at make my pay less than 1500 out of 5,000. So my savings rate looks fantastic. I assume everyone 401k comes out of their pay.
-
So we've been spending a lot this month. My daughter and I went away for a few days. I've been buying tools I don't strictly need. Etc. then we had a bat in our house and all had to get rabies shots (long story) and that ws really sobering. I have the money to pay but it's hurting my feelings to do so. So I'm taking the new table saw I just ordered back to the store. I feel too guilty to keep it. I'll be posint more monthly spending/savings as I get my Mint account organized.
-
Hi,
I think I am going to join you here for the second half of this year.
I only found MMM about one year ago. So I have only tracked my expenses in detail since last July (I used to have a very high-level budget only, in the past).
So, this will be a YoY view on variable expenses (i.e. excluding the fixed cost I cannot really control, like property tax, TV/radio licences, waste disposal) to see if my new budgeting regime works.
July looks better this year, but I had big vet bills last summer, so it's not quite like for like.
Still, primary goal is to reduce overall spend, second goal is to meet my overall budget plan this year (= $2,800 per month on average).
2018 baseline 2019
$ (5,571) (2,304)
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Continuing to fail at this. Spent my usual $250 on groceries, and almost $400 on eating out. I need to reexamine this goal, because I think it's unrealistic. If it were just me, I could manage to cut it down, but my wife loves eating out as much as I love theater and a lot of my social life happens in restaurants or bars. For example, $100 of that is in meals alone (fast casual food, desserts, coffee, other treats), $100 is on meals out with my wife (two different date nights, this is honestly low for what I usually spend going out with her), and $200 is on nights out with friends (several different bars and restaurants with different groups of people). I could probably cut down some in each category by reducing frequency and/or what I order, but it's never going to be as low as I feel like it should be. I value the time with my wife and the time with my friends. I know there are less expensive ways to spend time, and we do some of that too, but going out is baked into the culture of my city and my friend group. I need to think some more about how I want to readjust my budget here, because I end up overspending every month and pulling from other categories.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Great here. I apparently was so busy with my friends this month that I only spent $12.50 on one ticket, haha.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Whoops. I got suckered into Lady Gaga's new makeup line. I admit it!! I don't have very much makeup, though, and a lot of what I have is pretty old. I'm looking forward to playing around with what I ordered when it comes this fall, and getting rid of some other stuff that's probably expired.
Grand total for this month is $3200. I'm okay with that total. Hitting $40k will be a stretch, but I'm on pace to spend under $41k.
-
I'm actually spening more now than in a long time. With only 12 to 18 months left till FIRE, there are lots of expensive projects and things I need to pay for. Once on the ACA we'll need to cut spending to get the subsidies. So, with all the moeny we need for FIRE invested now, we can spend with abandon till we pull the plug and no longer are working.
-
Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent). Spent $4,322 or $989 over budget in July.
Buying a couch tanked us, but I’m pleased that despite all the travel this month we would not have gone over budget absent the new couch. I’m definitely justifying this purchase...but the new couch was a consolation prize to signing a three year renewal lease for our 600 sq Jr one bedroom rather than upgrading to a larger, more expensive space, where TBH we would also have bought a larger couch. This one is big enough to lie down without our feet hanging off the edge and the chaise means we both get to lounge and sprawl out. It’s amazing. I did stalk Craigslist for over a month before giving up and buying new. Same with bar stools, although those are still in the box in case a good used set becomes available before our old ones sell (hopefully, for something).
I’d still like to stay under 40k for entire year, which now means we need to stay under $3,063 a month or $1388 after rent for the remaining 5 months. Doable, but DH gave me an uh-huh when I told him this so we shall see...
Blue = last month| Green is this month
Rent: $1675| $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $436| $428
Travel: $1427| $650 - $436.45 food, transit, sight seeing on vacation; $48.63 train, drinks, dinner visit to in-laws; $103.36 food, drink, misc for friend bachelorette weekend; $61 train & food visit to in-laws.
Shopping: $401| $1396 - $956.24 new couch; $45 disposal old couch; $94.75 DH gym shoes & casual shoes; $64.94 new vacuum cleaner; $196.89 new bar stools; $18.73 shorts; $18.96 ebooks
Eating & Drinking Out: $119| $33 - $8.47 lunch out; $2.1 coffees at work; $11.54 lunch w/friend; $7.81 ice cream w/family; $3.13 snacks at work
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $84| $58 - $30 internet; $27.94 electric
Other: $104| $82 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $53 Classpass subscription(s)
January: $2951 | February: $3549 | March: $3394 | April: $2944| May: $3278| June: $4246 | July: $4322
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 6 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 35 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 193 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 117 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 8 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 359 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1640 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL |
Cell Phone | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 |
Restaurants | $ 166 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 |
----------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 |
Ended up not being too bad of a month. In the green for everything. Next month will be interesting as I drive across the country. No income, lots of expenses anticipated.
-
My July update:
- Eating out was higher this month due to our holiday - One memorable lunch for $130 didn't help, but I have now been to Matsos in Broome and really enjoyed the lunch. Well worth it.
- We spent a bit more on non-food type purchases, replacing clothes that had work out.
- Kids are always going to be around $2000 a month for uni living expenses.
- Our utilities was up, and up compared to last year. Some of that was timing of bills, as we had a $450 strata bill come in a few days earlier this year. But I will have to investigate the rest
- Transport was way up again, but our holiday was largely responsible for the bump, being over $1200 out of the $1786. probably could have recorded it as holidays, but it was transport too. I always fret over where to put some expenses.
Overall wasn't too bad for the month as we did have a great holiday. We were down 12% from average for the month, but over the year we are 5% down, with a target of 10%. Next month will be difficult as we have some large rates due.
-
Posting to update. Pretty good month! Our goals are total spend under $2700, and to keep our top two expenses (food and utilities) down. We're trying to keep our total food spend -- groceries and eating out -- under $600 (family of 4, 2 teenagers), and our utilities as low as possible.
If we hadn't gotten hit with $600 worth of unexpected vet bills this month we would have had close to our best month of the year so far. We also did great on the food and utilities.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
May 3242 771 323
June 4117 822 337
July 2885 521 324
-
A bit late, but I was on vacation. Here are my July numbers.
Transport (salmon pink) is huge, because we have been to the far north. Apart from the fuel costs, there are also a lot of tol roads and many ferries (we took the scenic route along the coast upwards).
Food (green) is pretty similar to normal, but we cook very differently on a camping stove compared to a normal meal at home. We often eat burger or sausage with potato salad and some vegetable. Or we eat self caught fish or clams.
DH paid for many of the campsites, so that doesn't show so much on my numbers (light blue).
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 6 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 35 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 193 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 117 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 8 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 359 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1640 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 0 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 97 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 97 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1044 |
Update. All expenses reflect the cross-country road trip I just finished. Have a while before I move into the house and get settled so expenses may get out of control a little. Should be settled in by September and will be excited to finish the year strong.
-
Let's get back on the accountability bandwagon. Haven't posted since May so here we go:
June: €1000
- Most of this month was spent on vacation. €500 of vacation-costs for a 3 week trip (total costs were round €900 but some things like flights had been paid earlier).
- Considering I was only in town a week that month my €50 for eating out was too high as well.
July: €1055
- Groceries were high again at €135. I really seem to have a hard time keeping grocery costs down this year even though I don't feel like I'm eating that much different compared to last year.
- Again a fairly high travel cost of €285 due to some expenses for June trip that I had to pay back to others. Included in the €900 trip total.
August: €970
- Groceries finally more reasonable at €100!! Still 4 days to go though but staying <120 should be no big deal.
- Eating out/bars was high this month as I had several social events/celebrations.
- Travel high again at €223 as I've made a car rental reservation for an October trip, but part of that will be paid back to me by my fellow travel buddies.
Jan: €1175
Feb: €1110
Mar: €1060
Apr: €690
May: €950
-
Posting to remind myself to come back to this later. (tonight? Some other day? Who knows when I'll get the time.)
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 8 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 43 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 198 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 105 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 7 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 380 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1645 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 |
Rough, but mostly unexpected necessary without much unnecessary expenses. Big months coming up ahead.
-
So, this will be a YoY view on variable expenses
Primary goal is to reduce overall spend, second goal is to meet my overall budget plan this year (= $2,800 per month on average).
2018 baseline 2019
$ (5,571) (2,304)
(2,208) (1,954)
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Groceries were under $200 this month, but eating out was high due to my wife's birthday and some travel. But still a reasonable (for me) $250. I'll take it.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Under $250, happy with all the tickets I got.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Didn't buy anything from this category this month!
Just under $3400 for August, including some vacation expenses for a trip I just took and a trip I'm going to take next year. But I'm happy with what I paid for everything, so it's all good. Still on pace for $40-41k for the year.
-
Total Jan: € 508
Total Feb: € 1105
Total March: €971
Total April: € 644
Total May: €1276
June:
Food: €78
Transit: €128
Fun: €135
Shopping: €0
Tuition: €0
Healthcare: €9
DIY: €17
Renewed my rail discount card for another year (€52) and took some extra hobby classes that were a lot of fun. Otherwise doing pretty well this month so far.
Haven't been here for a while! @Hirondelle my grocery spending is up as well. Don't forget that VAT on food is now 9% instead of 6 and that inflation on food is almost 5% compared to last year. My oats were € 0,38 /pound last year and now they're €0,50/pound. Still cheap but a big increase.
Total June: €875 - bought some text books and bought a few take-away meals which I only rarely do. Had a very hectic time at work, was busy preparing for exams and we were doing work on the house.
Total July: €1215 - a few weeks of the madness described above + our 10 day summer holiday. Not too bad actually.
Total August: €498 or €5500 - I wasn't at work for half of the month so it was pretty easy to not spend money. This figure even includes about €100 in text books. I did spend 5k from the savings account on a big project around the house: we dug out the whole garden and hired people to do it (a full skip of rubble the previous owners buried) and then put in new fences, a new gravel path and some grass. Other than that big one off August was a good month.
-
August was typically expensive. Some of these numbers don't change much, others jump around. Significant things in here:
- Transport costs were high again. We had car issues during the month, and I replaced some of my motorcycle gear with newer, safer gear. $742 in maintenance as compared to $601 in fuel.
- We had an interstate trip to help our daughter move back home as she has deferred from uni for 6 months. Extra fuel costs, and extra eating out costs due to this trip.
- The hobbies/holidays group includes a trip to the football finals next weekend, and some fathers day presents. The presents (to me) were appreciated and needed, rather than wasteful.
- We have decided to space out the rates payments this year even though it will costs us slightly more. The savings in paying up front is not enough to warrant the loss of cash now. It will mean we have increased Utilities for the rest of the year.
We are currently running 6.2% below last year. Aim is 10%, but it is heading in the right direction.
-
Posting to update. Decent month, but could have been better. Our goals are total spend under $2700, and to keep our top two expenses (food and utilities) down. We're trying to keep our total food spend -- groceries plus eating out -- under $600 (family of 4, 2 teenagers), and our utilities as low as possible.
Looking ahead, September will be an exploding bloodbath of spending (long preplanned vacation).
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
May 3242 771 323
June 4117 822 337
July 2885 521 324
August 3052 624 369
-
August:
There is a large expense "uncategorized" (grey). We are trying to change citizenship and this is the cost for the request and for a test.
-
August:
There is a large expense "uncategorized" (grey). We are trying to change citizenship and this is the cost the request and for a test.
@Linea_Norway -- Are you two becoming Norwegian citizens? Do you have to give up your Dutch citizenship to do that?
-
August:
There is a large expense "uncategorized" (grey). We are trying to change citizenship and this is the cost the request and for a test.
@Linea_Norway -- Are you two becoming Norwegian citizens? Do you have to give up your Dutch citizenship to do that?
Yes, we need to give up our Dutch nationality. Being Norwegian means that we can vote in Norway. Today we can only vote locally, but not at national votes.
And also, if we ever get a government that is making life difficult for (not working) immigrants, we feel a bit safer having the nationality.
We had to pass a test, answering 32 questions about Norwegian culture. Luckily we passed easily. The whole process might take more than a year. In our application we have written our jobs, as we still have them at this moment.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 8 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 43 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 198 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 105 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 7 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 380 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1645 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 11 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 161 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 204 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 913 |
Shopping remains a challenge. In the case of this month, 120 of it was fees for a soccer league I joined this season, which gets put in the shopping category due to how I have my categories. I only really shopped for $40 for a shadow box to frame a poster. Hoping to finish the month strong and then look forward to October.
-
September is an expensive month. We are going to sell our home and therefore we have some additional cost upfront.
I went to Ikea to buy some stash for home staging (the darker blue colour), 260 euro.
We also went a week on vacation where we ate out every day (green). The sum spent should have been much higher, but DH paid many of the dinners, which is not visible in my numbers. We also drank wine every day, marked as food, as I bought it at the grocery store or at a restaurant.
I ordered 2 expensive books for a hobby. Haven't received them yet, 4 weeks later, so I should be checking on that. The amount is drawn from my account.
Home (grey) is big because I got a lot of bills to pay, like the 3-monthly internet bill. And the water/sewer bill.
Not visible on my numbers, but DH paid 2200 euros for a car repair.
Next month might also be an expensive month. We will have to pay for a technical report for the home sale (in Norway the seller makes such a report available to all the buyers). And we need to pay for advertising. The broker costs will be paid for when we sell the home. The broker might send an early invoice for other bills, like getting the official documents from the community, legal system, etc.
-
This is a YoY view on variable expenses, starting w/ when I began tracking expenses more accurately last year.
Primary goal is to reduce overall spend, second goal is to meet my overall "variable" budget plan this year (= $2,500 per month on average, as I decided to push for a 10% reduction compared to last year's average).
I guess I still have substantial fixed costs to deal with. However, those are health-care and house-related, so they will not be influenced unless I move. So I want to focus on what I can control directly. Still, I am amazed to see how little some ppl here spend even with bigger households. There is still a lot of fat here in my budget I need to trim
2018 baseline $ 2019
July (5,571) (2,304)
Aug (2,208) (1,954)
Sept (4.561) (2,098)
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Succeeded this month…because I spent way too much on groceries. Mostly stocking up one some staples.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Hardly saw anything this month, so the total was very low.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Success. Only bought one thing that I love and use daily.
Just below $3200 for the month. It’s artificially low since that figure includes getting unexpectedly reimbursed for some travel expenses, but I’ll take it.
-
Today I received 1250$ extra in income, which is my pay increase since May. That was about time.
-
Super late to the game, but definitely need to join. Spending has been absolutely crazy. I don't even think I qualify as a mustachian right now. :(
Hopefully this thread will continue in 2020.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 41 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 180 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 132 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 6 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 366 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1587 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 189 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 |
Shopping. Mostly necessary this month so won't give myself too hard a time. Want to get shopping under control in October, planning to give myself a little breathing room on restaurants in October. Also plan on spending some money on gas with a roadtrip planned in October.
Most importantly, my monthly averages are all in the green as far as my beginning of the year goals. Shopping and gas are the only ones close to the average monthly budget.
-
Super late to the game, but definitely need to join. Spending has been absolutely crazy. I don't even think I qualify as a mustachian right now. :(
Hopefully this thread will continue in 2020.
I feel the same (Mustachian-in-training) ;-)
At least I have figured out where my weak points are, but tackling them is a different story (lifestyle choices). Unless somebody has any tips for getting vet discounts (my vet bills this year already has been a total of more than $5k) and cheapest healthy way of feeding cats and dogs ...
-
September was a bit of a blow out for us. Mainly due to a holiday, which will also impact on October.
Highlights and lowlights:
- Food is going up now we have another mouth to feed in the house.
- Money to house the kids is going down - this relates directly to the point above
- Mortgages were up this month, due to a 3 fortnight month on one of the many mortgages.
- Utilities were also up, mainly due to the timing of rates payments. This will be the same next month too.
- Holidays - $2300 on an overseas holiday we wanted and needed. But lots of $
We are currently 6% below last year and the target was 10%. I don't think 10% is achievable anymore, but anything below last year is a good start.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 41 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 180 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 132 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 6 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 366 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1587 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP | OCT |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 | $ 4 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 90 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 | $ 31 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 189 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 5 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 | $ 130 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 | $ 716 |
Half-way update. Had a big roadtrip out of the country this weekend, don't anticipate spending any more on gas this month.
Shopping has been great. Overall expenses has been great.
But in one of my better mustachian moments, I had been struggling with a check engine light. I would have previously taken it into a mechanic, sat in a lobby, listened to what needed to be done, agreed to whatever they said, and paid whatever it cost. With some mustachian inspiration I headed online, found out that AutoZone can pull the error code for free, so I had that done. Found out the error code, then watched a bunch of youtube videos and read some articles. Turns out that it was due to the most common cause for that particular code (loose/damaged gas cap), so a $5 purchase on amazon was all it took.
-
My halfway status is that I had to pay my credit cards from last month when we were on vacation. But the expenses there were already registered on September. Now I just need the cash to pay the bills.
For the rest, the biggest numbers so far are my savings. And one bigger than usual amount for food (for good reasons). I even have got 85 euro income from my side-gig.
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. I reworked this goal. I realized I was running up the dining out bill by treating my wife, which is something she and I both enjoy. I don't mind that spending. What I do mind is the spending on myself for fast casual meals when I don't have it together to cook, or overordering when I go out with friends. So I separated the category. When I do that, it's clear that the spending on myself is more reasonable.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Pretty good. Bought a fair number of tickets, but all at reasonable prices.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Success-ish. I did buy a new product this month, but it's something I've wanted to try for over a year, I ran out of a mediocre analogue first, and it was on sale.
This month...oy. I spent $4700 which is by far the highest spend all year. A lot of annual bills came at once (my gym membership, my renter's insurance, some software subscriptions I value), we went to a fancy restaurant for my wife's birthday, and I spent $$$ on a playoff ticket for my team that rarely makes it. Don't regret any of the spending, but I had forgotten how backloaded some of my planned expenses are for the year. I'm definitely not going to hit $40k now. I would have to spend less than $2500 each in November and December, and that's just not realistic. My half of the rent alone is $1300. But it's possible for me to hit $42k, which would still be less than last year. So that will be my new goal.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 46 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 169 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 119 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 6 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 345 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1542 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP | OCT |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 | $ 4 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 91 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 | $ 62 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 184 | $ 5 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 5 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 | $ 163 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 | $ 1134 |
End of month.. overall pretty good. A couple unexpected expenses at the end of the month but can't complain. Need two solid remaining months to make 2019 a success!
-
Hmmmm. October was spendy. An O/S holiday meant extra expenses as we learnt to ski, ate out and generally lived the good life. These extras are clear in our expenses.
The good - Transport, utilities Kids spending, non-food expenses and food are all down 10% for the year, and will end up there.
Down 7% for the year, aim was 10%.
-
October has been a cheap month. Most the extra cost for stashing the house for sale has already been spent. And because we have been so occupied with the sales process, we didn't do anything else that cost money, like driving to our cabin.
Car spend is a little high, because of a repair of one of the brakes. DH could have done the job himself, but he thought it was a lot of fuss and thought it was worth to have it fixed cheaply.
Next month I will pay the yearly car insurance for two cars, including the taxes to be allowed to drive on the road. We plan to sell one of the cars in 2020, and then I will get the remaining money back from the insurance.
-
October update
2018 baseline $ 2019
July (5,571) (2,304)
Aug (2,208) (1,954)
Sept (4,561) (2,098)
Oct (2,912) (1,725)
-
October update
2018 baseline $ 2019
July (5,571) (2,304)
Aug (2,208) (1,954)
Sept (4,561) (2,098)
Oct (2,912) (1,725)
Amazing decreases each month.. nice job!
-
Amazing decreases each month.. nice job!
Thank you!
It's really amazing what detailed expense tracking can do to discipline oneself.
I kind of feel embarrassed about how much money I have bled over the past decades by just not paying (enough) attention.
-
Posting to update. Our goals are total monthly spend under $2700, and to keep our top two expenses (food and utilities) down. We're trying to keep our total food spend -- groceries plus eating out -- under $600 (family of 4, 2 teenagers), and our utilities as low as possible.
We had a long-preplanned vacation in September, which pushed our total spend up. Food has been a challenge this year. In 2018 we averaged $750 a month; this year so far we are averaging $705 despite the teenagers being bigger and hungrier. So we've improved spending somewhat, but we are far short of the goal I set at the beginning of the year. I may take all of next year and just focus on food spending, to see if we can't nudge that needle down more. We don't eat out much, so the savings will have to come from smarter shopping, growing more food, and batch cooking.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
May 3242 771 323
June 4117 822 337
July 2885 521 324
August 3052 624 369
September 5063 820 362
October 2731 792 307
-
We have a problem. My DH changed banks this year and he didn't print out his transactions from last year. Therefore at the end of the year, when I asked him how much he spent that year, I can't get a good answer. He can only show the difference in savings which include market growth. It would have been so nice if he has also tracked his transactions. I think we should do it both from next year, when we won't have any more income.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 46 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 169 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 119 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 6 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 345 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1542 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP | OCT | NOV |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 | $ 4 | $ 8 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 91 | $ 27 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 | $ 62 | $ 122 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 184 | $ 5 | $ 25 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 5 | $ 0 | $ 314 |
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 | $ 163 | $ 496 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 | $ 1134 | $ 1264 |
10 days to go in November, I was anticipating a bit of a higher spend this month. Some big car items needed taken care of. On top of that, lots of shopping still to be done (I try to get all my christmas shopping done over black friday), so it'll end up being a bit of a pricy month.
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 49 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 166 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 116 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 41 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 378 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1538 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP | OCT | NOV |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 | $ 4 | $ 8 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 91 | $ 78 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 | $ 62 | $ 136 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 184 | $ 5 | $ 82 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 5 | $ 0 | $ 395 |
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 | $ 163 | $ 699 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 | $ 1134 | $ 1501 |
Little pricey car month for me, but still doing pretty well coming in around that $1500 average total spend. Going for a record breaking month in December, excited to close the year on a high note.
Overall, gas is the only tight budget for my beginning of year goal. I currently have a full tank and don't have much driving to do remainder of the year.
-
Again been absent for a few months. Time for an update.
Jan: €1175
Feb: €1110
Mar: €1060
Apr: €690
May: €950
June: €1000
July: €1055
August: €970
September: €1350 due to some much necessary clothes shopping and travel expenses.
October: €1400, spent the whole month out of the country so mostly travel costs.
November: €925, finally back to normal spending levels.
My projections for this year is about €12500 of total spending, which is almost 1k more than last year. That's A LOT of lifestyle inflation, but it's almost fully caused by higher travel expenses which was a result of a doing two big trips a year which was kind of an exceptional unanticipated thing. It does mean though that my savings rate has remained rather stable than gone up regardless of a significant raise, so I do need to be more strict for myself sometimes.
-
November update, near the end of the year now. The stand out things are:
- 50th Birthday meant a big blowout in out eating out and entertainment costs. I'm happy with the cost, as it will only be twice (next year is my wife's 50th)
- Our food costs are higher with an extra mouth to feed. It is about 50% up from where it was, so not so much lifestyle creep as 50% more mouths to feed.
- Expenses relating to kids is down. This relates to the last point, as we are housing one under our roof rather than at uni, until February
- Transport was higher due to a registration ($700 per year)
We are heading for a 7% reduction in overall spending for the year, which I'm hoping to be able to continue next year. My aim was 10%. We are not "bare bones" in our lifestyle, but we are careful in our spending. I think we've done reasonably well when 40% of our costs are effectively fixed in our mortgages. We had reductions in interest rates this year, but have continued with the current payment levels to get further ahead on them.
Future goals - transport costs and the "eating out/entertainment" costs.
-
My biggest expense this month if for transport (salmon colour) and contains 2 x car insurance for a whole year + 2 x the yearly general road tax, to be allowed to drive on public roads.
The other big category is home (dark grey). I had to buy a ladder towards the chimney, because the house didn't have one. I bought it second hand. Some of the cost is also a new swing set for a neighborhood playground that we needed to have our home officially approved for living in. Partly refunded by a neighbor, but that doesn't show in my list. Otherwise the usual home bills.
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Sort of. I spent more on groceries this month because my CSA was over...and I also spent more eating out with friends over the holidays.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Pretty good. Bought a fair number of tickets, but all at reasonable prices.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Success-ish. Restocked on some skincare that I love and am running low on during a Black Friday sale.
This month was painful. After spending $4700 in October, I spent an astronomical $4900 in November. Some of that was purchases I've been waiting to make for months because I knew they'd be on sale for Black Friday, some of that was a new laptop after I got fed up with my old one that was unusably slow and falling apart. Then a few medium expenses like a haircut (only 2-3 times a year), a half marathon I wasn't expected to win the lottery for (lol), and some expenses related to a hobby. I don't regret any individual expenses and it was all for things I value at good prices, but there's no way I'm hitting my goal of $40k. After paying my rent this month, I'm sitting at just over $41k in spending for the year so far. I still need to buy some Christmas presents (nothing crazy, but I like to get a few things my immediate family will appreciate), but hopefully I can at least keep my final tally for 2019 less than the $42,874 I spent in 2018.
Kind of frustrating that I have paid more attention to my spending this year than ever before, and I'm still going to end up at the same place. Maybe I just need to accept that this is my happy medium of being conscious about my expenses but still living my life in a HCOL city.
-
Posting to update. Our goals are total monthly spend under $2700, and to keep our top two expenses (food and utilities) down. We're trying to keep our total food spend -- groceries plus eating out -- under $600 (family of 4, 2 teenagers), and our utilities as low as possible. Utilities have been dropping as we plug away on our house reconstruction and the structure gets tighter and more energy efficient.
It was a good month, but I'd really like to get that food spending a bit lower. Still working on that.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
May 3242 771 323
June 4117 822 337
July 2885 521 324
August 3052 624 369
September 5063 820 362
October 2731 792 307
November 2467 661 326
-
Well, I’m way behind and we’re over budget; last four months below. We are at $38,973 end of November, so no way we will stay under 40k for the year. Just rent will put us over. It’s more of a question of what’s the least over we can go. We should still beat last year, and I guess that’s not nothing.
I had hoped to make up ground after our July couch purchase, but we picked up a new hobby, camping/backpacking, and that was that. The upfront equipment costs added up even when looking for used or cheap beginner stuff. Plus we used off-season sales to upgrade for next year’s planned trips. I’d like to say this will make future vacations cheaper, but car rentals are more expensive than flights to cities and we get a lot of flights/hotels free with cc points. So it will probably only somewhat reduce food/entertainment costs while traveling. But the car trips will be more eco friendly.
Also some health issues added up extra costs, and more paid/to pay in December. On the bright side, we’ll likely still be ahead $3500 for the year by choosing a high deductible plan vs low one, even if the out of pocket expenses suck right now.
Monthly budget to meet 40k goal is $3,333 ($1658 after rent).
August - $4,143 or $810 over budget in August.
Rent: $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $590
Travel: $477 - $42.83 tickets & food in-laws; $126 train tickets home; $55 camp fee; $253.65 food, drinks, & Ubers out-of-town wedding
Shopping: $668 - $102.36 cat food & litter; $96.75 coffee table; $14.95 book; $40 sleeping bag; $40 used sleeping bag; $45 used tent; $121.52 2 sleeping pads & compression bag; 107.95 backpacking pack; 11.98 compression bag; $44.71 underwear; $25 cat post; $137.81 work shoes (-$120 things we sold)
Eating & Drinking Out: $35 - $22.06 lunch; $1.77 work coffee; $11.43 work lunch
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $60 - $30 internet; 29.93 electric
Other: $637.74 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $58 Classpass subscription(s); $50 wedding gift; $50 tickets to play; $50 public transit; $79 cc annual fee; 14.85 game; $119 amazon prime subscription; $70.30 doctor; $9.44 meds; $108 labs
September - $3,082 or $251 under budget
Rent: $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $528
Travel: $221 - $109 food & drink trip home; $50 camping incidentals; $62 tickets & food in-laws
Shopping: $352 - $27 ebooks; $5.04 stakes; $180.41 suit + blouse; $8.99 headlamps; $34.93 pot + camp mug; $22.99 wine glasses; $72.63 backpacking pack
Eating & Drinking Out: $168 - $1.77 work coffee; $8.00 snack out; $9.18 work lunch; $33 dinner out; $116 drinks & food w/ out of town friends
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $30 - $29.32 electric
Other: $108 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $49 classpass subscription(s); $30 public transit
October - $3,350 or $17 over budget
Rent: $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $669
Travel: $454 - $87 camping transit, fee, & incidentals; $367.20 weekend visit to friends
Shopping: $448 - $99.42 cat food & liter; $14.97 ebooks; $16.95 camp stove; $42.14 headlamps & drying rack; $16 SAC knife; $11.63 mat couplers; $246.86 backpacking quilt + pillows
Eating & Drinking Out: $292 - $41.16 work lunches; $67.46 wine subscription; $61 drinks w/ coworkers; $47.02 drinks w/ friends; 22.07 drinks w/ friends; $35.51 dinner out; $18 work coffee
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $32 - $32.18 electric
Other: $147 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $98 classpass subscription(s); $9.90 gift; $2.50 public transit; $7 annual website subscription
November - $4,266 or $933 over budget
Rent: $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $574
Travel: $298 - $125 camping transit, fee, lunch; $118 train tickets + food in-laws; $55.30 food on visit home
Shopping: $453 - $9.36 guide books; $72.13 bear bag; $46 Fire tablet; $25.42 coffee filters + nalgene replacement lid; $300 tent
Eating & Drinking Out: $275 - $15.38 drinks w/ coworkers; $69.61 dinner + drinks w/ friends; $75.87 wine subscription; $15 drinks w/ friend; $8 work coffee; $47 Christmas market; $44 friend’s benefit event
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $292 - $28.69 electric; $262.94 my cell plan (annual)
Other: $699 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $98 classpass subscription(s); $19.72 shipping; $3.18 app; $8.25 taxi; $20 public transit; $95 cc annual fee; $95 cc annual fee; $300 epipens; $31.07 meds
January: $2951 | February: $3549 | March: $3394 | April: $2944| May: $3278| June: $4246 | July: $4322 | August: $4143 | September: $3082 | October: $3350 | November: $4266 |
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 49 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 166 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 116 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 41 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 378 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1538 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP | OCT | NOV | DEC |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 | $ 4 | $ 8 | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 91 | $ 78 | $ 0 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 | $ 62 | $ 136 | $ 0 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 184 | $ 5 | $ 82 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 5 | $ 0 | $ 395 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 | $ 163 | $ 699 | $ 0 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 | $ 1134 | $ 1501 | $ 557 |
Mid-ish month update. Going for a record low spend to finish off the year. So far so good with my only expenses being rent, car insurance and my amazon music membership!
-
Nov+ update - my computer broke, this led to unplanned expense plus a delay in updating my files.
In addition, I had some car repairs, so Dec also will look a bit spendy (probably in excess of 500 quid on top of regular expenses).
2018 baseline $ 2019
July (5,571) (2,304)
Aug (2,208) (1,954)
Sept (4,561) (2,098)
Oct (2,912) (1,725)
Nov (2,254) (1,745)
Dec (2,234) a lot
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 49 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 166 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 116 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 41 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 378 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1538 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP | OCT | NOV | DEC |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 | $ 4 | $ 8 | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 91 | $ 78 | $ 0 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 | $ 62 | $ 136 | $ 0 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 184 | $ 5 | $ 82 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 5 | $ 0 | $ 395 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 | $ 163 | $ 699 | $ 0 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 | $ 1134 | $ 1501 | $ 586 |
Continues to be a good spending month for me. Nothing outside of essentials/recurring payments. $500 rent, $56 car insurance, $1 amazon music, $29 groceries.
Going to challenge myself not to spend anything for the rest of the month. Get creative with freezer/fridge and pantry!
-
Nov+ update - my computer broke, this led to unplanned expense plus a delay in updating my files.
In addition, I had some car repairs, so Dec also will look a bit spendy (probably in excess of 500 quid on top of regular expenses).
2018 baseline $ 2019
July (5,571) (2,304)
Aug (2,208) (1,954)
Sept (4,561) (2,098)
Oct (2,912) (1,725)
Nov (2,254) (1,745)
Dec (2,234) (1,757)
Closing the books now with the Dec spend (in red).
Not as bad as I expected.
Next year, I will track total spend, though (now that I got a proper baseline).
-
Category 2018 AVG | 2019 GOAL | 2019 AVG | JAN | FEB | MAR | APR | MAY | JUN |
Cell Phone $ 75 | $ 10 | $ 7 | $ 24 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 | $ 3 |
Gas/Fuel $ 150 | $ 50 | $ 45 | $ 32 | $ 0 | $ 33 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 138 |
Restaurants $ 540 | $ 300 | $ 151 | $ 13 | $ 84 | $ 76 | $ 0 | $ 425 | $ 598 |
"Shopping" $ 420 | $ 150 | $ 106 | $ 426 | $ 175 | $ 65 | $ 0 | $ 54 | $ 95 |
Car Expenses $ 445 | $ 100 | $ 38 | $ 54 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" $1630 | $ 610 | $ 344 | $ 549 | $ 262 | $ 177 | $ 3 | $ 482 | $ 825 |
Total Expenses $2902 | $ 2000 | $ 1464 | $ 1799 | $ 1697 | $ 1429 | $ 641 | $ 1657 | $ 2438 |
Category | JUL | AUG | SEP | OCT | NOV | DEC |
Cell Phone | $ 3 | $ 18 | $ 5 | $ 4 | $ 8 | $ 0 |
Gas/Fuel | $ 40 | $ 100 | $ 27 | $ 91 | $ 78 | $ 0 |
Restaurants | $ 166 | $ 233 | $ 29 | $ 62 | $ 136 | $ 0 |
"Shopping" | $ 4 | $ 179 | $ 184 | $ 5 | $ 82 | $ 0 |
Car Expenses | $ 0 | $ 0 | $ 5 | $ 0 | $ 395 | $ 0 |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total "Big 5" | $ 213 | $ 530 | $ 250 | $ 163 | $ 699 | $ 0 |
Total Expenses | $ 1821 | $ 1674 | $ 1129 | $ 1134 | $ 1501 | $ 587 |
What a fun month. Second non-essential spend month of the year, to close off 2019 with a bang.
Met all my goals for individual categories, overall spending. Amazing process, very revealing and very helpful. Thanks for setting it up!
-
December figures. Our food went up, with 5 in the house for a couple of weeks.
My aim was a reduction by 10% We got to 7%, which I am happy about.
If you take out the mortgage repayments, which we didn't change when interest rates went down, then we are at about 12% down for the year. So a good effort.
Now, another 10% next year!
-
I'm on track to spend ~$44k this year, and I would love to get that down to ~$40k in 2019.
Final numbers are in for 2018, and I spent $42,874. Rent is by far my biggest expense (HCOL) and is pretty well optimized for where we are. However, there's plenty to cut elsewhere:
-2019 goal is to spend less on dining out than I do on ingredients from the grocery store. Success.
-I see a lot of theater, and that's also important to me, but I want to put in more effort making sure I get the lowest priced tickets possible through rushes and lotteries. Pretty good. Just bought one ticket this month.
-I spend too much on personal care items like skincare. I need to stick to my routine, use up what I've got, and stop trying new products. Success. Didn't buy anything this month.
Total for the month is $3800, with Christmas gifts in there.
Annual total is even more than last year, at $43,375. I didn't make my goal of $40k, and I actually ended up spending even more than 2018. I was kind of bummed about that, but analyzing the breakdown, I don't feel as bad. I spent more on groceries than last year, but less on eating out. I spent about the same on theater tickets, and am very happy with what I saw. I did spend a little more on personal care, but I hit my goal about buying less new stuff just because it was on sale. It was all high quality items I know I love.
Honestly, the major difference is the new computer and mattress I had to get this year. And my wife's financial situation changed, so I took on more of the household expenses. (I didn't talk about it in detail monthly because she is lot more private about her info.) Without those three categories, I would have been at $40.5k, which is close to my original goal. I guess that's why I'm so glad for this place, and having an awareness about overall spending. It was not a strain at all to have to stretch the spending to pay for those "unexpected" things. In the case of the computer and mattress, I had money set aside for infrequent purchases like that. In the case of increasing my share of the household expenses, it just means a little less to save. No debt, no living paycheck to paycheck.
-
For the year, we spent $43,252. $3,252 over the goal of 40k, but less than 2018’s $44,167. New furniture ($1250), medical expenses ($884), and picking up a new hobby ($1,160) put us over, but also not cutting back enough in other areas to absorb those expenses. At least there was no creep upwards and our raises/bonuses all went to savings!
I was happy that general shopping (if you minus the new furniture) and travel was way down from 2018, even with the new hobby expenses. But groceries and “other” went up. Most of the “other” increase was from medical, class pass, and cc fees for travel hacking. Also disappointed in not further reducing the eating and drinking out expenses.
My main takeaway from the year of tracking expenses is just how much goes to entertainment and extra non-necessities. I don’t really regret too much of the expenditures, but feel more self-aware. I feel like we’re trying to cut down on those things until I see all the black and white numbers showing we’re not. Goal is to keep trying to creep down to 40k in expenses in 2020.
2018 vs 2019
Rent: $20,726 | $20,311
Groceries & Personal Care: $5,777 | $6,508
Travel: $7,078 | $4,929
Shopping: $4,413 | $4,471 (incl $643 cat food & litter, $1250 new furniture)
Eating & Drinking Out: $2,843 | $2,635
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $1,241 | $1,122
Other: $2,089 | $3,642 (incl medical, gifts, subscriptions, entertainment, cc fees)
December - $3,707 or $374 over budget for the month.
Rent: $1675
Groceries & Personal Care: $624
Travel: $106 - $106 train tickets to in-laws
Shopping: -$124 - $82.93 cat food & litter - 207.39 things sold
Eating & Drinking Out: $243 - $76.80 dinner w/friend; $152.36 drinks & dinner w/friends; $3.54 work coffee; $10.41 work lunch
Internet, Phone, & Electric: $231 - $29.83 electric; $201.64 DH cell plan (annual)
Other: $952 - $14.99 HBO; $14.16 Netflix; $0.99 kindle unlimited; $11 shipping; $12.77 shipping; $279.40 bar dues (prof license); $325 doctor; $40 labs; $100 condo staff holiday fund; $40 work housekeeping holiday fund; $35 kid Xmas gift; $50 mom bday gift; $21 eBay seller fees; $7.35 shipping
January: $2951 | February: $3549 | March: $3394 | April: $2944| May: $3278| June: $4246 | July: $4322 | August: $4163 | September: $3082 | October: $3350 | November: $4266 | December: $3707
-
I spent about 1000€ less in 2019 than in 2018. But still more than in el cheapo 2017.
My problem is that DH switched banks during the year and didn't export his expenses. So he cannot calculate how much he spent last year. I would have preferred to see what we spent in total in the last year before our FIRE.
-
December numbers. Pretty good month, considering it was the holidays and we made another trip to see family.
Total spend Food Utilities
January $3869 $656 $539
February 2223 593 558
March 2877 843 444
April 2803 606 394
May 3242 771 323
June 4117 822 337
July 2885 521 324
August 3052 624 369
September 5063 820 362
October 2731 792 307
November 2467 661 326
December 3674 566 379
Total spend for the year = $39,003 -- higher than our average, as it included some pretty gonzo travel. Next year we need to continue to get the food spend down. Big win for 2019 is getting the utility costs down as we progress with our house construction. Thank you for the thread @use2betrix!
Onward!