Monthly budget

[JShane]

I do what my wife tells me to do. And I do it happily. Whether it's cut back on spending or work extra details to bring in more. That woman is a financial ninja. And I wouldn't be anywhere near where I'm at if it wasn't for her

 

[Jbotto]

What I wouldn't give to see some of that info from people I know. Leaves me scratching my head some of them I mean I have a pretty good idea what they're making and sit there scratching my head like how? Quite frustrating at times actually.

I’ve been catching myself trying to keep up with the Joneses lately. Not being content with what I have. It’s a terrible feeling to compare but deep down I know those people have gone into debt to show off all their new toys. My wife and I have stayed the course really well but man is it tough. We’ve been taking big advantage of no interest on student loans and will have mine paid off by April. Both our vehicles are paid off and neither are new. She has a mountain of student debt due to a degree that has more fancy letters in it and took 8 years. Trying hard in 2023 to be content with what we have and to cherish skills, experiences, and memories than to be bogged down in material things and comparing our life to others.

As far as budgets, we do a monthly excel budget that has worked out well. Actually freeing really when you realize how all the little stupid purchases add up and pull you that far away from goals.

 

[midwesterncrosshair]

The most revolutionary thing we did was open checking accounts at another bank. Each month, we deposit our mad money in the hubby and wife accounts - we each get to spend it on whatever, it's our individual mad money. A lot of schtuff we used to buy on the family money now doesn't happen, since it has to come from the play cash. We save far more per month than we allow ourselves to have in those

That’s an idea I could get on board with.
When you pay the bills and you have money leftover, out of that 100% leftover what percentages go to mad money, savings, retirement or whatever other places you would put extra money?

Good info from everybody on this thread thank you all.

 

[Addicting]

That’s an idea I could get on board with.
When you pay the bills and you have money leftover, out of that 100% leftover what percentages go to mad money, savings, retirement or whatever other places you would put extra money?

Good info from everybody on this thread thank you all.

After Knowing what we need to cover the bills we pay ourselves. Meaning that we do per pay transfers of a set amount. Bills are 2k for the month and income is 2.5k. So we know we can send half of that 500 to ourselves right out of the check. That way the money never hits the main account. It kinda tricks us into thinking we have a lower balance than we actually do because we don’t see it every day. We try to keep it at or below a couple hundred bucks.

That keeps us from spending by having to decide if it’s worth it or not because we have to use our personal account at a different bank. Just the act of having to look up a different account or dig out that debit card is enough time to make you weigh out the pro/con of why you saved it in the first place.

 

[Mallardsx2]

We pretty much live the way we have always lived (semi-frugally) with a large chunk in savings in case of emergencies, any raises we get, we take 50% of that raise (and 100% of all bonus’s) and it goes towards the house principal.

This has really proven to be great tactic.

January 1, we take a chunk of cash and put that towards all hunting trips and lease fees yearly. It stays in an account all by itself and once we have reached that limit, it’s over. With 2 of us that hunt and all of the points and fees in multiple states, it doesn’t take long to get to that number. Some years we hunt “on the cheap” to be able to carry over a bit for future “big trips”.

We only hunt and fish. Literally, we can’t afford any more hobbies.

 

[undercover]

We don’t use a credit card or debit card except in emergencies. Always pay cash except for the few utilitiy bills which come out monthly. If I can’t pay for it with cash I don’t need it. The CC/debit cards numbers have been compromised twice. What a PIA that was. Once from the local BDUBS and the other from online shopping. Yes it sucks to pre pay for gas!

 

[Mountain Man]

A budget is something I have yet to get around to using, but probably should. We max out retirement contributions, make necessary student loan payments, and have built up both an emergency savings fund as well as a brokerage account over the years. That said, I am currently stationed in Europe and we are burning through money on “once in a lifetime” family trips that are “cheaper” because of reduced travel costs due to our proximity. We still pay off the credit card each month, but the expenditures are definitely greater than the income at the moment (especially since my wife can’t work here). I keep telling myself that this is what we have saved for and we aren’t going into debt, but it is stressful to be spending more than we are making even if it is for a specific finite period of time.

 

[TOGIE]

We’ve always had a budget I kept in a spreadsheet since we got married.

But until this kid we’ve only loosely stuck to it. We were saving so much money so easily that we really didn’t care how everything else got spent. Plenty was going into work retirement accounts, savings account, we were throwing money in the Roths and brokerage account so we just kinda lived how we wanted.

But now with a mortgage, kid, we’ll need some day care, college fund, etc we’ll need to be much more diligent. I built a new spreadsheet and we went over it yesterday.

Talking about out it is key im realizing. I only ever kinda told my wife how the budget looked. But looking at the spreadsheet together spurs on the conversations regarding how things could be tweaked to make one thing work or another.

I had also never actually tracked what we were spending on groceries, gas, or random crap. I started doing that in December to start seeing the realities.

I basically have a spreadsheet form of the Dave Ramsey app, I just like spreadsheets. It’s a google sheet actually so my wife and I can both look at it and update the tab of expenditures from our phones.

One major thing we realized really needs to change is not having individual credit cards anymore even though they get paid off each month from our joint checking account where all pay checks go. That’s just a minor leftover from before we got married but it makes it way harder to individually have an understanding of how much has been getting spent and to keep track of how exactly much we’re spending on groceries, gas, and random crap.

Basically my budget tallies all money in and all money out each month. It estimates the future with what our monthly pay should be, then i true it up at the end of the mon to with actual pay checks and actual spending and see what it is. it should come out to zero after saving, giving, budgeted expenditures, bills, and so on. If it’s positive we need to save more, or go on an extra date night, if it’s negative something needs to be adjusted or we had an emergency expenditure.

 

[Nick87]

One major thing we realized really needs to change is not having individual credit cards anymore even though they get paid off each month from our joint checking account where all pay checks go. That’s just a minor leftover from before we got married but it makes it way harder to keep track of how much we’re spending on groceries, gas, and random crap

Yah I'd agree with this. I don't have a spreadsheet or anything but the "random crap" is where it adds up I beleive. My credit card consists of lots of gas charges but the going into the gas station that adds up imo. Just to pay 5x for shit we have at home.

 

[TOGIE]

Yah I'd agree with this. I don't have a spreadsheet or anything but the "random crap" is where it adds up I beleive. My credit card consists of lots of gas charges butbuts the going into the gas station that adds up imo. Just to pay 5x for shit we have at home.

Yeah this has hugely been what’s been killing the budget recently. Stop overs at Starbucks by my wife or I go out to lunch a couple days while at the office and other misc unnecessary crap we do. Doesn’t look bad on our individual cards but when we look at both of our balances we both go “oh shit”

 

[Nick87]

Yeah this has hugely been what’s been killing the budget recently. Stop overs at Starbucks by my wife or I go out to lunch a couple days while at the office and other misc crap we do. Doesn’t look bad on our individual cards but when we look at both of our balances we both go “oh shit”

Adds up quick. Especially with prices. Haven't had Chipotle in years. I was in town the other day and stopped got the wife and I each a burrito and chips with gauc. No drinks $39. I was pretty close to just telling them keep it. Glorified fast food.

 

[TOGIE]

Adds up quick. Especially with prices. Haven't had Chipotle in years. I was in town the other day and stopped got the wife and I each a burrito and chips with gauc. No drinks $39. I was pretty close to just telling them keep it. Glorified fast food.

Dude chipotle is out of control. It’s lost it’s appeal to me. Tastes just as good as always. But yeah 30 bucks for two burritos made how we want them when in high school I could get one for 6.50…

Worth it in the 7-9 dollar range but it’s not worth it any more. Haven’t been in months and not sure when we’ll ever go again lol

 

[Nick87]

Dude chipotle is out of control. It’s lost it’s appeal to me. Tastes just as good as always. But yeah 30 bucks for two burritos made how we want them when in high school I could get one for 6.50…

Worth it in the 7-9 dollar range but it’s not worth it any more. Haven’t been in months and not sure when we’ll ever go again lol

Yup what kills me is the line was almost out the door. Crazy. There was enough axe body spray and Hollister cologne in that place I thought I was gonna pass out

 

[SAJ-99]

This thread is fascinating in many aspects.

Most people don't do a budget because they don't like what they will find, and generally people are lazy. After all, it's not really "fun" process. @Leinenkugelsfreak I suggest creating that spreadsheet. Pull a bank statement and CC statement and start looking back at where you spent your money. October is a usually a good month because it is before the holiday gift buying start. Only you can classify the expenses non-discretionary versus discretionary. Most financial sites will let you classify the expenses on the card. This often takes time, but look at it as time invested in learning about yourself. Second suggestion is pick a "live-like-a-pauper" month. Hell, pick Feb because it is only 28 days. Every item you buy should be absolutely necessary. See what the results are for that month. 28 days. Let us know the results. Every solution is different for every person. The one common positive is that generally when the people ask the question they have sufficient income to have the discussion. A lot of people don't have that.

In the end, Charlie Munger summed it up at the last Berkshire meeting. He was speaking mostly to investing and wealth management, but you could apply it to life in general. It is usually what gets people into trouble.

Billionaire investor Charlie Munger: ‘The world is not driven by greed, it’s driven by envy’

The 98-year-old billionaire says he's 'conquered envy.' In the past, he's said that's a secret to a long and happy life.

www.cnbc.com

@Big Fin. I would love to see the demographic profile of this site. Have you ever don't a profile questionnaire. We have threads complaining of gas prices, housing prices, and making budgets, while the how-to responses reference buying campers and boats and other toys. Normally I would say that is a problem, but the membership profile here is probably heavily tilted to that being normal and generally not economically crazy. It's hard say. I know big game western hunting isn't a cheap sport, so I'm very curious on what the DIYs economic profile looks like.

 

[Nick87]

. Every item you buy should be absolutely necessary. See what the results are for that month. 28 days. Let us know the results.

Seems like a good theory but there's always something, vehichle needs something, Furnace takes a shit, something you've been needing to upgrade around the house goes on sale at a discount you can't afford not to do....can't say I remember a month where there hasn't been an unexpected expense.

 

[CPAjeff]

Some fantastic info has been given so far!!

I use a basic excel sheet. My wife and I have modified it over the last dozen or so years, but it works for us. We’re pretty old school and use the cash envelope method.

One of the best ways to start a budget, at least for us, was to document each time we spent money. We did this for a couple months before hammering out the real budget. This gave us an idea of “normal” spending trends. We were able to cut out all the crap spending and have a realistic budget.

CUT UP THOSE CREDIT CARDS!

I’d be lying if I said I don’t have one… she’s a safe queen and makes an appearance once a year come tag application time!

One of the soundest pieces of advice I was ever given was to keep the house payment below 25% of the net monthly income. It was a giant kick in the nuts to see homes that we could afford, but didn’t want to get into because it was over the 25%. Staying below the 25% has paid off time and time again.

 

[SAJ-99]

Seems like a good theory but there's always something, vehichle needs something, Furnace takes a shit, something you've been needing to upgrade around the house goes on sale at a discount you can't afford not to do....can't say I remember a month where there hasn't been an unexpected expense.

I get that, but an unexpected non-discretionary expense should be planned for. It’s like when you buy a house, a person needs to understand that upkeep on the house will be 3-5% of the value of the house each year. It has to be planned for, or at least saved for. Once my vehicle gets through the warranty period, i have to start saving for future repairs. You pointed out there was sticker shock every month. Only you can tell us what is driving the sticker shock.

 

[Nick87]

We only hunt and fish. Literally, we can’t afford any more hobbies.

Yah I think that's like 90% of us

 

[Nick87]

I get that, but an unexpected non-discretionary expense should be planned for. It’s like when you buy a house, a person needs to understand that upkeep on the house will be 3-5% of the value of the house each year. It has to be planned for, or at least saved for. Once my vehicle gets through the warranty period, i have to start saving for future repairs. You pointed out there was sticker shock every month. Only you can tell us what is driving the sticker shock.

We do plan for it in a way..i guess thats where the budgeting comes in. We usually just pull from savings for things like that and try our best to put it back in.

 

[westbranch]

Seems like a good theory but there's always something, vehichle needs something, Furnace takes a shit, something you've been needing to upgrade around the house goes on sale at a discount you can't afford not to do....can't say I remember a month where there hasn't been an unexpected expense.

The You Need a Budget app helps create sinking funds for those types of expenses. Without creating additional bank accounts. Starting out go back as far as possible (24 months or so) and average out the monthly expenses to allocate things for tracking. Could do it with a spreadsheet but if you don't do spreadsheets regularly I think the $70-80 yr would save you a lot more.