Budgeting GTKY

[thelittleredm]

How do you budget? Do you use a computer program or do it by hand? How much wiggle room do you leave in your budget?

Brought to you by what I'm doing at work.

[BabyStandish]

My husband created an excel spreadsheet. By doing the Dave Ramsey snowball method we should be debt free by August of 2017. We meal plan and budget for groceries and don't go out to eat very often. We have 2 date nights a month where we sort of splurge within reason.

[samanthasays]

H and I need to budget. We have been married for 2 years and still havent combined accounts. I think we could be doing SO much more with our money, but we have lots of holes in our boat. We spend money on little things, and those little things really add up! The eventual plan is to go down to one income (so I can be a stay at home dog mom *score*) so we really do need to buckle down. I will be lurking this thread for advice

[ohinvrtedworld]

We do "cash envelopes" but not really. Capital One 360 lets you have tons of different savings accounts so we have our paychecks automatically split into accounts designated for rent, auto insurance, groceries, gas, credit card payments, etc. We switch $ on the app into checking when actually buying things like food and then can see how much is left in that account for the rest of the pay period. It works for us so we don't have to go to am ATM to do a cash budget-like system.

[lgraceh]

Pretty much exactly what BabyStandish said. Dave Ramsey snowball method. Excell spreadsheet that I track. We have a weekend budget for dates like movies, eating out, buying fancy ingredients to stay in, go golfing. I try to anticipate higher weekend budget needs like Mother's Day weekend (which is also both our moms birthdays) and our budget is currently projected out into October. We mess up and stray off track sometimes but are able to get it back together usually. I keep 1 mortgage payment in savings instead of the Ramsey recommended $1000. We have been trying to put extra money like from my recent overtime into DIY projects. It gives us something to do and also improves the house and keeps us from buying little things. We cut it close some weeks (like under $200) and other weeks it seems like we have a little more, but it all evens out.

[lgraceh]

Oh, and we try to do cash for almost everything based on what I've allotted out of the budget. Basically the envelope system.

[PirateCat]

We don't really budget but we keep track of our expenses via Mint and periodically assess how we are doing. I'm sure we could do better but it's worked decently for us so far. Our biggest budgeting vice is eating out so that's always the first thing we watch when we feel like we need to cut back our spending.

[goldenlove3]

We did the Dave Ramsey baby steps to pay off all our debt a couple years ago and it feels awesome. Keep it up everyone!!

We use YNAB (You Need A Budget) for budgeting but H is the one who set it up so don't ask me how it works. I just know that it's a zero based budget so every dollar has a place to go. We have a budget meeting at the beginning of every month where we figure out what we have going on. If there's weddings or birthdays, we can budget a little more for gifts, etc. It has worked well for us.

[siouxsieq]

I'm not a spreadsheet person, but I really enjoy building savings/paying off debt/keeping my hard-earned money. What I do is put almost all of our money in savings as it comes in and only leave what we need for bills and a little wiggle room in our checking account. It makes me feel like we are always poor, and our savings is built up pretty fast this way. Having to transfer money into checking before making a purchase makes me think twice as to whether it's worth it.

[peaseblossom55]

We don't budget, we have 3 checking accounts 3 savings accounts, yours, mine and ours type thing. I pay most of the bills, and move most of the money around for savings, expenses. We each have our own accounts so I don't get mad when he buys new hockey gear or if I go splurge on new shoes or whatever. We keep our savings at about 6 months worth of living expenses at least. If we make any large purchases we consult. I'm more of a saver, H is more of a spender, but I never worry. It all works out. I don't count where each dollar goes.

[joy]

Apr 27, 2016 12:18:17 GMT -5 thelittleredm said:

How do you budget? Do you use a computer program or do it by hand? How much wiggle room do you leave in your budget?

I budget per month based on my total monthly after tax pay. 

Bills (cell phone, water, gas, electricity, cable), mortgage, groceries, and savings come out first.  I have a budgeted amount for all utilities while groceries, cell phone, and savings are all standing amounts. 

I start the month with a "left over" category.  Anything I buy comes from the "left over" category.  When it's gone, then it's gone.  I track every purchase.

Health insurance, dental insurance, retirement, and my public transit pass all come out of my paycheck pre-tax.

I track using Excel.

Deciding how much goes into savings while still leaving me enough to live on is the "wiggle room."  I have my own amount that I'm comfortable with after all these years.

[icedtea]

We've tried budgeting on and off, but it hasn't really stuck. We live in a LCOL area and are fortunate in our careers. I want us to get a little stricter because I realize we could be saving a lot more. But we do have savings, and are actively paying down the mortgage and my student loan.

We'll need to get something better in place if we move up north to a higher COL, like planned, so I need to figure that out. We're both spenders (me on little things, him on bigger ones), and neither of us particularly enjoy tracking things. Argh.

[mustloveerica]

We have a google docs spreadsheet. We also used the snowball method and I got rid of all of my debt (excluding 2 houses) last year. DHs student loans and car should be paid off next year. We are very careful with our money because we like saving and being able to do fun things with our income (vacations, home renovations, IVF, etc). But this means that we live by a very strict budget. We pay for groceries in cash (whatever we don't have cash for we don't buy), we go out to eat twice per month (we pack lunches every day), etc. it works for us.

[teraiin]

tl;dr: We sort of budget, but need to do better.

We are fortunate because with the exception of the mortgage we don't have any debts.

We do budget, or I should say I budget, but it's more laid back than I'd like. I do more of a 'guesstimate' at expenses. I do try to keep rough track of what we're buying so I usually have a pretty good idea of what to expect when we get our credit card bill. Our credit card gets paid off in full, no exceptions.

However, I'd really like to get more on top of things. Not even necessarily to save 'more' but just to be more aware of our expenses. I feel like there really is no reason to not be aware of how much money we're spending per month rather than just estimating. Does that make sense?

We also make fun money a bit of a game for us. For example we need to sell old video games to buy new video games. Or fun money must come from the checking account and not drawn from savings.

My determination to get more on top of things is being encouraged by new expenses soon, plus our cars are not getting younger (one is ten years old and one is eight), my income being cut, etc. It's stressing me out but I'm angry at myself because if I had kept better track of things in the past I'd have at least a somewhat better idea what to expect...

If you read all of that you deserve a cookie.

[icedtea]

teraiin, I can relate to that—at the least, I'd like to know what we spend. We've started tracking again via a google spreadsheet, but have a hard time sticking with it. We tried Mint but it didn't work. I need to find a "budget app for lazy people."

[teraiin]

Apr 27, 2016 14:20:05 GMT -5 icedtea said:

teraiin , I can relate to that—at the least, I'd like to know what we spend. We've started tracking again via a google spreadsheet, but have a hard time sticking with it. We tried Mint but it didn't work. I need to find a "budget app for lazy people."

Yup that's exactly what I need, an app for someone lazy. Or you know... I guess I could stop being lazy... :/

[notagoddess]

We pay for everything with one credit card that's a Bank of America card, which is our checking/savings too. It makes it easy to keep track of spending. We pay the card off in full every month. We transfer a modest amount to savings every month after paying rent and bills.

We both log in to the account and check our financial situation multiple times a month. But we don't have hard limits on categories like groceries or whatever. The goal is not to spend too much money and build up some savings. I expect this to change once I finish school and get a full-time job.

[joy]

Honestly, what motivates me to budget more than anything is savings. I love having a healthy savings account. My husband always says "Isn't this a great number?" and then I say "Yup, but $1000 more would be better!"

I also had very very very tight margins when I got my first job out of college. My rent was 75% of the my take home pay, then I needed to eat, pay my utilities/cell phone, and have a bit on hand to go have fun. Budgeting ensured that I had some semblance of a life and didn't rack up credit card debt. That lesson hasn't left me sixteen years later.

[teraiin]

Apr 27, 2016 14:31:42 GMT -5 joy said:

Honestly, what motivates me to budget more than anything is savings. I love having a healthy savings account. My husband always says "Isn't this a great number?" and then I say "Yup, but $1000 more would be better!"

I also had very very very tight margins when I got my first job out of college. My rent was 75% of the my take home pay, then I needed to eat, pay my utilities/cell phone, and have a bit on hand to go have fun. Budgeting ensured that I had some semblance of a life and didn't rack up credit card debt. That lesson hasn't left me sixteen years later.

When we first got married our rent was ~65% of our take home pay so I hear you on the budgeting for that!

I think that's another reason why I was so annoyed at myself for getting more lax. I went from being pretty scrupulous to "is the $$ in the savings going up? Great!" mindset. I need to get back to being more on top of things.

[spicysalmonroll]

I'm an accountant so I love my Excel sheets. I track my credit card statement and categorize each purchase (groceries, gas, gifts, etc). I have a loose budgets for each category- like I'd prefer my eating out to be under $100 a month but some months are 50 and some are 150 and I don't stress about it. As long as it's not 300. I use my credit card like a debit card and pay it in full each month.
H has his own accounts- part of his paycheck direct deposits into mine to cover the bills and the rest that goes into his account he is free to do as he pleases.

Like joy, I'm a savings whore. Each year when I get my tax refund and people are spending it, I get SO excited to add it to savings. I currently have 6% pre-tax going to 401k, 5% post tax going to Roth IRA, and 20% post tax going to liquid savings. These are all automatic transfers that I don't touch. But I do occasionally use the liquid account for large items such as new furniture, home repair, new car down payment, etc.

[aprilz81]

We budget and use an app on our phones so we can enter purchases at any time (I try to do mine at the register) and it syncs between our devices. When we open it up it will refresh and sync so we always know how much money is left. We use GoodBudget which is a free app with the option to pay to upgrade (we do).

This app is a virtual envelope system, so each month we get a refill of our "envelope" in each category we have. We track gas for vehicles, my fun money, DH's fun money, groceries/house supplies, mortgage/cell/utilities, entertainment, church giving, our home equity payment, clothes, and a few other areas. We track our savings goals (vacation, Christmas, ROTH IRA's, general savings) with this as well.

Something we've been doing for the past few months is having a Sinking Fund for annual expenses (Amazon Prime, Costco membership, Lifelock, etc.) or expenses that are seasonal (mulch and flowers, lawn care, etc.). We added up what we spend a year in these categories and then divide by 12. Now we don't have to figure out how to pay for things, it can come out of the sinking fund. It is a little difficult to get started if you have a lot of expenses before the year is up, but after a year you should be able to have a good cushion there for those expenses that you only have once or twice a year.

I started budgeting like this 6 years ago when I bought a new-to-me car. I've always been good with my money but just in a "my bills get paid in full on time" way. I never really paid attention to how much I was spending or what I was spending it on. This makes me aware if we have a spike in our grocery budget or if we are budgeting too much for gas because the prices dropped.

[lgraceh]

Ooo, aprilz81, that app looks promising. I should check that out. I hate having to answer DHs frequent money questions. He has the logins for every account but I guess chooses to just let me take it. I'd love for him to take a more active role. Even if it's just knowing what we have available!

[ceejay]

Apr 27, 2016 14:20:05 GMT -5 icedtea said:

teraiin , I can relate to that—at the least, I'd like to know what we spend. We've started tracking again via a google spreadsheet, but have a hard time sticking with it. We tried Mint but it didn't work. I need to find a "budget app for lazy people."

This is where I'm at too. H and I are both very thrifty and end up saving more than we spend. I've never really tried to budget besides mapping out a general monthly budget estimate to verify that yes, we are living well within our means. But I'd like to have a better idea of how much we're spending on what, and how much we could or should be putting towards paying down our house and car. Especially when we talk of moving to a larger house in 3-5 years... I'd like to have a better grasp on how much more I would feel comfortable spending on a mortgage.

[michelleca]

Lurker joining in, but I love budgeting! I have excel spreadsheets that outline fixed and variable expenses, monthly budgets, and an actual spending worksheet that I enter everything into by category. My budget includes an amount for savings, and I transfer that amount at the beginning of the month.
Writing down everything that we spend keeps me accountable. Now to get DH on the same page..

My friend writes a budgeting blog, and I really enjoy her writing: www.halfbanked.com/

Editing to add: I also try not to buy anything I don't have the cash for right away. Exception is our mortgage. I have been putting $ away to replace our second vehicle so we don't add a car payment. 
I write out savings goals and timeline, listing what I am saving for, so I know how far off getting my new living room set is, etc., keeping an amount for emergencies. I don't bother with multiple savings accounts, but I can see why people would like them.

[rooskie]

I download our bank account and credit card charges into excel each month. We have general guidelines but as long as we keep our averages in check for the year it is ok with us. The main goal is to see if we are spending way too much in one category (restaurant usually) and cut back the next month. We were more into it when we were snowballing but now we just have our mortgage.

I do have a tab where we calculate our net worth each month which ties into our retirement projections and the mortgage pay offs. That is what keeps me excited. I track our net worth to the S&P500.

We are both natural savers so a huge chunk of my pay goes into a savings account that is used for investing and soon IVF. We might take out extra to pay down the mortgage when we finally get pregnant too. I try to pay 20% of our income to our mortgage each month since our pays have gone up since we bought the house. And the 4 extra pay checks each year and bonus checks go straight to this savings account too.

[joy]

@samrs22 - I actually added morning coffee to my budget last year. I'm buying it so let's just make that a "bill." Haha.

[mikaela20]

When I first started our budget my DH was back in school. It was tough. But we made it work.

I was obsessed with a local TV show, Till Debt do us Part and I used all of her excel spreadsheets and resources.

Our budget is manageable and it got us out of debt and build a decent savings fund. Our budget includes savings, an emergency fund and planning for things such as vet bills and pet emergencies.

Here the site if you wanted to check it out. It's a bit old school style but we found apps and online bills just didn't work for us.

www.debtfreeforever.ca/tools.html

[wilmaroo]

You guys are all so organized! We should get with it. Almost all of our bills are on auto pay so direct deposit paychecks come in and bills go out. Some times we only have a few hundred dollars on payday sometimes more. If we have more on payday we put extra towards credit card/student loans. We do transfer money on each pay day to savings for big things like car insurance, taxes ect. I'm going to check out some of these apps you guys have suggested.

[spicysalmonroll]

mikaela20, I liked that's show too! There's a new one on Spike called Life or Debt that's the same concept and I love it.

[mikaela20]

Apr 28, 2016 8:08:48 GMT -5 spicysalmonroll said:

mikaela20, I liked that's show too! There's a new one on Spike called Life or Debt that's the same concept and I love it.

I will check it out, thanks!