Post by thelittleredm on Apr 28, 2016 12:27:23 GMT -5
Love seeing what you guys do! I used to be really really tight with my money until my senior year of college and then I got into abad habit of retail therapy. H isn't great at not spending, either, so that doesn't help. I've been trying to get better.
Since having to buy a new car, I made myself go over all our expenses to get a budget in place ASAP. We have money coming in from all over so I created a spreadsheet in Google docs.
One sheet is our overall expenses and income. Everything is laid out from most expensive (and necessary) to least expensive (and wanted, not needed). My second sheet breaks down which paycheck each expense is taken from. Anything easily paid for with cash gets taken out ASAP and set aside.
I know I'm kinda late on this thread, but I wanted to throw in a +1 for Mint. It is a bit of a pain to set up, but once you get going, it's awesome to track trends in categories. categorization is key - I go in at least once a month or so and look through to make sure things are going in the right buckets. I feel like it has "caught on" with certain recurring labels (i.e. The name of my internet provider is always labeled utilities, etc.). Plus you can make custom categories. I also have it set up to track my student loan balances, which is nice, because they are at four different sites. (Undergrad + grad school, ouch.)
I am awful at keeping up with tracking, so it's amazing to have Mint just pull everything in for us. I use cards for everything so it will show up in Mint (and pay each of them off every month, no excuses). That also helps with points building on my credit card, which I use for vacation flights - last big vacation we took was to Italy and we got one of the flights for free with points.
Anyway, I'm bad at keeping up with budgeting but Mint helps me not be in denial about how much we spend on food, which is totally our Achilles heel. Well, the one we can change - childcare is our biggest line item (yes I have a mortgage, childcare is way more!). I need to start packing lunches...
irish14 - Mint was so frustrating for me. I had both myself and my husband hooked into it, and all it did was prompt my husband to call or text me when he received a notification.
We are currently revamping our budgeting style. I have to put MH back on a strict budget. He doesn't look at prices ever.
This is my H too! He doesn't spend like crazy but when he does buy something, he literally just buys the first one he sees. I'm like babe- no! I would have checked 8 websites and gotten that for $23 cheaper!
I thought I had my shit together, but all the comments in this thread put me to shame.
We don't "budget" necessarily. I track our recurring expenses (bills, due dates for CC payments) and make sure they are paid on time and match those payments to our income so I know how much we will have left of each paycheck, and which check is paying which bills.
Aside from that, we basically live by a "we have $xx to last us until the 15th" rule and spend accordingly. I move money into savings dependent on what's leftover just before the next paycheck hits.
I thought I had my shit together, but all the comments in this thread put me to shame.
We don't "budget" necessarily. I track our recurring expenses (bills, due dates for CC payments) and make sure they are paid on time and match those payments to our income so I know how much we will have left of each paycheck, and which check is paying which bills.
Aside from that, we basically live by a "we have $xx to last us until the 15th" rule and spend accordingly. I move money into savings dependent on what's leftover just before the next paycheck hits.
It's all those drone purchases that are making things hard.
I thought I had my shit together, but all the comments in this thread put me to shame.
We don't "budget" necessarily. I track our recurring expenses (bills, due dates for CC payments) and make sure they are paid on time and match those payments to our income so I know how much we will have left of each paycheck, and which check is paying which bills.
Aside from that, we basically live by a "we have $xx to last us until the 15th" rule and spend accordingly. I move money into savings dependent on what's leftover just before the next paycheck hits.
It's all those drone purchases that are making things hard.
Between drones and motorcycles, it's amazing that we can pay our mortgage.
Post by risscaboobs on Apr 29, 2016 13:02:20 GMT -5
My husband does our budget. He has a spreadsheet. I don't have anything to do with it. /shrug I'm not really good with money, and I like that he takes care of everything.
irish14 - Mint was so frustrating for me. I had both myself and my husband hooked into it, and all it did was prompt my husband to call or text me when he received a notification.
ha yep I turned off notifications for sure. Also, DH and I have a sort of policy that if something is >200 we let each other know about it. Only time we've ever really watched cc balances closely was when we were looking to buy a house, bc of the mortgage application.
Post by loves2shop4shoes on May 1, 2016 7:29:54 GMT -5
I'm super late to this, but I thought I'd contribute.
DH and I sit down and do the budget once a week. Not kidding.
At the beginning of each month (like the 1st or 30th of previous month), we sit down and itemize every expense we have. We list any special expenses coming up (like holidays, trips, etc.) and make a budget for each of those things. Then we write down how much we get paid, and when those pay checks will arrive. (We are both paid biweekly.)
We then figure out cash flow and set a financial goal of the month. (I.e. Save a certain amount, budget a certain amount for a home remodel/furniture expense, etc.)
We set loose budgets for the question mark line items. And by loose, I mean I always budget at least double what we'll actually spend. It creates wiggle room.
Then we check in once a week, pay the bills that are coming up, and see how we're doing with our spending.
MH created an Excel spreadsheet where he tracks what bills we have due and win. It also tracks the standing amount left on our various debts (except my med school loans, because I'm currently pretending they don't exist while I'm in forbearance).
We don't really budget how much we're going to spend on things like groceries and miscellaneous items. We just pay the bills first and see what we have left.
Right now we are in "debt payment mode" versus "saving" mode. So we've been aggressively paying down various debts whenever we have money to work with in the bank account. We've been naturally decreasing how much money we spend on extras so we can pay down more debt. I'd like to work on building our savings up at the same time, but MH is pretty hardcore about the debt (probably because of those aforementioned med school loans).
I might look into that Good Budget app. We're both pretty into tech, so something like that might help us more than excel does.
Met in May 2011 Engaged November 2011 Married November 2013 Started TTC November 2015 Began Infertility Workup November 2016 BFP! Lucky #13 Cycle TTC Due Date: 9/5/2017
Then Comes Family, LLC is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising
program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.