Tuesday 17 June 2014

Budget Friendly

This might be kind of boring for some but I feel like it's really important to know. I'm the type of person that loves to make lists, I could make a list about anything! When I know I'm going to go clothes shopping I'll make a list in my phone of all the things I want to get (weather I stick to the list or not), going camping I'll make a list of food and what to pack, going on a trip I'll make a list of every piece of clothing I want to take, planning a party I have tons of lists. My 'notes' in my phone is full of lists :) I also really like to budget, like budget my finances, it's an easy way to keep track of how much money is coming in and whats going out and when. That way I never find myself in a jam or strapped for cash. Well of course even if you have a budget it doesn't always mean you stick to it so there are times when money is tighter from not sticking to the budget, however I always know when that is going to happen so I can be mentally prepared.

What I like to do is keep a running spreadsheet of each paycheque, so I will have my budget planned out for a few months in advance. I do all of my banking on my phone so come pay day I take out my budget (which I keep as a paper copy in my purse) see what payments I need to manually do and I do those immediately through my online banking. That way those payments are done with and I don't accidentally spend the money that was allocated for that bill. Then I cross off those items from my budget plan so I can visually see what is left to pay. I take a look at what scheduled payments are supposed to come out of the account so I know what to expect for the next 2 weeks.

This is what my budgets look like with both mine and Mark's income and expenses combined:
*numbers do not reflect actual income and expenses, I used dummy numbers for visual.

                                 June 13/14

Cheque Total: $2000

Expenses                               Other

100 Fuel                                100 Mastercard
200 Groceries                        100 Credit Line
100   Smokes
160 Spending
100 Insurance (car)
100 Phones
100   Hydro
$860 Total
+$200 Other
1060 Total Expenses
-2000 Income
$940 Extra Money

 
                                June 27/14
Cheque Total: $2000

Expenses                             Other

100 Fuel                              100 Visa
200 Groceries                      100 Credit Line
100   Smokes
160 Spending
100   Insurance (escape)
600 Rent
$1260 Total
+$200 Other
1460 Total Expenses
-2000 Income
$540 Extra Money




This is exactly how my budgets are set up. All of my normal expenses are on the left hand side, and yes I budget for smokes. Mark is a smoker and that wont change so I know that money will always get taken out of the account so I may as well budget for it. The 'spending money' is more of a guideline. I'd like to stay within the dollar amount I allocate for it but if we go over that gets taken out of 'extra money'. The 'other' expenses I keep for credit cards and credit line as well as any other things I know I will need to pay for (such as gifts, clothes shopping, new tires, ect.). I keep these in the 'other' column because I  know they wont be permanent bi-weekly expenses. The 'extra money' that is left over is supposed to be for saving, or for putting onto credit cards if we need to make more then a $100 payment. One good idea is to put that money into a savings account right away so you can't even touch it, that way your $160 spending money is all you've got and it may keep you from going over that. But if you aren't good at that then you might end up going into the minus in your account and that will affect your next weeks budget.

Right now we are renting but if we owned a house I would also have sections for fire insurance, property tax and that sort of thing to go into a separate account monthly so that at the end of the year we aren't scrambling for money.

I hope this helped anyone thinking about doing a budget or realizing they need a budget more then they thought they did. Just because I have a budget doesn't mean I always stick to it though (something I need to work on). It does help you to see just exactly how much money you could be putting away though and that might help guilt you into not spending so much ;)

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