Allowance Challenge

Chitown over a windy city blues had a great post on possibly using the allowance system to control spending.

Basically this means you are giving yourself a set amount of money to spend each week and after you have spent it there should be no more spending. Reader Aaren commented on how she puts $250.00 a month into a separate checking account that is simply for her allowance and gas. There are several other PF bloggers that are trying the allowance system as a way to focus on goals such as saving more and paying off debt.

I want to try to use the allowance system for one month and would love to have some people participate with me so we can hold each other accountable.

I know DD is moving in the beginning of the month and the first weekend of the month is also the 4th of July but lets all see if we can pick an amount for an allowance to give ourselves for the month. Perhaps we can post at the end of every week how we did with spending and what we bought with our allowance. We can update on our blogs how we did each week.

Who's in??

The $900 Budget

I did a rough budget based on a take home pay of 900.00 a month. The rest of money will go to debt for the next year. This won't officially start until January but I like to prepare for things and decided to figure out what I would be spending the 900.00 on ahead of time.

Here is what it is looking like.

Mortgage 302
Water Bill 55
Gas Bill 160
Website 13
Gym 56
Car Ins 75
Gas(car) 50
Food 189

If I can do this for a year I will have paid off $32,000 in student loan debt.

I won't stop saving, this budget does not include money I get for the two special assignments that I do in school or my tax returns and some scholarship money I will be getting in spring.

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

Back to Reality

I came back from Costa Rica early last week, and have been doing my pre assignments for Columbia, but I am need to get back on my personal finance accountabilty program. June will be the first month in three months that I follow a budget. I also am going to start saving more because my income went up to over $3100 a month, not including rental income. I believe I can keep my regular expenses at $1000.00 and use the remaining $2100 to rack up savings and reduce debt. I can't stand it anymore. I feel like I have hit rut. I need to continue saving and decreasing debt with " gazelle intensity" like Dave Ramsey says.

I also started contributed to my Roth again. Now that it is back to where it was before the recession started. Don't know if I can max it out this year...but I can dream.

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

Had to take money out of Emergency Fund

This weekend was a tough weekend, I spent it at Columbia for my orientation and found a place to sublet in New York while I'm there, but because of that I had to take money out of my emergency fund.

I ended up finding a sublet from another Columbia student who will be gone for 2 weeks, its real close to the school ( about 9 blocks from Teachers college), but the price tag is $1000.00 for the month of June and $1000.00 for the month of July plus a $1000 security which I will get back when the girl comes back and checks her room. So I am sending her 2 checks: 1 for 1000, and 1 for $2000.

I am will going to have work hard to get my emergency fund to $20000 by the end of the year. As it stands now it has less then $10,000.

Until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

Still have $1200 in my checking account!

Even though I have not budgeted my money this month, I still have over $1200 in my checking account... WTF!  I paid all my bills, went grocery shopping, put gas in the car, etc. This doesn't count the found money I received last week, that money went right into my savings account.  I really don't have any other expenses coming up.  This could probably last until next Thursday when I get paid again, and then I am going to put it right into my savings account...getting closer and closer to $20,000!!! Go Me!!

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

February Budget Results

Let's just say things are not looking to pretty. This was the first month I really tracked my spending and its good to see where my money is going and what I need to cut back on. Over $600.00 on miscellaneous expenses. You have got to be kidding me. I really need to buckle down for march. I did not meet my goal of paying $1000.00 towards my car loan. Thank God for March. Hopefully I will be able to post my March Budget early tommorrow morning. It looks like it will be a snow day tommorrow. You know what that means.... NO WORK!!!

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

A sigh of relief

For the past 3 months I have been paying a $300-400 gas bill ( which has been more than my share of the mortgage).  It's been a killer especially with me trying to pay my car off by June.  January was the worst with a $462.00 bill. 

I hate PGW!!!!

but I digress... my dear blog friend Smallbudget told me to check out PGW's budget billing plan.  They take the average of your gas bills and spreads the cost over 12 months.  Since I could not take another $400 gas bill ( I'm hoarding cash at the moment) I called PGW to see if I was eligible. 

...and I was.  My gas bill will now be $135.00 a month.  They will periodically review my account for adjustments but boy...this makes budgeting a little bit easier. 

How are yous guys (south jersey/philly talk) faring with heating bills this winter?

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

February Budget

Here is my Febuary Budget: My Goal for the month is to put $1000.00 to my car loan. I want to pay it off by the beginning of the summer. My gas bill is extremly high. Any ideas on how to get it lower? Perhaps I should get on a payment plan with PGW?

Until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

Trying to Budget for 2009

I am back and in full effect!!! My New Years Eve and Day were wonderful. On New Year's eve I went to church until about 12:30 and then had a nice party at my house that lasted until 4:30 in the morning. New Year's Day I slept in and my guy made me a big breakfast to take away the hangover. Through out the day I reflected on the things I wanted for my life in this new year, but I also took some time to be thankful for all the blessings I received last year and in prior years.

With that said it is time to look forward. There are so many things that I want to accomplish this year and many more that I would like to accomplish by the time I am 30 and its not going to happen if the money is not right.

So YBP decided to begin budgeting from day 1 of 2009. I am really going to keep track of my daily spending, net worth, debts and saving. Doing this is not a want or a maybe... this is something that I need to do.

I have tried many different budgeting tools but this year I am going to use Fabulously broke in the City's budgeting worksheet. So far I really like it. It is in really bold colors and has many different spreadsheets and graphs so one can really break down and understand what is going on in their financial life. I am still playing around with it but so far so good. I will give a full review probably towards the end of the month or early next month.

more later

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

November Budget

I am going to do a modified emergencyolopy for the month of November. After all my 25th birthday is in 12 days and then there is Thanksgiving at the end of the month. If you anyone can give me ideas on how to frugally celebrate my 25th birthday I would greatly appreciate it.

Here is my budget for November. I am going to concentrate on strictly the basics

Mortgage: 452.40
Car Payment: 230.00
Car Insurance: 280.00
Gas ( Utility) 86.00
Water Bill 45.00
Gas ( car) 100.00
Groceries 100.00
Debt repayment 310.00 ( estimate student loans and credit balances)
IRA 180.00

Total: 1607.40

If I stick to the bare minimum then I will have over $1500 to save up!

Its funny that when I look at how much I spend per month for my car vs my share of my mortgage( with an extra 10% added to the principal), my car expenses are way higher. I realize that I really need to get my car paid off by April. Once I do that I won't have to pay for full coverage insurance.

I have more goals that I would like to accomplish for November but I will post them tomorrow.

Until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

Emergencyopoly... I'm Playing

Wellheeled has a game she is playing in the month of November called Emergencyopoly, and I am definitely playing it. You should join in too!

The rules of the game are very simple:

• For one month live like you just lost your main source of income
• Approximate how much money you would have to spend due to job loss (insurance costs, job search costs)
• Focus on only your core expenses ( rent, food, car payment)
• Take the money that you would have to spend if you didn't have a job and use that to help build up your emergency fund

I am so playing it... maybe I can get my E fund up to $4000.00 by the end of November. I will try to have a budget posted by the Friday morning.

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

My mini shopping spree

Remember how I told you I was going to update my wardrobe? Well on Sunday I went to Philadelphia Premium Outlets and bought a few things that I felt were necessary for the fall and my wardrobe. I budgeted $250.00 for everything I had to buy and the total damage done came to:


$286.86!!!!

I was over budget by $38.86, but I still ended up buying good quality clothing.

Here is what I bought:

1. 3 cotton knit shirts from Ann Taylor Loft. They were 7.99 a piece and I bought blue, black and green

2. A pair of trouser dark denim jeans from Banana Republic regular price $59.99 but marked down 40% so they cost me $35.99

3. New undergarments from Bali. On sale of course. Total spent there was $59.00

4. And finally Gap. I spent 168.90 in that store and bought some great things.

-brown herringbone blazer regular price $49.99... my price 24.99
- 3 keyhole tops( black, gray, blue) regular price $18.99... my price $7.99 each
- white collared button down shirt regular price $29.99 my price $20.99
-purple ruffled button down shirt regular price $29.99 my price $17.99
- 2 cardigans (1 purple, 1 gray) regular price $34.99 my price $20.99
-1 pair of cuffed cropped pants regular price $34.99 my price $14.99
-White pleated top regular price $24.99, my price..well $24.99

In Gap alone I saved $107.00.

These are just staples that my wardrobe needed. I have plenty of trousers, and a few skirts but I don't have a 3 piece suit. I must get one of those!!

In November around my birthday I plan to head back up to the outlets and get

- A really nice coat
-3 piece suit
- 2 Wrap dresses
-1 well made tote ( for lugging around papers)
-2 pairs of boots
-2 pairs of flats
-some cute scarves

all in all I think I did pretty good. Today is the first day of school for teachers so I have get ready for work. I am trying to figure out how to make a screenshot of my budget so you can see how I did this month. If you know how to do that please let me know.

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP

Why are you waiting so long to get married???

Today DH and I had to run a few errands and we ran into some of his old friends. He proceeded to tell them we were getting married and when they asked when he told them the date which is August of 2010. What happened next is something I've grown accustomed to when I tell people I'm engaged. First its a look of extreme shock and then they ask the infamous question. "Why are you waiting 2 years?" and "That's a long engagement" I didn't answer the question but let DH answer it ( he is a lot more diplomatic in certain situations), but my dear friends in blogworld I will tell you why we are waiting so long to get married.

WEDDINGS COST MONEY!!!!

I don't come from a wealthy family and neither does DH. We have to work for everything we get. I worked my way through college, Rutgers University in hte house!!! In fact I worked full time overnight and went to school during the day. We are paying the down payment for the house by ourselves, although we are getting closing cost assistance from the seller.

1. Our wedding will be paid for by us. We have budgeted roughly $20000 for a wedding outside on the banks of a river in Philadelphia. The wedding and reception will be held at a historical mansion. We plan on paying for the wedding in cash split equally between us. That means we both have to save $10000. To make it easier on us we will be saving 5000 a year. That is will not be too hard for us at all. If worse comes to worse DH can always take some money from his 09 and 10 tax return and he will have his half and I can always get mine together during the summer when I teach summer school along with saving a little more during the year.

2. We refuse to start our marriage in debt so will be paying off all our consumer debt( student loans, car loans, personal loans) before we get married. The Bible says the borrower is slave to the lender, and we refuse to be shackled to any company or owe anyone money. It is going to take a little less than 2 years to pay off both of our debts (we are doing this separately and have committed to taking a portion of each of our take home pay to pay off our respective debts). I can only imagine how good it will feel to start our married life together with our only debt being our mortgage.

So people can keep on looking at us like we are crazy when we tell them our wedding is in 2 years, but we look at it like we are setting up a strong foundation for our lives, and we are changing our family trees. Dave Ramsey says live like no one else, so later you can live like no one else. That's what our plan is. If in many years we have a daughter who decides to get married it won't be no thing but a chicken wing, and we can bless her by having the cash saved up, and she can get married whenever she likes, because her parents sacrificed and planned for her.

Walking in prosperity is not just about it you. Life is not just about you. The choices that we make today will affect our children and our grandchildren, and generations down the line. My boo and I have made the decision to radically change our lives not for us but for them.

...long answer i know, but that is the very honest answer about why we are waiting two years to get married.

until next time, think prosperous thoughts!!!

YBP

A wonderful weekend that cost money

I was going to do a budget for July but my mortgage person told me not to spend anymore money. She said whatever money I get from paychecks do not use at all. "Just let it sit in my bank account" her words not mine. That is not really a problem, the only bills I have to pay this month are my car insurance and car payment. Everything else is pretty much taken care off.



I have, however, spent some money that I probably could have done without spending this weekend. My parents came down to look at the house that I'm buying. Dad said it was a good investment which is good. However I did take them out to dinner at a little Hibachi grill place in center city. The total bill was around $210.00 I looked at it a nearly fainted. Then I looked at it again, and thought... well there were six of us so that's not that bad. Then DH paid some money to it and my mom paid some money to it and so I only had to put up about 80ish dollars ( I put this on a credit card, the only major credit card I carry with me daily and I always pay off the balance each month)



My other spending this weekend was at a candle, 2 shirts, and a pair of capris all on sale at Old Navy. I spent 40.00 total and put this on my gap card. Lucky for me that is the only thing charged on the card and the payment won't be due until august. I plan to pay the full balance of this in August.

in other news:
I will be cutting any unnecessary expenses in an attempt to live a more frugal lifestyle. I also am going to be doing weekly meal menus so that DH and I can stop eating out. As for right now I will be eliminating my $35.00 a month gym membership, and my prepaid legal membership( my parents are going to be highly upset). Once we move we will be getting a house phone/Internet(29.99 a month) bundle through comcast so our sprint phone bill ( unlimited everything $99.00 per month per phone) will go down to the bare minimum.

Right there is roughly $180.00 in income that is added to the budget!!!

I will continue to look at my past few months of budgeting from PearBudget to see what else I can cut..

oh PearBudget( another thing about to be cut) ..that's $3.00 a month ...i am pretty sure I can find some free money managing tools out there. If anyone knows of any let me know.

until next time, think prosperous thoughts

YBP