Adjusting budget categories September 30, 2008

If you read any personal finance blogs at all, you know that one of the most important things that you should do to get control over your money is to create a budget. I’ve tried to do this, and one of my favorite things to do is to project out how my budget might look in the future. I’ve currently got a spreadsheet that tracks my money into 2013. I know that anything that far in the future is pretty theoretical, but it gives me a bit of motivation to see that if I work hard, and am diligent about things, that I can get to the end of this.

That being said, I’ve just done a pretty serious re-write of the projections. I was finding myself in a place where I frequently had much more to pay than I was anticipating, and I wasn’t sure why.

Let me explain – previously, I had allocated myself $100 every pay period to take as cash, to deal with things like paying for gas, paying for parking every morning at the Train Station, and paying for other miscellaneous things that came up. I quickly found, though, that it was nearly impossible to change my habit of paying for gas on a credit card, and that I was having to forego taking my $100 in spending money, and instead applying it to the card I use for daily expenses – which just perpetuated the cycle of having spent too much money on the card.

So, I re-evaluated. I dropped my free cash amount down to $20 a pay period, and came up with a more accurate number for the essentials that get charged to my Citi UPromise card every month. They are:

• CVS copay – $15
• Gym Membership – $15
• Netflix – $14.69
• Cell phone – $60
• Cable/Internet – $70
• Gas (2 tanks a month) – $80
• Train Parking – $70

For a total of $324.69. So I’ve now budgeted $325 a month for this, and adjusted my payment outlooks to reflect this. I do imagine there will be some wiggle room in here – Cable/Internet might be a bit less than this, but I haven’t gotten an official, one month bill with no adjustments yet. I’m also considering cancelling Netflix. I’ve already downgraded my cell phone significantly, which seems to be working out.

Its much better to just be honest with myself and realize my own habits and impulses, and plan for them, rather than pretending I will be able to make myself behave in a way that I won’t.

Food budget May 5, 2008

One of the easiest places for me to spend a lot of money, in small increments, is on buying food. Not only do I have bad habits/impulses when it comes to eating out at nice restaurants (or at least expensive ones!), but I also have a tendency to get lazy and blow $5 – $10 on breakfast or lunch. I used to regularly stop at Starbucks every single morning and get a Venti Skinny Vanilla Latte – to the cost of $4.15. At least one morning a week, I would also get either a breakfast sandwich or some other pastry, which could easily push the total cost up above $7. I also hate getting up early, and have a very hard time motivating myself to do so and bring lunch and snacks with me to work. My usual solution would be to run downstairs to the Italian place and grab a sandwich and chips, at a cost of $6.15 every time (actually something of a bargain considering the neighborhood I work in).

That was then, though. I am getting much better. Since the beginning of the year, I have largely eliminated Starbucks from my morning rituals – and I actually find that I don’t even miss it that much. I’ve also gotten better at trying to go shopping, and prepare tasty things that I can easily bring with me on the morning.

I went to the grocery store yesterday and spent less than $20, and am entirely confident that this will feed me for the next week. My purchases were:

1 dozen large brown eggs – $2.19
4pack of Activia vanilla yogurt – $2.79
4oz crumbled Gorgonzola – $2.51
1 jar roasted red peppers – $2.99
2 lbs of fresh strawberries – $5.00
5 Packham Pears – $4.46

Total……………………………$19.94

The plan was this: Using 8 of the eggs, I made a spinach frittata that keeps cold exceptionally well. The frittata used the gorgonzola on top of it, as well as a chopped red pepper and an onion. My mother was more than happy to “trade” me the onion and pepper for the compromise of getting to keep the remaining 4 eggs (since I wouldn’t use them anyway). She also made a sort of ham, spinach and provolone potpie that she split with me, giving me 3 good-sized pieces. The roasted red peppers were for this pot pie of hers. I have some left over home-made granola, as well as a good quantity of odwalla bars, so between the granola, the bars, the yogurt and the fruit, I’ve got plenty of healty and filling snacks. I go to the gym on Mondays and Wednesdays, so I will probably just have a bowl of cereal when I get home on those days. I should definitely be able to not spend any more money on food this week, which is a very good feeling!

I really am trying to reform April 18, 2008

You know how I mentioned that I wasn’t going to be using any credit cards except my Upromise card? Well, I’ve actually been ok with doing that. What hasn’t been going all that well is the totally minimal use of the card that I was planning for. Its very hard for me to say no, especially to myself. The card had a balance of $20.50 when I first added everything up a few weeks ago. Now, its up over $150, which isn’t going to be good when it comes time to charge the auto-debits that come due at the 1st and 15th of the month. That being said, lets take a look at the damage:

Not so bad, right? The first 2 charges are the co-pay at the Doctor’s office, and the cost of my perscriptions for the never ending cough. Can’t really say I regret those, as I am feeling about a million times better. The $45.98 at Rum Runner is for alcohol I bought last weekend. I’ve been dying to try those new Starbucks liqueurs, and had gotten a recipe to make a coffee and coke float. So, I bought the coffee flavored one, the cream flavored one, and a bottle of Stoli Vanilla. It wasn’t until we got home that I realized the liquor store had actually only charged me for one of the bottles of Starbucks stuff, so I actually got something of a deal on it all. The Gulf Oil charge is for filling my gas tank. My car is both tiny and pretty good on gas, and since I take the train to and from work, I don’t actually have to fill it up very often, which I am thankful for. That tank of gas should probably last me a good two weeks. The D’Angelo’s charge is from last Sunday, when I was tired and lazy and hungry all at once, and craving a stir-fry chicken sandwich. And the Dunkin Donuts charge is from the other morning when I missed my train, and I bought BF and I bagels.

So, all in all, not bad. But, I really need to work on keeping the impulse fast food purchases under control. Everyone needs to eat, but its so much healthier and cheaper to not give in to my every impulsive desire to eat out.

Numbers update April 15, 2008

I get paid on the 15th and 30th of each month, and its usually disturbingly quick how quickly the money is allocated out. This time around felt pretty good, though, as I was able to pay off 3 credit cards in their entirety. My Capital One card, Bank of America US Airways card, and Chase Amazon.com card are all at $0 now. Its a little bit cheating, as these were the cards where I transferred the majority of the balances to the US Bank card, leaving me with just odd amounts and interest to pay off. Still, I feel good that the number of accounts I am paying on each month is going down – it makes you feel like you are making more progress to be able to send a larger amount to something, rather than having to worry about many smaller amounts.

So, I’m down to 9 cards with balances, and I will pretty easily have 2 more of those paid off next pay period – 3 if I happen to get my tax refund before the end of April. Between the tax refund and the economic stimulus check next month, this is looking like a really good few weeks to catch up and get things paid off an under control.

As I mentioned before, I am trying to move to a credit-free lifestyle. One of the ways I am trying to accomplish this is to put a total ban on using any of my cards, with one exception: my UPromise card. I’ve decided to still use the UPromise card because it does earn rewards towards paying off my student loans (a debt that I can’t really even begin to think about until I’ve got the credit cards under control, though I am currently making the monthly minimum payments). Also, the UPromise card only has a $500 limit, so I really can’t get myself into too much trouble there. I’ve switched all my auto-payments over to that card (Verizon for my cell phone, Netflix, which I am considering canceling, and my gym membership, which is definitely worth the $15 a month I pay). I’m also going to charge my $235 a month Train pass to this card. My intentions are to pay it off every 2 weeks, as part of my bi-monthly bill pay, but doing it this way will let me both earn the rewards and stretch out the dollars a little further, particularly at that tight, first of the month time period