money matters
Jan. 7th, 2003 01:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kismet09I have put myself in charge of the household budget for the next six months. I've decided that a) it's time for me to understand exactly how and where I spend too much money, and b) I am probably responsible enough to not get our house, clothes, dogs taken away. This morning, in a moment of weakness, I bought the Buffy Season Three DVD set. We're off to a flying start...
Seriously, though, I have gone through almost all of our bank statements since we moved here, and have computed how much we spend in a number of categories (food other than groceries, groceries, bills, misc, target... these are the big categories that we need to work on), and now I can hopefully set up a reasonable budget and stick to it.
How do the rest of you out there set up your budgets? Are they by category? Are they just written in your checkbook, and when you run out of money, you stop spending it? This still mystifies me.
The way I set up my eating plan (when I'm feeling disciplined enough to use it), is to have a checklist of portions of food I can eat per week, and when I run out, say, of checks in the cheese category, that means no more cheese for the week (or stealing a check from the meat category, which is allowable). I feel like I should be able to do the same thing with money, but it never quite works out for me. If y'all have any better suggestions, I'm open to them.
Things I'm considering:
-a 'date' budget, from which we go out on weekends
-a limit of number of trips to Target per month (we spend waaaay too much there)
-a postal budget, or buying some set number of stamps at the beginning of the month, and not sending anything once I've used them all (this would be painful for me and my nervousness habit)
sigh. i hate money.
Seriously, though, I have gone through almost all of our bank statements since we moved here, and have computed how much we spend in a number of categories (food other than groceries, groceries, bills, misc, target... these are the big categories that we need to work on), and now I can hopefully set up a reasonable budget and stick to it.
How do the rest of you out there set up your budgets? Are they by category? Are they just written in your checkbook, and when you run out of money, you stop spending it? This still mystifies me.
The way I set up my eating plan (when I'm feeling disciplined enough to use it), is to have a checklist of portions of food I can eat per week, and when I run out, say, of checks in the cheese category, that means no more cheese for the week (or stealing a check from the meat category, which is allowable). I feel like I should be able to do the same thing with money, but it never quite works out for me. If y'all have any better suggestions, I'm open to them.
Things I'm considering:
-a 'date' budget, from which we go out on weekends
-a limit of number of trips to Target per month (we spend waaaay too much there)
-a postal budget, or buying some set number of stamps at the beginning of the month, and not sending anything once I've used them all (this would be painful for me and my nervousness habit)
sigh. i hate money.
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no subject
Date: 2003-01-08 07:25 am (UTC)I keep $200 in my checking account at all times as a cushion just in case I screw up balancing my checkbook. It makes me feel better.
I have devided up my bills by paycheck.
Paycheck 1- credit card, HOA, my cell, Scott's cell, our home phone, quarterly water and ADT bills
Paycheck 2- loan, car, BGE, cable
Scott pays the mortgage, our car/home/life insurances, and his credit cards.
Since all of the above bills are about the same each month, I know exactly how much of my paycheck is going to bills, and exactly how much spending money I have. I also know exactly how much I can afford to charge to my credit card each month and still pay it off, and I limit myself to that. Granted, living within your means really sucks, but I am psyched to not have any debt for the first time in years.