Budget Thread

[jubilantsquirrel]

So, MH and I have no budget. We're not in debt or anything, but I would like to start making a budget so we can put more money into savings. Does anyone use any budget apps? I think one that we can both download and have access to would be the easiest for us.

Tell me how you have your finances organized. We currently have a checking and a savings account. We used to have our own separate checking/saving accounts and then our joint one, but earlier this year I closed my personal one and moved everything to the joint account. MH still has his personal accounts for no other reason than he just hasn't made time to go in and close them yet. I think I'll get on him to do that so we just have the one main account to work with.

Can we open up additional saving accounts under our regular one? I'd like at least 1 more savings account for MH's car. He currently has 220k miles on it, so we'll be needing a new (used) one for him in the not so distant future. We have some money "earmarked" for this purpose, but I'd like to move it to a separate account and then have MH deposit his mileage reimbursement checks into that account as well. I'd also like to have a house project savings account. Are other things I should open up accounts for?

Someone please help me a financially responsible adult.

[hangry]

Omg, me and MH need this thread. I will come back tomorrow and share some thoughts. I’ll warn you, i have no solutions, but can brainstorm with you.

[jubilantsquirrel]

Dec 28, 2018 20:59:58 GMT -6 hangry said:

Omg, me and MH need this thread. I will come back tomorrow and share some thoughts. I’ll warn you, i have no solutions, but can brainstorm with you.

I am ok with brainstorming!

[tgrimes]

jubilantsquirrel I use BOA and I have 3 savings accounts. I’m sure you can do it with your current bank. I’d just ask what the fees are. I have to keep a minimum balance to not be charged a maintenance fee.

[jubilantsquirrel]

Dec 28, 2018 22:13:34 GMT -6 tgrimes said:

jubilantsquirrel I use BOA and I have 3 savings accounts. I’m sure you can do it with your current bank. I’d just ask what the fees are. I have to keep a minimum balance to not be charged a maintenance fee.

We have Chase as our joint account. I have been interested in switching to a credit union though.

I downloaded Mint tonight, but I haven't had a chance to mess with it too much yet other than to get the bank account synced up.

[vino]

So, i’m old school and just use an excel spreadsheet. I track every single penny in and out of this house. I have all income at the top, then along the left column list all bills.

For the bills there are the ones that are monthly and aren’t negotiable, for the misc spending I have it listed into categories; Misc, kids, Transportation, Cats, grocery. The reason I’ve got these separate is because they are a little more flexible. I list everything we buy into these categories.

Once you list and keep track everything for a month or so, you can see where adjustments can be made. As well, there are a ton of resources about how much of your net income should be divided into the categories, example 10% savings, no more than 35% for home etc.

I do a month per spreadsheet then at the end of the year I total up and average out the dollars to create the next years budget numbers.

I really, really love this stuff and I’d be happy to help.

ETA: re: precentages
I use the Gail Vaz-Oxlade for budgeting and staying on track
35% for housing (mortgage/taxes, rent, utilities, insurance, maintenance),
15% for transportation (car payments, gas, repairs, insurance, parking, transit),
10% for saving (long-term saving),
15% for debt repayment, and
25% for life (everything from groceries to entertainment, medical to childcare… In fact, everything that’s not in the other four categories)

[goldenlove]

We use YNAB for budgeting but I don't think it was free and it honestly seems a bit complicated. H loves it though. There's also a Dave Ramsey app called Every Dollar. H went through an obsession with Dave Ramsey so we pretty much follow his advice which is every dollar has a purpose and gets budgeted at the beginning of every month. He recommends having "budget meetings" with your spouse to think ahead in the month and plan out where everything goes. We're not SUPER strict with it and will move things around if we have an unexpected thing pop up. But in general we know if there's going to be a birthday party or whatever. We always budget in play money for each of us too.

We have our main account through Chase (also thinking about switching to a CU) and then a couple online accounts with Ally that we can easily transfer money to for long term savings.

[jubilantsquirrel]

vino, excel spreadsheet was the first thing to come to mind. But we don't have a home computer, so I'd have to do it at work.

I definitely want to just track our spending for a month or two to see what our spending habits are like. I know we spend about $150-175 a week on groceries. I have no idea about gas. I know what I spend each week, but no idea about MH since he can drive anywhere from 50 to 100 miles in a work day. I know what our bills are, but outside of that we don't keep track of our spending.

To be honest, budgets outside of regular bills have confused me. Like a clothing budget. I don't buy clothes every month, so would I just keep adding money to that section each month until I buy some clothes? I think using percentages would help with this. I have no idea what percent of our income goes to our mortgage.

[jubilantsquirrel]

Dec 29, 2018 10:37:57 GMT -6 goldenlove said:

We use YNAB for budgeting but I don't think it was free and it honestly seems a bit complicated. H loves it though. There's also a Dave Ramsey app called Every Dollar. H went through an obsession with Dave Ramsey so we pretty much follow his advice which is every dollar has a purpose and gets budgeted at the beginning of every month. He recommends having "budget meetings" with your spouse to think ahead in the month and plan out where everything goes. We're not SUPER strict with it and will move things around if we have an unexpected thing pop up. But in general we know if there's going to be a birthday party or whatever. We always budget in play money for each of us too.

We have our main account through Chase (also thinking about switching to a CU) and then a couple online accounts with Ally that we can easily transfer money to for long term savings.

That app came up on a lot of lists when I was researching them. But it's $6 a month. I don't really want to pay for a budget app. I might look into the Every Dollar one. The Mint app is having a hard time synching up my credit cards (they're all empty except for the Costco one, which will be paid off before the new year). But so far getting set up on that app has been a bit of a pain.

[tgrimes]

BOA has a budgeting tool in online banking. I just click a little button and it gives me percentages of my spending. It’s very convenient. Maybe your bank offers something similar.

I still use a spreadsheet like vino though. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[hangry]

Wow vino, I admire your system. I will need some time to set up a spreadsheet and review those percentages. I can secure all the bills but what I don’t know if H would be open to is me monitoring all his leisure spending (although that is what is most needed!)

[hangry]

Right now, I have my own savings and checking, as does my H. We have figured out our income percentage and divided our bills to match up to those percentages. I.e. he makes 65% of our total income and therefore we figured out which bills add up to 65% of our bills. And me the rest. My confession is that we only review this every few years. And that is all we do for budgeting. We have some debt to pay off so we reeeeeaaaaallllly need to get ourselves under better control.

(I am cringing at myself as I write this)

[jubilantsquirrel]

Dec 29, 2018 14:02:31 GMT -6 hangry said:

Wow vino, I admire your system. I will need some time to set up a spreadsheet and review those percentages. I can secure all the bills but what I don’t know if H would be open to is me monitoring all his leisure spending (although that is what is most needed!)

I'm the opposite, I don't want MH privy to my leisurely spending! But it is needed.

[jubilantsquirrel]

Dec 29, 2018 13:33:41 GMT -6 tgrimes said:

BOA has a budgeting tool in online banking. I just click a little button and it gives me percentages of my spending. It’s very convenient. Maybe your bank offers something similar.

I still use a spreadsheet like vino though. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I think my Chase app does that. But Jeremy also has a separate account he uses and then we have the credit cards. I was looking for an app that I could synch everything up to and see it all on one page.

[vino]

I think the first step is to lay out all of your accounts, credit cards etc list the balances and debts and see if that is working for you. If it does, cool, if not see where you can amagamate certain accounts for easier tracking.

As far as your question for budgeted amounts, I have a set dollar amount per month, so for example the kids are $400 per month. But some months he gets one haircut and we go to an indoor place once and nothing else, other months we sign up for soccer and sport ball and that eats it all plus more. But the $400 per month was calculated based on the previous years total spending on kids and divided by 12.

I’ve got blank spreadsheets with my format laid out, if you’re interested PM me your email and i can send it to you. It helps to see a visual, and them tailor it to your preferences and needs.

[jubilantsquirrel]

Yes please vino. I'll send you a PM now. Thank you!

[cookswithwine]

H and I have a joint account and separate accounts. Joint is where our checks go into and all our bills come out of. Our separate accounts are for fun spending money. We do $100/pay check. So for me this is: nails, makeup, dinner out w girlfriends, etc. I like it bc we don’t have to monitor each other’s misc spending. If you have money in your account, go nuts!

A few months ago I added up all our expenses for a previous month. We were coming up short and I wanted to know where our money was going. I found out week day lunches was a huge expense! Now I get $50 cash out each week and that is our lunch money for the week. Date nights was also up there but I need those for sanity reasons. Basically I prioritized what was important to me and where we could spend less. I also re did all of our car insurance bc Geico was redic.

ETA: I forgot to talk about saving. I was so good at saving pre kid! I’m still trying to save every month. We have about 3 saving accounts for various purposes.

[sophiegrace]

Everyone seems to have covered their formats for budgeting than I would have, but I would like to mention how much I love “no spending” months to get things either I track or to just become a bit aware of where things are going and if there’s a lot of financial waste going on. I like to do it 2-3 times a year and the money I save goes straight into whatever I choose in the beginning. M’s school account, retirement, stocks, etc.

I set my restrictions pretty tight, but you can make the rules how ever you like.

[cookswithwine]

sophiegrace what does a no spend month mean? Do you only eat food from the grocery store? No going out?

[sophiegrace]

Dec 30, 2018 13:35:22 GMT -6 cookswithwine said:

sophiegrace what does a no spend month mean? Do you only eat food from the grocery store? No going out?

Pay bills and get gas for your car, set limits or get gift cards for other things you might think you need.

To do it right you not only stop going out to eat, but you don’t go to the grocery store until you’ve used up all the meals possible in your pantry, fridge, and freezer. You can make it what you want to, but the stricter you are the more amazing the results are.

[cookswithwine]

sophiegrace ok... that would mean limiting our produce intake. Unless you count frozen which is yuck. January can be a sucky birthday month lol. My parents always did sober January.

[elle]

Dec 30, 2018 16:50:00 GMT -6 cookswithwine said:

sophiegrace ok... that would mean limiting our produce intake. Unless you count frozen which is yuck. January can be a sucky birthday month lol. My parents always did sober January.

It really and truly is.

[sophiegrace]

Dec 30, 2018 16:50:00 GMT -6 cookswithwine said:

sophiegrace ok... that would mean limiting our produce intake. Unless you count frozen which is yuck. January can be a sucky birthday month lol. My parents always did sober January.

I still go to the grocery store for that and things like milk, but I’m spending $30 not...uh...hundreds.

[jubilantsquirrel]

Dec 30, 2018 17:03:33 GMT -6 elle said:

Dec 30, 2018 16:50:00 GMT -6 cookswithwine said:

sophiegrace ok... that would mean limiting our produce intake. Unless you count frozen which is yuck. January can be a sucky birthday month lol. My parents always did sober January.

It really and truly is.

Yup!