Comments on: Tracking My Finances in April: Day 19 http://www.howisavemoney.net/finances/tracking-finances-april-day-19/ Tips and tricks to save money, manage credit and reduce debt Tue, 07 Sep 2010 07:35:06 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: LuLuGal http://www.howisavemoney.net/finances/tracking-finances-april-day-19/#comment-14004 LuLuGal Thu, 01 May 2008 02:57:12 +0000 http://www.HowISaveMoney.net/?p=1229#comment-14004 Hi Steve and thanks for visiting. I have not tried your cash system because I do not believe in using cash when I can do the same budget and get cash back on my credit card. We are doing the same thing except that while you have a twenty dollar bill in your pocket I have a twenty dollar allocation in my ING account. One way to set this up would be to set up individual accounts in ING and say put the gas money in a gas account and only use the debit card feature of ING to get gas...but I like getting my rewards and do not like to carry cash. :-) Hi Steve and thanks for visiting. I have not tried your cash system because I do not believe in using cash when I can do the same budget and get cash back on my credit card.

We are doing the same thing except that while you have a twenty dollar bill in your pocket I have a twenty dollar allocation in my ING account.

One way to set this up would be to set up individual accounts in ING and say put the gas money in a gas account and only use the debit card feature of ING to get gas…but I like getting my rewards and do not like to carry cash. :-)

]]> By: steve http://www.howisavemoney.net/finances/tracking-finances-april-day-19/#comment-14003 steve Thu, 01 May 2008 02:38:37 +0000 http://www.HowISaveMoney.net/?p=1229#comment-14003 I haven't read your whole website, but i read this entry and wondered if you've tried going "cash only" on at least some of your budget categories--the ones that are truly discretionary and that you tend to run over budget on. (In my case, that's food and gas and "walking around money"). What you do is use only cash for these categories. Put the cash for the month in 3 envelopes (i cut the envelopes so that they are only as tall as the cash, so they fit in my wallet), and spend from the envelopes ONLY. And that's the money you have available for those 3 categories. If you do that, you just can't spend any more than you have. It's actually kind of fun, because having the cash limit reinforces your planning. Of course, there's still willpower involved, you could always whip out your debit or credit card when you run out of cash, but you have to be a lot more honest to yourself at the actual point of sale because there's none of this waiting until you get home to tally up your spending categories and only then "knowing" that you are over. Actually, right now i am only using cash until the end of the month, so i'm totally out of the habit of having the plastic cards in my hand. (Some people object to the idea of carrying cash because "it could get stolen" or "i could lose it". In my experience, the amount of cash I have lost through overspending on debit cards and credit cards in a couple of months far surpasses the amount of cash that i have ever lost or had stolen in my entire life!) Maybe this is something you'd like to try . Good Luck and keep trying! I haven’t read your whole website, but i read this entry and wondered if you’ve tried going “cash only” on at least some of your budget categories–the ones that are truly discretionary and that you tend to run over budget on. (In my case, that’s food and gas and “walking around money”). What you do is use only cash for these categories. Put the cash for the month in 3 envelopes (i cut the envelopes so that they are only as tall as the cash, so they fit in my wallet), and spend from the envelopes ONLY. And that’s the money you have available for those 3 categories.

If you do that, you just can’t spend any more than you have. It’s actually kind of fun, because having the cash limit reinforces your planning. Of course, there’s still willpower involved, you could always whip out your debit or credit card when you run out of cash, but you have to be a lot more honest to yourself at the actual point of sale because there’s none of this waiting until you get home to tally up your spending categories and only then “knowing” that you are over.

Actually, right now i am only using cash until the end of the month, so i’m totally out of the habit of having the plastic cards in my hand.

(Some people object to the idea of carrying cash because “it could get stolen” or “i could lose it”. In my experience, the amount of cash I have lost through overspending on debit cards and credit cards in a couple of months far surpasses the amount of cash that i have ever lost or had stolen in my entire life!)

Maybe this is something you’d like to try . Good Luck and keep trying!

]]> By: LuLuGal http://www.howisavemoney.net/finances/tracking-finances-april-day-19/#comment-13964 LuLuGal Tue, 22 Apr 2008 00:30:38 +0000 http://www.HowISaveMoney.net/?p=1229#comment-13964 Get started on it girl....the earlier the better. Get started on it girl….the earlier the better.

]]> By: Dollar Frugal http://www.howisavemoney.net/finances/tracking-finances-april-day-19/#comment-13960 Dollar Frugal Sun, 20 Apr 2008 19:51:54 +0000 http://www.HowISaveMoney.net/?p=1229#comment-13960 I think we all might have to "bump up" the amount gas takes up in our budgets. *sigh* I'm very impressed that you have a good budget - this is something that I need to work on. I think we all might have to “bump up” the amount gas takes up in our budgets. *sigh* I’m very impressed that you have a good budget – this is something that I need to work on.

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