Welcome to tracking of income and expenses for the month. Please note thatI get paid on the last day of the month so my cash flow net effect will usually be negative until the last day of the month.
This does not mean that I am adding to my debt, it just means that the money coming in is less than the money going out because bills are due starting on the first but I don’t get paid until the last day.
So again to clarify (since I get so many questions), this shows the cash FLOW for the month. On Day 2 of every month I will have a negative FLOW because I have paid rent etc so money has LEFT my checking account. I have not had any money come in on Day 2 of the current month since I got paid on day 27 or 30 or 31 of the previous month so that income is counted for LAST month.
Income for the month to date: $72.38
Expenses for the month to date: $1930.02
Net effect: -$1857.64
Since the last posting I spent $15.20 to fill my gas tank. I love living so close to work AND Walmart since it is halfway through the month and I have only spent $15 on gas and my tank is FULL!!!!
I plan on making one out of town trip so that might be about $20 worth of gas so I estimate that I will be well under the $75 gas budget for the month.
I spent $29.31 on groceries over the weekend, mostly staples like bread and fruit for snacks at work. I will be spending more money on food this weekend since his royal highness Dinero is running low on dry food and has no wet food….which he makes known by running to his bowl and HOWLING and then giving me the evil eye.
I will see you guys and gals later as I continue my journey to save money and become debt free!!!!
I also ‘spent’ $70 on car insurance this month. I prepaid the balance on the insurance so I am not spending this every month right now….but it is still part of my budget.
I am putting any money left over from my Zero based budget into the Coupons and Overages account (formerly Coupon Savings) in ING. This money will be added to the money I need to go home for summer (more on that later.)
Yet another month of savings I guess.Your spend on grocery this week shows a bit of trend as I have looked back at the last four posts on tracking finances. I guess you keep cutting down on the necessities. Great to read .
Yes I keep cutting down on ‘necessities’ as you say because I have a big trip coming up over the summer and I need to save for it. I have reduced daily spending and am funneling this money into savings since I will need cash for the trip. Post coming up on that soon!!!
Thanks for coming by to check out my ‘biz-nisss’.
That’s cool. Looking forward to reading it. Thanks Paul.
I have a question-hope the way I word it, doesn’t sound TOO stupid-but how do you decide what to cut when you’re cutting down on necessities?
The first step was to track what I actually spend. I found that some months I was spending about $180 on food alone. I then reduced the budget by $170 and saw that I could live off that because I was buying treats like ice cream and cookies and chips.
I cut a little bit each month and saw if I could live off that instead….leading to healthier eating as well.
This might not work for you…but it fits my style. Unless you know how much you are actually spending you will not have an idea of where to cut back.
Also I was buying lot of juice….but when I decided to stop drinking juice for lent that freed up a bit of money as well. I still kept juice for my guests, but not drinking it myself allowed me to shave off a bit of the grocery money.
So to sum it up….trial and error to decide where to cut.
Awesome! thanks for the advice 🙂 I love this website, it’s very very interesting to read. I have subscribed to your RRS and have bookmarked this page. This will definitely be on my reading list-for sure. thanks again!
Thank you for subscribing. I always appreciate new readers. Feel free to let me know what you like or don’t like about the site.
It’s so true you need to keep track of your finances. The best tip I have for saving money, is this:
For a week, do not carry money on you and leave your cards at home. Make a packed lunch. This will force you into not spending, after a week of this you realsise you really can do without all those things that you could have bought, like a magazine, a can of coke, chocolate, beer etc. It really works. Do this once a month and it will come natural.