$60K Savings Challenge AUGUST Totals.....Expensive Month but at least it's not Negative

I have posted my AUGUST End of Month 60K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.
Check out the side bar to your right for the specific numbers.

I am once again able to say that we finished up August barely in THE BLACK.
The amount put into Savings for August was $789.25.

The MasterCard bill(which is paid off each month-NO BALANCE EVER!)was just under $2K this month. We had some big unusual purchases like a new stove, hotel bills again, gas purchases for trips and other costs associated with summer fun.

We had a bit of rolled coins as usual, but I am still sitting out on eBay.  I miss the cash coming in from that source but I dread jumping back in and dealing with all the problems selling there brings.

On the recurring utilities front, we saw an increase of $2.46 in the electric bill from July. A negligible amount as we haven't run the A/C hardly at all in August, just like we didn't run it in July.

The water bill saw a dramatic decrease! We went from $97.24 in July to $38.87 in August!  I guess patching that hole in the pool and not having to run water constantly into the pool was the reason.  I hope hubby can resolve future pool issues quickly next year so we don't WASTE all that money on unnecessary water.  It's just so wrong.....

The Food Budget costs for August are in another post, which is located Here.  Food/Toiletries spending in August was my lowest monthly total for the year.  I'm hoping to stay out of the stores more this month and have set a September Food Budget of $250.

With #1 son going off to college(college textbooks & a laptop computer), more summer fun expenses(like entrance fees to various experiences), replacing a vehicle's windshield, other school(graphing calculator for daughter, back-to-school clothing expenses for 2 kids) & marching band expenses, August turned into an expensive month.  I was hoping for at least a $1K savings for the month.
Didn't quite happen.

But considering that we just paid over $6 THOUSAND DOLLARS in CASH for #1 son's 1st Semester of College, I don't feel so bad about only saving $789.25.

Let me repeat that.....
We paid for #1 son's 1st Semester of College in CASH.
Yes, I AM boasting here!  8-))
Hubby & I have worked darn hard to save all that money and have gotten to a place in our financial lives where we can pay CASH for college.
No payment plans.
No loans.
C-A-S-H.

We started our married lives with me as a waitress heading back to graduate school and him in his 2nd yr. studying for his Masters.
We were pretty broke like most regular people who are just starting off in life.
On our 1st Anniversary, with his degree in hand, we embarked on life with no jobs and about 15 thousand in Student Loan debt.  That was 1983.  15 Thousand in Student Loans was ALOT in 1983 dollars.

Yes, we did live with family briefly at two points in our marriage when we were just starting out but we bought our first house WITHOUT large sums of money given to us from family.  We were very proud that we waited until we could afford the home to buy it.  We did have a mortgage however.
After buying that house, we made paying off the student loans the priority and paid them in full in 2 years.
14 years after buying our 1st home, we bought our 2nd home.  At that point we were able to put a rather large down payment on that home and carried TWO Mortgages for almost a year until the 1st home sold.  I don't recommend buying another house BEFORE you sell the old one.lol  The point is, because of buying a modest house the 1st time and living frugally, we were financially able to put a large downpayment on house #2 AND carry that extra mortgage WITHOUT too much difficulty.
Then we paid off the 2nd house fully in 6 years and have remainded Totally Debt-Free since 2006.

We celebrated our 27th wedding Anniversary last week.  We have worked 27 yrs. living frugally to get to the level of financial freedom where we are now.
The moral of my story is if we can do it, you can to!
It takes time but you have to just keep going.....even when you stumble and don't keep with your budget one month, just pick yourself up and try again next month.


We are Eight Months into this $AVING$ Challenge, and we have a Savings Total of $15,635.41 for the year.


What's ahead for September....
Less food spending.
Trying to track small outlays of cash better.  These add up to big outlays over time.
No travel this month so no unusual hotels, gas, food expenses.
No big ticket purchases foreseen this month and no items to buy for the kids.

I'd love to stash away $2K this month.  It should be do-able unless something comes up.

Be sure and check out how others are doing with their finances this month at MONEY SAVING MOM.

Sluggy