I have posted my JANUARY End of Month 30K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.Check out the side bar to your right for the specific numbers.
I have to report that we finished up January in the Black.
The amount we ended the month of January with was.......$755.65
Income
Besides Hubby salary we had a small amount in Rebates and some rolled Coins under the Income Heading.
Outgo
As for the expenses in January.....
The electric bill doubled! This was not unexpected as our electric rates increased 30% on the 1st plus January was colder than December so more energy was used.
The water bill jumped $15 from last month. Extra showers and laundry to do with extra people in the house in Jan.
All other regular bills...Cable, Internet, Phone, etc. are the same each month.
The Food Budget costs for January are in another post, which is located HERE. Food/Toiletries spending in January was high but compared to the value of the items bought we still saved just over 84%.
Jan. and Feb. are heavy expense months for us, as some quarterly and semi-annual bills come due.
The credit card bill,which is paid off EVERY MONTH,($643.14)wasn't too bad considering it's mostly gas purchases, 1 grocery store purchase and some Birthday/Relative visiting eating out.
The out-of-the-ordinary expenses in January halved our savings for the month.
It was a bad month for this family's teeth.
3 Wisdom Teeth, 4 Regular Teeth and a set of Braces later, we saw a big chunks of cash leave our account. We do have dental insurance(thankfully!)so these expenses won't be as bad as they could have been. The braces are paid for, out of savings we put aside for this expense a couple of years ago but the 7 teeth that were pulled WERE paid for out of our Jan. income. At the moment that expense stands at $1,780. We have to pay for these services but get reimbursed with our dental benefit later. I am still waiting on one of the reimbursements. This payment will go into the income column and be applied against the expenses in February.
So how was your January financially? Leave a comment and share with us what you did with your money, both the good and not-so good. Do you have any tricks or tips that help you to end your month before the money runs out? Let us know!
Sluggy
About the only positive I can think of regarding our ailing water heater (we're down to one functioning element) is that we're using a lot less hot water and therefore less electricity. All laundry now gets washed and rinsed in cold water, and our spiffy dishwasher has its own heating thingy, so it takes whatever water it can get (probably lukewarm at best) and heats it - I love this not only because it's more efficient but because when the dishwasher's doing this part of its cycle, it flashes "Ho Ho Ho" on the little LED screen. For some reason that always makes me smile.
ReplyDeleteShowers are really where it hurts to not have hot water - we're getting very good at the military way of wet down quickly, turn off the water to lather up, turn back on to rinse quickly. Not what I consider fun or relaxing, but it works.
Come spring when we can take our garage crap out onto the driveway and thereby get at our water heater, we will try replacing the bad element, and if that doesn't do it, we'll bite the bullet and get a new unit. But given the weather right now, that won't be happening for awhile :)
Here's to saving money!!
If you can't revive the HWH in the spring, how about a tankless or a solar HWH? I wish when we replaced ours about 6 yrs. ago we had gotten a tankless.
ReplyDeleteI really expected to spend less in January, but then realized that the extra came from stockpiling: holiday gifts for next year, supplies purchased on sale with coupons, ECBs, etc.
ReplyDeleteJanuary is still a tough month because you're really getting the tail end of the holiday season. I think it's a colder month than December too. The fact that you had the funds to pay for the dental bills means you get gold stars!