Showing posts with label January spending. Show all posts
Showing posts with label January spending. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 3, 2021

2021 Food Spending Report.....the January Edition

 Onward to January's Food Spending report......




Here are my FOOD BUDGET spending totals for JANUARY 2021.

I have posted January's totals on the Total Grocery Savings Page located HERE and have updated the Totals there.
I am listing subtotals for each store I purchased from in January.  If you aren't interested in that much detail, just skip to the bottom for the Totals Sum.  My spending includes Food, Toiletries/HBA, Cleaning Products, Paper Goods & tax where applicable. We are a family of 4(2-3 eating at home this month). No "kids" under 24.
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BREAD OUTLET
OOP  $6.49
Value  $26.94
Savings  75.91%

CVS
OOP  $4.86
Qs/Ads/ECBs  $83.81
Value  $88.67
Savings 94.52%

DOLLAR GENERAL
OOP  $4.56
Qs/Ads  $30.20
Value  $34.76
Savings  86.88%

MALACARI'S
OOP  $5.95
Value  $948
Savings  37.24%

OLLIE'S
OOP  $5.06
Value  $9.84
Savings  48.57 %

OCEAN STATE
OOP  $0.00(used free gift card
Value  $13.99
Savings  100%

P and R DISCOUNTS
OOP  $47.44
Value  $116.06
Savings   59.12%

RITE-AID
OOP  $0.00
Qs/Ads/BC  $1074.81
Value  $1074.81
Savings  100%

WALMART
OOP  $120.26
Value  $294.31
Savings  59.14%

WEIS
OOP  $87.14
Qs/Sales  $96.37
Value  $183.51
Savings  52.51%

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My best 3 Store Savings Totals were Rite-Aid at 100%, Ocean State at 100% and CVS at 94.52%.   My worst savings rate was at Malacari's with 37.24%.
I shopped at 10 different stores in January.  

TOTAL Spent.........................................$295.22
TOTAL Coupons/Store Sales.................$482.34
TOTAL Value of Items Purchased........$777.56
TOTAL Savings of ................................62.03%

TOTAL Out of Pocket for January w/R-A........$295.22
TOTAL Coupons/Store Sales w/R-A....................$1557.15
TOTAL Value of Items Purchased w/Rite-Aid....$1852.37
TOTAL Savings with Rite-Aid items.....................84.06%

This closes out the January food/toiletries spending.

THOUGHTS & COMMENTS for this month.....
I went into January wanting to eat down the pantry/freezers a bit and not spend a bunch of $$ on food shopping.  I did still stock up on good deals that I found them.  We ended the month of January at  $104.78 UNDER my usual Food/Toiletries/HBA/Paper Goods monthly budget. 
I also had a very big month of cash rebates, which was just $49.69 Less than what I actually spent on groceries. (This doesn't count any ShopKicks, Fetch, Checkout51 or Swagbucks rebates I did.) I am happy with that.

The monthly food spending savings percentage went UP by 8.68% in January 2021 to 84.06% compared to the December's 75.38% savings average mostly due to a LOT of Rite-Aid shopping.  Usually I don't do so much R-A buying in January.


With 1 month accounted for, I have spent a Year-To-Date Total of $295.22 on food/toiletries in 2021.

2020 Yearly Grand Total Spent....................$295.22
2020 Yearly Grand Total Value of Items....$1852.37
2020 Grand Total Saved...............................$1557.15
2020 Yearly Savings Total............84.06%

The average per month amount spent is $295.22 in 2021 so far.

LOOKING AHEAD To February 2021...........
We have had some very bad Winter weather already and more is on the horizon for this weekend into next week.  February is generally our worst Winter weather month so other than spending/rolling my Bonus Cash at R-A I don't plan on hitting Walmart which is my main Ibotta store much in February.
Weis(PMITA)Markets hasn't been good for Ibotta lately so yeah.
We'll probably double down on eating from what we have at home in February and try to keep the spending to a minimum except for needs.

If you have other ideas or guidelines you follow please leave a comment and share yours with us all.

*  How much did you spend on food/toiletries in January?

*  Do you track your yearly food spending?

*  What was your savings percentage buying on sale and/or with coupons vs. buying at regular retail price last month, if you track that sort of thing?

*  What are your methods for keeping your food spending in check?

Is anyone out there up for tracking expenditures and trying to spend less but still eat well?


Sluggy

Tuesday, February 5, 2019

2019 Income & Spending Report......the January Edition


Now that we are living on an annuity(like a pension) and 401K$ withdrawals(retirement savings), I am still going to keep track of our monthly spending and income, and hopefully we'll still be able to live BELOW our means and I'll have some leftover monies each month to tuck aside.

Two changes we implemented for 2019 at your financial meeting in Jan--

* Hubs wants to take $150 per person WAM(aka Walking Around Money)in 2019.  I found last year's $100 per month adequate but Hubs chafed at that little so we are upping it this year to $150 per person per month.
                                                                                                                                                             
*As for our 2018 Slush Fund, this is how we are going to handle it in 2019......
We won't be taking a quarterly 401K withdrawal in 2019 until we "need" to, instead of taking one each quarter as we had planned back in 2017 when Hubs retired.

Since the Slush Fund ended 2018 with $23,164.17 in it and the Sinking Fund ended 2018 with $468.37 in it, we are for now at least not take any more 401K withdrawals and use what is in the Sinking Fund and/or Slush Fund to cover all irregular bills that come up in 2019.

I have set up a page to track the Slush Fund.  Click on the tab marked "Slush Fund 2018-2019" at the top of the blog.

  I am trying to be as transparent as I can with how much is coming in and how much is going out.  8-)


On to the January report---

I had 2 goals for January.....
The 1st is to actually finish the month in the black and not the red.
The 2nd is to try to have a little cash leftover at the end of the previous month to tuck back into a slush fund.  This slush fun may be to apply toward unforeseen bills that are coming due in subsequent months, to spend on "extras/wants" during the year or to just sit there and grow until the end of 2019.

I can report that we finished up January in the black.
The extra amount we ended the month of January with?.....$409.77

Income or Funds We Can Access

The "income" in January---

* Monthly annuity payment of $3218.16(after tax withholding)
* RMSA(Healthcare account)reimbursement of $1833.50
* Interest earned on non-retirement accounts of $386.58
* Blog revenue of $161.02(3 months worth)
* Withdrawal from my Paypal account of $233.72.
Total "Income" for January....$5,832.98


Expenses in January---

* Healthcare Premium for January was $1,848.67(paid for with RMSA reimbursement)**
* Variable Expenses in January came to $3,574.54
Total Expenses....$5,42321

** The folks holding our retirement medical reimbursement account screwed up and didn't reimburse the bit for the dental payment we made, thus we paid $1848.67 but only got $1833.50 back.  the shortfall will be accounted for when it finally comes in.

Sinking Fund--The balance in the Sinking Fund coming into January at $468.37. Nothing was paid from this fund so it goes into February at $468.37.


We went into January with $23,164.17 in the Slush Fund.
Add in January's overage of $409.77 and the Slush Fund goes into February at $23,573.94.


Outgo
As for the variable expenses this January, here are the good and the bad side of things....

HERE are the GOOD THINGS

*  Phone charges and internet were approximately the same as in December.(Within $2 or so).
*  The gas card bill was $89.71 than last month(mostly these charges went on the MasterCard rather than the gas card so not necessarily lower).
*  The health insurance premium was the same as in December.
*  The c/c bill was $877.01 lower than last month.
*  I paid for a whole year of garbage removal in January for a 1 month discount over the regular yearly price.

HERE are the BAD THINGS

*  The electric bill was up $18.96 from than last month.
*  The water bill was $4.56 higher than in January.
*  The WAM withdrawal was $100 higher than last month.(Agreed upon change.)
*  Hubs had $82.04 in charges on his Discover card in January.
*  I had $134.60 in charges on my Amazon card(mostly my Prime renewal).
*  I had $20 in charges on my fat lady clothing charge card.

The Food Budget costs for January are in another post, which is located HERE.  Food costs are covered in the credit card payment(sometimes our WAM cash too).

So we end January in the black with $409.77 in overage, leaving the Slush Fund at $23,573.94 heading into February.
The Sinking Fund goes into February 2019 standing at $468.37 with no deposits made into it in Jan.

FINAL THOUGHTS on January---
Not a bad month really.  Food spending a bit higher than I wanted it.  We paid an annual irregular bill out of reg. income and not the Sinking Fund and still have just over $400 extra money to carry into February.  The only troubling item is the RMSA account folks shorted us on our premium reimbursement.  I hope that doesn't take forever to straighten out(and doesn't happen again!).  If it does it's only $15.17 and not the end of the world but it does screw with my accounting. ;-)

THOUGHTS going forward into February 2019----
February.......let's see what's coming up.
NO irregular bills in February(but March we've got over $2600 worth).
The credit card bill is going to be high for Feb. mostly due to getting new tires and sensors on my car,  paying for new glasses,  my car was due for an oil change(synthetic oil=$$$), there is Birthday meal spending and Hubs spent $200 on two subscriptions on this statement coming up.  We are almost up to $2K in charges and the statement doesn't close for another 6 days.....I think I need to keep Hubs home this week so he can't spend anything. lolz
I don't see anything unusual outside of these items.
Everything else will be normal spending(well, the electric bill will be seasonally high(hello Polar Vortex!).

So how was your January financially?
  
Did you spend less than the income you had in January?
Did you stay within your budget or not?
What did you do with any money leftover at the end of the month?
Did you pay off any debts or put extra toward your mortgage principle or into savings, in an emergency fund or a retirement account?
Or did you blow it on a want?

If you posted your financial progress on your own blog, leave a link in the comments so we can go check out your progress too and celebrate or commiserate with you!


Sluggy

Saturday, February 2, 2019

2019 Food & Toiletries Spending......the January Edition


Onward to January's food spending report.......



Here are my FOOD BUDGET spending totals for JANUARY 2019.

I have posted January's totals on the Total Grocery Savings Page located HERE and have updated the Totals there.
I am listing subtotals for each store I purchased from in January.  If you aren't interested in that much detail, just skip to the bottom for the Totals Sum.  My spending includes Food, Toiletries/HBA, Cleaning Products, Paper Goods & tax where applicable. We are a family of 4-5(4 at home this month). No "kids" under 22.

*****************

ALDI
OOP  $16.82
Value  $30.15
Savings  44.21%

BIG LOTS
OOP  $2.25
Value  $5.00
Savings  55%

MAINES
OOP  $30.08
Value  $64.30
Savings  53.22%

OLLIE'S
OOP  $4.40
Value  $7.96
Savings  44.72%

RITE-AID
OOP  $0.00
Qs/Ads/BC  $1080.04
Value  $1080.04
Savings  100%

TARGET
OOP  $0.00
Value  $79.79
Savings   100%

WALMART
OOP  $19.89
Qs/Ads  $9.07
Value  $28.96
Savings  31.32%

WEIS
OOP  $367.18
QsAds  $359.09
Value  $726.27
Savings  49.44%

*********************
My best 3 Store Savings Totals were Rite-Aid at 100%, Target at 100% and Big Lots at 55%.  My worst savings rate was at Walmart at 31.32%.

I shopped at 8 different stores this past month.  

TOTAL Out of Pocket for January.........$440.62
TOTAL Coupons/Store Sales.................$501.81
TOTAL Value of Items Purchased.........$942.43
TOTAL Savings of ................................53.25%

TOTAL Out of Pocket for January w/R-A.............$440.62
TOTAL Coupons/Store Sales w/R-A...................$1581.85
TOTAL Value of Items Purchased w/Rite-Aid....$2022.47
TOTAL Savings with Rite-Aid items.....................78.21%

This closes out the January food/toiletries spending.

THOUGHTS & COMMENTS for this month.....
I made a half-hearted attempt to do a eat the freezer down/low spend thing in January but it was derailed by some good meat deals et al.  I went over my regular targeted food budget of $400 by $40.62.  So much for my low spend month! lolz


The monthly food spending savings percentage went down by .17 % in January 2019 to 78.21% compared to the December 2018 78.38% savings average.  Still over a 78% savings rate however so no worries there.  ;-)

With 1 month accounted for, I have spent a Year-To-Date Total of $440.62 on food/toiletries in 2018.


2019 Yearly Total Spent To Date...................$440.62
2019 Yearly Total Value of Items To Date...$2022.47
2019 Total Saved To Date..............................$1581.85
2019 Yearly Savings Total To Date of............78.21%

The average per month amount spent so far is $440.62 in 2019. 

LOOKING AHEAD To February 2019.......

I will again attempt to do a low spend grocery month in February.  This month I'll try harder. It's a shorter month after all so I should be able to keep spending well below $300.
What I won't do is keep my grocery spending so low that I miss out on awesome deals.  We have a fair amount of give in the food budget here and I won't sacrifice quality foods just to see a lower spending total.
But if we were facing a financial problem(need to come up with $$$ for an emergency and I had to pull money from the grocery budget to cover it, etc.)I would definitely think twice about my food spending IF there weren't funds in other categories I could raid first.  While we aren't extravagant with our food spending, I don't like to constrict that spending more than what we are use to since better foods/fresh and frozen produce/etc. costs more but keep us healthier in the long run.  I'd rather pull $ for an emergency from eating out, entertainment, travel or WAM allocations.
I won't buy substandard foods to keep a grocery budget low but I can eat down what we have here already.

If you have other ideas or guidelines you follow please leave a comment and share yours with us all.

*  How much did you spend on food/toiletries in January?

*  Do you track your yearly food spending?

*  What was your savings percentage buying on sale and/or with coupons vs. buying at regular retail price last month, if you track that sort of thing?

*  What are your methods for keeping your food spending in check?

Is anyone out there up for tracking expenditures and trying to spend less but still eat well?


Sluggy