$20K Savings Challenge....SEPTEMBER Update

As promised, this will not be pretty. 8-(

Ok, here is my SEPTEMBER Savings Challenge Update post for 2012.

This post is NOT about bragging or showing off.  It's just what we are able to save given our income and being able to hang tough against "unconscious" spending.  Ok....not so much this month, but in general. lol

Just to update, My Savings Goal for the Year in 2012 is $20,000.  It's well below what I've saved in previous years I know.  But we also have a goal of paying for 4 home improvement projects at Chez Sluggy this year.  We plan on cash-flowing these projects with the additional money we save and/or our income tax refund.
Our background info--We are a family of 5(kids are 21-16)with one living away from home.  We have 2 dogs. We own 4 cars at present and live in/own free & clear a 4 bedroom house in a small town.

On to the September report.....

I have posted my SEPTEMBER End of Month $20K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.
Check out the side bar to your right for the specific numbers.

I have 2 goals each month.....
The 1st is to actually finish each month in the black and not the red.
The 2nd is to hit the targeted savings amount of $1,666.67.

I have to report that we finished up September in the RED!
The extra cash amount we ended the month of September with?.......Negative $153.54
So we went backwards and are now $153.54 further away from our goal for the year.

meh.

Income
We had -$236.86 left over from our income after our monthly expenses were deducted.
Luckily we had a Stock Dividend, a car insurance Reimbursement and some Bank Interest to offset this net loss for September.  This combined $83.32 brought our net less down to -$153.54 for September.

Yes folks, the loss could have been worse without this little bit of income.

Outgo
The usual along with large irregular bill AND an unexpected/unplanned for expense converged on September to make it our worst month for savings since I can remember.

As for the expenses this September......

HERE are the GOOD THINGS

* The school taxes were paid and planned for so the money was there.

* The credit card bill decreased by $250.85.
* The cash withdrawals went down $550.

HERE are the BAD THINGS

*  The water bill went up $26.62-this was mostly due to Hubs closing the pool for the winter.

*  The electric bill went up $5.42.
* 2 unexpected car repairs totaling $1,551.75. Yah, THAT was the real bad ones.

The Food Budget costs for SEPTEMBER are in another post, which is located HERE.

YEAR-TO-DATE GRAND TOTAL.....
With 9 month behind us, our Savings Grand Total for 2012 is at  $16,215.75.

Not only did we NOT save the $1666.67 we need to each month in September, but we lost $153.54 toward the goal that we had saved up to this point.

Luckily though, we had a few "better than our monthly goal" months so far so we are still on track to get to our $20K mark by the end of 2012.

With 9 months done, we should be at $15,000.03  saved for the year, so we are still $1K+ ahead.

At this point, I need to come up with $3,784.25 for the rest of the year to make my $20K goal.  This breaks down to $1,261.42  per month for the next 3 months.  Unless something untoward happens we should be able to meet this goal.

As for a look ahead at OCTOBER.......

*  No irregular bills are due this month.

*  Normal bills only are expected.

*  We have a trip to take so there will be some additional spending but it will not affect the budget.  Any cash needed for that will be taken out of the money I saved in 2011 for my Savings Challenge.

So how was your September financially?
Did you spend less than you made?
Did you stay within your budget or not?
How much did you save in September?  Did you use it to pay down debt or build your Emergency Fund?

Even if what you are able to save each month doesn't look like a lot of money, figure out what percentage of your income you saved.  You might feel that it's a more substantial amount in those terms!

We saved 12.71% of our take home income in August.  My goal is to shoot for 50% each month.
Our heavy expenses in August had us fall short of my goal.

Leave a comment and share with us what you did with your money, both the good and not-so good.
Did you have debt you were able to pay on?
Did you pay off a car, a house or a credit card?
Did something financial blow up on you last month?
What are you doing financially to change your life?

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

Sluggy