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

Now that we are living on an annuity and 401K$ withdrawals, 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 our 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.  Why pull 401K monies out when they are earning more than our other regular bank funds?  Use those instead for now!

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 taking any more 401K withdrawals and using 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 April report---

I had 2 goals for April......
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 April in the BLACK!
The amount we ended the month of April with?.....$414.19

Income or Funds We Can Access

The "income" in April---

* Monthly annuity payment of $3222.24(after tax withholding)
* RMSA(Healthcare account)reimbursement of $1848.67
* Interest earned on non-retirement accounts of $573.85
* Blogging Revenue of $100.51
* Deposit into checking for M/C charges reimbursed of $100.82
Total "Income" for April....$5846.07


Expenses in April---

* Healthcare Premium for April was $1,848.67(paid for with RMSA reimbursement)
* Variable Expenses in April came to $2611.31
* Irregular Expenses in April came to $971.90
Total Expenses....$5431.88

Outgo

As for the variable expenses this April, 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 March.(Within $2 or so).
*  The water bill was $7.83 lower than last month.
* The c/c bill was $286.76 less than in March.
*  The electric bill was $87.60 lower than last month.
*  The health insurance premium was the same as in March.
*  The WAM/cash withdrawals were $185 lower than the previous month.

HERE are the BAD THINGS

* There was a $14.21 higher charge on the gasoline credit card.
*  Hubs had $641.16 doctor bill(we have now met the deductible for 2019).
*  I had $223.07 in charges on my Amazon card.
*  I had a $31.67 fat lady clothing company bill.
*  I had a $76.00 dental bill for a filling repair.

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

So we end April in the black with a $414.19.  Added to the Slush Fund going into April at $20,673.38 makes it go into May at $21,087.57.

The Sinking Fund goes into May 2019 standing at $468.37 since nothing was paid out of it in April.

FINAL THOUGHTS on April---
It was a good, lower spending month.  We mostly sat home and didn't spend out of the ordinary this month.  No irregular bills were due.  We finally hit our healthcare deductible OOP so lower medical charges going forward.

THOUGHTS going forward into May 2019----
May should be pretty low in the spending department too.
Electric will be lower as the heat is off.
No more big eye doc bills for the rest of 2019.
The c/c bill should be much lower than in April.
The only "ugly" bill is the semi-annual car insurance bill is due in May and Ex-College Boy pays his cut which is about 1/3 of that bill.
The daughter graduates and moves out so electric/water/food consumption will go down going forward.
We still have not needed to make a 401K withdrawal in 2019 to this point.  We still have a nice cushion of Slush Funding so 401K can sit and make us interest. 8-)))

So how was your April financially?
  

Did you spend less than the income you had in April?
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

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

2016's Savings Challenge Goal

$28K Savings Challenge Updates & 2016's Savings Challenge Goal

So this Savings Challenge I do every year, well, since 2009 at least........I use the previous year's SC $ saved as an emergency fund for the following year.

IE-the money saved in 2012 was used to fund emergencies & irregular expenses in 2013 when regular income didn't cover everything.
Then at the end of following year, when all the emergencies that were going to take place had, I took whatever was left in that SC and put it into an interest bearing non-retirement account of some sort and it became "permanent". And hopefully when we retire it will be added to our sack o' money/retirement funds.

I started my personal Savings Challenge in 2009 when I was on a Yahoo group called "The Compact".  I was younger and pretty naïve about how much I could save from our income then and challenged myself to put away 60 THOUSAND DOLLARS!  Yes, 6 with 4 Zeroes after it. lolz

I didn't even get halfway there.
But you know what?
It didn't matter that I failed at my goal.
What mattered is that I had a concrete number goal and I saved something even if I didn't achieve that goal number!

They say it's hard to save money if you don't have a target so figure out your target.  Then you can set about figuring out how to reach it.

In 2009 I saved $23,865.36
We used $13,460.81 of that money in 2010 for unexpected expenses, sending the remaining $10,404.55 to permanent savings.

In 2010 I saved $34,019.88
We used $427.81 of that money in 2011, sending the remaining $33,592.07 to permanent savings.

In 2011 I saved $34,461.31
We used $2,627.16 of that money in 2012, sending the remaining $31,834.15 to permanent savings.

In 2012 I saved $28,907.08
We used $23,611.66 of that money in 2013, sending the remaining $5,295.42 to permanent savings.

In 2013 I saved $24,033.60
We used $0.00 of that money in 2014, sending the full $24,033.60 to permanent savings.

In 2014 I saved $27,427.06
We used $0.00 of that money in 2015 sending the full $27,427.06 to permanent savings.

In 2015 I saved $40,000.00 and this will be the pot of money we draw from for any emergencies/irregular expenses in 2016 that we can't cash flow, before sending whatever remains to permanent savings when the year ends.

You can see from above that some years we had many unexpected expenses and most years we had few.....what we spent from the previous year's savings varied from $23,611.66 in 2012 to using $0 in 2015.
I am just thankful I DID save money because if there hadn't been that pot of money sitting in the bank in 2012, we would have had to delay or worse, put some of those expenses on a credit card!

So with 6 full years of my Savings Challenges(2009-2014) tucked away for our retirement years my total is sitting at $132,586.85.

Again when 2016 is over and everything is paid for, whatever is left from that $40K I saved in 2015 will go into permanent savings for our retirement years.
************

Now I need to settle on a savings goal amount for 2016.
Since we actually saved $40K in 2015(without the bonus $), I think I'll keep the goal at that level for 2016.

$40K is possibly doable for a second year, given our income level, but it's not a given.  If I keep my frugal nose to the grindstone and no big expenses wallop us this year we could make that number again.

$40K averages out to saving $3,333.33 per month.

Now how do I plan to get to this goal?

I'll remain frugal in my spending, keeping our living expenses as low as possible.

* We'll keep food spending in check.
* Utility bills will be monitored and usage adjusted if it gets too high.
* Gift giving costs and Christmas spending will be tracked.
* We don't foresee any larger car bills this year(as 2 of the 3 cars are newish), our housing is basically sound and HVAC systems are running well so those expenses shouldn't be a factor in 2016, just gas for cars and regular maintenance on cars and house systems.
* Entertainment will be sought out that is inexpensive or free.
* Travel will be done on the cheap if possible.
* Clothing spending will be low this year.  Last year much of College Boy's wardrobe was replaced and I also bought clothes for the Daughter but those costs won't be duplicated in 2016.  I'll try to do some sewing when I need clothing items replaced and Hubs is good to go with his wardrobe.

Items that may hijack my saving goal--
* We will have some extra expenses in 2016 with home repairs(getting things ready to sell in a couple of years).
* Hubs current medical issue with no resolution in sight yet, so the medical co-pays are a wild card in the spending plan.  Also any unforeseen medical issues that may crop up during the year.
* 1 child still in college and dependent on us and another child still on our medical insurance will mean higher spending than if we didn't have dependents at this point in our lives.

So who wants to play along and save some of their income in 2016?
Figure out what you can reasonably live on and put the rest away for your retirement....or if you still have debt(and why do you still have debt at this point in your life?!?)put something extra this year toward that goal and get yourself DEBT-FREE and/or MORTGAGE-FREE before you retire.

Set whatever goal feels right for your life.  Experts have said that people who set goals do better with their money overall.  Set a goal to keep yourself accountable.  Better yet, post a goal on your blog or in a community forum online and let other people's eyes help keep you more accountable.  8-)

Yah, it might not be fun to track your expenses but if you don't know where your money is going(and with most folks the money DOES GO!)how can you know if you keep any and how much you keep?

Tell us your savings goal for this year and how you plan to go about achieving that number.


Sluggy

$28K Savings Challenge......July Update

Every year I keep a close eye on our monthly expenses and our monthly income.

Our income is mainly the salary my Hubs draws from his job.  We have money taken off each paycheck from the top to put into savings, before we even get our hands on it.  This money that's taken goes into various pots....life insurance, health insurance premiums, long term care insurance premiums, investments and retirement savings.  It's automatic so we are never tempted to NOT put it into savings or these other categories.

Once the automatic savings amounts, plus taxes and medical/dental/vision premiums are taken out, it leaves what we get to "live on".  From this amount we budget for bills, both monthly and irregular bills(semi-annual, annual etc.) and our variable bills(like food, eating out, clothing  etc.)  Anything left over once our monthly expenses are paid, I put aside into an interest bearing Savings Challenge account. 

For 2015 I am continuing my Yearly Savings Challenge.  I am raising the Goal amount slightly to $28,000 this year, $4K more than my goal for last year.

On to the July report.....

I have posted my July End of Month $28K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.
Check out the Savings Challenge page tab at the top of the blog for the specific numbers HERE.

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 $2,333.33.

I have to report that we finished up July with a lovely amount of $.
The extra amount we ended the month of July with?.......$4,089.56

Income

We had $3933.47 left over from our income after our monthly expenses were deducted.
 

Other monies received in July totaled $156.09.  This included interest made on non-retirement accounts and a per diem from Hub's work.

This brought us to our gain of $4089.56
Since we have no debt, this goes into savings.

Outgo

As for the expenses this July, here are the good and the bad side of things....

HERE are the GOOD THINGS

 

*  Phone charges and internet  were approximately the same as last month.
*  The gas credit card went down $85.41.  Hubs didn't buy gas at the Sunoco station because it was so high last month there, even with his .5¢ discount.  He put most gas charges on the reg. credit card and bought at a non-Sunoco station.  This credit card earns us point we can cash in for gift card.
*  The credit card charges went down by $2873.  There was no vacation spending on it plus we put very few charges on it before it closed mid July.

 

HERE are the BAD THINGS(and the not so bad)
.
*  Water bill went up by $10.63.
*  Electricity bill went up by $11.51(A bit more a/c used and the washer/dryer were run more with an extra person here.).
*  The cash withdrawals went up $326.52 due to using cash for some of the apartment hunting trip expenses and I bought a $100 Rite-Aid gift card this month.

 

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

July has been out "cheapest" month so far in 2015.  Our expenses in July came to only $2200.00.
And that was even with a few out of the ordinary expenses(a Sam's club c/c charge, some medical co-pays, buying a gift card and paying the garbage bill ahead for the last 6 months of 2015.  These all came out to about $700+/- beyond our normal monthly costs.
 

The 2015 TOTAL.....
With 7 months accounted for, our Savings Challenge Grand Total for 2015 is $22,886.92.
That averages $3269.56 a month put into savings so far. 
We have left $5,113.08 to put away this year to reach our $28K Goal.

With $22886.92 saved already we only need to put away $1,022.62 each of the next 5 months to reach the $28K goal for the year and that's very doable for us.  ;-)

Finally thoughts on July---

I am amazed at how fast we've been able to pile up the extra/unspent $ this year!  It helped that in April we had that third paycheck.....this always builds our momentum and when it comes early in the year it gets me revved up to keep going.
July was NOT a third paycheck month but even so by not putting charges from mid May to mid July on the c/c we were able to keep the bills somewhat low.  Not having any car repairs last month also helped in that regard.
I am stoked to only be $5K+ away from reaching this savings goal for 2015.


THOUGHTS going forward into August----

As for irregular expenses.....
We have both the house insurance and $695 of car insurance due the end of August.
There are no trips planned this month, except for a one day trek to take College Boy back to school.  We will be renting a van for that trip so there is some expense for that.
The credit card bill is going to top out at around $1900 by the time it closes next Tuesday.  Yikes!  I blame eating out(both traveling and having kids home to visit in July expenses)plus a little retail therapy(mostly Hubs and getting a few things for College Boy before he heads back to school).

The last big irregular expenses coming is end of September and that is the school tax bill(local property taxes here are broken up into a school tax bill and a local tax bill).  I pay one in March and the other in September.  If we can keep the c/c spending down for the rest of the year we are golden for making our savings goal this year. 8-)

With 7 months behind us we have $22,886.92 down and $5,113.08 left to save in 2015. 

 

So how was your July financially?
  

Did you spend less than the income you had in July?
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

April Eating Out

I was reading Cindi's latest post over at Thrifty At Sixty and decided to add up how much we spent at Chez Sluggy on eating out/take-out last month.

                                  Image credit the BarfBlog
Usually our eating out/take-out spending is counted in the Cash Withdrawals category of our monthly spending.  Cash withdraws encompass all small cash spending for the month which usually includes take-out, dining out(but that is sometimes put on the c/c instead), hubs haircuts, dry cleaning, his coffee habit and when he buys lunch at work, any incidental purchases for the home(repair items, tools, when some kid comes to the front door to sell us something for school fundraising, the Sunday newspaper, etc.)

I started this exercise thinking, "Gee, we hardly spent ANYTHING on eating out/take-out this month!".
Well I was wrong, as usual.....lol

April Eating Out/Take-Out Spending
Chinese take-out  $18(we got 2 meals out of this)
Bob Evans eating out  $22(used a coupon)
Popeye chicken take-out  $20(we got 2 meals out of this)
Subway sandwiches take-out  $12
Domino's sandwiches take-out  $12
Total.....$84

Granted 2 of the meals we got 2 meals out of them so 7 meals for $84

I noticed a pattern that ALL of these meals were Weekend(does Friday night count as the weekend? lol)expenditures and all but 2 of them were Lunch meals.  Only 1 of the 7 was eaten away from home.

I was going to start keeping track of this category of spending but we are on vacation in May so I KNOW most of the meals(if not all)eaten while traveling will be eaten out, so this won't be representative of our usual amount of eating out/take-out spending.

Since we can afford this amount easily in our budget, I am not looking to reduce this spending.
But I do like to know what we are spending and where.
If we ever need to cut corners more on monthly expenses, this is the kind of thing I'd target to reduce or cut out altogether.

Our eating out/take-out spending is more about a break from the routine of cooking at home for us, rather than it being about a great tasty and flavorful adventure in dining.  We don't buy fancy foods when eating out, just stuff we don't make at home(fried chicken, Chinese cuisine, etc.) or a quick sandwich.
It helps that we are not paying for a family of 5 any longer when we go out.  Heck even Chinese take-out for 5 use to cost us $40+!

Have you ever kept tracking of your eating out/take-out spending?
Do you have an eating out/take-out category in your budget?
Are you trying to cut down on your eating out/take-out spending?

Sluggy

 

Food & Toiletries Spending.....December Update & YEARLY Grand Totals

Onward to December's food spending report & closing out the 2013 Totals.....

Here are my FOOD BUDGET spending totals for DECEMBER 2013.

I have posted December's totals on the Total Grocery Savings for 2013 Page located HERE and have updated the Yearly Totals there.
I am listing subtotals for each store I purchased from in December.  If you aren't interested in that much detail, just skip to the bottom for the Totals Summary.

My spending includes Food, Toiletries/HBA, Pet Supplies, Cleaning Products, Paper Goods & tax where applicable. We are a family of 5(3 at home this month)& 1 dog. No kids under 17.
******************

MAINE SOURCE(restaurant supply store)
OOP  $21.69
Value  $30.87
Savings  39.74%

RITE-AID
OOP  $4.19
Qs/Ads/+Ups  $360.58
Value  $364.77
Savings  98.85%
 

SHURSAVE STORES(small local independent affiliated stores)
OOP  $68.08

Qs/Ads  $54.17

Value  $122.25

Savings  44.31%

WEGMAN'S
OOP  $39.92
Qs/Ads  $8.00
Value  $67.08
Savings  40.50%

WEIS MARKETS

OOP  $151.23

Qs/Ads  $130.57

Value  $281.80

Savings  46.33%

I am no longer adding my rebates received into my food budget directly. I will use them on food on occasion and will note that when used.  I will keep track of rebates/gift cards/certs received here as before however.

REBATE CHECKS RECEIVED IN December.....$0.00

GIFT CARDS and CERTIFICATES....$0

TOTAL Value of Cash/Store Checks/Gift Card Rebates Received...$0.00

COUPONS and FREEBIES

1 x Free Coke 12 pack Q from MyCokeRewards

*********************
My best 3 Store Savings Totals were Rite-Aid at 98.85%, Weis at 46.33% and the Shursave Market at 44.31%.  My WORST savings rate was 39.74% so I think I did exceptionally well in December on the value of what I got!
I shopped at 5 different stores this past month.

TOTAL Out of Pocket........$285.11

TOTAL Coupons & Store Sales Savings...$581.66

TOTAL Value of Items Purchased............$866.77

TOTAL Savings of...................................67.10%

This closes out the December food/toiletries spending.

THOUGHTS & COMMENTS for this month.....

I went into December wanting to cut my food/toiletries budget by $100, to $300 budgeted for ALL purchases, to make up for overspending in November by about $120.
I met that challenge.
Go me! 8-))

In December, total savings percentage for the year has gone UP 6.32% over November's year-to-date total of 60.78%, to 67.10%. 

If you add my November and December food spending together it comes to $867.89, which makes my monthly average $433.95 for those 2 months.  I am still over my $400 goal per month for Nov./Dec. but I got close.

As you can see my Savings Rate in December remained high, partly because of my Rite-Aid shopping.
Without the Rite-Aid totals added in, my December Savings Rate is 44.04%.  Achieving a savings rate in the 40's is what I strive for.  Add in Rite-Aid totals and my overall Savings Rate hits  67.10%.
 

We kept the food spending under $300 this month but still splurged on Prime Rib Roast for Christmas dinner(plus fresh seafood on Dec. 23rd) and ate very well otherwise all of December. 

So what is my secret to spending so little on groceries and toiletries?

I chalk this up to.....

* I buy loss leaders.

* I use a smallish assortment of coupons(to buy things I would have bought anyway).

* I use a price book, tracking to stock up when groceries where at their rock bottom price in the sales cycle.  I never pay full price for anything that will eventually go on sale....ok, maybe not never but very infrequently.

* I buy items on instant markdown and substitute them for other ingredients that are more expensive that week(or keeping those marked down goods for later in the freezer).

* I cook from scratch a good deal of the time, because it makes sense and I have to watch what I eat and have to keep my sodium intake low.

* I buy in season whenever possible.

* I have started to cook/serve/eat less food at meals so we have little to no food waste.  Sometimes I purposely cook more than we are going to eat for planned leftovers.

This is NOT to say that I don't follow/do all this all the time.  I do splurge and pay more for some things occasionally or just don't bother due to boredom or lack of energy, etc. or make mistakes.  But more often than not, these are my guidelines and how I keep more money in our pocket.

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

 

Here is the run down of the Grand Totals for my Food & Toiletries Spending for 2013--
 

2013 Total Saved $4,008.31

2013 Yearly Total Value of Items  $8,569.13

2013 Yearly Total Spent $4,560.82

2013 Yearly Savings Total of  46.77%

Yes, I saved almost HALF of what I would have spent if I just ran to the store and bought whatever/whenever I felt like buying by thinking ahead and exercising some restraint over my behavior.

 

The average monthly food/toiletries spending this year was $380.07.  We kept our food/toiletries spending average BELOW $400 per month in 2013.

 

How much did you spend on food in December?
Do you track your yearly food spending....if so how did you do this year?
 

Sluggy

$30K Savings Challenge FEBRUARY 2010 Totals....a Great Month!

I have posted my FEBRUARY 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 February in the Black.

The amount we ended the month of February with was.......$4,094.60

Income
Besides Hubby salary we had a hefty amount in Rebates and some rolled Coins under the Income Heading. Hubby also got a Bonus check from work...yay!
Not sure where the Bonus $ will end up but I'm putting it into the Savings Challenge for now. Without it, we are at $966.20 in savings for Feb.

Outgo
As for the expenses in February.....

The electric bill was $399.10, just a few dollars more than January's bill. Since Feb. is the most expensive month here for heating, I am good with that number.

 The credit card bill seemed also a bit high(over $1K) but was paid off(like every month)so no interest charges at least.  On second thought, the cc bill wasn't too bad, since hubby didn't make as many Cash Withdrawals this month.  He used the cc more for gas and such instead of cash.  When you combine the cash withdrawals and the cc charges this month against those charges combined in previous months, they average about the same per month.

We had some large out-of-the-ordinary expenses in Feb. 
The car insurance is due then, so that was almost $1300.
The other BIG expense was our part of #2 son's dental extractions, $475.00, after the insurance paid their part.

All other regular bills...Cable, Internet, Phone, etc. are the same each month. 

The Food Budget costs for February are in another post, which is located HERE.  Food/Toiletries spending in February was under the budgeted $250(due to the rebate money that came in last month)and our Savings percentage was a whopping 91.12%!

Looking Ahead to March....
The cc bill is on track to being under $500 this month, which is always good. ;-)
There are three non-monthly charges this month--the quarterly sewage bill(not very much), the County/Municipal Tax Bill and our State Tax Bill.
One tax bill is over $1K, one is under $100, so that's approx. $1200 in extra expenses for March.

YTD Standings....
We have a Year To Date Total of $4,850.25 in Savings.  To save $30K for the year, we need to put away $2,500 per month average.  We are almost on target after 2 months....Jan. was dismal but Feb. was great due to the bonus.  I'm looking to only put away $1400 in March due to the Tax bills since it's a high bill month.

So how was your February 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