How do YOU answer the credit card question?
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How do YOU answer the credit card question?
| Fri, 11-05-2010 - 3:30pm |
Why can’t you just use your credit card?

Cash can be seen and touched and kids get that, usually at an early age,


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The only ones I have are:
Car Maintenance, Activities/Entertainment, Clothes, Home and Medical
The rest are in my checking account as they are regular bills that come out once a month, mortgage, utilities, food, life insurance, newspaper, gym, car insurance.
Then there is emergency savings and savings for the kids.
In another account is my taxes and homeowners insurance.
Tickets would be in activities/entertainment. I put a certain amount there each week.
So, on your grocery bill .. you have a budget, and you adjust your purchases to ensure you stay under that number? I've done that at times, but I'm not really concerned about how much I spend on my groceries, as long as I know I'm not overpaying for things. I don't use coupons (they dont' save me enough to make it worth it), but I do bulk shop and shop sales. If i want salmon for dinner this week, I'll buy salmon ... even if that means I spend $20 more this week than usual. I don't adjust the rest of my menu to fit that salmon in under my budget. I just dont' have any financial motivation to do so. Also, if some month we're going to be gone a lot, we might spend a lot less on groceries. I'm not going to go buy MORE jsut so that I hit my budget target.
"I don’t mind a banshee, that’s fine. 2 banshees? I HATE you. I actually wish bad things upon you." -- Day[9] Daily #459 P1
"I don’t mind a banshee, that’s fine. 2 banshees? I HATE you. I actually wish bad things upon you." -- Day[9] Daily #459 P1
Oh, our bill shows us how much we have used, if we have spent more or less than what they estimate for the year.
Yeah, we spend only a certain amount per month, most of it at Costco and then the rest with delivery. I get all the non-bulk stuff with delivery. We will have to get a gallon of milk this week as I am not going to get delivery until Saturday but I don't mind spending $2 out of my spending money for it. It doesn't happen that much and I don't usually spend all my spending money each week. I take what I don't spend and save it for bigger things that I don't want to take out of budgets like pedi's, hair coloring, going out to dinner with friends, parties-have a passion party coming up soon ;)
If I had an animal, yes I would have a budget for "pet". I did so when I had one.
"I don’t mind a banshee, that’s fine. 2 banshees? I HATE you. I actually wish bad things upon you." -- Day[9] Daily #459 P1
"I don’t mind a banshee, that’s fine. 2 banshees? I HATE you. I actually wish bad things upon you." -- Day[9] Daily #459 P1
I found the best thing for me is to keep a running checking account balance in Excel. Then I project what my expenses will be in the upcoming months-- right now it goes through December 2011. Basically, I look at what my current expenses are and what things fall during certain months and add them all in. When something changes, I make the appropriate changes in the upcoming months. In my checking account I keep a certain amount as a buffer. Before we get our middle of the month paychecks, I transfer anything over the buffer amount into the savings account attached to our checking-- unless I know we have an unusual expense coming up that month. Then, when the savings gets over a certain point, I can transfer that money elsewhere.
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