Budget budget budget...

[V8]

How do you do your budget??

Every week, fortnight or month??

How do you make sure you have your money set aside each month to cover your expenses?

I am thinking of using an 'envelope' type system where i deposit money in fortnightly to cover bills. I really want to stick to a budget cause i have worked out if we stick to our budget we can not only cover our mortgage and pay our bills but save just over $6000 a year, which would be a huge amount of savings we could actually afford to get a newer car and pay to go to my twin sisters wedding next year.

I am sick of feeling like i'm just chasing our tails each month and living off the credit card and then paying it off, means we have no spare cash for anything. I'm also concentrating on getting our other debts down other than the mortgage (interest free loan) but it's under $1000 now i just paid a fair whack of it off. And then also being ahead and actually SAVING some money. That would be a huge relief, but i know it's going to mean some changes and we may just have to go without things if we can't afford it that month.

So yeah, anyone else on a budget diet???

[HunterzMummy]

:yes::yes:I am the budget Nazi..

I pay everything weekly, and because i do everything over the internet i put my allocated funds in whater bill when we get paid for example..

Our phone and net is 60 a month therefore i put 18 each wk into the bill through internet banking

i put money each wk into our power, mobile bills and anything else we have.

We also have a GE account however i dont do this weekly as i found out we were being charged 50c for every deposit.. So we have a separate account where i put wkly deposits for the GE and our 2 direct debits. Then pay it at the end of the month.

It works a treat for us cuz when we recieve our bills in the mail we have a big fat 0 amount owing and even sometimes credit its great.

I just keep a diary of exactly what goes where and when :yes::yes:

[canberramomma]

We are getting used to being paid monthly, which is a bit of a drag, but it seems to be working out ok.

I budget by paying all my bills by direct debit or online, we don't have credit cards, and I have a 'housekeeping' account so that I know how much to spend every week, I have an allocation of 1 tank of fuel per month, and the kids don't just get 'stuff' (well, not from us, anyway).

We have trimmed a lot of the 'fat' off our day-to-day living, as I'm sure a lot of hubbers have. It's amazing how well you can survive if you just step back and examine your lifestyle. It's difficult though because a lot of the decisions can be emotional as well as financial.

[Susan Mac]

I budget monthly, but only because we aren't on a tight string.
If money WAS tight, I would absolutely budget fortnightly (because that's how often we are paid), using an 'envelope system'.

[RuthD]

I worked on our budget for a few hours last night. I was depressed at the end. We have trimmed the fat off our spending for months now but never really looked at the budget. I thought I would look at what will happen when I am no longer on paid maternity leave - 12 more weeks thankfully. MAJOR problem. Found we would be short $1000 a month. We have 2 houses and one is being renovated and so it isn't bringing in an income just sucking us dry. So today I looked into any way we could save more money.

I realised we were still donating to Mission Aust at $25 a month so that had to go
Increasing our health insurance excess by $200 only saves us $17 but if we go any higher in our excess we will have to pay the medicare levy
Looks like my daughter 2 will be in day care only 1 day a week. With a new baby due any day I was hoping to have her in 2 days, That only saves us $170 a month. I know if I take her out completely it'll save more but I think we will both need that extra day
I have 2 students for tutoring so there's $360 a month but only during term time.I am only half way to $1000 at this stage. Desperately racking my brain to find ways to cut or make the rest.

think I will look into paying bills fortnightly not waiting until the bill comes. Will be turning off all unecessary power and hopefully the weathers cools soon because I hate needing the aircon when trying to save $$.

Ruth

[Ana Gram]

I have a weekly budget. I also have an envelope system for the items which do not fit into my budget, like savings, birthday and Christmas presents, household items etc.

What I do is get my weekly money out and pay for everything in cash, I prefer doing that as I do better when I can physically handle it and count it. At the end of the week, I divide up the remaining money into my envelopes.

Then I get the new weeks money out. I then go through the envelopes and change the money in there into notes and my weekly money into coins. Sounds a little confusing but it actually stops me sending money. I wouldn't think twice about spending a $50 note in my purse but it is all coins, I won't as it looks like I have no money. Doing this, some weeks I have saved over $50 which is pretty good on the single parents pension!

[chrysalis]

I am quite careful with my money. I have a fortnightly budget, where I just take my income and allocate my known expenses - e.g. rent, food, bills, mastercard. I pay these upfront if possible, so I am ahead.

Sometimes, what I do is withdraw whatever total amount is left available for spending that fortnight and have that cash on me. It means I know exactly how much I have left and can keep track of it.

I have a seperate high interest account for savings and transfer any savings online to that other account. I then use that for larger items or big expenses, emergencies etc. I never take that money unless it is for a substantial cost that can't be absorbed in my normal income. I automatically transfer money to it if I have enough to cover costs that fortnight or month.

I never buy on credit, and always pay my credit card off entirely every month. Sometimes that's not possible, in which case I will pay the maximum possible out of my income.

To save money - I usually buy second hand (good quality items, nothing worn or damaged). I never go shopping on impulse. If I see something I "want", I won't buy it immediately but I'll wait for 1-2 days. 95% of the time I have changed my mind, decided I don't need it or found a better/cheaper option. If I do need to buy stuff, I have a set list in my mind and price limit and don't browse.

I get my hair cut at the cheap hairdresser, $25 every 2 months. I buy essential items in bulk, or largest size packets available. I have substituted expensive name brand cosmetics and shampoos for cheaper but just as good stuff. For example, cetaphil lotion, sorbolene, 1/2 lt containers of shampoo. I buy from factory outlets where possible too. I never feel like I'm missing out on anything.

You can save a lot of money just by not buying unecessary items - and a lot of stuff we buy is unecessary!!

[SweetSerenity]

I am like HunterzMummy, weekly budget for me.

I have an allocated amount each week that goes towards bills, savings, rent, food etc.

What you need to do is write up a list of ALL of your expenses. Whether it be a gym membership, groceries, phone bills, petrol, car insurance... EVERYTHING.

If it's a monthly payment, divide whatever amount you normally pay by 4 weeks, and it will give you the amount you would pay weekly towards it.

For Car Rego, divide it by the amount of weeks in the year, and it will give you an amount of what you should put aside weekly to cover that.

Just remember to include EVERYTHING, that way whatever is left (even if it's something small) you can use it on whatever you want.

I think Internet Banking is a god send :D :yes:

Good luck :D

[spark]

I wholeheartedly agree with the jar or envelope system.

I have jars for food, petrol and misc, and if there's no money left then that's it til payday. It really makes me stop and think before I buy on impulse.

We get paid monthly but I try to have a rough weekly limit to spend each week so I know I will have enough towards the end of the month. Eg I allocate $700 for the month for grocery shopping, so I divide $700 by 4.3 (as there isn't exactly 4 weeks in a month) that gives me about $162 a week to spend. If I go over it means I have less to spend next week.

I've found that only using cash makes it much easier to know where you're at. When I just used my debit and/or credit card, I never really had a clear picture of how much I was spending, but now I do.

Can you guess...I really like using cash :laughing:

[~Emmylou~]

We get paid fortnightly.

On payday I pay rent for the fortnight. I have worked out what our bills are on average and put away a percentage so the money is there when it's due. Daycare fees, groceries, fuel, etc stays in the bank. I have a spreadsheet for the budget and as it is spent I adjust the spreadsheet so we know what is still left in the bank for each thing.

Envelope system doesn't work for me, if the cash is in the house...it is in danger LOL. I find it works better to keep a separate bank account and just transfer it over online.

Whatever is left over after everything is accounted for, I take out of the bank and keep on me as cash. If I have the cash I just find I'm more careful of what I spend because I can see it in my wallet (and can therefore see it getting lower LOL). If I'm constantly eftpos'ing I always run out before the end of the fortnight because I loose track.

[mummeeto2]

I've set up a spreadsheet with 2 pages. The first has all our direct debits (mortgage, insurance, daycare, car etc) on it. We get paid fortnightly so have Week 1 & Week 2, then totals plus the monthly direct debits. At the bottom of the page I have a section with Current bank balance for transaction account + credits due - debits due = adjusted balance. This adjusted balance is what we have to spend, put away.

My second page I have set up is similar to envelope system but instead of envelopes at home I transfer money over to the high interest saver. In the spread sheet I have listed all the bills we get & roughly how much they are each month so I know how much to put away. Across the top is our pay dates & I've highlighted the dates that bills are due so I can easily see what's saved for that particular bill & when it's due. Good thing about this way is we are earning good interest on our bills.

[V8]

Cool, good to see what works for others. I went away and spent a bit of time on our budget, and i worked out that we are able to just cover all of our expenses with the money i receive, which isnt' too bad as that includes rates, electricity, rego etc etc. DH's income goes towards the mortgage and his gym membership but we have a little left over each month from this, so i will be using that to put towards savings and paying off the interest free items we bought. When i get the credit card paid off i'll reduce the limit and work with cash only and use an envelope system to put aside for our monthly bills etc and for things like rego etc. I feel better knowing that we are not over our heads, but that there is room for improvement. :smiliedance: Hopefully we can afford to go overseas for my sister's wedding and get another car. :)

Ruth, that must be a killer is there any way you can get some extra work doing nightfill at the local supermarket to bring in a bit extra. Goodluck with budgeting and hope you get some good ideas to help with your situation.

Thanks again everyone, great to get some tips :) Will see how we go!

[Lifesupport]

I budget Monthly - although after recently having a meltdown after working out what exactly what living one income means it may be more frequently than that now.

We use the Quicken budget and account tracking features that I described when I went into a small financial meltdown last week.

It is much easier than working out on a spreadsheet and the pretty graphs make it blindingly obvious if you are spending too much!.

For big ticket items we have a separate online only saving account that we put amounts into each month. That way we at least get some interest while we are saving for the item or bill. And it is a little harder to get at.

canberramomma - you are doing pretty well on one tank of fuel a month. We use one a week, I guess one of the disadvantages of living in Melbourne.