As a reminder, my husband pays the "big bills" like mortgage, phone, car, and electricity. I pay for groceries and the pets and that somehow evens things out. Only, to be honest, this doesn't actually work out evenly. We had a discussion recently about how I make a lot less than he does and he has agreed that he's going to take over the Costco runs. We'll see if this works out.
.png)
Groceries ($893.73, 42.8%) - Look, we keep eating.
Pets ($374.17, 17.9%) - Once again I am asking who thought it was a good idea to get a dog? (Me, it was me. I'm my own problem.) Litter, food for the dog AND cat, flea and tick prevention for the dog, litter for the cat. The list never ends.
Savings ($300, 14.4%) - Boo.
Bills ($168.37, 8.1%) - Insurance. It went up by eight dollars AND DON'T THINK I DIDN'T NOTICE, insurance company.
Cars ($142, 6.8%) - I gassed up once and paid for registration for the new car.
Clothing ($131.71, 6.3%) - I bought some stuff for work.
Personal care ($27.20, 1.3%) - Some face lotion.
Eating out ($24.17, 1.2%) - Okay, this is where I splurged this month (outside of HAVING PETS). I got coffee A LOT. June was rough at work and some mornings I just need a pick me up.
Entertainment ($13.70, <1%) - Spotify subscription.
Gifts ($12.63, <1%) - A couple of greeting cards.
Why am I broke all the time? Well, I think we just need to look at those first two categories. *sigh*
****************
What's something fun you spent money on last month?
Pet expenses are no joke.
ReplyDeleteI am really impressed that you got coffee "a lot" and still only spent $24. My kid occasionally gets a drink from Starbucks (I am personally Done with Starbucks, so I haven't joined her, but don't think I haven't Starbucksed it up in the past) and it's like $8 for her weird butterfly-with-boba drink. If I'm going to splurge on a fun drink, I prefer to go to one of the local businesses, but their drinks are just as spendy.
I mean, I normally only get coffee once or twice a month, but I allowed myself coffee EVERY Friday and a rainy day and that's a lot for me. I didn't actually eat out, though, so that's a thing. I just get a decaf americano, so I'm not getting a "fancy" drink, although it feels like a splurge to me.
DeleteGroceries are really expensive these days. I try to shop at Aldi but have noticed in the past few months that the prices there are going up up up. It doesn’t feel like much of a saving anymore.
ReplyDeleteI rarely go to Aldi, but their prices still seem reasonable to me. I just wish they had a better selection.
DeleteOther than postcards at the Kruger airport, I had a few fun things: I bought three books - including Maya's! So exciting - lunch out with a friend, and a ton of cherries. It's cherry season here and the farm market is open, so I've been indulging a lot. My husband has taken over the Costco cost as well but that's because we got new credit cards to optimise airline points, and my new Visa isn't accepted at Costco (they only take Mastercard). Although, this week he is going camping and I need to go to Costco so I guess I'll have to use my debit card.
ReplyDeleteI don't consider $24 on eating out to be a huge splurge, so I am still impressed! Everything is so expensive these days, though. I went to coffee at a fancy little French pastry shop with my girlfriends, and this is what I got: a chai latte with oat milk. This is what it cost: NINE DOLLARS. WHAT EVEN.
Nicole, I have been buying cherries like a crazy woman. The season is so short and I want all of them! They are my absolute favorite fruit.
DeleteI think it's fascinating because in the States, Costco will not take Mastercard, so I had to get a different Visa card that I almost exclusively use for Costco. It's crazy how different it is.
I bought new tire ( 5 in total for two cars), balancing, and pressure sensor fixes- is that fun? My husband bought a paint sprayer to do basement walls- that was a lot of fun compared to brushing over the irregular surface, missing huge spots because of mortar lines, and having to go back to paint the gaps.
ReplyDeleteAs you can guess, I have a different definition of fun than many.
None of that is fun in my mind! I guess it's a great thing that people on this planet are so different.
DeleteHey, you're not broke. Think how rich Hannah and Zelda make your life! Think if you didn't have them and were putting that money in savings instead... what a bleak existence that would be.
ReplyDeleteI like how spending $24 eating out FOR THE WHOLE MONTH is a "splurge" for you. Has anyone ever told you you're incredibly frugal?
You're absolutely right. I would not trade in Hannah and Zelda for all the $$$$ in my savings account. They are my precious angels.
DeleteI'm obviously not incredibly frugal or we would have a much smaller house, no pets, I'd thrift my clothing, and I'd do my own pedicures. Everyone decides where they spend money. I rarely travel, I rarely eat out, and all of our furniture is from antique shops and estate sales. It's just priorities.
And people aren't wrong if they choose to prioritize things differently than I do! It's just that you have to be honest with yourself about what your personal priorities are and I think that's hard to do sometimes.
Yes to paying bills proportionally by income. It puts too much stress on the lower earner to try to split things, and there's no reason for it. Obviously my marriage isn't a great example since we're not together right now, but it did make things easier when we went from totally separate "you pay this, I pay that" finances to us each paying a fixed amount into a joint checking account for the household expenses. We both set up automatic withdrawals every two weeks so that we never had to think about it. Anytime we had an unexpected expense and needed to top up the balance, we just made an extra payment into the checking account. We did 50/50 since our incomes were similar, but you could just as easily do 60/40, 70/30 or whatever the split is. Anytime we received money, such as tax refunds, we also plopped that into the joint account.
ReplyDeleteIt is funny how different households handle finances. I physically recoiled from the idea of a joint checking account. LOL. The way we do it works for us, but we do have to talk about it once in a while. My husband recently got a very sizeable raise (long story short - there was salary inversion in his department and they worked to undo that through A PROCESS) and so we had a discussion about how things were going - we do this every six months or so - and now we have a new Costco strategy.
Delete