With the new year starting, now is a great time to look at your budget and make any necessary changes. Do you have a budget? If not, now is the perfect time to make one. We have a budget set up, and we go over it about 3 times a year, because things change. There are always new things that come up or items that finally get paid off. Examples would be: new medical bills, cars that have been paid off, new insurance needs because of teenager drivers (YIKES! that last one is us for sure). A budget is a big help to let you know exactly how much money you have to spend for certain items. For instance, once you have hit the limit on your grocery budget for the month, you know there is no more to spend.
Here is an example of our monthly budget, these are NOT our actual numbers , I am just giving you an idea. Let’s say after taxes our take home pay was $4800 a month. With our budget, we pretty much account for every penny, and then stick to the budget we have set.
Mortgage 1800.00
Tithing 600.00
Power 250.00
Phone/internet 100.00
Garbage 30.00
Water 30.00
Cell Phones 75.00
Auto Insurance 100.00
Life Insurance 60.00
Cable 30.00
Medical Bills 100.00
Newspaper 12.00
Gasoline 200.00
Student Loans 300.00
Grocery/Clothing/HBA/Gifts 600.00
Grocery/Clothing/HBA/Gifts 600.00
Savings 200.00
401K 300.00
There are some items in the budget that are fixed (cable, newspaper, life insurance, etc). Then there are items that change some from month to month, an example of this would be our power bill, it is a lot less in the summer than it is in the winter. Another example would be gasoline, because the amount of driving I do varies. I keep a spiral notebook with all of the numbers in our budget. When I pay a bill I write the amount down, under that budget category If there is any money leftover at the end of the month, that goes into a “misc./leftover” category. That amount can then be used for items that either cost a little more that I thought they would (surprise doctor visit), or rolled over into the next month for any surprises that happen that month. Here is an example of what the gasoline and power would look like:
Gasoline
$200.00 (beginning balance)
-33.00 Dec 6
-50.00 Dec 12
-47.00 Dec 24
-50.00 Dec 31
= 20.00 leftover
Power
$250.oo
-242.oo
=8.00
Misc/Leftover
20.00 (from gas)
8.00 (from power)
= 28.00
Let’s say the Doctor bills we had for this month were $15 more than I budgeted, I would just take $15 out of the misc category and use it for the medical category. So, the Misc category would now look like this:
Misc
20.00
8.00
8.00
-15.00
= 13.00
If you noticed, I lump all of my groceries/clothing/Heath and Beauty Aids & Gifts together. The reason why I do this, is because if there is a great deal on groceries one month, I will stock up on those items, and spend less on clothing & HBA. We have a nice stock pile on clothing and HBA, so I could go without buying those items if needed. January is a HUGE month for clearance clothing, Christmas items and toys. I will use a lot more of this categories budget for those items then I will for food that month. It works for me to have flexibility for buying these items, but still have a budget total for the items as a whole.
When looking at your budget, you can probably find things you can cut if necessary. For instance, we do not have an expensive cable bill. Our actual bill is about $13, because we chose one that doesn’t have all those fancy channels.
I hope this all makes sense to you. If you have any questions, let me know.
