A day of no spending

I am happy to report that yesterday and the day before I did not spend one dime.  I need more no spend days.  Today I did go to the pet store and get food, cat litter, and a new bed for one of my cats so I spent about $42.  

A weekend of spending out of control

This weekend I felt like I had no control over my spending. It was my onw fault really and I need to learn from it.

The problem started on Friday morning when I decided that I "needed" to buy 2 new pairs of jeans because they were half-price at $29.50.

Later that day I bought a $149 subscription for the local Broadway series. Admittedly, the $149 covers 6 shows over the next year and will get me in to shows for less than $25 a ticket. Maybe that was not such a bad purchase.

Friday night my girlfriend treated me to a concert at which I purchased a bottle of wine and two bottles of water. In retrospect, I could have done without the wine.

On Saturday, we used gift cards to to get into see the movie Ironman and then I felt I "needed" a soda and popcorn for another $10. I could have done without them. We then went to the mall where I spent $30 on a case for my iPod. I didn't really need it but I may protect it from damage. After the mall we went over to a friends house and I brought side items for $5. The $5 in side items were not an issue because I did not have to purchase my dinner.

On Sunday I had lunch at a local eatery for $9. I guess that is not a problem either as I had just been on a long bike ride and was 20 miles from home.

As I write this post I see that I should have saved the $22 from the concert and the $10 from the movies, and the $30 iPod case. The jeans will last me for several years and I really did get a good deal on them. $62 of questionable spending. I need to get these kinds of spending leaks under better control. Feeling bad about the spending is a good sign to me though because there was a time in my life when I would not have thought twice about it.

My current living arrangements

I have been dating someone for several months now and at the present we spend most every night together if we are not traveling for work. Basically, I spend my time at her house for a variety of reasons and I am fine with that. I am still having to pay a mortgage and utilities at my own place though. I have raised the thermostat and unplugged the televisions to save electricity.

The plan is to eventually move in together in 8 months or so. I am going to have to sell my townhouse and I will probably take a loss on the sale. I am fine with that because once I do sell my place and start paying half of her mortgage my housing costs will decrease about $1,200 per month not including utilities. It will take my about a year to recoup a $15,000 loss at that rate.

I am keeping my fingers crossed with the housing crisis. My townhouse is in a historic neighborhood close to downtown and that should be a plus with the price of gas. I am able to take the train to downtown from where my girlfriend lives and that is a really good thing with $4.00 gas. I am thinking about canceling my monthly parking which should save me the $110 monthly parking fees less the daily cost of parking at $4.00 a day if I drive. The train cost $3.50 round-trip. I have to admit I have gottne spoiled with the in-out priveledges of the monthly parkers.

May 2008 Spending

My income for the month was higher due to having 3 paychecks in the month as apposed to the usual two paychecks per month. My father also sent me a $25 check for my birthday. The big category for the month was Pets. Due to my travel I had to spend $396 to have my cats boarded and I also had to refill the insulin Rx for my diabetic cat ($156 for insulin and syringes). My car expenses were higher than normal due to my having to renew my car tag.

I am still spending too much in the allowance category and I am not sure what to do about it. I spent less than I brought home for the month but my year to date spending exceeds what I have brought home on a year to date basis. I have a ways to go. My savings is really suffering too. I really need to revamp my thoughts on what is important to me as far as spending goes.

Transportation costs

At $4.00 for a gallon of gas I have been finding alternative ways to work. Twice this week I have worked from home and once I have taken public transportation at $3.50 a day. Due to travel last month I only had to fill my tank once and spent $50 on gas for the whole month. My current budget calls for $75 per month on gas. The only way I will be able to comply with that is to continue to take public transportation and work from home whenever possible.

GPS Navigator Deal!!!

This past Saturday I went to Best Buy and bought my girlfriend a Garmin Nuvi 200 GPS navigator. I feel like it was money well spent because she is so bad with directions. Anyway, the regular price was $219 but it was on sale for $169 then I had a 12% off coupon and $20 in Best Buy Reward Zone certificates.

The entire purchase including sales tax, a carrying case, and a 2 year extended warranty was $195. I think I got a really good deal!

It was an unexpected purchase for the month of May...I did plan to purchase her one later in the year but she is getting ready to go on a long drive so I wanted her to have it for my piece of mind.

I took the train to work today

In the next 12 months I plan to move in with my girlfriend who lives approximately 20 miles from my work location so today I did an experiment and to the train to work. All in all it was not bad. I think it took a little longer from a time perspective but it was less stressful not having to deal with traffic.

When I start doing it regularly I will buy 20 trips at a time and they will cost me $1.50 each way as opposed to the $1.75 it regularly cost. Yesterday I filled my gas tank up and at $3.79 per gallon it cost more than $50. Not too long ago it cost me less than $30 to fill my tank. That alone is a good reason to take the train to work.

Currently I pay $110 per month for parking in my building. I think by July I will stop paying the monthly parking and use a daily lot at the rate of $5 to $7 a day when I drive in to work. Now I take advantage of the pre-tax parking program so the parking really only cost me about $92 per month but I can also take advantage of the same type of program with the public transportation cost. If I take the train 20 days to work and make 40 trips then the regular price at $1.50 per trip is $60. Using the pre-tax program would make it about $50.

Something to think about.

April 2008 Spending

The month of April showed that my spending was less than my income by $845. That is a little misleading because I took $1,000 from my savings during the month. My payroll taxes decreased because I changed my withholding, my grocery bill and utilities were lower because I have been spending significant time at my girlfriend's house. The allowance amount is artificially low because it was offset by a $337 employer fitness reimbursement for the bicycle that I bought last month. I am still spending more on pets than I planned to. Most of it is food but $74 related to pet sitter costs. All in all for the year I am over spending my budget in total and need to tighten my belt.

March 2008 Spending

Yes it is very ugly! I bought a bicycle that cost me $1,062 including new bike shoes and a speedometer. The good thing is that in April I received a $337.50 reimbursement from my employer for it and I will receive another $220 in June. So at the end of the day the bike only cost me $504.50.

Obviously it was not just the new bike that sent me over the edge with my spending, I also paid $150 on my Citibank Visa balance that I did not include in my original budget, I had extra pet expenses related to pet medications ($119) and pet sitter expenses ($74). My travel expense was high in March due to a weekend at a cabin. Some months I will not have any travel expense.

Note that the monthly averages are equal to the yearly amounts divided by 12. Items like my salary have higher monthly averages due to me only getting paid twice in March. Some months I will receive 3 paychecks so it will average out.

All in all, I hope to do a little better next month. It is hard because I am in a new relationship and we have a lot of things we want to do (eat out, travel, etc.). As the relationship settles in there will be less expenses.

Verizon Unlimited Cellphone Plan

For several years I have used Verizon Wireless as my cell phone provider and I have always been happy with the service. Until last September I had a 2,000 minute per month plan that cost me about $87 per month including taxes with my 20% employee discount. I changed my plan to a 900 minute per month plan last year when I realized that I was only using about 700 minutes per month so now I pay about $55 per month including taxes.

Verizon wireless and several other cell providers have started an unlimited usage plan for $99 per month. I am not eligible for my 20% discount and I do not know how much the taxes would add to the monthly base charges.

I have recently began dating someone who is on a different plan so I may need to upgrade my cell plan to get more minutes. This is something that I am thinking about.

Does anyone know the "after-tax" cost of the $99 unlimited plan?

Week one with the MacBook

I have had my MacBook for one week and I have to say that I am happy with it thus far.  Yesterday I purchased the iWork software suite from Amazon.com for $59.  In contrast the Apple store sells it for $79.  This is the software that has word processing, spreadsheets, and presentation applications in it.  Basically it is Apple's version of Microsoft office.   

I am also contemplating purchasing the extended warranty for $249.  My 2 month old iPod nano went on the fritz yesterday so that makes me a little nervous.  The computer purchase put a serious dent in my monthly budget for February.  I am going to have to watch my spending in the allowance category more closely over the next several months.

I do now believe what I have heard, "you buy a PC for work and a Mac for home." 

New computer purchase

My home computer died a little over a year ago and since then I have been using my work laptop for my primary computer. I would like to buy an Apple Mac but the fact that I have never used an Apple and I have not heard the best reviews about Quicken for Mac have deterred me.

I am almost ready to make the leap now though. I saw that Amazon.com has the Apple MacBook MB061LL/B 13.3" Laptop $1,024 after a $75 rebate and I also have $105 in gift certificates that would bring the price down even further to $919 is prompting me to make some decisions. I am eligible for a 6% discount through my employer but then I could not use the rebate or the gift certificates. I know I could get other brands cheaper but I have heard so many good things about Apple computers. If money were not an object at all I would really be interested in the new Macbook Air that fits in an envelope.

I am a little afraid of the unknown with an Apple. Will I have any trouble setting up my home internet service and wireless network? What is the customer service like?

Does anyone have any thoughts on the matter?

January 2008 Income and Spending

Even though I spent $194 more than I took in for the month I think I did a great job of sticking to my budget. Key spending categories are:

• Allowance $90 under
• Groceries $3 over
• Household $107 over

I had a one-time unexpected expense of $120 related to burglar proofing my home. I paid down$2,215 of the 0% $4,000 credit card cash advance that I took out. As noted in my earlier posts, the remaining amount will be paid off during February along with my 0% balance on my Discover card. The credit card paydown was the primary cause for the $194 overage.

I earned $16 in interest income that is not shown on the table above.

All in all tracking my spending has really helped me to keep it in check throughout the month.

Keeping on budget

Almost two-thirds of the way through January and I am keeping on budget. In fact, so far my spending for my allowance which is basically all discretionary spending categories (dining out, personal care, entertainment, etc.) has been about $180. Typically I would have spent at least $225 or more by now. The biggest splurge in there is my purchase of my TaxCut software which is a non-recurring expense and I will get a $10 rebate.

This month I also earned my first $10 from MySurvey.com. I will receive a check in 8 to 10 weeks. Earlier this week I was at a corporate event in Florida where I stayed at a nice hotel and ate very well. I did not spend one dime of my own money while I was there. I did however have to pay for a pet sitter ($74 including tip). Instead of using my corporate credit card to pay for the hotel, I used my Discover card to take advantage of the 5% rebates on travel expenses during the months of January through March. I figure I will earn $35 in rebates to help offset the pet sitting fees.

I am sorry, what was your name again?

I had the pleasure of attending a corporate event where Benjamin Levy was the entertainment. He wowed us with his skills as a magician but I was even more impressed with his ability to remember names. I was so happy to hear that he has written a book, "Remember Every Name Every Time". I am terrible at remembering names and it is to the point that it is an embarrassment.

I am going to spend some of my allowance budget on this book to better myself.

Recap of 2007 income and expenses

My 2007 income and spending is above. I have the information more granular but for the sake of space I combined some spending categories. Specifically, the allowance category is made up of dining, personal care, clothing, and most other spending that was totally discretionary.

My 2007 spending was the basis for my 2008 budget. In 2008 I am hoping to increase my salary and interest income as well as decrease my allowance expense and interest expense. I should be able to save more if I keep some discipline in my life.

Gym membership

I have decided to cancel my gym membership. My company subsidizes the monthly fee so it only cost me $17.50 per month but I haven’t used it in a few months and it is a waste of money right now. I wonder what portion of gym memberships go unused? I prefer to exercise outside to being on a treadmill anyway.

Final Christmas Tally

I ended up exceeding my original Christmas budget of $500 and spent a total of $635. The additional spending related to a trip to Harry & David for two gift baskets. In retrospect I need to only buy one of them. I will know better next year. All in all I am not too disappointed with my Christmas spending because it was less than the most recent prior years. I did spend money on myself that I did not expect to spend, primarily the new TV for the bedroom. I guess I spent my tax refund a little early. I am still i the process of finalizing my 2008 budget and will post it later this week. I originally did not even budget for Christmas which is silly because I will spend money. Those are the type of spending categories that I need to be careful of in my budget. Here is the breakdown of where I spent my Christmas budget:

Wine Country Gift Baskets $50
Harry & David $123
Amazon.com $285
BestBuy $25
Barnes & Noble $32
Target $50
Pottery Barn $10
Cash $20
Nail World $40

Unwanted catalogs

There is a website that will let you unsubscribe from unwanted catalogs, Catalog Choice.org. Not only will it help save trees and energy by receiving fewer catalogs, but it will help curb any shopping temptations that the catalogs may bring. It takes just a few minutes to sign up and then you can go through a comprehensive listing of catalogs and decide which ones that you don’t want. What a great idea.

Flat screen TV

I succumbed to the temptation to buy a new TV. I bought a Sharp 19 inch flat screen DVD combo. I don’t really need one but I have been eyeing them for a while. I do feel a bit guilty about it but I looked at BestBuy.com today and noticed that the price for the same tv this week is $50 more and the regular price is $100 more than I paid. That takes a little guilt away. I do need to buckle down again after the new year and focus on my savings.