What are your monthly expenses....the amount you need to get by on and still live a normal life? This is the beauty of an anonymous board. We can share this type of info and no one will know who we are. We are trying to reduce our monthly expenses. My job I don't feel is secure and my spouse only works part-time. I don't feel that we live beyond our means but I would like to see how we stack up compared to others out there. We have cut out cable TV (or I should say we went down to basic cable), reduced our internet speed slightly, go out to eat less, etc) but the number still seems large: We live in NorthEast and have one child Utilities/RE and School Taxes/Groceries/Mortgage/Auto/Gas/529K/Xmas and Birthdays/house maintenance/church/haircuts, etc=$3600/Mo. Miscellaneous spending (vacations, eating out/going out, shopping, golfing, etc) = $750/Mo. So we average around $4350 per month. I should mention that our RE and School taxes are high here, unfortunatley. Our house is what I would call modest and our mortgage is less than $1000. We would love to be able to live OK on a total gross of $55K or so in these economic times but we can't once taxes, 401K, and healthcare come out of pay Would love to hear from other folks Thanks
Sounds like you have a pretty good grip on your expenses. At least you know where your money is going. Our goal is to stay out of debt and have an emergency fund readily available. One thing you want to do is keep an eye on is miscellaneous spending. A starbucks here and there, eating out too often, a couple of bottled waters a day, etc. will add up quickly. Doing a written budget every month will open your eyes and you'll find money you never knew you had. btw, our monthly overhead is around $3k a month but we have absolutely no debt, including the mortgage. We keep a $30-35k emergency fund handy rather than having credit cards. This reduces a lot of stress.
Agree. It's amazing how fast misc spending adds up. We don't let a balance roll past a month on our credit card. We always pay it off at months end. In fact, the only thing we charge is gas for personal car. Everything else we pay for with cash/check. Just helps us keep spending under control. If we can't pay cash we don't buy. Like you, we also paid off our mortgage. We still worry about everything that could go wrong in this world but we feel alot better knowing the roof over our heads is paid for,-that we'll never be 'upside down'. We keep 7 months living expense in cash in an e-money market. Month living expenses are $3500. That is taxes, utilities, groceries-absolute necessities. Then we try not to spend more than $500 per month on 'fun' stuff-like eating out, movies, travel.
Our monthly expenses are around $5000(mortgage$2200). We save around $1000 a month....we clear around $7000/mth. Debt free for a month now!!!!! Have not used credit cards in 3 years and do not miss them. The key is to keep a budget and pay with debit cards and cash...You can actually negotiate 3% discount when you pay cask. Emergency fund is around $20,000. Plan on bulking it back up now that we have moved into our new house. Now is not the time to be over spending I agree. I think your budget is on track. I found Dave Ramsey three years ago and he helped me get a handle on my debt and expenses....It's funny but once you start to budget it is like giving yourself a raise since you no longer waste money.
Very good thread. Happy to hear so many people have their acts together. Would only need about 3,600 a month (mortgage 30 year, taxes, private school, insurance, groceries, gas, etc), but we currently make triple mortgage payments. Less than 5 years left at this rate. "Live like nobody else, so someday, you can truly live like nobody else".
This website can tell you what the average person with X amount of income spends on various household categories. Does it help? www.allfinancialcalculators.com
