One Million and Beyond

Week in Review (August 3-9)

August 12th, 2009

This past couple weeks has been incredibly busy as you can tell by my lack of posting. Our close friends got married this past weekend which meant that on top of the usual running around we had a lot more to do in the weeks leading up to the wedding day. I wasn’t part of the wedding party but my wife was which translated into my helping her out so she could put some time towards the wedding. The net result was that we ended up spending a lot more than we would have liked but it was for a great cause and our friends wedding went off without a hitch. Now that this event is behind us I would like get back to the usual routine, hopefully at a slightly slower pace.

I have to say that the wedding did make me reflect on life in general; we put so much effort into things that don’t matter yet not nearly enough time into the things that do. I thought about my own wedding a couple years back and realized that I myself am a fairly laid back person but even I get caught up in the craziness of it all. I also thought more about the rat race that I am a member of and how much I would enjoy not being entirely reliant on the ‘daily grind’ to pay for everything.

The whole concept of the rat race is tied to the fact that we need to have the constant flow of money in order to keep everything moving along, in order to pay our debts, pay our mortgage and essentially pay to live. I’ve also been re-reading Timothy Ferriss’ book The 4-Hour Work Week which has rekindled my desire to not be forced to work. Although I’ve never reviewed the book or gone through the exercises in detail it is one the books that has made the biggest impact on me in recent years. I think it might be time to investigate what Tim accomplished and wrote about in a bit more detail.

Overall this weekend was just a small reminder of why its important for me to keep at the finances and debt reduction and that although I am still not 100% clear on what I want other than being in the rat race I do know I don’t want to be in it anymore.

Posted in 2009, Commentary, Weekly Budgets | No Comments

Saving Idea – Reuse

July 31st, 2009

I beleieve that in North America we have been conditioned to consume and throw out. When we purchase a product we use it and when it gets a little old we toss it and get a better model. Take a look at your cell phone, if you have one, did you replace it within the last year or two? Chances are that you did and your old cell phone was still perfectly functional; it was replaced simply because there was a better model out there for us to use. Rather than simply buying new all the time this weeks saving idea suggests that we reuse some of the items that we throw out. I will not pretend to be any different from other consumers, I too buy products when I might not NEED them. But I do try to reuse whenever possible.

A perfect example of this occured for me a couple years ago when my friend was moving out of town. He was never big on cell phones and didn’t have his own. Because of the move he was contemplating getting one. When he told me this I offered to give him an old cell phone of mine. I had purchased it as part of a pay as you go package. I changed packages and cell phone carriers a couple months after making the purchase and had kept the phone. In the end I gave my friend the phone and he’s still using it. We were able to reuse an item that would otherwise have cost him a bunch of money.

Opportunities to reuse items are all around us and it doesn’t have to be for big ticket items only. We have jars of rice at home that were once salsa jars; this keeps the rice protected and from spilling. I could have purchased special jars or containers for this but why when I had some perfectly good containers available. Printed pieces of paper have been turned into little scraps for notes so they can be reused before they are recycled. Getting into the mindset of reusing items isn’t always easy because we are so used to buy use and throw out that we don’t even realize that something might have a second use or could be useful for someone else..

Saving ideas are posted on Fridays as suggestions on how you could save yourself some money. If you have a saving idea send it along to matt@onemillionandbeyond.com.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | 1 Comment

Weekly Budget – Week 30 (July 27 – Aug 2)

July 27th, 2009

Life is back to normal this week, the baby is back home and we’re grateful that she is. Had you asked me what I would have thought of my daughter leaving for a week a couple years ago I would probably have looked at you funny. First off a couple years ago there was no baby in the picture and only discussions of one so I would never have conceived my life changing so much. While it doesn’t mean that life is slower nor any less hectic if anything more so but the priorities are a bit different. Unfortunately as this month has shown I am still struggling with a few of the same demons financially. Here is this week’s budget:

Its been a few weeks since I started my weekly budgeting back up again and I am starting to understand where my money is going far better. I know there are a few of you out there ready to throttle me because its rather obvious. For as much as you are correct I wanted to take the slower approach to getting to the bigger picture. I knew I spent too much on smoking and drinking and watching my spending has pointed out just how much. I didn’t try changing my lifestyle in some vain attempt to get everything under control. Convince a hard core smoker or coffee drinker to quit cold turkey without any preparation – my only comment is good luck if you have to live with them.

My goal with this month was not to dramatically alter my spending but to get a strong understanding of where I was spending my money and for the most part it was going where I thought it was. I didn’t think I spent over 16% of my total expenses on the car or some form of transportation; that was a bit of a surprise. The food and housing costs were where I was expecting them – give or take. Now that I really have the bigger picture in August I will start curbing some of the unnecessary spending; in order to get under my budget from week to week. This won’t be perfect by any stretch of the imagination but I think it would be nice to cut back on some of the smoking and drinking spending and put that either onto the credit cards or into investments.

Speaking of investments although I might have had limited success this month with the budgeting I did suceed in one thing and that is to start setting aside some money even if a tiny portion. I’m paying myself first – even if its very little. One has to start somewhere.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | 1 Comment

Week in Review (July 20-26)

July 27th, 2009

This past week was a bit of a strange week for my wife and I because our baby daughter spent the week with her grandparents at a cottage. Most parents have no problem with the grandparents looking after their child for a week. Many of my favorite summer memories come from weeks spent with my grandparents. There is one difference – I remember these weeks where our daughter is still a baby. It was sad not to have her there and nice to be able to sleep a little. The spending this week was different from most weeks because the food budget was not consumed by grocery bills but by eating out a couple times (mostly because we rarely get a chance). Here are this weeks numbers:

When you look at the bottom line I was over budget and there’s nothing that can change that fact; now the good thing was I was only $90 over budget. Unfortunately I was $90 over budget. But this was a week of spending the way I used, eating out rather than cooking and driving a lot more than I do now. The net result was we spent money where we normally don’t spend money. It was nice for a week to have some fun and eat out but at the same time I forgot just how expensive it was and we just ate out! I can only imagine what it would have been had we gone and ‘partied’ as we did in our twenties.

Now onto the other categories, it seems that I spent less on smokes and drinks than I have in the past couple weeks or at least these were moderately under control which was nice. I did forget to include money for miscellaneous items and I purposely left the baby item empty. While I spent in both areas the misc items were a lot less than they have been which was rather nice.

The net conclusion from this past week? While it was nice to be a little spontaneous I missed my daughter and wouldn’t trade randomly going out to dinner for seeing her smile before at the end of a day of work. And although I do enjoy going out to dinner once in a while I don’t enjoy the prices anymore. I have slowly turned into a practical parent type and I’m glad for for it. Now I just need to become the out of debt practical parent type.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | No Comments

Week in Review (July 13-19)

July 22nd, 2009

Last week was a very expensive week for me in that I was playing a little catch up with my bills. The net result is that I spent almost two thousand dollars last week. Other than the bills I spent a bit too much money on a few items but before I get into the details here are last weeks final numbers:

My bills ended up being a bit less than originally budgeted simply because I was guestimating one of them to be $140 and it turned out to be $115 when the amount came out of my bank account. This was a pleasant surprise. What was an unpleasant surprise was my spending in pretty much every other category with alcohol spending being the largest surpise. I spent nearly double my budgeted amount on this; other than simply purchasing more expensive items and a bit more than we would normally buy I can’t see any reason why this ended up going up so much. We purchased a bit more because we went up north to a cottage and got some for everyone but this wouldn’t account for the large discrepancy. This will be an item that needs a lot more attention going forward.

The gas costs and food costs were higher than I expected and this is simply due to the trip to the cottage, although this cost is coming up again this week overall the extra spending here is what I would call within acceptable limits.

Another item that is now visible on the list that was not included in previous weeks is an investment category. I have decided that I need to start setting aside some money in mutual funds every pay or I will likely spend the money on day to day living expenses. A $50 bi-weekly contribution isn’t significant but it will add up over time.

Overall I’m a little surprised at my spending and I’m also glad that I have been focusing on my weekly budgets so much because I am starting to realize why I have been living beyond my means. This weeks budget is less of a data collection activity and more of a target for each of the line items. I think the hardest item to meet will be the alcohol spending simply because it seems we spend way too much money on it.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | 4 Comments

Weekly Budget – Week 30 (July 20 – 26)

July 20th, 2009

This week’s weekly budget will be a bit back to normal numbers since almost all of my bills were paid last week. The middle and the end of every month always see spikes in my spending which is why I have leaned towards avoiding displaying that information in the past. I have done a preliminary review from last week and it seems that with the exception of the alcohol item I am starting to fall within what seems to be a normal range. Here is this weeks budget:

This will be the last week where I am simply collecting information, I am pretty comfortable knowing how much I spend from week to week and how a change in my weekly routine will affect my budget. This week will also be a bit of a test to see if I will be able to maintain my food and alchol spending as those seem to be the items that are both often over budget and items that could be decreased.

Another item of note is that because the little one is with the grandparents this week we won’t have any baby related expenses; to offset any possible expenses with the baby will be the fact that my wife are going to go out once or twice to treat ourselves. I know that this is something that should be avoided when trying to stick to a budget but we haven’t treated ourselves in months and from time to time its worth it. I’ll be posting my review of last weeks spending later on this evening.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | No Comments

Weekly Budget – Week 29 (July 13-19)

July 13th, 2009

This weeks budget might look a bit surprising for a few people and that’s mostly because of one thing, the middle of the month. I’m like a lot of people that I know and the middle of the month is when I have a fair amount of regular bills coming out. This month is no different and surprisingly most of my pay which is also the middle of the month will be gone. Without further adieu here is this upcoming weeks budget:

I have adjusted the alcohol section to be a bit more reflective of what is spent, I know its not ideal but I am still trying to figure out where all my spending really is. I’d rather adjust the expected spending for this week to see if in fact that is how much I spend on alcohol. If it is then we’ll have to do something about decreasing the amount. Other than that this upcoming weekend we’re going to be taking the little one up north which explains the increase in gas costs. Again not condusive with spending less than I make but this was a planned trip and the cost of not going is considerably higher (babysitting costs).

At the end of this week I should start getting a better sense for my spending again and where the typical levels are at for things like smokes, transportation, alcohol. My bills will fluctuate and I’m aware of that but I would like to get a better sense of where everything else lies so I can start planning and adjusting properly. The goal in the next few weeks will be to bring my expenses below my income.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | No Comments

Week in Review (June 6 – 12)

July 12th, 2009

This past week has been a good first week and I was able to keep up with the daily updates. I am glad that I decided to keep the table for the week updated daily; I feel if I was to kept everything till the end of the week I would not have been as on top of it. Additionally I was able to see the spending and realize if I was going over and what I could do to mitigate the problem going forward. Now onto this weeks results:

Although I ended up being under budget not everything was rosy. First off I didn’t pay nearly as much to bills as I would have liked; this was as a result of cash flow more than anything else. The reality is that if I were to pay the full amount that I had budgeted I would have ended up risking not having money on hand for incidental issues. Other than paying less towards my bills I ended up paying a bit less than expected for food, the reason for this was that my wife paid for a bunch of the groceries and we didn’t buy everything we needed. The net result is less money spent but we’ll have to buy more in the upcoming week.

Now for the areas where I did spend more, transportation and alcohol. The first of these two is not a big issue since spending more on transit tickets this week means I’ll pay a bit less next week. As for the alcohol, I took a guestimate on how much money I spend on booze during the week. It seems that I was off which is a little surprising. I like to have a drink in the evenings and although we don’t drink a lot the cost adds up. I think this upcoming week I will adjust for the real cost and try capping it and sticking to that cap. As far as I see there are a couple options with this, one adjust for the spending and make sure its not a problem (aka keep the lifestyle) and the second option is to lower the consuption or spending.

As I said good first week; now its time to budget for the upcoming week and be more accurate with all of the categories.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | No Comments

Weekly Budget – A revitalization

July 7th, 2009

Over the past couple years I have been trying to get myself into a weekly budget with some limited success. The primary reason for the lack of success has been motivation, lack of effort on my part and being too busy. I guess the first and third just feed into the lack of effort to some extent. Since my post on Saturday about refocusing on my finances I took a look at my spending and although I haven’t completed the exercise I have realized that I am back to my overspending ways.

My solution to budgeting has been the weekly budget – I am convinced that this is a solution that can be applied easily and is a small enough piece that can be managed without too much effort. In my efforts to finally get my finances under control I am going back to the weekly budget. This weeks budget will be a touch on the off side because some of my spending (aka bills) has been predetermined or already spent.

Here is my weekly budget for this week:

For the most part this is similar to the weekly budgets that I have kept in the past though I have added a new category for bills. I have always kept this one separate in the guise of keeping some of my finances to myself. The reality of the situation is that if you asked me I would tell you so why not place it on the blog.

I am keeping the alcohol and smokes on this as separate categories for the time being though I am hoping to cut them down and generally eliminate them. But as Leo Babauta recommends in his book Power of Less the Power of Less one goal at a time. I’ll post about this later in the week. For this week the goal is to simply create a budget and stick within it.

I have managed to keep myself in check over the past two days with my spending and keeping track of it and I intend to continue this. I will try to keep my spending updated throughout the day and hopefully at the very least daily.

If you’re curious I’ll be updating this page with my current week’s results: Weekly Budgets

Finally I would like to make a comment, I know this budget seems high for some of you but I would like you to keep a few things in mind:

1. I live in a large city so my day to day costs are more expensive than most peoples
2. I have a baby that will require unexpected spending
3. I have debts that are weighing me down so my bills will be high for a while
4. This budget represents my budget but will include household costs so some line items may seem disproportionately high
5. Finally, this budget is a work in progress

I am hoping to keep to my budget this week and improve it over the next couple weeks as well as refine what it is that I am spending my money on.

Posted in 2009, Budgeting and Planning, Weekly Budgets | No Comments

Weekly Budget – Week 20

May 10th, 2009

When it comes to these weekly budgets I have kept my finances completely separate from my wife’s. The budgets that I have been posting have been my weekly spending and that is mostly because she’s a private person that doesn’t share her financial information. We share our spending and one week I might give a bit more to the grocery spending than she does and vice versa. I think going forward I am going to start including mostly my spending but at times hers as well. There is no reason to keep things like grocery spending completely separated.

Here is my budget for this week:

This is definitely an increase from my typical budget. I have mixed a couple categories that were somewhat divided before. The biggest one is food, this upcoming week I expect that I will pay for the groceries and even if I don’t this is approximately what we’ve been spending for the three of us every week. This does include food and stuff for the baby.

Other than that I’ve allocated approximately $50 for alcohol which is an unnecessary expense but we have a long weekend coming up and it’s nice to have a beer or two when we get home from work and after the baby is asleep. I know that there is room for improvement in this budget but at the moment we are able to work this budget.

Question for my Readers

How do you handle items in your budget that are unnecessary but fall into the quality of life category? For example having a beer or some wine with dinner, unnecessary but if you enjoy something like this being forced to remove it becomes an issue of quality of life.

Posted in 2009, Weekly Budgets | 3 Comments

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