Budgets work

Author: Ashley

7 Jul

I’ve discussed our budget here and there before, but basically we have an Excel spreadsheet that has a bunch of categories and each category is alloted a certain amount of money. We keep our receipts and at the end of the day we “put them in the budget”. That’s how it works in theory. In reality, I keep my receipts in my wallet until it’s so full I can barely close it, and then I hand my husband a big wad of folded up receipts and ask him to figure it all out. And he does.

This month I got a lesson in the fact that budgets really do work. I was especially bad about not putting my receipts in the budget. Because of this I didn’t really know how much I had spent. I thought I was doing so good on groceries. I thought I had hardly spent anything at all. I thought we were going to be way under budget. But then the day of reckoning came when I gave my husband so many receipts it actually made my purse lighter (I kid, it wasn’t that bad). I was over budget on groceries. OVER?! How could that possibly be? Apparently I made a ton of little trips, rather than just a few big ones. Those little trips tricked me because they are easy to forget about. And since I thought I was doing so good I think I splurged on some things I wouldn’t have purchased if I had known how close to the limit I was. That’s how it happened.

So that’s proof that, in this house at least, budgets work. So I’ve been trying to do better this month. So far so good.

Filed under: life

6 Responses for "Budgets work"

Bruce "the tax guy" July 7th, 2008 at 11:05 am 1
A hard lesson. At least to learn it in that manner.
Yes budgets work, and not in just your house.
The key and the flaw are the same.
It only works if you use it.
Most don’t keep up with it.

Don’t feel bad we don’t keep up with ours either.
Ashley July 7th, 2008 at 11:31 am 2
To Bruce: Yeah, normally it is fine. I was just extra lazy last month for some reason. It was only a few dollars over, I just thought we were going to be under. This is a good time to get motivated to keep up with it better.
Mrs. Micah July 7th, 2008 at 11:41 am 3
One thing I do now is use my online statements to transfer most of the information (how much I spent where). It works quite well as long as I a) don’t wait so long I forget what category it goes into and b) don’t have to split up the purchase into multiple categories. Means less messing with receipts.
moneyloveandchange July 7th, 2008 at 9:26 pm 4
Groceries have been a killer for us as well, so don’t feel too bad! I am about $20 over every week, and I am not sure how to plug the leak. Actually, if my son will start using the potty, that would help!
Ashley July 7th, 2008 at 10:17 pm 5
To Mrs Micah: That’s a good idea. I like to use the receipts so that I know for sure what has been put in the budget and what hasn’t been. If it’s in my wallet it’s not in the budget. If I was better about doing it every night like I should then the online thing is a good way to go about it. Then you don’t have to worry about whether or not you got a receipt.

To Money love: Yeah, I can’t wait for that. My son has been leaking through the biggest size of the store brand, so we are going to try name brand next. Hopefully soon we will be out of them for good.
InDebtToo July 8th, 2008 at 7:01 am 6
Food and home improvements seem to be the money sinks for us. We’ve been doing better on the home improvements expenses lately, but struggling with the food still. We do weekly or twice-monthly meal planning which helps a LOT but still manage to end up with a few too many extras. I suppose I do best when I have the meal planning done, then do online grocery shopping. Not sure if that’s an option in the US, but in the UK all the major grocery stores deliver for a reasonable fee (the fee is way less than the extra food I’d end up buying if I go to the store). So I guess I need to get back on track with meal planning/online groceries.