by Claire
I’ve taken some time and put together a partial 2013 spending plan. I say partial b/c I am currently not sure what my 2013 take home pay is actually going to work out to be because I made a lot of changes to help me with taxes, I now have my health insurance taken out, the reversing of the payroll tax “discount,” etc. I was using the fact that I will not know my exact take home pay beginning in January 2013 as an excuse for not setting up a budget for my “spending money.” I caught myself using that excuse so here I am to just get started.
By way of information for new readers, I’m in a good place with knowing my regular monthly bills and laid out those constants in a post about a month ago but it is those little here and there spending items that kept getting me and that I did not have a plan for. I just had weekly spending money that had to cover things that came up. That isn’t a great way to manage your money I have learned and so I’m trying to lay out something super specific. My readers have challenged me to do so and while I’m thankful, I’m also a little cranky. 🙂 I don’t like getting this specific which is exactly why I must do it.
I’ve decided to go with the cash in envelopes system to start on these items. The “use my spending money” method is far too lenient. I cannot keep track of what I am spending in that manner. So, from each paycheck I will set aside cash in envelopes for these items:
Kid incidental spending (from this will come field trip fees, school pictures, fundraising contributions, teacher gifts, birthday gifts for parties they attend): $20. Looking back at this year’s spending it appears that January and February will be light on the spending for kid incidentals so I should be able to set aside $80-$100 as a good start on this fund. (After re-reading the list you will see below I can already see that this category is too broad. I’ll re-work it but am leaving it here as the learning tool it might be for a reader).
Clothing budget for me: $25 per paycheck. I received clothing as gifts (or gift cards that I can use toward clothing) so I am good on clothes and shoes for at least 3, probably 6, months.
Beauty Budget: $25 per paycheck. Since beginning the blog I have dramatically reduced my spending at the hair salon. I mean DRAMATICALLY. This fund will be for my now twice a year visits for a good cut and color as well as the cheap in between hair coloring I do at home. I now use grocery store shampoo (but wash my hair much less frequently than I used to) and since that adds up to $15.00 about every six weeks (for the shampoo, conditioner and hair mousse), I incorporate that into my grocery budget. This fund will also cover my twice a year make up purchases as well although I’m pretty low maintenance on the make up front.
Car Maintenance: I’m setting aside $20 per paycheck to save up for somewhat major maintenance should it arise–oh and tires and brakes. The vehicle I am driving has oil changes for life covered as well as the basic maintenance check. This fund will be for the bigger stuff but I a pray that b/c my mileage use is SO low that this fund will not be needed much.
Okay I know this isn’t an all-inclusive list and I have distance to go on thinking about what items I need a separate line in the budget for, so I remembered a long time ago I had saved a list from a website that I now cannot recall the name of (apologies!) and somehow I dug it up. I share it with you below as food for thought for myself AND anyone out there who may need help like I do in capturing where the money goes! I am going to use this list by starting to delete those that don’t apply. I sometimes feel like I am standing in mud and cannot move when I try to think about these budget items.
- Airline fares (and the luggage fees).
- Alcohol (you may include this in dining out, but I would separate this from your grocery budget if you buy for take-home).
- Alimony paid in or out.
- Allowances (his, hers, kids …).
- Appliances.
- Baby formula or breastfeeding supplies.
- Bank fees (such as when you order checks, use an out-of-network ATM, have debit card access fees, or pay a check-cashing fee).
- Batteries.
- Birthday gifts.
- Bus fares.
- Cable or satellite TV.
- Car insurance.
- Car payment and / or car purchase fund.
- Car registration fees (including the driver license renewal fees).
- Car repair and maintenance.
- Cash assistance.
- Child support paid in or out.
- Christmas gifts.
- Cleaning services.
- Cleaning supplies.
- Clothing.
- Coffee shop.
- College fund.
- Computer and office supplies.
- Condo or neighborhood association fees.
- Coupons and rebates.
- Credit card payments.
- Day care and babysitter fees.
- Dental insurance.
- Diapers.
- Dinners out.
- Donations to church, non-profit or charity.
- Dry cleaning.
- Electric bill.
- Emergency fund.
- Fast food.
- Fitness center or gym membership.
- Fuel for the car.
- Furniture purchases or repair.
- Garden supplies.
- Greeting cards.
- Groceries.
- Grocery assistance (such as you receiving food stamps or buying groceries for a family member.)
- Haircuts, manicures, spa treatments.
- Health insurance.
- Hobbies.
- Holiday candy and flowers (Valentine’s Day, Easter, Halloween …).
- Home maintenance and repair.
- Income taxes paid or refund received.
- Income tax preparation fees.
- Internet service.
- Investments.
- Landline phone.
- Laundry service (as in coin-operated machines or drop-off laundry service).
- Lawn care.
- Legal expenses.
- Life insurance.
- Medical co-pay and deductible expenses.
- Medical insurance payments.
- Mortgage – primary.
- Mortgage – secondary or home line of credit.
- Movie tickets or DVD purchases.
- Museum, park and zoo passes.
- Natural gas, propane or heating oil bill.
- Newspapers, books and magazine subscriptions.
- Nuisance (aka annoying expenses). Yes, I did see that category on a budget list once!
- Over-the-counter medications.
- Parking passes and parking fees.
- Payroll – regular.
- Payroll – overtime.
- Payroll – bonus or holiday pay.
- Payroll – severance pay.
- Personal care products.
- Pet expenses.
- Photo printing.
- Postage.
- Property taxes.
- Property insurance.
- Rent.
- Retirement fund.
- Satellite radio.
- School lunches.
- Sewer bill or septic tank maintenance.
- Shoes.
- Snacks.
- Sports, club and activity fees and equipment (I should be able to save some money on equipment from Goalie Monkey).
- Sports event tickets.
- Student loan payments.
- Taxi fares.
- Textbooks.
- Theater or concert tickets.
- Tobacco.
- Toiletries.
- Trash and recycling bill.
- Tuition and class fees.
- Turnpike and bridge tolls.
- Uniforms for work, school, scouts, or sports teams.
- Union dues.
- Unemployment benefits.
- Vacations.
- Vision insurance.
- Water bill.
- Wireless phone (including texting and data plans).
- Wedding plans.
- Work lunches.
- Yearbook photos.
Born and raised in Texas. I’ve at least driven through every state in the US courtesy of a roadtrip loving Dad.
I’m single with two children and a good parenting relationship with their father.
I am a “life is just half full of funny” kinda gal. Humor is my saving grace and I am thankful for it every single day. I have a strong Catholic faith and am thankful for that foundation.
I read a lot for a living but still enjoy a good book. I love biographies but in recent years have found the need for fun fictional books–sadly, for a long time I just didn’t enjoy fiction!
I love live theatre of any kind–from local productions to Broadway.
I love to scrapbook and pride myself in my kids’ albums.
I love being a mom but also love my career. I’m blessed to have found a balance allowing me to be at everything my kids need and want me to be at–while also having a career.
Favorite Quotes: Well behaved women rarely make history.
Behold the turtle. He makes progress only when he sticks his neck out. -James Bryant Conant
What you have written is a great start on discretionary items. I would cut down on the list below your post by 75%. It is way to detailed. I use Quicken and still keep my categories to a minimum. The less categories, the more likely someone would keep track.
Ah, the envelope system. Good call.
I plan to use this one myself. Good luck getting your budget together and continuing to pay off debt.
This is AWESOME! I know you think it sucks (and it does kinda especially short term) but it’s a huge step! I’m debating on how to manage things better too so thanks for that list. New idea: the first day of the new year is to get organized, not to nurse a hangover! 😉
Well done! I think I will be using this. Been following you for awhile – and think you are doing a fantastic job !
Just a suggestion on the clothing budget. Perhaps set a limit on how much you accumulate. If you set aside $25/pay but have no spending for many months, perhaps start redirecting the $25 to debt reduction once the clothing budget has reached $x dollars. If you can make do with your current wardrobe longer than aniticpated there is really no need to continue setting aside those funds once you reach a certain point.
You wrote about refreshing your wardrobe only a few months ago, so I’m surprised there is already a need for more purchases. I’m not sure what could be causing additional items to be needed again in 3-6 months? If you did dirty physical work, or were in the middle of a significant career or weight change there might be an ongoing need for clothing. I realize it’s a personal choice, but I’ve always felt that setting a budget for clothing (or any discretionary item), puts you in the mindset that you now are “preapproved” to spend that amount on a regular basis, whether the need truly exists or not. If you had enough suitable clothing yesterday and nothing wore out or was damaged while you slept, then nothing has changed today. I know this is taking it to extremes but clothing is something we need but can easily let slip beyond necessity.
I realize in your line of work, appearance is important. I also stick to a wardrobe of classic/timeless styles. Nothing trendy. No weird colors, so everything goes with everything else. I only replace when something wears out, so it’s always one in and one out in my closet. For 2013 I’m planning to replace a belt and one work blouse. That’s it unless something is unexpectedly damaged. In preparation for these items, at Christmas I asked for a gift card to my favorite store, so I actually have no planned spending on clothing this year.
I completely understand that $25/pay is likely cutting way back from what you used to spend, I’m just suggesting that once you’ve accumulated a couple of hundred ready for both a need and a deal, perhaps the funds would be better redirected to the debt rather than continuing to pile up.
Years ago when we first set up a budget, determined to control where the money went I assumed clothing was a reasonable line item to include. In reality, month after month passed without spending it I realized it was just a make work project. At first I would push those allocated funds to the next month on my spreadsheet. When the money went unspent for several months, I just started deleting that row if it wasn’t spent, knowing the same amount was in the plan the following month if it was needed. Now I don’t even bother putting a clothing amount in for any of us. Most of our annual replacements can be covered as part of Christmas and BD gifts and anything else is so insignificant it can be covered the week it happens, and I just have slightly fewer dollars that week for the extra mortgage payment I make every Friday.
I’ve lost 20 pounds in the last three months. It’s slowly coming back on but my profession does demand clothing that fits. I don’t like to shop for clothes and honestly do not have a lot. A friend was recently amazed by my closet. I should take a picture and post. I buy only classics but I lose weight when I stress…and I don’t need to look like I’m swimming in my work clothes as I try to get through a stressful time.
Ah, that make sense. Needing more clothing again so soon didn’t seem logical. Since the need for a different size is temporary, could you borrow a few things from someone who is pregnant or on maternity leave? Skirts in straight, simple styles can often easily be taken in temporarily and let out again in the future.
Ah…I like this. I need to ask around. I also could benefit from taking some things in for tailoring BUT I have a HECK of a time fitting those tasks into my schedule. No excuses. I need to figure out how to get the stuff taken in (or even taken to a friend who can sew) and then picked up again. Thanks JMK!
theres a girl in austin who does house calls and also DIY alterations workshops. if you have enough items i bet she’d make a trip
I swear, I’m not a spammer, but may I suggest Dave Ramsey’s cash flow forms as a way to get started? They can be found here: http://www.daveramsey.com/tools/budget-forms/. We use the monthly cash flow plan. For our needs, it has enough details, without being quite as overwhelming as the list at the end of this post.
great start. on the exhaustive list – its only result will be to exhaust you! it’s good to be sure you are covering everything, but i bet you can combine some categories and get it down to 10-15 overall categories per month, with many of these being auto-debit payments (like rent, auto insurance, etc.).
One example: you can combine gas, auto insurance, tires, brakes, tolls, registration, and car payments in to one category (or maybe 3). Utilities can be another combined category.
I’m not going to use that list Adam. It IS too exhaustive. I put it out there as food for thought for myself and others. I find it difficult to come up with the categories which, I am realizing, leads to more spending. I’ve already deleted those that don’t apply but also found some that didn’t occur to me (like pet costs, for example). Dumb that this is so challenging for me but I am sure I am not alone. In fact, people’s reluctance to sit down and go through this painful process is what leads to the overspending! Lessons learned.
one more thing i thought of – my starting point (and i suspect most people’s), is my take-home pay. so my retirement saving, health insurance, life insurance, taxes, and even my gym membership, are automatically deducted from my paycheck, and i don’t worry about putting those in the budget. that helps me simplify even more and i don’t have to do a bunch of math for money i never see anyway.
This is what I do as well. I used to track my gross pay and all the deductions, but it drove me batty! Especially since the withholding amounts would fluctuate by a few pennies every few weeks.
I wouldn’t dare try to track my gross pay. I just don’t know what my new take home is going to be yet. I’ll get my first paycheck for 2013 on January 11. My health insurance, new federal withholdings, flexible spending account amounts and the elimination of spousal and stepchildren coverage will all hit on this check. I’ve guesstimated very conservatively but until the 11th I won’t know for certain.
That detailed list makes my head spin and I like numbers! I did my 2013 budget which includes the detail (just not that many categories, lol). I try to keep broad categories and use my actual spending to figure out if I needed some of the other categories.
Try not to get too overwhelmed with the budget. Stick to your basic goals and then realize that you can always amend your budget and add new categories over time, even annually is fine. I find it’s easier to make smaller changes over time instead of excpecting to come up with the perfect budget day 1. You are making good progress; hang in there.
Making a 2013 spending plan is a great idea! So is the envelope system! I’m going to try this!