by Tricia
September turned out to be an awesome month in regards to our income. In July, I was given the honor of being interviewed by Scott Burns, a finance writer for the Dallas Morning News, and the article was published in August. The article brought many new visitors to my site and brought more revenue for August. The money brought in will help pay for the home repair we desperately need before winter.
Dining was higher this month, and part of that is due to a gift certificate I won for $50 (I include the gift certificate as income and I record the expense as dining). That reminds me…I have a funny story about that dining out experience.
Under the Automobile category, you will see $48 for breakdown insurance. I did end up renewing our AAA membership. We haven’t had to use it (yet), but at least it is there for an emergency.
I also spent $69 for credit reports. $50 was to renew my annual subscription that monitors my credit reports for suspicious activity. The rest was to learn a little bit more about my FICO scores.
Here’s a minor confession. You’ll see that we spent $35 under entertainment. $20 of that brought me 2 minutes of entertainment at the casino. Seriously…two minutes. I played a slot machine and I didn’t even get one winning spin. I could say it was bad luck, but I’m gonna say it was a sign to stay away from gambling from now on. I don’t go often (maybe once every two years), but I’ll just use my $20 for something else 😉
I felt the above were noteworthy items. If you look at the report and have any comments or questions, feel free to ask!
Just curious, under what category do you put the credit report expenses? I haven’t figured out where to stick it…hence the question.
Thanks,
Hi Bean Counter – I just made a new category called credit report, because it didn’t seem to fit with other categories that I use. I could probably put the annual fee under insurance if I wanted to because it does come with identity theft insurance. Hmm..perhaps I will for next year.
Is it just me or do you have about $2,276 more in income than expenses. This amount could be added to the credit card payment to decrease that amount. It does look like you are controling your expenses unless I’m missing something.
Tricia,
This is really useful for me. We have roughly the same income, and we are also a family of 3. I am really behind on figuring out my monthly budget and what we’re spending, so I don’t know how we’re doing, but I think we spend a lot more than you guys do. Great job. And I can’t wait til our diapers line and our daycare line are both zeros too! What a relief that must be. Our son will be 3 in a couple months.
And, maybe I’m missing something, but where are your housing expenses? It’s late and I’m tired–am I just missing them in the list?
Tim – that’s correct with the $2,276. Some of that goes towards the principal amounts on our debt: home loan, student loans and our car loan (which is now paid off). The rest from September was put to debt except for some that I have reserved to pay for a home repair this month.
Tiredbuthappy – I was so happy when we didn’t have to buy diapers anymore! Although I seem to be buying toilet paper more often now..hmm…
The only part of our housing expenses hitting the income and expense report is the interest we’re paying (under interest expense). The rest of the payment is reflected within our net worth. Here’s how the payment went for September:
Total payment: $323
Principal: $30
Interest: $230
Escrow: $63
Our escrow goes towards our property taxes (around $550/year) and our homeowner’s insurance ($200/year).