by Hope
When I first began interviewing for my new job, I knew I was going to have to negotiate a salary. And for the first time ever, I left my heart out of it. I did not focus on how much the business could afford or being reasonably priced to get the job.
I knew I wanted this job. But I also have finally learned my own worth. I have 20+ years experience in my field, extensive amounts of study, skills, certifications, and testimonials. I bring a lot to the table professionally.
But I have always SUCKED at figuring out what to charge for my services. And notoriously I have low balled because of my empath tendencies and lack of confidence, but I was determined not to do that this time. Or ever again.
So I started with a budget. In an ideal world, pie in the sky, what do I NEED to bring home and what do I WANT to bring home financially. Obviously, we all want to bring home a million dollars a year. Or even $200,000. However, this budget was based on my needs and then my wants. And being reasonable.
This is what I came up with.
| Ongoing Expenses | |
|---|---|
| Payee | Monthly Amt |
| Mortgage | $1,014 |
| Utilities | $350 |
| Internet | $77 |
| Phone | $61 |
| Gas | $80 |
| Food | $400 |
| Dog | $160 |
| Netflix | $23 |
| Pandora | $5 |
| Cloud Storage | $6 |
| Car Insurace | $500 |
| Spending | $200 |
| Quarterly | Monthly Amt |
| Pest Control | $27 |
| Car Maintenance | $100 |
| Annual | Monthly Amt |
| Siteground | $30 |
| Domains | $12 |
| Social Curator | $25 |
| Elementor | $17 |
| Microsoft Office | $9 |
| Dog Health | $100 |
| Ongoing Mo Expenses | $3,196 |
| Debt Pymts | $2,744 |
| Monthly Must Have | $5,940 |
| Savings Goals | Monthly Amt |
| Christmas | $167 |
| Kid's Birthdays | $84 |
| Travel | $417 |
| New Car | $300 |
| Move | $500 |
| Savings Goal | $1,468 |
| Monthly Want to Have | $7,408 |
Ideal Income
This led me to the starting point of my salary negotiation.
I must make $3,196 for just day to day living expenses + $2,744 to keep making minimum+ payments on my debt (i.e. make progress to paying it off) = $5,940 per month take home pay.
I want to make an additional $1,468 per month to hit my savings goals, which equaled $7,408 per month in take home pay.
Knowing that I needed to leave room for negotiation and being a contractor which adds additional taxes to my income, I started my salary negotiation at $10,000 per month. And praying to hit $8,000.
As we talked hours, availability, job description, terms, we finally settled on the $6,000 figure for 20 hours per week per month for 6 months.
I was so freaking happy after this past year. And so immensely proud of myself.
The Start of Something New
I am now two weeks into my new role, and I LOVE it. My brain is being challenged again. I am getting to help build a team. And we are striving to hit BIG GOALS. And the owner/my boss is an amazing human to work for and someone I really admire professionally. (We worked together several years ago.)
I am praying that this role will continue, but it is certainly dependent on me meeting some lofty goals. I’m up for it though. But either way, I just know that this is the start of something new for me. And the mental health affect of this new job, challenge, especially after last year has been amazing. It’s so nice to be so motivated and hopeful again.
If you are an expert at salary negotiation, I would love your feedback. Because I am really bad at it. Really bad. But this was a really big step for me.
Hope is a creative, solutions-focused business manager helping clients grow their business and work more efficiently by leveraging expertise in project management, digital marketing, & tech solutions. She’s recently become an empty nester as her 5 foster/adoptive kids have spread their wings. She lives with her 5 dogs in a small town in NE Georgia and prefers the mountains to the beaches any day. She struggles with the travel bug and is doing her best to help each of her kids as their finish schooling and become independent (but it’s hard!) She has run her own consulting company for almost twenty years! Hope began sharing her journey with the BAD community in the Spring of 2015 and feels like she has finally in a place to really focus on making wise financial decisions.
I think you need a line item in savings for taxes.
I thought your monthly car insurance was $1200– $7200 every 6 months? Why are you only paying $500/mo? Are the kids contributing to it?
At this point, I don’t think you should be saving over $400/mo for travel. You drained all your emergency funds and had to refinance your mortgage to save your house. Your current salary is only guaranteed for 6 months. Travel is a luxury you can’t afford, literally, right now.
What is $500 for “move” each month?
I’m pleased you negotiated a solid salary—I hope that you save and spend it carefully.
This is a “In an ideal world, pie in the sky, what do I NEED to bring home and what do I WANT to bring home financially” budget. Not the current reality. This was an exercise, a tool to determine where I should start with salary negotiations.
Hope! I’m glad you were able to negotiate but these numbers are wrong. You have $500 a month for insurance which is less than half what you said in the prior post. Can you please tell us why your mortgage has increased by 50% from the $650 is was before?
The increase of the mortgage is the result of a negotiation last fall to roll my arrears into a new loan agreement. In addition to rolling the past due amounts and a couple of future payments into the terms, I shortened the loan life from the traditional 30 years.
This budget was an exercise, a “dream budget” to help me start salary negotiations.
If that is the case will the payment go back to $650 when you are caught up? If that’s the case and you can get your car insurance under control you will have a way better situation.
why would you shorten your home loan to make your mortgage payment higher when you’re having difficulty paying each month? what are we missing?
It was the offer that was acceptable and got what I needed…
I have to ask, what is in the spending category? 200 a month seems like a lot for someone who does not have stable employment. I also thought you had just mentioned your car insurance being 1200 a month? As well as the mortgage being suddenly increased with no reasoning? All I have looking at this budget is a lot of questions, and not a lot of answers.
As I mentioned at the beginning of this post this is “In an ideal world, pie in the sky, what do I NEED to bring home and what do I WANT to bring home financially” budget. It does not reflect the current reality.
Hope, your numbers don’t compute. $3,916 + $2,744 equals $6,660, not $5,940. Another $1,468 brings it to $8,128. Even before you add your estimated taxes (which hopefully you are budgeting for monthly), you are far below your projected expenses. Please make that make sense. In looking at your expenses, several things stand out. First is that your listed expenses total $2,876. So what is the other $1,040 you say is part of your ongoing expenses? What have you failed to tell us about? The second is the mortgage, which has gone from $650 to $1,014, but you have been asked about this multiple times and refused to answer so it is what it is. The third is your food, which you list as a fairly realistic $400, but which is four times your previous claim that you spend $100 on food. Lastly, can you explain the car insurance? $500 a month is not anywhere near the $7,342/six months’ figure you gave us in an earlier post. Are the children paying for theirs? Please understand that the lack of transparency is a source of frustration for BAD readers. And when the numbers don’t add up it’s doubly frustrating.
Good catch, I transposed the numbers in the text, but not in the table.
And this was an exercise to begin salary notifications…”In an ideal world, pie in the sky, what do I NEED to bring home and what do I WANT to bring home financially” budget. It certainly doesn’t reflect my current reality.
Now that you have estimated what you would LOVE to have per month, it is time to toss that and start over with real numbers. Get rid of the 400 a month for traveling right now, the 500 for “move”, the 167 for gifts… you should be paying off those cards so you can afford this stuff later! you know now that you can do meaningful holidays/birthdays without spending 3012!
Hope, if you pay off the debt, you’ll have the 2744 a MONTH! I challenge you to make a barebones budget to pay off the debt and see how far you’ve gotten in 6 months!
Hope, no one cares about your “ideal world” nonsense, we want you to face reality and post real numbers.
Your “pie in the sky” budget needs to inclide saving for retirement. ANYTHING. Just start SOMEWHERE.
Also salary negotiations should be based on researching the market rate for your skills, not your petsonal budget.
Since we’re talking an ideal hypothetical scenario, where is your health insurance and retirement savings? You have dog health savings, but none for yourself. I’m also certain that your kids would rather you invest in your own retirement/health costs than splurge for Christmas and birthdays. $50 per kid in cash for birthday and Christmas is more than sufficient. If you’re still gifting your parents/siblings/random other people, then it’s way past time to put an end to that tradition as well. If you want to do something small that is extra around Christmas time, then spend it out of your $200/month sundry cash fund.
you don’t need a pie in the sky, you need a budget for what costs are not what you want or believe. You need to live in the real world not just make up numbers.
You need to stop with these theoretical budgets, playing games with paying off debt, and actually buckle down and DO IT.
Do you not see that this is the root of your problem? That you seem entirely incapable of operating in reality?
It may be an exercise but it still should include emergency fund, health and retirement! You need savings for those things, not thousands for Christmas, travel, a new car and a move! None of them are listed.
Guys, Hope was asking for our help here and everyone jumps down her throat. I think it’s perfectly normal to sketch out a rough idea of what you would like your budget to look like when negotiating new compensation. Compared to your previous methods Hope, this is absolutely an improvement! You at least looked at what you needed before negotiating.
I agree you should have retirement and health insurance numbers here though. Not having those is risky. Now that being said, in the past I have understood ignoring them because bottom line having a roof over your head has been more of a priority. Being homeless.with health insurance isn’t really an improvement unless you have a health condition. However, assuming you keep this additional income its definitely something you need to figure out so I would argue it should be considered in the ideal budget here.
Even in an “ideal world” a mysterious $500 monthly savings for “moving” and $400 for travel when she is only making minimum debt payments is not smart.