Blogging Away Debt

June 2015 Budget Update

Hey, guess where I am! Traveling again, that’s where! Whoa! Considering we hadn’t initially planned to travel at all this summer, I’ve been pretty busy! This is already my second trip of the summer (first trip posted here), and I’ll be making a third trip either at the end of this month or beginning of August, depending on timing of my Dad’s tests and doctors’ appointments so I can be there when he receives an official diagnosis.

Fortunately, I get to say that this trip is much more pleasure-based compared to the last one. I’ve never mentioned, but my Dad owns two properties. His primary residence is in Utah and his secondary residence is in Wimberley, TX (south of Austin-area). So this trip included the entire family – we all loaded up the car and drove cross-country to visit family in Austin, spend time together for the 4^th of July holiday and take advantage of my last week before I start my full time job (eek!!!) Plus, my Dad was in town so I’ll be able to go and help him with some things on his property. With all of his health issues he’s going to be forced to sell his Wimberley property because it has a lot of acreage and there’s no way he can maintain it as he struggles with his physical decline.

So….killing lots of birds with one stone. We didn’t leave to come out here until July 2^nd, so the expenses associated with the trip will fall within the month of July. But similar to our other family-related trips, it’s going to cost us a minimal amount out of pocket. My mom gave us a little money for gas and we’re staying for free with family. I bought a bunch of groceries when we first arrived and we generally take family out to lunch or dinner once while we’re in town. But for a week long trip the costs are pretty minimal.

I’ve got lots to do in the short time we’re here so I’m going to run. Here’s how the month of June shaped up with our spending:

Place	Amount Spent
Rent	1055
Electricity	150
Water	53
Natural gas	21
Sprint (2 lines)	119
Cable/Internet	99
Car Insurance	156
Health Insurance	394
Trash	35
Preschool	1181
Gift-Giving	50
Restaurants	119
Entertainment	25
Groceries	550
Gasoline	81
Household Goods	41
Clothing	8
Parking	19
Work Purchases	20
Debt Payments	725
Total	4901

A couple quick budget-related notes before I run out the door:

Remember we had a very low income this month (no income from hubs’ business), so we had to raid our EF. One of our top priorities in July will be to replenish it. As a result, our debt payment is way below our average and we put no money toward savings.

Our preschool expense was above average because it included the deposits I had to put down for our new preschool ($75/each), which starts mid-August. Also, watch out – electricity is sky rocketing as our temperatures are climbing. I already received July’s bill and its over $200! Ouch!

I hope you all had a safe, healthy, and happy 4^th of July to you American readers, I wish any Canadian readers a happy belated Canada Day, and just happy week to all the rest of you! : )

Month in Review- June 2015

by Matt Fildes

Hey Everyone! I hope you’re all having a great week.

It’s July 2nd, so that means it’s time for a month in review. June went by in a flash, didn’t it? The summer months always seem to fly by so fast.

Since I didn’t post on Tuesday, I want to share a couple of items that happened over the weekend:

The same couple that I went out with earlier in June, invited me and GF out again; this time for dinner AND a movie (BTW- Jurassic World is AMAZING). I happily said “Yes!” but it also broke my “fun” budget for the month, which I carried $50. It wasn’t a big deal since my buddy asked me earlier in the week and I was able to budget for the dinner and movie out of my paycheck vs. having to dip into my emergency fund. I’m just really excited that I don’t have to say “No” to everything anymore.
I didn’t have a debt update to share since my last paycheck of the month is delegated to paying my mortgage and some other smaller bills. If I didn’t have any plans during this week, I could normally set aside $70-80 for a debt payment. Since I went out to dinner instead, I made no debt payment this week.

As for June, there was a lot that happened, so to review:

Firstly, now that most of my smaller debts are paid off (with only one more to go below $10,000) I had an internal struggle (The Hard Wins) on how to deal with the the fact that the payoffs are going to be few and far between now.
The day after my “Hard Wins” post, I increased my 401k contribution from 4% to 10% (which I mentioned in the comments of that same post). Update: I think this was a wise decision. For one- I haven’t noticed much of a difference in my take home pay. It ended up being about a $60 difference, but it’s definitely not hurting my ability to pay my bills. Plus, it’s awesome to see my retirement account grow so much faster!
In the following post (Time Off), I decided to use the month of July as a vacation from paying off debt to both enjoy my vacation to Disney and clear my head so I can hit August refreshed and ready to go. Update: vacation is only 7 days away (yay!) and this Wednesday’s paycheck marks the first paycheck in a LONG time (if ever) where I didn’t have to make a debt payment. I’m using all the extra money to buy myself some new clothes and to stock up on supplies (more on this on Tuesday)
I went out for dinner and drinks with a with an awesome couple, in which my “fun” fund came in really handy (here) and was most definitely worth it.
In this post (Birthday Party), I went to a good friend’s son’s 1st birthday party. Since I started an ESA account, I figured I give the gift of some cash for my buddy to start one of his own for his son.
In the same post, we began our planning for Disney. Since we are driving down, a lot of you had some great ideas our how to make our trip as fun and as frugal as we can. We’ve incorporated many of the ideas into our plan as we want to spend as little money as we have to on our drive down and then back up.
Lastly, we had a little Father’s Day celebration (Father’s Day) where GF did some amazing little things for me, as I am the father to our kids (lol, they’re dogs). We also started cementing our Disney plans and GF used her couponing skills to get us a whole bunch of goodies on the cheap.

As for my debt paydown, no big milestones met this month, but I still paid off $1,592.21. Down to a balance of $48,466.83. Not my best month, but not my worst, either.

Hope everyone has a great holiday!