27 and Frugal

I did much better on my March budget than most people did with their tournament brackets! It was an odd month because I only received two paychecks due to starting the new job. I am looking forward to April being a normal month so I can adjust to my new commuting expenses and weekly paycheck.

Fixed Expenses

I was under or even with all of my monthly bills (yes, even my cell phone). I was very happy to see my gas/electric bill come to only $63.95/each this month. I had $90 budgeted because … Continue reading »

When starting to get your finances in check, everyone will tell you to create a budget. Budgets are key to tracking your spending. Included in your budget, should be a category for savings. However, if you do not track your savings any other way, it is easy to lose sight of your savings goals!

Tracking savings allows you to see financial improvement; to see how successful your budgeting actually is!

Savings Tracker

I have created a separate worksheet just for savings within my budget spreadsheet. Savings and spending go hand-in-hand, so it really is important to keep these together.

My monthly budget & savings worksheet can be downloaded here: http://www.27andfrugal.com/files/easy_peasy_2010_budget.xls

If you already have a budget that works for you, simply copy/paste the Savings worksheet and use it on it’s own.

Ideally, the worksheet should mimic your savings account, so start with your beginning of the year balance. This sheet will be filled in automatically once you input your savings into the monthly budget sheets. Or simply manually enter in how much you are transferring to savings each month.

The interest does need to be entered manually from your monthly bank statement. Seeing exactly how much or how little interest you are earning every month may make you want to look into alternative saving account options.

The box on the right is the most important part of the whole sheet… your goal! Do everything you can to keep this goal in the back of your mind each time you make a purchase. When you are over 50% of the way to your goal, you will have incentive to put more into your savings every month. Continue reading »

Last week, I made the last and final payment on my car loan. Now that I officially own the car, I decided to make some adjustments to my car insurance policy.

I called Progressive and let them know that I am now the full owner of the car. Immediately, they were able to remove protection for financed cars decreasing my rate!

I was also interested in removing collision and changing some other aspects of my policy to get my payments down to ~$100/month. When telling the customer representative this, she asked me a few questions to check … Continue reading »

Being laid off from work is like being dumped. Only worse. Not only do you emotionally feel rejected, alone, and abandoned; but you also have to deal with losing your entire means of financial support. Below are some tips to deal with the emotional and monetary woes that go along with being unemployed.

1. Develop a routine

Keep a weekly routine just as though you’re still working. Wake up in the morning (no sleeping past noon), eat some breakfast, search and apply for jobs, fix lunch, work out, make dinner then relax. Yes, there will be gaps in there and you need to be self-disciplined to use them wisely. In general, stick to a normal day-time schedule. Go to bed at a normal time and get up at a normal time.

Sure, you can stay in your pj’s for a while but the more you keep a real-world schedule the easier it’ll be to keep a healthy mentality. The easier it will also be to re-adjust to a work schedule when you find another job.

2. Set a goal

Set a goal in something else in your life that you enjoy doing. Now is a good time to spend more time with those hobbies that are often ignored. The idea is to keep yourself busy but still focused on something productive.

One example is to set a workout goal. Have you always wanted to run a 5k but didn’t feel prepared? Simply, budget out $25 and sign up for one. Schedule this training into your day and stick with it. Since being unemployed can cause you to feel down, meeting this goal will provide a nice boost to your self esteem. Continue reading »

How’d I do this month?
Bars: $0/$20
Bills & Utilities: $114/$200
Car Payment: $0/$300
Cell: $77/$80
Entertainment: $49/$50
Gas: $156.36/$190
Gifts: $39/$300
Groceries: $15/$200
Personal Care: $0/$20
Restaurants: $18/$70
Shopping: $11/$100
Student Loan: $0/$162
Continue reading »

To be completely open and honest with you, I’ll go over my monthly expenses and budget with a post each month.

How’d I do this month?
Car Payment: $585/$300 (but this is good)
Groceries: $254/$200
Gas: $148/$115
Cell: $86/$75 (ugh)
Personal Care: $28/$20
Bars: $27/$20
Entertainment: $77/$50
Shopping: $65/$300 (yay!)
Bills & Utilities: $114/$200
Restaurants: $63/$75
Student Loan: $162
Discover Card Payment: $150
Continue reading »

To be completely open and honest with you, I’ll go over my monthly expenses and budget with a post each month.

Introduction
Since this is the first breakdown of my monthly expenses. Let me explain my personal definitions of each category and how I estimate my spending.

Shopping
Shopping includes all non-food, tangible items. Gifts, clothing, video games, shoes, fabric, cleaning items, etc. Continue reading »