DD’s Monthly Expense Checkup – September 2008
Here is the latest installment of my monthly expenses. Below are the results from September:
- $830.00 – Mortgage
- $643.00 – Da
ycare - $464.09 – Groceries
- $330.00 – Van Payment
- $194.16 – Gas
- $136.62 – Electricity
- $135.79 – Medical Bills
- $125.00 – Student Loan
- $115.75 – Phone & Internet
- $113.59 – Misc Household
- $77.15 – Eating Out
- $55.00 – Tennis
- $42.00 – Haircuts
- $35.00 – Babysitting
- $30.63 – Oil Change
- $26.40 – Kid’s stuff
- $15.00 – Donations
- $1.50 – Video rental
For a total of $3,370.68
Considering that our last two months totaled $3875.84 and $4170.34, I’d say we’re finally seeing some improvement.
Some of you will remember that I’ve trying out a new spending strategy of paying with cash for groceries, entertainment and other misc household items. I was hoping to save $100 a month in the grocery and misc categories. And while I reached that goal, I don’t think it had much to do with paying with cash, but more to do with buying too much stuff last month. I’ll keep at it another month and see what kind of results we have after two months.
Improvements:
- Daycare – As I’ve mentioned before the billing cycle in a month behind, so the bills are finally reflecting the fact that we’ve dropped down to 20 hours a week (2 kids).
- Medical Bills – I said this was deceiving last month as those were old bills. By even mentioning this topic I instantly jinxed us and both kids got sick at the same time (right before a trip out of town of course).
- Misc Household – We shaved about $90 off of this one, but I think that was due to August’s strange purchases more than us saving this month.
Needs Improvement:
- Dinning out – Over half of this total was from our trip to Minneapolis, but you can’t expect us to go back to the Twin Cites and not go out to eat 🙂
- Tennis – Actually this is for a 3 month membership in an indoor court. Last year it was quite a bit more than this, but I played twice a week last winter, this year I’m playing once every other week.I’d say there wouldn’t be much expense in the category the rest of the year, but I just broke a string, so look for that next month.
- Video Rental – I know we only spent $1.50(Blockbuster), but guess what we turned it in late, so we’ll have a late fee next time we rent one. Now I remember why we held on to my Netflix membership for so long.
** Confessional time ** This wasn’t all of our expenses, I had $4,000 in college expenses (not sure if wanted to chart that) and we also had a $1900 Health insurance payment too (But this was covered in my severance, so I didn’t count it. In January, it’ll be up to us) ** End of Confession **
Until next time,
-DD
My family spent $146 on eating out last month, and although I think this is a little high, I’m not too upset with it. I think $77 is fine for you DD. I know everyone has a right to their own opinion, but look at it logically. $77 is only 2.2% of your total expenses, and how much pleasure do you derive from it? I’m willing to bet that 2.2% is a great value.