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After you paid all your bills, rent, mortgage, health insurance, 401k's etc, all those consistent monthly expenses you can't avoid paying. What is your "spending" money? If you save some money every month include that in your left over spending sense you don't actually have to put those money away if you know what I mean.
I want to get an idea what other people have left over every month.
Specifics of one's personal finances is usually something that is not shared with anyone, especially on a public forum.
Our specific financial status is shared between my Husband and myself and it will remain that way.
There are some questions that are too personal in my opinion.
If you want/need financial assistance in regards to your own budget and payments it may be best to find a financial advisor and consult with them or purchase a book or two regarding finances, budgeting and investing.
I will state (within the spirit of the thread) we have enough leftover to purchase a "glass of merlot".
Usually around $1-2k, sometimes none, sometimes more. Income is pretty variable. I have my expenses pretty well controlled aside from 401k which I typically put around $1k a month in. On lean months that sometimes doesn't happen and I try and make it up in subsequent months.
Eesh. I guess technically I have a lot of cash left over, but I don't think of it as such, I sock it away.
Our situation is that we have to pay our taxes quarterly, and save a lot of cash for retirement savings which we don't know how much we need until tax return time so we don't have to pay $$$ in more taxes.
So in my mind there is no leftover cash. It's all allotted. If it's not spent, it's stuck in savings or allowed to ride for next months spending. I allow myself quilting money, and I'm in a bit of redecorating frame of mind, so I am allowing a little more to buy some small furniture pieces, and we enjoy meals out and some other fun stuff.
I've always found that not having "leftover" money keeps my spending in check, although that's never been a real problem for me. It's sort of a mind trick. If you have "leftover" money, it's easier to spend it, than if you budget 50 bucks a month on quilting, and 200 hundred bucks on eating out and 50 bucks for an outing somewhere.
It's sounds sort of restrictive on one hand, but it does stop you from willy nilly spending, like a friend of ours who used to go to the gas station, walk in with a 20 for gas, but thoughtlessly picks up a bag of chips, a Coke and a candy bar, and puts the rest in his tank. Then wonders why a 20 in his gas tank doesn't go that far, and goes back to put another 20 in his car, and repeats the scenario. He as packing on the pounds and wasting a great deal of money on crap he didn't even *think* about as he ate his way down the road.
Eesh. I guess technically I have a lot of cash left over, but I don't think of it as such, I sock it away.
Our situation is that we have to pay our taxes quarterly, and save a lot of cash for retirement savings which we don't know how much we need until tax return time so we don't have to pay $$$ in more taxes.
So in my mind there is no leftover cash. It's all allotted. If it's not spent, it's stuck in savings or allowed to ride for next months spending. I allow myself quilting money, and I'm in a bit of redecorating frame of mind, so I am allowing a little more to buy some small furniture pieces, and we enjoy meals out and some other fun stuff.
I've always found that not having "leftover" money keeps my spending in check, although that's never been a real problem for me. It's sort of a mind trick. If you have "leftover" money, it's easier to spend it, than if you budget 50 bucks a month on quilting, and 200 hundred bucks on eating out and 50 bucks for an outing somewhere.
It's sounds sort of restrictive on one hand, but it does stop you from willy nilly spending, like a friend of ours who used to go to the gas station, walk in with a 20 for gas, but thoughtlessly picks up a bag of chips, a Coke and a candy bar, and puts the rest in his tank. Then wonders why a 20 in his gas tank doesn't go that far, and goes back to put another 20 in his car, and repeats the scenario. He as packing on the pounds and wasting a great deal of money on crap he didn't even *think* about as he ate his way down the road.
Yeah, quarterly taxes as well. I know what those are, however, so it's just kind of a floating target on my checking account. Basically, I knew that was Sam's money sitting in my checking account until this Monday so I didn't get excited about it being leftover money.
Leftover money to me is leftover money. It doesn't bother me that I tend to spend more when I have more leftover money. That's what it's there for.
Everything is budgeted for, but outside of the big bills, expenditures are a bit more flexible. I budget for a range and aim to go below it - that way, when I have higher than average expenditures due to travel, visiting family, etc, I have money from previous month's budgets that have "rolled over."
After bills and retirement, I have between $800 - $900 left over depending on the month (utilities vary wildly depending on the season). Half of that automatically goes into savings through a weekly transfer.
Approximately 1/3 taxes, 1/3 savings, 1/3 bills, so we have about 1/2 of our post-tax income left after paying bills. On second thought, it's considerably more than that. A lot of what I count as bills, you would probably characterize as discretionary spending.
Last edited by randomparent; 06-19-2014 at 08:05 AM..
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