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If you cannot get access to hubby's money flow you cannot make any budget.
She can still do a budget if the amount her husband is spending is consistent every month (just write it in the outgoing side of the budget as "hubby's money"). But I strongly suspect that it is not, and that's part of the problem.
You have 2 dogs - there is your answer to where all the money is going, IF you are responsible pet owners. Keep the dogs, forget eating out so much and get cheaper cars. The dogs will give you more pleasure than everything else. Good luck.
huh??? my dog costs me about $20/month. So even if it is twice as much and two dogs, it is barely even $100/month.
People spend so much money on BS stuff. Too expensive internet/cell phones/dumb starbucks/magazines/movie channels/Itunes/....
Either write down everything you spend money on or pay everything via CC for a month and then check your account. This isnt rocket science and should be pretty obvious when you look at it.
I make 45K and my husband 65K. We have no kids, just 2 dogs.
Our mortgage with taxes escrowed in is $1550 a month. We have 2 car payments and then all the regular bills (cable and internet, cell phones, electricity, groceries etc....). Only debt is 7K on a credit card.
We have about 20K saved but we always seem to be dipping into it. We don't spend a lot or go on lavish vacations. The only thing we might spend to much on is restaurants. I tried a monthly expense report and we should have plenty left over. My husband and I have separate checking accts and I don't know his log in so it's possible he is spending something I don't know about. I am not sure what else since we make over 6 figures combined.
It is probably food. If you make purchases using plastic, tally up your food bill for last month. Get ready to have your mind blown.
I make 45K and my husband 65K. We have no kids, just 2 dogs.
Our mortgage with taxes escrowed in is $1550 a month. We have 2 car payments and then all the regular bills (cable and internet, cell phones, electricity, groceries etc....). Only debt is 7K on a credit card.
We have about 20K saved but we always seem to be dipping into it. We don't spend a lot or go on lavish vacations. The only thing we might spend to much on is restaurants. I tried a monthly expense report and we should have plenty left over. My husband and I have separate checking accts and I don't know his log in so it's possible he is spending something I don't know about. I am not sure what else since we make over 6 figures combined.
I'll assume a worst case scenario of $5500 per month net. That assumes a high tax state and high payroll deductions for health insurance and whatever. It's likely that $110k gross has a higher monthly net than that, though. I'll assume two average to above average late-model car leases and base the "regular bills" on my own worst case scenarios.
5500
-1550 mortgage
-900 cars
-280 credit card
-150 cable/internet
-150 phones
-200 electric
-125 water & utilities
-160 car insurance
-90 small bills combined, ie Netflix, Hulu, gym memberships, etc
-800 combined groceries and eating out
-250 miscellaneous spending, ie: gas, coffees, movies, clothes, etc
Leaves 945 over. The husband and OP are probably spending that on miscellany. Doesn't seem like a far off scenario.
I've lived like this before... Something that gets me personally is the grocery store...I don't shop very efficiently. I tend not to plan ahead so shop hungry. Blue Apron actually helped me save money.
I'd say that it's highly likely the OP has the above kind of scenario and the husband isn't squirreling away that much money. While it does sound like he's keeping something from her, it's probably not that much.
What I did is move to using cash for all groceries and miscellany and cut all the "regular bills as low as possible. I wasn't super strict with the cash, but when I ran out I knew I needed to say "no" to all but necessities for the rest of the month. Saved quite a lot that way -hundreds.
Last edited by redguard57; 09-21-2017 at 10:44 PM..
That's actually not high for an income over 100k. That's around 25% on housing. Their income should be a little over 6k a month take home. Their car payments would have to be something like 600-900 a piece to kill the budget.
I agree with that, it's actually the right kind of mortgage if that was the income. Our income is about 15k more than OP, and our mortgage is 2k a month. But the main difference is we currently don't have a car payment as own both vehicles, and even then we try not to have more than $350 a month on a car note.
The real answer is that $100,000 a year just really isn't that much money in 2017. I make $65-70k a year and can't even afford a 1 bedroom apartment in a nice, no-gunshots heard and nobody blasting Mariachi band music at 10pm type neighborhood in New Jersey. It's ridiculous what your money doesn't buy you these days. I live pretty low on the hog and barely have anything. Throw in a couple car payments and some credit card debt and maybe a student loan payment and you're lucky if you can afford McD's for lunch with $100 grand. Dollar has lost like 95% of it's value since they went off the gold standard in the 70's and they just keep the printing the stuff even as we speak. Meanwhile real costs like housing, automobiles, and health insurance have skyrocketed. So if you're feeling poor these days and can't figure out why, it's because you basically are. Getting ahead in life is increasingly becoming a vaporware fantasy.
... I make $65-70k a year and can't even afford a 1 bedroom apartment in a nice, no-gunshots heard and nobody blasting Mariachi band music at 10pm type neighborhood in New Jersey.
If you're dipping into savings when you make 100k combined you're spending is somewhere.
You need to stop the two account household and go to a joint or three account.
The joint oats all the overhead common expenses. You both put a equal amount of money in it to cover the overhead.
Starting next month out a box on the table. Both you and hubby put every receipt that you spend on every day in there with your name on it. The bills and utilities too. If you're the type who never takes a receipt or just tosses it you're really going to need some financial order
Sit down and write down (actually write down) EVERYTHING you spent that month.
Start with
Mortgage
Insurance
Cars
Car insurance
Work your way diwn to the candy bar you bought with the coffee at the gas station. Go as far as three columns you him and together. I bet you'll find a few things you can stop spending on.
Now you have a picture of all your spending the set living expenses and the frivolous expenses or spending. I bet you'll crap at what you're spending money on and don't even realize it. Think about this. If you spend $5 a day and he spends $5 a day for every work day that's $50 a week and about $200 a month spent. Most don't even think about spending $5 a day for a coffee and a snack. If you want to have a understanding of your finances you need to first track and understand how and where you spend money.
I live in a high cost area and barely make more than 50K and save a double digit percentage of that (averaged around 30% of my gross over the last 15 years). Urban Adventurer is making things out to be worse than they really are. Granted, I didn't start out saving that much because I had credit card and student loan debt, too. That's why I rented a room instead of got my own apartment. It allowed me to travel as well as pay off debt.
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