Monday, March 16, 2015

My Budget :) & a story

Hey Bloggers,

Today I thought I'd share with you my "Budget Envelope System" & the reason why I decided we needed one.


Once upon a few weeks ago..........
We had a cyclone called Marcia blow in for about four days.  Nothing too damaging, torrential rain & not a lot of wind where we are.  But enough rain for our back yard to flood, the pool filled up with dirt & to cap it all off the pump & chlorination system died.  We think they filled up with water & the electrics got fried.  So we had to replace them & unfortunately for us I didn't know that pools & duct-ed air conditioners (it died early in January) aren't covered by your standard house & contents insurance.  Oh no you have to get separate insurance called Motor Burn out Insurance.  Which I would have known about if I had read the hand book full of techno babble.

This will be added in November (I'm not making the same mistake twice thank you).  So we needed to come up with close to $1000 for the pool over the last few weeks.  Then last week we got a visit from the neighbours behind us about our trees along the back fence.  They want us to prune them because one of the gentlemen in his early 70's was climbing onto the top of a 6 foot ladder to prune the branches damaged & hanging over his side of the fence.  Understandably we could see where there is cause for concern.  But that means we are now up for another unexpected bill of $650 to get the trees pruned.  Which is something we where considering getting done at a much later date. Say in about 6 months or so *sigh*.  It never rains it pours around here,  Pun intended. So just after Easter (because our garden man is super busy at the moment) we are having some yard work done. Hopefully that will keep us in the good books with the neighbours.  Then I got my car (Tom the Kia) serviced & was overcharged $200 (a story for another time maybe). I had to take Tom back to Kia Maroochydore to get the door fixed (a pre-existing problem) as well as the hand brake that mysteriously stopped working after being serviced at the Nambour place I use to go.  Which was another unexpected bill of $350.00.


So of course that leads me to our new Budget.  Because I woke up one morning not long after all of this & decided I needed to calm the inner "Control Beast" by seeing where our money goes each week/month.  Plus I'm tired of being "One of those women who have no idea about the finances" as my step-mother likes to tell me not so kindly (mostly I let the comments slide, but some times they stick).

Firstly I watched a bunch of videos from You Tube on the subject.  Because lets face it - I like to find out as much as I can about things before doing them.  Remember I'm A.C.D. ;)   One video that I found particularly helpful is this one. Why?  Because of what he says near the end.  That it may take three to four months for you to perfect your budget.  That to me is the most single important piece of info that any one could have given me.  Being the type of person that I am (anal) I tend to stress if things don't go right or are perfect straight away.  By him saying this it has given me the freedom to not worry about any "mistakes" that I/we make with the budget.  Also it helps me not stress over those things that have a habit of cropping up that are out of our control - see above story (which I hate! First world problem I know).  

Now here's the fun bit.  I nagged asked Doug how much we spent on what each week/month & worked up about four budgets until I was happy with the categories and amounts (because some hubbies listening skills suck!).  Plus there is always that one thing you forget or crops up.  So here are my categories &  what I use to pay them:

My three groups are : Cash, Credit Card & Stays in bank*

Cash:

  • Groceries
  • Karate - Emsy
  • Fuel - Kia
  • Fuel - Bluey
  • Pets
  • Haircuts
  • Pool
  • Medical
  • House Upkeep
  • Car Upkeep
  • Car Rego
  • Air con
  • Clothing 
  • Birthdays
  • Christmas
  • Emergency
  • Fun 

Credit Card:

  • Optus
  • Telstra
  • House Insurance
  • Car Insurance
  • Tuckshop

Stays in bank:

  • Electricity
  • Water
  • Rates
  • Gas
  • School Fees
  • Swimming - Lilly
  • Tax
The only problem I can see with the last category is the money could "disappear" on other things.  The reason I have a Credit card & stays in bank is because these things are transferred electronically either fortnightly or monthly & I didn't want to be taking money out just to be putting it back the next week or month.  I could see payments being missed & that is not going to put me in my happy place ;p.  

** Also the telephone quote isn't something I'd do - honest.

Have a great day.


1 comment:

Dawn T said...

WOW a very organised list there Paula. I wish you well with the budgeting. Things do have a habit of happening when least wanting... take care and don't stress too much.