3/14/2014

My Money, My Choices - Level 1, Activity 3

Activity 3 is to make a Balanced budget....balanced.

I already have a budget set up (see the 2014 budget tab), but I wanted to go through this process to have the opportunity to really look at everything.  So, I decided to download Gail's Build-a-Budget Excel download.

I made a few additions and a few deletions to account for categories we do, and don't have - and for variable expenses, I used the average numbers from 2013.  The big caveat here is that i didn't adjust Jordan's income to 2013 numbers - I've used his new base salary which is much lower (he's now half on commission).

So!  If we made no changes, we'd be in deep ca-ca over spending by almost $1,700/month!

But we're not going to do that, no siree!

Here's what we're actually going to do:

Yes, yes, I know that the total is still a negative, but that payment won't be made unless Jordan's commission is at least that amount.

This goes back to my promise a few days ago.  When we get Jordan's Commission pay - the first thing we're going to do is add extra to the escape - that's what the new Escape Snowflakes tracker bar is all about.  Plus, this doesn't include the recent change to our phone/tv/internet which will be going down.

Check out the My Money, My Choices program by clicking here.

Related Posts:

  • My Money, My Choices - Level 3, Activity 1This activity takes us through calculating our personal savings rate.  Gail tells us that there is basically two different types of savings. Long Term - Retirement Planned Spending - Emergencies, Kids School Funds, Vaca… Read More
  • My Money, My Choices - Level 3, Activity 4The fourth activity in level 3 is getting set up on a company pension plan if you're not already on one - thankfully I am but unfortunately, Jordan's company doesn't have one. Mine is a defined contribution (not defined be… Read More
  • My Money, My Choices - Level 3, Activity 3 A couple days ago, I wrote about creating the Emergency Fund, today is about automating it.  This one is really simple - just set up an automatic savings programme.  With a goal of $25,000 it's going to take us a … Read More
  • My Money, My Choices - Level 3, Activity 2This activity is to set up an Emergency Fund...which Jordan and I have...but is it being used properly?  This is what Gail says an emergency fund is for: Needing new tires is not an emergency. Nor is a new roof, that re… Read More
  • My Money, My Choices - Level 3, Activity 5 & 6In this activity we set up our retirement savings..and automate them (activity 6) I think it's really apt on the tail of yesterday's post about my grandmother in retirement and the post we did about a week ago or so on Level … Read More

3 comments:

  1. I'm kind of confused. Does the second scenario work because you will cut all discretionary spending to $1200 per month? How are you going to do that?

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    Replies
    1. In the first scenario, I used what the average monthly total of what we actually spent in 2013 on variable expenses was, but with his new 2014 salary. I wanted to see what would happen if we made no changes to the budget w/ his new salary.

      His new base salary is $25,000 lower than it was at his old job, so we've cut a tonne of budgeted/planned and hope he's able to earn what he's 'missing' through commissions. I don't want to budget for money we don't have yet, so the commissions aren't included in the 2014 plan.

      We've also just started using a spending journal (more on that later), and that should help us stay accountable to the budget.

      Delete
  2. It looks like you have everything under control. It is always so brave to post about money problems/debt. It has been a long road for us. I'm not saying that we will never have debt again but it is wonderful to live without it. We have the mortgage but we are chopping away at it. We may need another car in a few years or less but I hope to have enough saved up at that time. Fingers crossed.

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