Since we've all been chatting here for so long I wanted to pose a question to the group and get a little feedback. I'm on a frugal/cost cutting/couponing type group on facebook as I am wanting to learn better ways to cut corners....
So many people on the group are cheap to the point of being ridiculous. I'm all for saving money and want to cut corners where I can but at the same time life is for living. Also I work with a lady who is notoriously cheap...one day I brought taco bell into the break room and she said "that's a lot of cheese on your tacos" I said "well I asked for extra cheese" and she replies "bet you paid extra for it" and I said "bet I did but I like extra cheese" geez 15 cents isn't going to break me when it's something I like and it's not like I eat at for lunch more than 2-3 times a month.
So I guess my questions is where do you draw the line between being conscious about your money and being insane with it? Like I try to keep a fairly strict grocery budget which means not a ton of snacks which we don't need anyways but I'm not living on beans and rice for a month unless I have to.
For us...we just have general frugal rules and then exceptions to those rules and then we tend not to stress about it much in between. It took us about a year to really hone our budget, but we now have it at a place where we are happy with the amount we have given ourselves to spend.
In general terms, we have a fairly strict budget and then we just commit to living within it. I know some families that eat out every week. I don't believe there's anything wrong with that if it fits within your budget...but we don't choose to do that. We have fixed a dollar amount to certain activities and then we don't go over it. (I will admit that there are rare exceptions to even this rule!) It often means foregoing an activity or item until next month, or saving up for a while. It's good to practice restraint.
We don't have a lot of "spending money" in our budget. We allow for $75-$100 a month in "family fun money", $40 a month for date nights, DH and I each take $100 a month spending money and the kids get $5 a week each for allowance. We also take out $20 a week in cash as WAM (walking around money).
We discuss as a family how we are going to spend our family fun money each month. This is the money that covers things like: the movies, eating out, bowling, museum/science center/zoo, etc On average, we only eat out once (sometimes twice) a month as a result of this tight budget and we hit the movies only three or four times a year. Some people would balk at this...but it works for us. This month (today, in fact!) we are buying The Force Awakens on Blue Ray with part of our family fun money. We will probably use the rest to go out to eat later in the month.
DH and I often forego taking our spending money and instead put it towards our vacation fund. Or sometimes we use a portion of it for ourselves and then the rest goes to vacation.
DH and I spend a lot of time together as a couple but we usually do free things. When DH and I have "official" dates that cost us money, we do them during the day when the kids are in school, so we save on babysitting fees and we pay for them out of our personal spending money. So, our "date nights" budget is actually with the kids. Each parent gets $20 to take a kid out on a one-on-one outing for some quality time. We rotate every other month. This is a new concept we introduced in 2016. So far, it's going like gangbusters!! This month I am paired up with DS and DH is with DD. They saved some of their money last month so they could afford to go to the movies this month. DD is THRILLED! DS and I are still considering our options. The kids LOVE to budget how to spend the date money each month. Who knew fun dates would be such an amazing teaching tool?
Occasionally, the WAM covers things like: going out for ice cream, buying nachos and cheese for an at home movie night, a hot and ready pizza, swimming fees or skating fees at the local rec center, etc. Most of the time it covers the junk we get at the dollar store, field trip fees for the kids, buying scout popcorn, paying the paper girl, etc. Whatever we don't spend goes in the vacation fund...so we are actually pretty frugal with this money. We buy/pay for what we need but try to keep the "extras" to a minimum. However, the money is there if we need it/want it!
I guess finding that balance is a little different for everyone, but we prefer to spend less on a monthly basis so we can vacation more. In the end, I think it's all about priorities. (Sorry, that got long!!)
Tax return in! Yay! I know we have 2 big expenditures this month (house insurance $700ish and motorcycle insurance $600 (insane what vehicles cost to insure here) so once those are out, I will know where we are at. Mortgage is out for the beginning of the moth, as are retirement savings, and utilities, so just a couple of small things here outside of the regular gas/food/other expenses.
So I think I am going set some goals/break up my savings account like
@stayhomemom77 did a little while ago- now to figure out the "buckets" ...
for the taxes being in! That IS a lot in insurance. I think I blocked that part of my Kamloops life out!
Breaking down my savings goals was one of the best things I ever did! DH thought I was nuts and just wanted a big ol' savings account for the house/emergency/curveball et al stuff and one other one for all the vacation/present money/clothing money etc stuff. I do the bookkeeping so I did it my way
and I love having everything so clearly delineated.
No I'm glad it was long I love these ideas and def some stuff I want to keep in mind as DD gets older shes only a toddler right now so we have time to figure some stuff out but we know family stuff can get pricey in a hurry! We live on a farm (well my DH grandpa's farm so all the benefits none of the costs) and right now our family outings consist of feeding the baby goats and chickens but I know that's wont last forever.
