Slow Progress

Things have been pretty tight lately, and we're not making much headway. Last month I only paid the minimums on my credit cards, so that I could set aside the rest to put towards several upcoming expenses:

We thought we were going to owe $1300 in income taxes to the IRS, due to some errors with our employers withholding too little, but it looks like it'll come out closer to $600 (and we will be getting a refund of close to $500 from state). It will be close to a wash in the end, but we need to front the $600 payment. We still haven't filled out our tax returns, so I don't know the exact amount.

Our car insurance renewals are due, for both vehicles, just shy of $1000 for six months. It's predictable (every April & October), but this time our premiums went up. Nothing we did, but the insurance company said that they've had more claims than usual (with most makes/models), and when that happens it means they adjust premiums upward.

Hubby spent $700 (he has a $2000 annual budget for discretionary 'big-ticket' items, like a computer), and we've got about $500 in normal springtime house expenses (weed killer, pesticide, grass seed, new mulch & topsoil, minor maintenance items).

We also have several smaller expenses over the next few weeks: a new windshield ($300), traffic fines ($125), vet bills ($150), water/sewer ($90), quarterly student loan ($120), wedding gifts ($150), wedding apparel/accessories ($75).

Gas Bill

I logged in to check my email this morning, and found the monthly email from our gas company saying that our bill is now available (most of our bills & utilities have online accounts/e-pay, so we use that to cut down on paper waste and to save on postage). Our summer gas bill runs around $50/mo, with the absolute lowest being around $35 if we're really cutting back on showers & laundry.

July's gas bill: $16.86

At first I thought that perhaps they had estimated our usage for the month and managed to screw something up (we've had several problems with both the electric and gas companies doing that in the past, and then we end up with a bill that is $100-200 more than usual when the actual vs. estimated readings catch up). Turns out that they had estimated our bill last month, and they must have over-estimated our usage - so I'm thrilled.

It's only $35 saved, but after yesterday's realization that we're somehow $850 behind for the month, every little bit helps!

Budget Categories

A Good Mom just posted an entry showing a pie chart with a suggested family budget (provided by the U.S. government), and asking how it compares... so I plugged in our numbers into a quick spreadsheet to take a look. Ours actually looks pretty reasonable, at least in the pie-chart. 

When we bought our house, it was very important to me to find something within a pretty tight budget - so that we would be able to someday make it on one income (if one of us decided to stay home full-time once we have kids). Our house was more expensive than most "starter" homes, but given our income level it's significantly less house than most of our friends and coworkers bought. The house category includes only our mortgages (so principal, interest, taxes, and homeowners insurance).

Our auto expenses are pretty high. We have two car payments totaling about $792/mo. I also included auto insurance and gasoline in this category. On the plus side, our cars are in decent shape overall, since they are relatively new, and we don't incur much in terms of repairs. 

The savings category only includes after-tax savings, so money going into our emergency fund & savings account. We use this money primarily to pay for tuition, vacations, and home repairs. Now that the emergency account is funded to nearly $5000, we will cut back on this and only put aside what we need for upcoming major expenses. Any extra money will be shifted to debt repayment. 

I know we spend a lot in utilities. We have a family-plan for our cell phones, and we each have a full data plan with texting added on. We have high-speed internet and cable TV at home. And we always seem to spend more on the normal utilities than most other families. Our electric bill runs about $100 during the winter months, and up to $175 in the summer. Our gas bill varies between $50 in the summer and upwards of $300 in the winter. Our water/sewer bill is about the only thing that doesn't seem ridiculous.

 

Household Bills - June 09

This month's household bills have all arrived, here are the numbers:

Mortgage #1: $1321.16
Mortgage #2: $ 229.50
Electricity: $ 56.67
Gas: $ 53.79
Cable: $ 105.18
Cell Phone: $ 127.08

TOTAL: $1893.38