Here is my thinking about my budget. I don’t have enough money coming in to do everything I want to. My take home for 40 hours is 585. I will up that to 600 by making sure I work a little overtime each week.

I usually set aside all overtime for travel. I get a lot on this job in the summer. A couple of times I worked 20 hours in one day. I get through it by thinking about the travel it will pay for.

For the last year or so I have saved half of what I made in regular time. I lived in a small single room studio to make that possible. In 2 weeks I will move into a 3 bedroom house on a couple acres of land. I can only see 1 neighbor from it. Living there will dictate a lot of my budget.

A lot of my success has been based on avoiding debt and avoiding ongoing bills like high rent. Yes, $600 is high to me.

Well…here it is. It is copied and pasted from Excel


WEEKLY
Food* $25.00
Rent $150.00
Electric Bill $20
Gas* 25
Insurance 29
Storage 16
Internet 20
Audio subscription cancel
Gym 0
Hair Cut* 5
mail box cancel
Pocket Money* 10
Travel overtime
Contingency overtime
401 K 48
Marketing 150
Savings 102
Total $600.00

To summarize
1/4 rent
1/4 savings
1/4 marketing (second income building)
1/4 living expenses


There are some problems with it. The biggest is a shortage of money.
The living expenses is the tough part. I have to cut my food budget (which includes household stuff) in half. Ouch! Hello beans and rice.

The house doesn’t have a washer and drier so I will have to use a laundry mat until I find a set. I actually mean, “find a set”. I will once again pick them up on the roadside and fix them. I want to “dumpster dive” a freezer also. I can’t stand the way a refrigerator thaws veggies during the defrost cycle and re-freezes them. I have worked many years as a refrigeration technician and this is a simple matter.

The main problem with the budget is that it does not have a contingency fund built it. I don’t think a budget can work without one. There is just not enough money for it. I still have about $1,000 in the last years contingency fund and hopefully that will smooth out the problems. I think I will get a raise in October. ($160 gross a month)

The tighter the budget, the more it needs built in contingency funds.

I think the budget has major problems but I will deal with them.

It has been awhile since my last post.

I am now living in a more expensive part of NC. Living cheaply is even more of a challenge. I have been here for 3 months.

My weekly take home was $523.00 a week and now is $585.00. Plus they pay for all my health insurance. I can afford to be sick now.

My original goal was to save half of my take home. I have done better than that and have saved over $10,000 in the last 7 months. My goal was to save $10,000 in 10 months.

I have had limited success with all the other goals.

I am working on my budget for the next year. Here are some major points it will cover.

In about 2 ½ weeks I will move into the house I will rent. It has 3 bedrooms and is on a couple of acres. I can only see one neighbor. The house is $600 (negotiated down from 650) a month, which is well below market price. It is a budget stretcher though. That is about 25% of my take home pay.

I will reduce my savings to 25% of my take home. Part of that will be in the form of an IRA that my employer will match my contribution to.

I will spend the 25% I will not be saving on developing a second income. I have two websites I need to build traffic to, and I am starting a third website on outdoor cooking.

That will leave me 25% of my take home to live on. I’ve played with the numbers a little and they don’t seem to be working. It will be a challenge.

My project for the weekend is developing a budget and setting it up in my envelope budgeting software. I will post it here when it is done.