Ugh…I’m feeling frustrated. October was my first month of “I’m really doing this, I’m going to save all the money!!” and somehow saved a whopping ~$800 over last month. Whomp whomp. The reality is that we actually did do better than previous months BUT a couple of things happened:
- My husband paid off his 0% interest loan and his credit card for some extra hobby purchasing that he did in the last couple of months. I’ve read a bunch of blog posts about how to get your partner on board, but honestly I’m still having a really hard time selling him on the whole “future without work OR stuff” thing. He is naturally frugal EXCEPT when it comes to his hobby and boy is it an expensive one. Since we’ve talked about this SO MUCH (note all the CAPS lock), and we now have a baby, and he says he’s really into it, I AM REALLY HOPING that this is the turning point here. The best sign is that there was no new spending this month, so here’s hoping he can keep it up!
- I did a fair amount of bulk spending this month that I shouldn’t have to recreate next month SO this should be one of the more expensive months, with the following being less. This is the scary thing about bulk spending: super easy to just start storing things away that you bought “because they were on sale.”
As a reminder, my hope is that this blog will accomplish 1 of the following 2 options:
- Be a success and create a community of like-minded people who will engage with me on one of the most taboo of topics: MONEY
- Make me accountable to reducing my spending so that I can retire early regardless of this blogs success and function as a journal to being really frugal
So here goes my monthly spending!
Notes about spending:
- This is my entire household spending (e.g. me and my husband, who is along for the FI train and just starting to really work frugality like me)
- I buy everything on a credit card (which is how I track my spending) and pay off in full every month
| Spending Category | Amount ($) | Notes |
| Rental Property Mortgage & HOA | $1040 | Townhome purchased as a personal property but now functioning as a rental to a family member (paying under-market rent at $1200 to avoid dealing with tenants and for help managing previous renovations) |
| Personal Property Mortgage | $2365 | PI – ~$1700 TI – ~$650 Reducing by $120 next month! But going to experiment with paying over by ~$50 a month for a while since I’d already gotten used to this payment (according to a calc this will save me 1 year and 2 months off my mortgage! may even up to $100!) |
| Phone | $37 | US Mobile OKAY! I checked our app to see if there had been any plan updates and was able to get the same service for nearly half the price!! So worth it to look into these things 🙂 |
| Medical + Health Insurance | $132 | More vitamins plus insurance |
| Utilities (Gas, Electric, Water, Trash) | $473 | Last month of crazy AC bill!! (hoping this significantly reduces our electricity bill in the future cause it’s driving our spend here at ~$330) |
| Car Insurance | $153 | Evenly spread across 12 months but we pay in twice yearly lump sums – about to increase by ~$15/month because we just added our ’86 4Runner to it – worth it’s own post on whether this is the stupidest/coolest thing we own +This month I added the cost to get the 4Runner road legal (tag and title) |
| Other bills (mostly insurance through work) | $306 | Netflix, WSJ, joining wordpress (annual), joining a local park (annual) some other stuff I should probably look into and get rid of…PLUS I’ve now added my ~$180 of insurance here (accidental, additional life, etc.) |
| Student Loans | $691 | |
| 0% interest loans | $699 | For our AC replacement and a rug for baby’s room – really this is an experiment because logically my mind knows that a 0% interest loan for something which I could buy in cash is a good idea due to the inflation we are dealing with /// at the same time I hate having out an unnecessary loan and it is living rent free in my mind which makes me want to kill it |
| Gas | $72 | We have a Prius! And both WFH so are able to keep this pretty low, even lower without my incessant shopping |
| Events (out to eat, alcohol, stuff to do) | $679 | Okay we started chipping away here! Only went out to eat like 1.5x last month, bulk buying alcohol through total wine, one weekend event…still some room but we’re getting closer to where I’m comfortable! |
| Car repairs | $69 | Parts for our ’86 4Runner which is not running AGAIN. Only pro to this is that my husband is getting to know more about cars and getting to know a neighbor through this venture |
| Miscellaneous | $124 | Continues to be small! I think that reducing amount of times shopping is REALLY having a great impact here |
| Travel | $0 | I’m only going to have money in this category when we actually go so I can categorize spend here for each vacation |
| Baby | $622 | I went back to work so now there is a $150/week payment to my MIL to watch the baby for a few days, plus some random stuff we got on amazon for her |
| Home Repairs | $7 | Painted a ceiling |
| Groceries | $567 | Bulk buying has already taken a chunk out here and next month should be even cheaper |
| Dog Expenses | $349 | Two dogs – very big! But one is about to go home to our in-laws this month after living with us for 2 years so looking forward to this expense decreasing |
| Amazon / Household | $208 | Cut this in half!! Woohoo! |
| Hobby | $2,623 | Husband’s hobby – it is not fully an expense because it’s a hobby where the objects retain value, but it’s also not an investment so I think it’s best left here. This month it is paying off a zero interest loan – no new purchases. So should be really low next month! |
| Total | $11,217 | Jesus it is crazy how quickly this shit adds up! Without my husbands debt payoff, this month actually is more like $8600 which is like SO MUCH BETTER. Still so much room, but moving in the right direction. |
| Minus rental | $10,177 | Since the rental is income-producing, it’s a little bit unfair to count this as an expense, at the same time, it’s money going out and YMYL says to count it all! To be fair – it could be less for many reasons (e.g. refinancing, having put down more in the first place, etc.) |
So clearly we’ve got a lot of work to do. I would say the top categories I can save money in:
- Husband’s hobby (this month ~$2600)
- Still a lot of juice in events, groceries, dog expenses, utilities and all the other little shit categories (Amazon, Misc., Memberships) that can be gotten rid of (currently $2400)
Some things I’ve already done to reduce spending:
- MVNO for the cell phones
- Remove PMI for both properties (will reduce home mortgage by ~$120 next month!)
- Replace AC
- Do repairs at home ourselves when possible (fixed fridge leak and did roach eradication most recently)
- Called about insurance, but was unable to find a better deal (didn’t dig too deep here because of a recent claim…probably stupid)
- Aligned with husband (after years of talking about this) on frugality in order to achieve a happier, more skill-free, less distracted, and financially independent lifestyle
- Begun BULK BUYING
Home Ec 
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