If you been reading this blog at all since we have been married you have read all about our budget & getting out of debt race. We did successfully pay off $12,746.25 in our first year of marriage. And honestly, had it not been for that debt I'm not sure we would've hopped into a budget as quickly as we did. Therefore, I'm grateful for that. I talked about our first budget set up here.
I came across this blog, via another blog that I follow (listed below in a recent post). I really enjoyed reading more about finances & budgeting. I think I could study that kind of stuff for hours at a time because I enjoy learning more about saving & creative ways to budget.
You want to know How to make a budget? <--click I really enjoyed what he said here. My favorite quote deals with shopping. I mean, what girl doesn't want the freedom to shop?...."The amazing thing is that by budgeting for fun stuff, it actually liberates you to spend money on these items. When you have money budgeted each month to buy clothes, the money is now sitting there waiting to be used for that assigned purpose. Suddenly you can go clothes shopping without feeling guilty!!"
We personally love the cash system. It has worked great for us.(But it may not be best for you) And we have made adjustments as we have been on this journey together. Even that post up there when we originally made our cash system has changed. It takes a lot of communication, compromise, and more communication. But I would say the area of finances is one that Teddy and I meet eye to eye on. It's truly by the grace of God, I know this. But man, having a budget that WE AGREE ON has made all the difference in the world.
Therefore, having a budget was the smartest choice we have ever made.
How about you?
-Kelli
If you have any questions let me know! We are very open about this. I think it's unfortunate that talking about finances is so "hush hush". Why not talk about our mistakes & creative ways we are making things work? We have learned from others who are open about such things, so we want to live the same.
1 comment:
I know all about budgeting, I probably dont have a budget that everyone agrees on but it gets my bills paid. When working for Impact I had a super tight budget because I owe a lot of school debt; which is why Im taking a year off. Either way I would make sure all my bills was paid and money was set aside for giving and what was left over, if anything, would be used for food and entertainment. Yes I have missed buying food behind making sure my bills were paid. I mean somebody was going to feed me so I was good. Now that I live with my parents and my whole goal is to pay down my debt I havent really followed my budget and it has hurt me. I have been buying stuff like crazy (like food from the grocery store). I really gotta calm down. I now have a budget and I have finally paid off my medical bills. I paid off the back rent I owed. I am giving and paying tithes. Eventually I will start saving and most of my money, like majority of my pay check is going toward knocking out my student loans through the snowball system. I pray by new staff training I will have paid off 1 loan company and have a little left on another. I pray by the time Im at full support that I will only be paying one loan company and almost done paying them off. I have a friend that holds me accountable with my budget so that helps. My priorities are giving, paying off bills and saving and my budget reflects that. I do have money budgeted for entertainment and I now have a strict gas budget because that can eat up all your money if you are driving everywhere. I dont operate on a cash system on anything except entertainment bc thats the only place where Im likely to overspend and all my other expenses minus gas come directly out of my account. Some other expenses that I have noticed add up are netflix and gym membership. Either way great blog, definitely will be checking out what others are doing. This also helped me to see when your married you have to agree on a budget..man I appreciate my singleness so much.
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