I have decided to post my weekly spending for the previous week on Fridays so you know how my cash has been flowing for the week.
Please note that I get paid on the last day of the month so my cash flow net effect will usually be negative until the last day of the month.
This does not mean that I am adding to my debt, it just means that the money coming in is less than the money going out because bills are due starting on the first but I don’t get paid until the last day.
So again to clarify (since I get so many questions), this shows the cash FLOW for the month. On Day 2 of every month I will have a negative FLOW because I have paid rent etc so money has LEFT my checking account. I have not had any money come in on Day 2 of the current month since I got paid on day 27 or 30 or 31 of the previous month so that income is counted for LAST month.
Income for the month to date: $7.20
Expenses for the month to date: $976.34
Net effect: -$969.14
In the last week I have gotten a $3 check from Pinecone, $1.76 from Prosper and $2.44 from Lending Club. This is a nice little start to the income flow for the month and has already been routed to my snowflake account where I will be sending extra money towards debt repayment.
January is supposed to be a No Spend Month and so far the only money I have actually ‘spent’ has been on bills which do not count. I paid rent and all its associated trimmings and also the internet and electricity bills.
The electricity bill was VERY high for me this month at $148.49, which puts me in the red by $63.49. It really is my fault entirely because I ran the central heater in the apartment instead of using my space heater during the winter.
On another note I got a credit of $20.48 on the internet bill because of outages last month so that helps a little bit. I need to reduce spending by another $43.01 in order to break even so far and I will just have to see what happens later in the month.
I will see you guys and gals later as I continue my journey to save money and become debt free!!!!
wow! the electricity bill skyrocketed from your norm! what I’ve found worthy to invest in is an electric blanket because it definitely would save you the heating bill…
Yes I almost died when I saw the electric bill but I knew it was going to be high because I was not being frugal. I was running the central heating instead of just using the space heater and using comforters like I did in the past. I have switched back to the more frugal side this time but I know the next bill will still be higher than normal because we are having a colder than normal winter now. Brrrr…..and Grrrrr.
New to this site. I’ll have to go do some reading to see where you live (climate) and apartment vs house. I guess in a small place in a moderate climate that would be high. All I know is I’d be doing backflips in happiness if I ever had an electric bill of $150. This month I had $1000 budgeted and it was only $945. We’re way overdue for another cold snap so the extra will likely be consumed next month. The monster bills should start to taper off after than. I only budget $750/mth in April, $500 May, etc and $300/mth through the summer. All in all it’s $5500-6000/yr. In our part of Canada we get both freezing winters and humid summers. Our bill covers normal everyday lighting etc but also heating, and we’re in the country and on a well (pump/softener/iron filter etc) so it covers our water bill too I suppose. It’s our only utility bill, but still!