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: $52.96
Expenses for the month to date: $1057.29
Net effect: -$1004.33
Since the last posting I received a total of $24.43 in repayment from my investments in Lending Club. I spent $26.13 on food and $93.67 on household items including kitty litter and a super jumbo pack of toilet paper!!! I am stocking up on items now since I won’t be able to do much lifting and bending after the surgery so I won’t be going shopping for a while.
I will see you guys and gals later as I continue my journey to save money and become debt free!!!!
Good words and I have often tried this approach.
What worked for us though was getting a so ftware program to import our bank transactions and show where our money was flying off to.
We started with MS Money and they went under.
Currently I am using a program called bank2budget free trial at bank2budget.com and it looks good so far. It offers my bank format so you would have to check to see if your bank is offered.
Easy recording is the secret to really knowing where we spend our money and harnessing our spending to create savings.
Good luck to us all.
I used MS Money at first too and I really loved it but then I also love that Mint is online so I can access it from places other than just my home.
My wife (computer expert) warned me from giving out our bank account id and password to anyone. She heard that a former Mint.com employee was caught with customer id’s and passwords that she downloaded from their servers. One customer had funds stolen from their account!
I am still using bank2budget.com application and plan on buying that application. I can’t believe how it is showing the areas where I am overspending according to national averages.
Thanks