We’ve been talking about budgets for a while now. So far in our Build a Better Budget series, we’ve talked a little bit about why we even bother creating a budget, about how the budget is more of a seat belt than a shackle, about the budget being a great communication tool, about the nuts & bolts of budgeting, and about using cash envelopes. I hope that our conversations have gotten you thinking about the possibility of creating your family budget. Be sure to sign up for my free email updates or for my RSS feed so that you don’t miss out on any of the conversation.
So you’ve created a budget, updated it each month, and started using cash envelopes for some of your spending categories. Things are humming along quite nicely. You’re proud of your accomplishment.
Then all of a sudden…… Life happens.
When life happens — and you know it will! — the damage often shows up in the form of a busted budget. Let me give you an example from our family’s recent budgeting adventures. We have been budgeting for a few months now. We’re pretty happy with the way things are working for us. We feel like we have a good handle on where our money is truly being spent.
Enter a busy work schedule and some unplanned travel for my job. We weren’t quite sure what to do with that. I have to pay for gas out-of-pocket and wait for the beginning of the next month for mileage reimbursement. I also have to pay for my meals and wait for reimbursement. While they aren’t big expenses, they certainly do throw a monkey wrench in our best laid plans!
Jason and Emma just accompanied me on two work-related trips in the past two weeks. We had a good time, I got my job done, and we were able to spend some extra time together. (Plus Emma got to swim in the hotel pools… She was thrilled!) We also ended up eating out and not knowing where to take that money from. Technically we were eating, so that’s food. But we had planned on using our food budget at the grocery store. We could use our miscellaneous money, but it was almost the end of the month. There wasn’t a ton of that left either.
I’ll spare you the details…. We ended up using our food money and restocking that envelope before our trip to the grocery store. When I get my reimbursement check, we’ll determine where that money is best spent or saved. But this little issue messed up our plans.
Fortunately, we had the cash on-hand to deal with this issue. But what if we hadn’t been ready for it?
My best budgeting advice for you is this…. Expect the unexpected.
Sure, we try to plan for everything we can possibly imagine when we do our monthly budgeting. We even pad our budget with some miscellaneous spending money. But we can’t anticipate everything. We can only be sure that something will happen this month that will throw things out of balance. Life WILL happen! Realizing that ahead of time has helped us deal with the speed bumps along the way.
This post is linked to:
:: Frugal Friday hosted by Life As MOM
:: Works for Me Wednesday hosted by We Are THAT Family
Life throwing monkey wrenches in the way….surely you jest!? Just kidding….Thanks for posting this and reminding people like me that life does throw the unexpected at us sometimes. Have a great weekend!
I wish those monkey wrenches didn’t happen, but *sigh* they just do! Hopefully just knowing that ahead of time lessens the stress when the wrenches come!
You are right. Life happens every month around here. You have to build in a misc category to cover it.
This may not work for everyone, but it worked for me: For three months I wrote down everything I spent. Every penny. Same with hubby.
Then we looked for things to cut. DVD rentals? Cut. Went to the library or traded with friends. Premium cable TV? Cut. We rarely watched enough to justify.
Get the idea?
We also looked at our phone bills. We dumped the home phone and the expensive cellphones and got Net10 phones instead. We pay only for what we use at 10¢ a minute and 3¢ a text. Our bills are gone, since we get none! and there are no overaqes or surprises, either.
We also eat out less, and consolidate our shopping trips. The point is that you can find all sorts of things to cut so you can get more for your money!
I hear you! We cut cable TV several years ago. People look at you like you have two heads when you tell them that you don’t have cable. We have rabbit ears, get 2 channels, and rarely watch TV. We get so much more done because of it! We’re considering dumping our land line when we move. We have two cell phones, so we may give that a try. Sounds like you’ve come up with many ways to cut here and there. Those sure do add up!
I am learning the hard way that this is so true…after a $216 car repair yesterday for what was supposed to be an oil change. Thanks for the reminder!