A Jar of Pennies…Planning My Future Budget
At the end of every day I empty out my pockets for loose change and throw it into an old Poland Spring 3 Liter bottle.
At first the change hit the empty bottom of the container loudly, but as the months passed it has gotten quieter and quieter as I put more money in. This makes me happier & happier.
This lil jar of change is my Mad Money stash because I believe everyone should have a little something for that rainy day. However, from the holidays and definitely what Michelle here as described as Lifestyle Inflation I almost brought my lil jar to the bank and cashed it out.
The plan for this lil jar will be future vacation or maybe the wedding dress of my dreams fund. Luckily I resisted the urge to cash it and realized I didn’t need more money…I needed a budget & the self-control to remain on that budget.
Hi Everyone, I’m a Chloe, from the blog Ergo, a 27 year old homeowner, who escaped of college without student loans & has a mediocre job.
Throughout the past 2 years though I have been carelessly living with a credit card swipe here & everywhere to the point where I have depleted my entire Checking account. I do have a savings account cushion that I WILL NEVER TOUCH so I’m not in debt yet.
However, if I continue on with my compulsive shopping habits and careless behaviors it will be the road I will be on. Now the Matter at hand is “How to build my Checking Account back up & Budget.”
I’m compiled a Mini List of a Few Rules & Tidbits I’m going to use to Start of my New Year w/ Saving Money & building back up my checking account:
- Confront my Inner Battle between Need vs Want…
- Shutting off my television at night. I sleep w/ the TV on…It’s not good for my TV or my electric bill. Also, I plan to not turn on every light in the house… Only if I’m in the room will I leave the light on.
- Identify my Biggest Spending Habits. Lunch-hour. If I stayed in on my lunch hour, it would really make a difference. My biggest money culprit is eating Lunch Out & Lunch-time shopping. If I stayed in and walked around the Office Complex where I work, I’d get an extra work-out in too. This would kill 3 birds with one stone. A) Save Money by Brown-Bagging it. B.) Save Money by NOT shopping at the Nearby Mall & C.) Save Gas, which in turn saves money.
- Date Night Every Other Week or Once a Month. If my boyfriend and I go out to eat it is at least $40. We eat out a lot. If I cut back to having a Date Night Once a Month after 2 & half years of dating I think that would be okay. There are MANY cheaper alternatives to the classic Dinner & a Movie Date…I can’t wait to find them!
- Creating a Master Excel Expenses Spreadsheet – I plan on laying out ALL of my Expenses & using the nifty formulas to calculate exactly how much I can spend or not each month.
- The most important thing I have to remember is just because I have a coupon, DOES NOT MEAN I HAVE TO USE IT! Additionally, if it is On Sale, IT DOES NOT MEAN I HAVE TO BUY IT! I’m guilty of both…This ties into Need vs. Want.
With these as my starting point, I definitely need to visualize the reality of the situation and take off those rose colored glasses w/ my personal finances. I’m shaking my head & kicking myself that I let my checking account get in fact so low. But in any changing experience, identifying the problem is the first step.
What Are Some Changes You Are Going to Make in The New Year to Save Your Pennies?
Ways I’ve Made Money
Hey everyone! I am currently in St. Thomas (WOOHOO!) and have some wonderful guest posts lined up for while I’m gone. I always love finding new blogs, so I hope you enjoy these great writers who were actually willing to guest post for me 
Don’t forget to read Sunday’s guest post on Why She Loves Her Budget, Monday’s guest post on New York City travel tips, and yesterday’s post on Money Saving Tips For Your Vacation.
This is a guest post from eemusings, a writer from Auckland, New Zealand. Visit her blog NZ Muse for straight talk about all things personal finance and lifestyle (career, relationships, food, travel); she also tweets as @eemusings.
I’ve gotten to grips, sort of, with the fact I’ll probably never feel properly financially secure. It’s never enough, and I know how easily things can go pear-shaped.
Since I moved out at age 17, I’ve always cultivated multiple income sources. It’s hard for me to sit still when I could be side hustling and padding the bank account a little more – money gives you choices, and the more options you have in life, the better, IMO!
I’ve eased off on this recently (I wanted more free time) but now I’m getting back into it with an eye to reaching some hairy savings goals next year.
Here are some of the random ways I’ve brought in extra money (aside from my main job) over the years:
Editing/Proofreading
My English skills actually come in handy for students whose writing isn’t so crash hot. I tidy up their essays and reports, and they pay me for it! Even better, I can do this from anywhere – preferably the comfort of my own home.
Tutoring
Unlike the former, this usually requires getting out and actually meeting students face to face. Depending on your skill set and experience, this can be pretty lucrative. Tutoring someone in law or chemistry pays much better than plain old English, unless you get a seriously desperate and seriously loaded ESOL exchange student. You gotta factor in things like transport costs and time into your hourly rate, though.
Surveys/market research
I do a lot of online surveys, though they generally pay out gift cards or vouchers rather than cash. It’s slow going, but I think it’s worth it for the amount of time I actually devote to it – which is a hell of a lot less than I waste cruising Twitter and Facebook. I’m funding Christmas presents with earned gift points this year.
Putting up promotional posters
After finishing up an admin job with one company, they hired me for a temp gig going around campuses and putting up flyers advertising their services (which they paid me a higher hourly rate for, even though it was way easier than what I did as their admin assistant!). And I got a workout while doing it.
Mystery shopping
My mother used to do this when I was a kid, so when I struck out on my own I signed up for the same companies and got my own account. Over the years the money has gotten worse and competition fiercer, but there are still a lot of freebies to be had (which is often what I do it for, rather than cash profit).
One of the easiest things I’ve ever done to make money on a hourly basis was bus surveys; I had an unlimited monthly pass anyway, so I would jump on a series of different buses, checking things like whether the driver followed protocol, was on time, and how well maintained the bus was. I planned this out so that I was super efficient and never had to wait long between rides, doing assignments around the CBD where buses are frequent. (Plus I lived in an area that was well-serviced, so I could catch all kinds of different routes home on different days and fit even more surveys.) At a pinch, I could do four or five in a hour – on my lunch break, or on a weekend afternoon – and make $40 or 50.
Focus groups
But the easiest money I’ve ever made hands down is via focus groups. I’ve done everything from taste tests to being hooked up to electrodes to test my brain’s reaction to various TV ads. You can bag up to about $80 an hour if you’re lucky, and I’d say an average rate is about $40. Sadly, market research opportunities don’t come along that often (and they don’t like you to have done any other focus groups recently).
What wacky things have you done for money over the years?
What’s the easiest money you ever made?
Let The Chicks Hatch
I have to say… I never thought I’d be irresponsible with money. My mom and dad gave me a GREAT start into the financial world, and gave me every tool a parent could give for me to get and keep financial stability. I took less than $11,000 in student loans for a four year degree, I have a degree as a Respiratory Therapist in the “recession proof” health field, and I am married to a man who has never done less than provide a comfortable life for us. We had everything good going for us. It’s amazing how quickly the feeling of stability can fall away from you!
Here’s my first and hopefully ONLY major financial mistake:
I was only six months away from graduation when I decided that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to look at getting a new car. Fast forward a month, and I was the proud new “owner” of a 2010 GMC Terrain. Oh did I ever have stars in my eyes! A beautiful, nearly new SUV with good mpg’s was sitting in MY driveway. It was my early graduation present to myself, because who would ever think that a Respiratory Therapist would have a hard time finding a job? The payments were easily managed, and I would have a great paying job within six months for sure, right? Wrong. I wish someone would have slapped me and said:
Hubs had been working the oil fields and was making great money, facilitating my feeling of comfort and security in our financial situation. Only problem? He was gone nearly three weeks of every month. I couldn’t hack it. I was a mess without him, so things HAD to change. We moved to another town, he had another stable, good paying job, but we also now had a rent payment. Bummer. I got a job to help out with my car payment, while his job covered every other expense. We were still treading water.
Now it’s graduation day! Oh how I’d been awaiting the moment to get my degree and my new high paying job! Well, again, life happens. The recession proof career I’d chosen, wasn’t so recession proof. I couldn’t find a job. I lived within an hour of THREE hospitals, and multiple home health companies, and there was nothing to even apply for. It was a shock, but I still had my part time job at Home Depot to rely on, so no big deal! We were still making it…barely. Hubby was miserable at his new job though, so we knew things had to change, and they had to change soon. This was about how he felt:
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| Source: http://ayearofsignficance.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/ |
We’ve now gotten all the way back to September, almost a year since we bought my pretty SUV. Our financial worries were there, but not screaming in our faces since we made just enough to pay everything and have a touch left over each month. There was no credit card debt, only two cars, two sets of student loans, and living costs. Things were ok. THEN…The call came. Someone wanted ME to apply.
I didn’t know there was an opening anywhere around us, but they had gotten my name, and wanted me. I applied, and actually landed the job! One problem though, it was far enough away that we had to move. Moving meant leaving our comfortable situation, leaving Tyler’s job, and leaving my job, and leaving our nice but cheap apartment. It meant taking risks. We took the chance. I moved September 10th into an apartment that would cost us DOUBLE what we paid in Idaho, and that wasn’t the only higher living expense we faced. Longer story short, we didn’t have a great plan to jump from. I was the only bread winner and we were BARELY scraping by, with two rent payments, and everything else on top of it.
Now fast forward to TODAY. I’m employed, hubs is employed, and we have a stable base again. But from the move and “life happening” we have over $5000 in credit card debt, $20,000 in car loans, $30,000+ in student loans between the two of us, and $1200 a month in rent. Now that we have the means, every cent is going towards repayment. No more credit cards for us. We’ve become a cash only family. We are SO lucky that this didn’t ruin our credit scores (somehow there was never a late payment), and we are so lucky it wasn’t worse. Depending on the month more than $1000 will now go toward extra debt payments and student loans, starting with the lowest amount/highest interest rate debt first, the credit cards. When that’s paid off, the normal payments to that rolls into the next lowest amount/highest interest until THAT’S gone, and so on. It will all be paid off within 5 years for sure, then we’ll be DEBT FREE.
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| Source: http://www.debtfree-and-in-the-black.com/baddebt.html |
All in all, I can’t believe that I was immature enough to rely on my “future” job to get a car, but it’s all too common. I know I was lucky. We suffered no real losses, only true stress. I hope that people can learn from my mistake and NEVER count the chicks before they hatch, as they say. It has been a scary roller coaster and it’s FAR from over. We’re still in a somewhat precarious position, so I know we’re not out of the woods, but we’re for sure on the mend. We just have to pray month to month that nothing big happens to us or to our pup that will set our plan back further.
I’m Heather
A young twenty something wife, mommy to a fur baby, and a respiratory therapist. I blog to keep life in perspective and to connect with others! I blog over at The Life Unexpected, (heatherandtylerdraney.blogspot.com) and I hope you’ll take the time to stop in and say hi!
