I've come the the realization that I detest variable expenses! I hate not knowing exactly how much things will cost. Why can't my grocery bill be the same every week? or what I spend on gas for my car? or my biggest nemisis....the electricity bill. It fluctuates so much and during winter it gets so high. Summer months the bill is like $70 a month and winter it's like $240 a month. And the electric company is no help. Some months their billing cycle is 28 days, some months it's 35 days. I think there has been one month this past year where it was actually under what I budgeted. And it always seems to be 35 day cycle during the most expensive month during winter. I know, I could go on the averaged out monthly plan. I had tried that for awhile many years ago. I just hated how inevitably after the year and they reassessed the monthly payment I always seemed to owe a big chunk to get "caught up". Plus, during the summer months was when we were spending on our kids' sporting activity and if I was paying the low electricity bills during the summer months it gave me extra money each month to spend on the kids, so I went back to actual monthly billing.
I will work on a budget and post it later.
I think I am going to start trying something new, if I can manage to keep track of it somewhat easily. I am going to try and budget for an average for each month and put the extra in savings if I am under what I budgeted that month. Also, I need to realistically come up with a figure for groceries. I know I woefully underbudget for this, as well as eating out (which in our case, is take-out food).
No comments:
Post a Comment