I still have my original box of checks for my current account from 1996. They still bear the National Bank of Detroit logo, despite becoming Bank One and later JP Morgan Chase. And yes, they’re still valid. I write one every once in a blue moon when a contractor won’t take a credit card.
Is that normal in your area? I have a 2500 square ft house running gas heat and hot water during cold winters, and full AC during hot summers, and my bill is never more than $200.
Like I said, I don’t use gas. Electric heat, electric range, electric water heaters, etc.
I think this is regional. Out here, contractors usually take a credit card (either call back to the home office or those little Square things), but never, ever, ever, American Express.
He’s religious and unapologetically so. In some cases potentially offensively so. That said, I don’t care what religion or non-religion someone is if they have useful information or techniques. That’s how I think though and in part why I clash with certain others who do care.
With regards to income it seems the board has a vast range.
I do admire your envelope system and discipline. We use auto debit for most bills and electronic transfers for the others. We probably over pay for a few services and not seeing the cash in the monthly envelope leads to counterproductive financial inertia.
I’m getting motivated to make a change!
Hey hey! 
I find shopping for groceries at say a Costco, Walmart, Target, or even Whole foods is difficult because so many items you buy there are not food related. So I might buy chicken, apples, milk, new shoes, and a new tv at Costco.
Also at Costco when I buy something like laundry detergent its in a large size which could last me for a year.
So if one is going to do a strict grocery budget you should stick to grocery stores only and have only one person doing the shopping.
We shop at Walmart and buy other things besides food. But we ring it up as separate purchases. Food is paid for by the grocery envelope for that date; detergent or shampoo comes from the incidentals envelope (and the receipt goes back into the envelope); clothes for the kids comes from the aptly named “kids’ clothing” envelope…etc.
The whole concept of “budget” is an arcane mystery to those of us who have acquired the mindset of spending less than we earn, and we just buy what we need and pay what it costs, and sometimes also what we want. It’s just instinctive – “I can’t afford that”. No pocket calculator required.
Give me a break. :rolleyes: I’ll repeat: it can only be “instinctive” if either you have an above-average income, or an ascetic personality.
For example, one of the things we budget for is maintenance and eventual replacement of our vehicle. One thing we’d ideally like is to have a vehicle that’s less than ten years old, so I can make some extra dough driving for Uber (they don’t allow vehicles older than that). But this vehicle was 13 years old when we got it, and 15 years old now. It’s going to be pretty tough to “catch up”, although if we can manage it, then the Uber money itself can help us stay within that window. How, pray tell, would your “instinctive” “mindset” take care of this? :dubious:
I was just going through the envelopes to prepare for my daughter’s upcoming birthday, and in the process was reminded that our electric bill envelope actually gets $360 a month, not $425 (not sure where I got that from–could be that is how much I disbursed from it for our last bill, I dunno). Maybe that’s not quite the sticker shock as the other number.
You’re talking about a highly specific, maybe once-in-a-ifetime, judgment where you are considering making an invstment that might yield a return in the future. That is not the same as day-to-day budgeting.
If “living within your means” is a “highly ascetic personality”, then I guess that word works for me.
Why, despite tons of evidence to the contrary being presented to you here, do you continue to insist that it is impossible that other people might just function differently than you do?
For some of us, we have settled into a natural flow where we have an understanding of our financial comings and goings to the point where we are able to make decisions and maintain our desired balance without having a specific amount allocated for categorized things. This is possible even on a modest income, and even when allowing for splurges, unexpected expenses, and changes to needs. It doesn’t work for you, and that’s okay, but please stop scoffing at people who work differently.
Some people have difficulty maintaining their weight without following a strict routine of counting calories in and out. Some people are able to make decisions about food and exercise without knowing precisely how much they are eating or burning, and manage to not have their weight fluctuate. For some people, it is instinctive to skip the extra slice of pizza because they haven’t been to the gym in a few days, or to dig in to the donuts in the lunchroom because they had salad for lunch. For other people, that would be disastrous. Because people are not all the same.
There is certainly an income level below which strict budgeting is necessary- but it is not necessarily the case that the dividing line is “average income”. For example, according to the Census Bureau’s 2015 annual survey, the median income of family households * was $72,165. Might be a surprise to you , but that’s what it is - and remember that it includes households where a husband and wife each earn about $36K. Doesn’t mean every family with a household income below that number needs to budget strictly - and it also doesn’t mean that everyone above that number doesn’t need to.
- Family households are those where at least two people are related by marriage birth or adoption. Non-family households are those living alone and those llving with non-related people.
It’s certainly month-to-month budgeting. We don’t do any kind of credit (other than repaying old debts), so the only way we’re going to get to that vehicle that’s less than ten years old is by upping the repair/replacement budget enough so that it pulls us up that hill. Which means reallocating from somewhere else, because every cent that comes in is appropriated to some envelope or other.
If you go through the thread, you will see that it was just the opposite: other people kept scoffing at me, describing budgeting as something inferior and a sign of a lack of discipline (never mind that the Gallup economist seems to think the exact opposite). Any “scoffing” you’re seeing from me is therefore *defensive *in nature.
You’re right, that is a surprise to me. I was operating based on the overall median for households, but mea culpa: it makes perfect sense that individuals living alone skew that number. Do you have any access to data more fine-tuned than that, like quartiles, quintiles, or ideally deciles? Because at $42K per year we are definitely significantly below that median (and we also have 2-4 kids here at a time). OTOH we live in a low cost of living area, and don’t pay a mortgage or rent (though unlike a renter, we have to pay for insurance, repairs, and property taxes).
So it may in fact be true that a majority of *family *households in the U.S. do have the means to get by on “instinct”. But the shade I was feeling seemed to strongly imply that other people’s “instincts” would serve just fine not only in their circumstances but in ours as well. That if they parachuted in, and had our income and family size etc., they could still get by fine just winging it. I’m very dubious of that.
ETA: This new information about median *family *household income makes me more fully appreciate why people talk about teachers being underpaid. My wife’s job requires a master’s degree, but even if I had the same degree and same full time job, we’d barely get above that median if that were our only income. Sheesh.
We monitor what we spend but to use Telemark’s words, we spend naturally within our means.
Traffic is so bad in Jakarta, and it is so limiting having to rely on a driver/taxis, that we have a rigid plan for shopping, since running out of eggs in the middle of a recipe could mean a couple of hours spent in a “dash” to the grocery store.
I have a long list on the computer, updated whenever we undergo a life change such as our son going off to college, of all the staples I want to have in the house at all times - flour, sugar, butter, eggs, salt, canned beans and tomatoes, soy sauce, sesame oil, corn starch, rice, etc. The full list takes up 3 columns on a page. It’s organized by section (fridge, freezer, storage pantry, baking supply cupboard, Asian ingredient cupboard, and so on).
I keep a few print-outs of the list in the kitchen, and once a week I plan a menu, consult the recipe books, and list what I’ll need to buy that isn’t part of our staples. The I make the rounds, checking on all the staples in the pantry, freezer, cupboards and refrigerator, noting which items need to be restocked.
It’s a highly organized system and it does take longer to make my shopping list each week than if I just scribbled a list off the top of my head. When we moved from Jakarta to Cairo, where a complete grocery store was a pleasant 5-minute stroll from the house, I was much more casual. By the time we’d lived in Cairo for 5 years I was amused at my old staples lists from Jakarta and wondered why I had ever been so anal.
Then we moved back to Jakarta, and I remembered exactly why.
So yeah, we do a lot of grocery budgeting, but the resource we are most careful about conserving is time rather than money.
Huh? I went back and re-read every single post, and I don’t see one single one implying in any way that budgeting is inferior or a sign of a lack of discipline. Could you please give me some examples?
I’m sure you were *feeling *that shade- but I’m not at all sure anyone was throwing it. Most of what you were getting was a reaction to your apparent inability to believe that anyone other than the very rich can manage without an actual budget. Nobody said anything close to “If I were in **SlackerInc’s **position ( which I don’t know in any detail) , I wouldn’t need a budget.” They said that in their own position , they wouldn’t need a budget. I’m certain I would need a budget if I were supporting 4 people on $42K a year - but you might not need a budget if you were supporting two people on five times that amount.
My parents had a single account but they had “her money” and “his money” for every month. As children, we were given a weekly amount (no amount of begging for more would work, but reasoning for a raise did). Once we went to college, each of us was granted an ATM card and “personal money”, which was allotted for the year. Big expenses came out of the general account; personal expenses from each person’s amount; clothing and groceries were assigned to Mom’s amount.
Absolutely, though I must say I’m surprised you didn’t see it if you went back and read all the posts with that in mind.
Here’s an early one:
You don’t think “ridiculous waste” qualifies as “implying in any way that budgeting is inferior”? 
Is that because it is stated outright rather than implied?
And I think I showed equanimity in my response to that one (there were not yet that many straws on my back, as it were):
Back to what I saw (and still see) as the “shade”:
Was I really wrong to take these, and other similar comments, as “budgets are a useful, if crude and blunt, tool for people like **Slacker **who don’t have our experience, discipline, financial acuity, or flawless instincts”? It’s possible, I guess–but I’m not convinced.
Continuing to cite examples:
Does this not translate as “The only people who need to budget are the very immature and inexperienced, and/or suckers who buy things that aren’t worth the money”?
Do I seriously even need to annotate this one?
Or this one? If you don’t see any shade there, I’d say your shade detector needs calibration.
Translation: “Budgeting is fine for the profligate, but for frugal folks it’s a counterproductive waste of money, even if your income is low” (I justify the last part of the translation, after the comma, due to the first two sentences I quoted).
Again, if you didn’t see any of this when rereading I’m not sure if it makes any difference to quote the posts to you…but you asked for examples, and I provided them. ::shrug::
ETA:
No argument with that.