Our spending is completely out of whack this month with our move!  We started our new lease on 9/17/2013 and ended the old one on 9/22/2013.  I tried to pay all the direct moving expenses out of our nest egg and reimburse to that account as they come in.  But we left off a few recurring maintenance things like changing light bulbs and air filters to the last minute, so we had higher non-budgeted spending than usual.  We don’t have a budget category for that sort of thing since it’s so infrequent and we would normally pay it out of excess cash, but this month there wasn’t enough excess!

The Everyday Budget

Top-line items

INCOME: September was the last month for which we used our 2012-2013 paychecks.  As of the end of September we got our yearly cost-of-living raises!  (See our budget adjustments section below.)

• $86.67 from Kyle’s side hustle, divided as usual

GIVING:

• 10%+ of our stipends to our church
• $50 to the missionary we support
• 10% of Kyle’s side hustle income

SAVINGS: Our usual amount, 17%-ish.

Non-discretionary spending

Rent: We paid all of September’s rent for our old place up front, $895, and are expecting a refund of $238.67 sometime in October.  We also paid $306 in rent for our new place – the prorated rent was $406 but we negotiated $100 off (go us!).

Internet: We paid $40.74 for internet at our old place for 9/1/2013 to 9/30/2013 – however, we ended service on 9/17/2013, so we are expecting a refund.  We also were charged $34.99 for internet at our new place starting on 9/20/2013.

Cell phones: Kyle’s usual $69.65; due to credits to my Republic Wireless account, we didn’t pay anything for my cell this month!  I still have several months of credits to my account but I’m hoping that people will start signing up for RW through our referral link again now that they are coming out with a new phone!

Discretionary spending

Groceries: I didn’t think that we really ate a bunch of groceries this month – moving totally threw off our normal eating patterns – but we did go over budget on our grocery spending.  We had to restock our fridge completely, so I guess it makes sense, especially after our low spending on groceries last month.  We also spent a bit more on snacky processed foods so that we could eat during Campout.

Gas:  Barely spent any money on gas this month – “budgeted,” anyway.  We spend more but it was reimbursed from our savings.

Restaurants: We went to my favorite not-on-my-eating-plan restaurant TWICE this month since my diet was so unusual.  Capitalize while we can.  We also had dinner with friends one night.

Electricity and Gas: It’s cooling off a bit here so fairly low spending.

Water: We actually paid two water bills this month, both for our last place.  We probably could have paid the second one in October but whatever!  We had bigger fish to fry this month and we’re not being overcharged.

Every month we have a few transactions that do not fall under either our budget or our targeted savings.  This month all the extra spending was related to getting the old townhouse ready to turn back over to the owner.

• $39.82 for a light diffuser
• $20.21 for cleaning supplies
• $19.22 for light bulbs and air filters

Spending Out of Targeted Savings

Fairly high spending this month because of the move – $971.68 going out and only $58.39 going in above our normal savings rates.  Good news is, though, that we’re supposed to get our full security deposit back!

Travel and Personal Gifts

We spent $85.57 on a wedding gift and $33.95 on a baby shower gift.

CSA

no spending this month – we’ll get around to buying our high-quality meat next month!

Cars

We spent $78.03 on a new battery for my car so we could get it up and running to move it.

Entertainment

We shelled out $180 for two 40% shares of season tickets to our university’s men’s college basketball home games.

Appearance

no spending this month

Medical

no spending this month

Electronics

no spending this month

Charitable Giving

The organizers of FPU charged me $30 for the coordinator book, so I paid for it out of this account.  The justification is that I need it to give my time to the class.  🙂

Nest Egg

This month we used $306 for the rent at our new place and $258.13 for direct moving expenses.

Taxes

We transferred $19.93 from Kyle’s side paycheck to this account.

Camera

We transferred $38.46 from Kyle’s side paycheck to this account.

Budget Adjustments

So many budget adjustments!  We finally implemented all the changes that we should have done starting over a year ago.

The first set of changes is due to our cost-of-living raise this month – since we use percentage-based budgeting, we increased our absolute saving and giving to keep up with our desired rate.  I also noticed that after redoing my W4 I was having less federal income tax withheld than I used to (and we generally owe federal tax at the end of the year so we were already under-withholding) so I set up a $40/month savings rate to our Taxes savings account.

The second set of changes was due to utilities and such related to our move – rent is going from $895 to $870, internet is going from $40 to $35, and car gas is going from $120 to $100.

The third set of changes is to allocate the remaining part of the raise and money freed up by decreasing those other categories.  We had about an extra $100 to play with so we put an extra $50 each toward Travel and Electronics.  I decided that we are really way over-saving into our Cars account, based on our projected expenditures, so I reduced the savings rate to that account by $50 and switched that contribution over to our Camera account.

Bottom Line

$28.30 over budget.  Poo.  Reimbursed from our nest egg.

Do you have a budget category for home upkeep (especially renters)?  What life events cause you to eat out more?  Do you get your pay raises at the same time every year or whenever you negotiate for one?