May Budget Overview & June Financial Goals

If you missed out on last months goals, you can go here to check them out.

To be honest, I haven't felt like we have been making much progress goal-wise in the last couple months. I guess life is like that sometimes, but it's especially frustrating to me when we were making good progress in the past and I have to admit defeat at the end of the month here!

The good news is that through getting rid of one of our car payments, paying off all personal credit card debt and creating a budget for ourselves using the cash envelope system, we have reduced our monthly bills by about $1500 a month.


May Overview
1. Met! Paid all mortgages on time again.

2. Didn't pay off all business credit card charges, but we did take a big chunk out of them.

3. Didn't meet this one. Second month in a row that we didn't put money into savings, and yes, I hate admitting that we weren't able to meet this goal again!

4. Didn't meet this one either. Taxes are the thorn in my side....

5. Met! I actually spent a lot of time in the office getting things caught up and organized. Now, if only I can keep it up. :)


As far as the cash envelopes, thanks to Safeway's Living Well promotion, I did really well with the grocery budget. I gave myself $250 for the month and ended up only spending $205, and averaged a 77% savings between Albertsons and Safeway!

We went over our eating out budget of $250 by $25 and also went over in the $350 Household budget category. Considering how many birthdays and other events that were happening last month, I'm not too surprised that we didn't make that one. We came close, and I'm happy with that.


June Goals

1. Pay all mortgages on time.

2. Put $1000 into savings. I know this is ambitious considering the last two months, but I will be quitting work at the end of July for my maternity leave and we need to be used to living without my income again.

3. Contact accountant about 2008 taxes. Baby countdown is on (~10 weeks!) and it needs to be done...

4. Keep working on paying off business credit card debt. I wish I could give this a number, but the way things have been going, income is just too unpredictable right now.

5. Make up list of monthly personal bills with due dates and put as many bills on autopay as possible. I spend so much of my time and energy on the business finances that our personal bills take the back seat. My ultimate goal is to stop wasting money on late fees - even little ones. So this will be the first step towards that.


Also, I filled the cash envelopes with $250 for groceries, $250 for dining out and $300 for household.

Erika