Couple Money

Using Cash for Lunch is Paying Off

Elle — Wed, 16 May 2012 19:12:32 +0000

(Sorry for the post being up later than normal, but I had to take care of a fee for my business checking account this morning. More on that later…)

Besides trying to cut gasoline expenses this month, I’ve also decided to switch over to cash only with eating out for lunch and so forth. I usually just pull out my check card when I grab a bite. However I was curious to see if I would spend less if I used cash.

At the end of each week any cash left over is placed in a safe spot for the end of the month tally. Whatever is left over will be used to pay down the student loan.

ATM Runs for Cash

So I decided to take out my food money once a week from a local branch ATM. The first thing I noticed when I went was that I was conservative when choosing how much to take out. Looking over fast food expenses for the last 4 months, I noticed I spent and average of $130/month or about $30/week. Since Wells Fargo, like many other ATMS, offer cash withdrawals in $20 increments and I didn’t want to take more than my average, I took out $20.

Mentality of Eating On $20

It sounds kind of ridiculous, but having the cash in my wallet be my only source of money for eating out changed my perspective. I went into college student mode and became more aware of the deals in my area.

An unintentional effect of using cash is that I also have found ways to get a bit more of it by carpooling and being the driver. I’ve taken a few people on errands (both going to the same places so why not?) and I’ve received a bit of gas money (~$15). It’s not a ton of money, but it’s still just a bit extra.

Bought Clothes with the Leftover Money

What’s fun about using cash only is that the $20 is going further than I thought. Saturday comes and we have my brother and sister in law in town for a brief visit. We took a tour around the neighborhood and in the shopping area was the local consignment shop for babies and kids. Looking at my wallet, I decided to go inside and see what I could get. I managed to pick up a summer dress, a play outfit, a bottom to go with our baby girl’s Wonder Woman onesie, and a fall jacket. I still had a bit of cash left over. So I managed to spend less on eating out, but I also picked up some clothes for our daughter.

Thoughts on Using Cash

Have you noticed something similar with cash only spending? Do you spend more or less when you only use what’s in your wallet?

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May Fuel Challenge Check-In #2

Elle — Mon, 14 May 2012 12:45:46 +0000

It’s another Monday, so it’s time for me to check in with my own progress with the Fuel King/Queen Challenge. I had a fuel up this week and it wasn’t pretty – I got 22.8 miles per gallon this tank. Ouch! I have got to get back to getting 28-30 miles per gallon.

I’ve been doing a lot of city driving and the results show – I got to change up my driving habits, quick. Here are a few things I’ll be working on when driving with this tank:

Be consistent with my driving speed. When I’m driving to the other side of town I tend to get stuck on Capital Blvd traffic. That usually means lots of lights and bad driving. I’ll try out different routes to see if that helps.
Keep my car light.
Be a part of a carpool. I’ll try to split car trips more with friends.
Combine errands to minimize unnecessary trips. I’m guilty of this during the weekends when I’m driving the city. I’ll work on doing one trip a day and taking care of several activities.

I’m hoping you’re doing better with your fuel-ups! If not, what do you plan on changing up for this tank?

If you’re interested in tracking your gas mileage and you don’t want to use Fuelly, here are some free spreadsheets I found online:

Angry Millionaire is on a Streak

Martilyo from Angry Millionaire has been getting some rather good consistent results from his Honda Civic. It has over 200k miles on it, but it’s a fine machine. Martilyo is getting over 32 miles per gallon with the fuel-ups.

Thoughts on the Fuel Challenge

I’d love to hear from you and your challenge. Please remember to leave your progress in the comments below – it’s encouraging and a way for us to see how each other is doing. If you have any tips that you’ve used please share them as well.

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Roadtrip Giveaway (Plus Posts I Loved This Week)

Elle — Sat, 12 May 2012 12:00:37 +0000

I recently reviewed a set of puzzle books on My Financial Reviews. Since many couples and families are taking a road trip this month, I thought a puzzle giveaway would be great.

Prize Pack Includes:

The Complete Idiot’s Guide® to Picture Puzzles, Vol. 2
Puzzle Baron’s Sudoku
Puzzle Baron’s Logic Puzzles, Vol. 2

If you’re already a subscriber to either Couple Money or My Financial Reviews, you’ve already been entered. No fuss, no muss – just my way of saying thanks for being a part of the community (If you haven’t signed up, just simply use one of links.)

If you want to double your chances, simply follow me on Twitter and leave a comment that you’re following. It’s that simple. I’ll pick the winner Wednesday evening (May 16, 2012) at 8pm Eastern time and send them an email to get confirmation. This contest is for the United States only (publisher is shipping).

Couple Money Around the Web

Besides writing here on Couple Money I contribute at other sites as well. Here are a few of my recent posts:

In a Nutshell-> What to Look For in a Family Car: Since the information is fresh on my mind, I wanted to share what we determined to be important for our family’s needs when it comes to transportation.
TurboTax->When Do I Amend My Tax Return?: Sometimes tax returns need to amended and sometimes it’s not a big deal. I share information that can help you determine what’s the right move.
Green Panda Treehouse-> Do You Balance Your Checkbook?: I think more and more people rely on tools to take care of this, but knowing how to balance your checkbook is essential to tracking your money.

Personal Finance Posts to Catch Up On

If you have some free time this weekend and want some tips and information for your finances, be sure to read some of these wonderful posts. They’re from tweets I’ve sent out this past week. Please follow me to get them as I post them.

Maximizing Your Maternity and Paternity Leave Options via @mymoneyblog http://awe.sm/5nnMi
Minimalism Addiction http://awe.sm/5oYcx via @MarriedWithDebt
How to Leave Your Broker http://awe.sm/5oXl5 via @michaelrpiper
The biggest financial mistake I’ve ever made via @dailymoneypf http://awe.sm/5nto4

Have a wonderful weekend with your family!

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Early Retirement? Maybe Not So Extreme…

Elle — Fri, 11 May 2012 12:08:40 +0000

It’s been pretty quiet over here with our finances recently. Once we bought the car, we’ve been building up our car fund a bit (to cover our current cars’ maintenance costs).

Our finances have been automated so we’re continuing to pay down the student loan and the mortgage while contributing to our retirement accounts.

I’ve been using the last month or so to catch up on my blogroll and my personal library. Among what I’ve been reading are Early Retirement Extreme (both the blog and book) and Mr. Money Mustache.

Could We Plan Our Retirement Differently?

After going over some of the numbers in the book and the blogs, I chatted with my husband a bit about this. For those who have been with us from the beginning, our goals have been fairly straightforward. Besides paying off all of our non-mortgage debt in 5 years (we have 2 ^1/2 years left), we also want both of us to have the option work to from home.(My husband enjoys his work, so it’s more about having an option rather than anything else.)

Our financial system is based on that – retirement was seen later rather than sooner. We thought about retiring earlier than average, but our thinking was if we enjoy doing the work that we, than why think about retirement?

However after some reading and thinking I’ve had a slight shift on my thinking. I was talking to my husband about some goals that we had (not just financial).

It’s given me some food for thought, so expect some future posts here starting next week (and on My Financial Reviews) about how this will affect our finances.

I’m going to spend part of this weekend looking some of the calculators for early retirement and look at the numbers.

Thoughts on Retiring Early

I’d like to hear about your family’s retirement plans. How many of you are working towards retirement or already are retired?

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Why Knowing Your Net Worth Matters

Elle — Wed, 09 May 2012 12:28:09 +0000

If you’ve been following this blog for some time, you’ve noticed that I do monthly net worth reviews. It’s one of the most popular series on this site.
Today I wanted share some reason why we do this and then share a couple of reason why we don’t stress over it obsessively.

Why We Do Net Worth Reviews

The purpose of the net worth reviews is to give us a regular system to look at our accounts, see what’s changed, and analyze what went well and what we need to work on.

Net worth reviews gives us an opportunity to talk. We have spoken about money before doing these net worth reviews, but having these reviews on a monthly basis has become a part of our schedule.
Comparing our budget to actual spending is valuable. these reviews allows us to see if what we planned is reasonable or if we completely missed the mark.
We get to see our progress (or lack of) on our financial goals for the year. It’s handy tool for checking up on our annual and long term goals.

It’s also nice to see if the numbers increased or decreased.

Why Net Worth Reviews Aren’t Everything

That said, we don’t obsess over the specific numbers when it comes to our net worth. Here are a few reasons why:

They don’t tell the whole picture. Net worth reviews are great tool at getting a snapshot of your finances. However the current balances of our accounts, assets, and liabilities are just part of the equation. Someone can have some pretty good numbers, but their jobs are not steady (perhaps layoffs are looming). A family may spend $350/month on groceries, but they may either be getting $500 of food (by preparing their own and finding deals) or they’re getting $200 worth of food(paying more to eat out).
One month isn’t enough data. As seen in February this year, our net worth can drop (due to the home’s new appraisal), but our day to day finances themselves haven’t changed. As many of us have seen with investments, stocks can be volatile in the short run, but over time it grows.

So we’ll continue doing net worth reviews, but we’re really focused on the trend rather than the month to month numbers themselves.

Thoughts on Net Worth

I’d like to hear from you. What about your family? Do you occasionally review your net worth? How do you calculate it? Do you find knowing your net worth important or not?

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