budget (Photo credit: 401K)
I have absolutely no idea how I managed to stay on my shoe string budget last pay period, but I did it. The only overage anywhere was the $1.63 that shows up on every budget because putting $65 down is easier for my mental calculations than $70 is. In other words, I didn’t go over budget anywhere.
| Category | Budgeted | Actual | Difference |
| Mortgage w/ Taxes | $610.00 | $609.40 | $0.60 |
| RRSP | $100.00 | $100.00 | $0.00 |
| RPP | $65.00 | $66.63 | -$1.63 |
| LOC | $400.00 | $400.00 | $0.00 |
| LOC Interest | $50.00 | $38.55 | $11.45 |
| Utilities | $200.00 | $190.75 | $9.25 |
| Fuel | $50.00 | $40.00 | $10.00 |
| Food In | $60.00 | $59.56 | $0.44 |
| Food Out | $10.00 | $10.00 | $0.00 |
| Other | $50.00 | $27.36 | $22.64 |
I’ve currently got $20 worth of gas in my tank right now, and the other $20 is in my wallet. The gas prices didn’t decrease last pay cycle because there was a holiday long weekend in the middle. Then rather than adjusting after the weekend was over, it just made its scheduled jump again. *sigh* I’m going to throw that other $20 in my tank today.
I picked up a $20 Groupon for an oil change for my car, which I’ll be trying to get in today as well. The other $7.36 in the other category is actually bank fees. I switched accounts to a cheaper option on Wednesday. It would have been my Procrastination Thursday topic for yesterday, except I had to go in to work a couple hours early for a meeting. More on that after.
This upcoming budget has more all around. More line items, and more money going to debt:
| Category | Budgeted | Actual | Difference |
| Mortgage w/ Taxes | $610.00 | $0.00 | $610.00 |
| RRSP | $100.00 | $0.00 | $100.00 |
| RPP | $65.00 | $0.00 | $65.00 |
| House Insurance | $40.00 | $0.00 | $40.00 |
| Car Insurance | $35.00 | $0.00 | $35.00 |
| LOC | $700.00 | $0.00 | $700.00 |
| Utilities | $100.00 | $0.00 | $100.00 |
| Internet | $65.00 | $0.00 | $65.00 |
| Phone | $100.00 | $0.00 | $100.00 |
| Fuel | $50.00 | $0.00 | $50.00 |
| Food In | $60.00 | $0.00 | $60.00 |
| Food Out | $10.00 | $0.00 | $10.00 |
| Bank Fee | $5.00 | $0.00 | $5.00 |
| Other | $20.00 | $0.00 | $20.00 |
Just a small increase in my line of credit repayment…
I received a small bonus for my work in 2011. It amounted to little over $600 gross, which after the taxes were taken off netted me just under $380. On to the debt it goes. That’s actually why I had to go in to work early today; we had a meeting discussing last years results and what we plan to do as a department moving forward.
There was also some discussion about compensation, including bonuses and salary. As you can see, I did receive a bonus (7/12 of what I could have received since I started in June). I’m apparently also due for a raise, which will be retroactively applied to January 1st of this year, and will show up on my next pay check. That’s good, because I kind of need it.
I’m going to try to maintain the more restrained areas of my budget for a while longer. Does it suck? Yep. But I’m encouraged by how quickly I’ve been managing to pay off this last burden.
Barring any unforeseen events, I will meet the financial stretch goal for Carla’s challenge that I set for myself back in January. Even without the bonus, I would have successfully just squeaked in. I’m really happy about that, because I honestly didn’t think I’d be able to do it. It seemed like too big of a gap to cross in that short a time period. One day short of a month ago (January 25), my balance was sitting at over $6500. It’s now sitting under $4500, which was my goal by the end of February.
Die debt balance, die.
How are your budgets doing this month? Have you been stretching yourself to meet a goal? How is it going?
Recommended Reading: Why I Got A Large Tax Return.
