Just started this and I wanted some budget help

**Hurricane0884** · 03-17-2011, 10:13 PM

Hello all my wife and i recently got married and soon after started the DR program. We have made some good headway paying off one cc and most of another one in about two months anyways i just wanted to see if our budget was reasonable Thanks for your help!

$2840 take home pay
240 for tithing
50 ira
637 rent - inlcudes water bill
80 utilities
110- mobile phone and internet
300 food
130- insurance for two cars with full coverage
179 car payment 1
276 car payment 2 - in process of selling/ trading car for much cheaper car
180 gas for cars
10 medicine
20 repairs/ oil change
209 tuition - calculated so that we can cash flow my wife through college i am on a full ride scholarship
25 blow money
25 toiletries
180 cc 2
70 cc 3 - this a no interest card from when i bought the engagement ring will be done in october unless we speed it up
what do you think?
I am currently working full time and going to school full time i would not mind pickin up some work on the side but it cant really be a full part time job any suggestions would be nice

Thanks again!

**mama2James** · 03-17-2011, 10:17 PM

Do you have an emergency fund, or any budgeted amount for savings? Plans for things that come up, like car repairs or registrations, doctor's appointments,, clothes etc?

ETA: oops, I see the line for car repairs i your budget now that i looked again

**Hurricane0884** · 03-17-2011, 10:20 PM

yes we do have an emergency fund of 1000 and i have another 1200 in stocks that i am holding on to for two more weeks so that i wont get taxed as bad for keeping it less than a year

**mama2James** · 03-17-2011, 10:39 PM

How long have you been working with this budget? Does it seem to be a good fit, or are you finding expenses that you don't have a category for...or consistently going over or under budget in certain categories?

**Hurricane0884** · 03-17-2011, 10:53 PM

Only been on a budget for two months we have been adjusting the food budget we started at a hundred a week and are down to about seventy five or so a week we are still working things out. I just wanted to see if we were working in the right direction!?

**ms.mel.who** · 03-18-2011, 07:28 AM

Congrats! Doesn't it feel amazing! Great work on cash rolling college and your schlorship.

Volunteer at the church on Sunday, and quadruple your payment to your crdeit card. That would be a replacement for a small part time job. Not to mention since my daughter and I began working in the church nursery, I feel more connected to the whole church community.

Getting rid of the car payment is a wonderful idea, but why just one of them?

When it was just my DH and I in college, we lived in the smallest house as close to university that we could find, and made it work until we left school. We still had one car, but we biked and car pooled as many places as we could. But I have no idea how far you both live from work and school, just an idea.

Hang in there, you will graduate and your income will go up.

**OOwl** · 03-18-2011, 08:38 AM

I am impressed with your thorough budget; however, I think DR suggests dropping your retirement fund contributions while you're getting out of debt. That was REALLY hard for me to do but it really inspired me to get it done so I could start that back up again. And that's the FIRST thing I did when I payed off all my debt was start the 401k back up. As crazy as it sounds, the "headgame" of having that stalled out was a HUGE inspiration to me to stay on budget and get out of the debt all the faster. Other than that, I think your budget looks great.

**alphanumericone** · 03-18-2011, 11:39 AM

Looks pretty good, but!
Drop the IRA.
Pay just the minimum on one CC, then put the IRA money and any remaining money on the 2nd CC.

Follow through on downgrading the car (or both).
Congrats on the full ride scholarship! Hang on to that!

a

**Wendy99** · 03-19-2011, 11:09 AM

good job & good motivation to recaculate our budget .. i think you've thought it out well and are headed in the right direction

**forHISglory** · 03-19-2011, 11:43 AM

I'm impressed! You are doing so many thing well: tithe, save, and thinking ahead. My only suggest is to keep on chopping at the food budget. I think you could probably do this more cheaply, which would free up a little more cash. Keep posting and keep on keeping on!

**Hurricane0884** · 03-19-2011, 11:47 AM

Thanks everyone for the ideas and encouragement. We are currently only trading in one car because we would take a loss on both of them but are going to have to roll it into a new loan just a much cheaper car. The other one is near pay off or should be within a year or year and a half. Yes it is very hard for me to give up investing I am going to school to be a financial analyst so it freaks me out! I am working on it though. Thanks again for all of the ideas!