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Long-term Savings Challenge

1K views 10 replies 3 participants last post by  greekislandgirl 
#1 ·
I am challenging myself (and if anyone would like to join me, that would be great!) to a LONG TERM savings challenge. I made a list on my computer of all the places I want to save money to, and listed how much I want to save, by what date, how much I've already saved, and how much I still have to save.

I think it would help encourage me if I did it on here, where I can see it all growing and maybe even get a note of encouragement from time to time!

I'm just going to use a really simple format. If you want to join me, feel free to use this format or one that works for you :)

Updated......Fund......To Total.......By............Saved So Far......... Still Need
6/25/10......BEF........€1000..........6/25/10.....€1000....................€0
6/25/10......FFEF.......€5000.........6/25/11.....€0.........................€5000
6/25/10......Wedding...€10,000......7/1/11.......€21.92...................€9,978.08
6/25/10......Home........€50,000......1/1/16........€0.......................€50,000
6/25/10......Travel.......€5000.......1/1/12...........€0.....................€5000

Green means that it's done, Blue means it's got at least something in it. I'll update each week as I put money into the various funds!
 
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#2 · (Edited)
Okay, that didn't work. I tried to edit but the time to edit was gone. All the numbers in the original post are off because they don't include our savings numbers!! Here's the real chart:

Updated......Fund......To Total.........By............Saved So Far......... Still Need
6/25/10......BEF.........€1000..........6/25/10.....€1000....................€0
6/25/10......FFEF........€5000.........6/25/11.....€344.39.................€4,655.61
6/25/10......Wedding...€10,000......7/1/11.......€1,721.96..............€8,278.04

6/25/10......Home........€50,000......1/1/16........€0......................€50,000
6/25/10......Travel......€5000.........1/1/12........€1,377.56.............€3,622.44
6/25/10......New Car...€25,000........1/1/20.........€0......................€25,000
6/25/10....Furn./Maint....€30,000......1/1/16.......€0.....................€30,000
6/25/10......Dental......€500............8/30/10......€0.....................€500

I also have a retirement fund but I'm not going to track that on here because it's not funded from my weekly budget directly, and it fluctuates so wildly (stock market) that it's not worth trying to keep up with it.

Some of these savings funds, like a new car in 2020, house maintenance and such are off in our future. We already have a new car (2008 model) and we expect it to last until 2020, and at that time, there's absolutely no reason why we will get a NEW car as opposed to a new used car, but my husband wants to have it as a larger number because who knows what cars will cost by then, right?

Our savings goal right now is:

At the end of every week, I take our surplus from our weekly budget (which last week was only €21.92, to give you an idea), and split it into the funds we are focusing on right now. We're doing Wedding 50%, Travel 40%, and FFEF 10%. (Travel includes honeymoon. Our wedding is supposed to be next July, if we end up managing to fund it.)

We already have our BEF.

When we get extra money (like my summer job), we'll divide it up 50/40/10, but not until it's actually in the bank. Exception is I'll skim €500 off the top and put it into the Dental fund, so that should be full by the end of August.

Well, it should be up to date now (after a ridiculous amount of editing to get the chart to line up right, at least on my screen), so challenge is officially ON!
 
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#4 ·
Surprise, thanks for the visit!

Week 2 of our budget ended last night so I can now update the numbers!

Updated......Fund......To Total.........By............Saved So Far......... Still Need
6/25/10......BEF.........€1000..........6/25/10.....€1000....................€0
7/02/10......FFEF........€5000.........6/25/11.....€448.45.................€4,551.55
7/02/10......Wedding...€10,000......7/1/11.......€2,242.29..............€7,615.48
7/02/10......Travel......€4,830.60.......1/1/12......€1,624.42...........€3,206.18
6/25/10......Home........€50,000......1/1/16........€0......................€50,000
6/25/10......New Car...€25,000........1/1/20.........€0......................€25,000
6/25/10....Furn./Maint....€30,000......1/1/16.......€0.....................€30,000
6/25/10......Dental......€500............8/30/10......€0.....................€500

I was able to get €40.66 in budget surplus from last week's weekly household budget. The rest of the money came from wedding gifts we got from relatives (not expected, very very grateful!).

The Travel Fund looks weird because we actually paid for some things out of it - a passport and an international driver's license. Since these are things that last years, I didn't see any reason to strive to add that sum back into the fund; so I just adjusted our fund goal down by the amount spent. (I realized that if I *always* try to keep my funds "topped up", we'll never really get anywhere! The funds are meant to be spent at the appropriate time.)

I think it would be fun and encouraging to put a little bit of money (even if only 1 or 2 € or even less than 1 €) into the so-far empty funds, just to see that there's something there.

I thought it might be fun to, for example, take the 50/40/10 from the budget surplus after taking out the pennies (so last week's surplus was 40.66, then I would divide 40.00 by 50/40/10, and then put the 0.66 into one of the empty funds). Just for fun, you know...

Total Needed: €126,330.60
Total Saved: €5,315.16
Total Still to go to reach all our goals: €121,015.44

:) That's the update for now...
 
#5 ·
Interesting idea and one that will definitely keep you focused on your goals!! Please keep us up to date with your weekly input!!
 
#6 ·
Thanks for stopping by Maui! I need to update with Week 3, and Week 4 ends in two days. My summer job is killing me. I was working until 2:30am last night and had to be at work at 8:30 this morning and now I have about 3 hours to myself before I go back tonight at 6:30pm until 8 or 9. I'm SO tired!! I don't know if we're going to be able to save much this week (week 4). Week 3 was good, I think the total I saved from the household budget was around €40-45. But this week we were traveling the whole week and we spent a lot more.
 
#7 ·
Update for the end of Week 4 a.k.a.... ONE MONTH DOWN!! I decided to combine the BEF and FFEF so instead of a €1000 BEF and a €5000 FFEF, now it's just a €6000 FFEF.

Updated......Fund......To Total.........By............Saved So Far......... Still Need
7/18/10......FFEF........€5000.........6/25/11.....€1454.25.................€4,545.75
7/18/10......Wedding...€10,000......7/1/11.......€2,271.30..............€7,728.70
7/18/10......Travel......€4,830.60.......1/1/12......€1,647.63...........€3,182.97
6/25/10......Home........€50,000......1/1/16........€0......................€50,000
6/25/10......New Car...€25,000........1/1/20.........€0......................€25,000
6/25/10....Furn./Maint....€30,000......1/1/16.......€0.....................€30,000
6/25/10......Dental......€500............8/30/10......€0.....................€500

So that's the update...

So far, I've managed to save €120.61 from the Household Budget (groceries).
 
#8 ·
That's great!

I thought I might as well join you, I need to get serious with my savings. Here we go:


Fund Need By So far Still need

Extra mort pai. 100 Sept 2010 60.00 40.00
Car 6000 July 2011 7.00 5993.00
Emergency 1000 Jan 2011 34.50 965.50

I'll start with these.
 
#9 ·
Emilie, thanks for joining me!! I have a few extra euros that I need to add to the list but I'm so tired right now... my job is outdoors and very physical and today was the hottest day of the year (well over 100 F) and I feel so dead!!! I will update soon though.
 
#10 ·
I should probably add renovation fund since we need to install a floating floor since the carpet is beyong gross. I will add them all to my siggy since my numbers are all mixed up.
 
#11 ·
Okay time for another update!!

Updated......Fund......To Total.........By............Saved So Far......... Still Need
8/17/10......FFEF........€6000.........6/25/11.....€2387.81..................€3612.19
8/17/10......Wedding...€10,000......7/1/11.......€2344.32..............€7655.68
8/17/10......Travel......€4,830.60.......1/1/12......€1697.76...........€3,132.84
6/25/10......Home........€50,000......1/1/16........€0......................€50,000
6/25/10......New Car...€25,000........1/1/20.........€0......................€25,000
6/25/10....Furn./Maint....€30,000......1/1/16.......€0.....................€30,000
6/25/10......Dental......€500............8/30/10......€0.....................€500
 
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