Tag: expenses Page 5 of 6

On May 2, 2016

Is there ever a dull month? This month involved a broken water pipe and a flooded crawlspace, entertaining both sets of parents for a week, and finding out I’m severely anemic (explains the chronic fatigue for the past several months – Me to doctor: “Not everyone blacks out every time they stand up? I assumed that was normal”). As April wraps up, we have only 5 weeks to go until our big UK/Paris adventure. To say I’m excited would be a tremendous understatement. But at least the trip is forcing us to get some estate planning done (finally! right?). Don’t worry, there’s a whole post coming up on the process and how to save money (you were worried, I know).

Do You Know Your Financial Reflexes?

On April 27, 2016

A reflex is defined as an “an action that is performed as a response to a stimulus without conscious thought.” When the doctor hits your knee, your leg goes up. You don’t will it to do so. It just does. I was at a friends’ house last month. She had a broken toe. She walked into her kitchen and accidentally kicked a Lego with her broken toe that her kid had left on the floor that she didn’t see. Her reaction: Deep breath, pick up the Lego, and walk away. WHAT?! No cussing. No yelling. No throwing things. She just took a deep breath and moved on. Now, I’m a yeller. My kids know I’m working on it and they are very good about reminding me to calm down. But you know what my reflex is if I were to kick a Lego with a broken toe? YELL AND SCREAM! I don’t consciously think “I’m going to yell about this painful, frustrating experience now” and then yell. It is my automatic response. The stimulus hits and I respond with yelling without conscious thought.

Everyone has reflexes/defaults/automatic responses. These are the things you do without consciously deciding to do so. Unfortunately, some aren’t quite as obvious as yelling in a frustrating experience. A lot of financial reflexes are ones we can’t pinpoint and that often causes problems. Tracking your spending to the penny helps identify these things, but think about different scenarios. I’ll present a few, but there are thousands! Instead of thinking about what you THINK you would do or what you know you SHOULD do in these situations, try to stick with your instincts. Try to identify what your default would be. I’m also not necessarily saying there are right answers to your reactions here. They will be different for everyone based on your priorities.

How to Stop Leaky Spending

On April 20, 2016

Last week, Mr. T turned on the outside hose for the first time this spring. The water trickled out. After some sleuthing, we realized the pipe had burst and as soon as Mr. T turned on the hose, the water started going in the (newly insulated and beautiful) crawlspace! Upon seeing the water all over, my first reaction was “SAVE THE STUFF!” I mean, that insulation was not cheap. And the boxes sitting in the water weren’t going to save themselves! Mr. T looked at me and said: “First we have to stop the leak.” He’s so sensible. That’s why I married him. Obviously. He made an excellent point. The order matters!

March 2016 Plan Update

On April 1, 2016

We did it! We just came into $1.4 million dollars and we’re done! See ya world! April Fools! (Sorry. Couldn’t help myself. Ahem… moving on…)

March! A thrilling month in the Banks house. I took a business trip to my office in the Midwest and met some interesting people on the plane. Also, we got new carpet in our whole house which we’ve been working up to for awhile. We wanted to get all of the energy updates done as well as everything decluttered before adding new, fluffy clean carpet to the home. The carpet we had was over ten years old, stained all over, very hard, and had all sorts of pet hair and dander from previous owners (which were not good for Mr. T’s dust allergies). Now, we feel like we’re walking on clouds! And I know all of the hidden pet hair has been vacuumed up!* I’m sitting on the floor as I type this because it’s just so wonderful…

Here on the blog, we celebrated a week of numbers! We looked at how much we spend, the percentages to know for retirement calculations, and then formulated a few new potential plans! If you haven’t weighed in on those, please do! We love to hear the feedback! We had some awesome guest bloggers continue the Roth IRA Challenge Series: Creating my Kaleidoscope and She Picks Up Pennies both took the challenge. I love seeing the many different ways people get an extra $5500! We would love to see more people take the challenge! A few more people shared their Fill-the-Bucket Lists on their blogs this month: FI Big Sky, Tawcan and Dream Beyond Debt – All of them are epic. I’ve also added all the current Fill-the-Bucket List Participants to the original Fill-the-Bucket List post. Go read all of them if you missed any!

How Much We Spend

On March 21, 2016

This week, we’re doing an in-depth look at numbers and we’re kicking it off by taking a good, hard look at how much we spend. Annual expenditures are really the magical number needed to retire. We’re getting real (with charts!) and taking a look at 2013, 2014, and 2015. First up, 2013:

Financial Benefits of Alaska

On March 14, 2016

In Alaska

I wanted to write a post highlighting the financial benefits of living in Alaska. With oil prices low, the state of Alaska isn’t in a great financial position. The state’s operating budget has counted on major income from oil and that income is now severely lacking. Because of that, many of these things may change this next year. But as things stand now, despite our high cost of living, there are several major perks for living in the state.

Why the YMOYL Wall Chart is the Best Retirement Tool

On March 9, 2016

The book, Your Money or Your Life is said to have introduced the term “Financial Independence” and offers a very specific road map for achieving it. I strongly advocate every person read this book. A large part of the program involves creating a chart. Let’s start with how to create your own chart and then talk about why it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. In Excel,* or on graph paper on the wall (I will argue for doing both momentarily), start tracking in a point-to-point or line graph form the following numbers:

February 2016 Plan Update

On March 2, 2016

I love the beginning of the month. It’s the time to sit down, figure out where we stand on the plan, and track the numbers! Overall, this was a great month at the Banks’ house. The most exciting news? Our post about putting your kids to work was featured on Rockstar Finance! Dreams do come true! February was spent touching everything in our house and getting rid of tons of stuff. We started with organizing our clothes, moved on to purging books, tackled the bathroom and kitchen organization (and found a million bag clips and hairbands!), and then worked our way through the rest of the house.

I Found the Hairbands and Saved Money!

On February 15, 2016