[USER]

Advice/thoughts on this budget? Trying to re-work ours as I feel like we’re not making any headway towards goals. We have a credit card and hvac we’re paying off and minimum payment is included in monthly bills payments. Both interest rates are at 0% currently.

All below is monthly
6% going into one spouse 401k
10% going into other spouse 401k
Combined take home: $11,690
Mortgage and utilities: $2984

Monthly Bills (insurance, cell phone, other payments): $779
Subscriptions (includes dog food, housecleaning, etc): $650
Children sports and other fees/daycare: $1100

Spending on gas/groceries/entertainment/etc: $1700
Roth IRA’a: $1160/ month

Leftover: $3317 for brokerage/savings/paying down debt/etc.

[Sherri]

How much is the total debt? No auto or student loans? Asking bc it’s unusual not to see those.

[Jess]

Following because this is almost our identical budget – down to 0% HVAC loan lol

[Travis]

I would check your priorities. If paying off debt is the most important, then put it at the top of your budget list.

Decide how soon you want it paid off and do the math to figure out how much you’ll need to pay each month to hit that goal.

Your secondary spending will have to take a back seat until the debt is paid off.

The GOOD part is you can usually pay that debt off in 9-18 months. And then you can go back to spending more in the other categories.

If housecleaning, extra subscriptions, and kids sports are the top priority, then be honest with yourselves and keep the budget as it is.

Either way is fine, just be intentional about where you’re putting your money.

[Bill]

Nothing outrageous, but that is $86k per year in the spending categories. Slightly above a “normal” middle class budget.

I’d go through those subscription and phone bills to see if there is fluff.

Eg are you on mint mobile vs Verizon. After that it’s just a value judgement for how much you want to spend on things like housekeepers, entertainment, and kids activities.

There isn’t a right answer for those.

[Kelley]

Would be nice to cut down on eating out/entertainment and knock your debt out.

Bet you could within 6 months if you really focused on it and cut down on spending

[Rick]

How serious are you on paying off the debt?
I ask that not to be snarky but as I expect you already see thousands of dollars available in other categories that could be used.

It seems the debt payoff is closer to nice to have and not a hair on fire situation to you all at this time.

[Sarah]

I’d look closer at the subscriptions. $650 seems way too high for that. And drill down closer to see bills within each category to see where you can trim further…. phone bill provider, streaming services, restaurants…

can you eat out less or eat at less expensive places, buy coffee 3 days a week instead of 5, etc.

[Katherine]

I would budget by purpose example: separate entertainment from groceries. And groceries from gas. Are you looking to save more? Or what to do with the $3k left over? Or???

For cutting expenses… We switched to Aldie for a lot of groceries and have saved there.

Some of their stuff is healthier and we have stocked up on name brand stuff (ritz for example) when they’ve had it for less than amazon/walmart.

We cut way back on eating out about a year ago, due to inflation.

And I would separate subscriptions out to their purpose… pet expenses, housecleaning). Do the budget by purpose… is it daycare for under 5?

Will that expense end? Or is it before/after school?

Can one of u work from home or adjust hours so you can reduce that expense for before or after care?

I’d cut back house cleaning, but that’s me…

[Ashley]

You’d need to provide more details besides “monthly bills/subscriptions/other fees”. Pay down that debt before interest kicks in.

And take a closer look at all of the miscellaneous.

And if in real life you clump them all together it’s likely that you aren’t paying close attention to where this is going.

A great way to track is to reconcile at the end of the month so you see whether reality matches up with your budget.

[Danielle]

When my husband and I were on our debt free journey we got very specific. Separate those categories so you know exactly where each dollar is going so you know exactly where you can trim the fat.

Look at what you’re paying for and see where you can get it cheaper.

Some examples we did were; changing wireless carriers (from Verizon to Xfinity saved us $80 a month!), cut all subscriptions, no eating out, cut cable (used families Netflix), ensure “entertainment” is minimal, Personally we cut it all together and did a lot of picnics in the park with the kids.

We never stopped paying ourselves and kept putting into retirement and made kids sports part of the budget as well.

[Bella]

I feel like this is pretty good honestly. Just use the left over for debt and you are good.

[Author]

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