As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, this month saw a few large expenditures that indeed deviated from budgeted expenses. The big one was, of course, my new motorcycle. Associated with that purchase was the requisite safety gear - my old stuff had served its purpose. I also bought a new mattress as more of an investment in getting better sleep and thereby better health. I shopped around quite a bit and got a nice one with a 10-year warranty for a good price. The timing belt on my car broke the day before I got my motorcycle (uncanny!) but it was relatively inexpensive for a timing belt replacement since my engine is non-interference, meaning it doesn't eat the valves when it fails.
The one area where I really let it get out of hand was grocery/eating out/entertainment. I've found that with an appropriate balance, I can enjoy life and get by on my $15/day with little problem. The idea is that groceries are cheaper than eating out, so it's a balancing act. Well, I ate out way too much this month. I also spent a lot at the cafeteria at work - instead of bringing healthful inexpensive food from home, I'd eat less healthy overpriced food there. I ended up $125 over - an average of $4 a day!
My major financial goal for June is to get that category reigned in and brought back to a more reasonable level.
I have already developed a payment plan for my bike - I'm going to divert everything from my student loan principle to that through the end of the year. At the end of the year, I'll re-adjust my Roth IRA contribution for 2010 and increase my motorcycle payments accordingly. Although my loan term is 5 years, I am on track to pay it back in less than half that if all goes well. Then it's on to the student loan...
0 comments:
Post a Comment