Evolving Personal Finance » targeted savings
Targeted Savings for the Non-Broke
As of January, we have resumed our use of targeted savings accounts! I missed this system so in the last 2.5 years when our life has been in flux: becoming funemployed, living apart, moving to Seattle, and having a baby. But said baby is over six months old now and things are much more predictable, so we’re back to using targeted savings. But pressing “play” on our targeted savings system again is not like starting it … Read entire article »
Filed under: targeted savings
Irregular Expenses Are Still Kicking Our Butts!
Somehow I thought that doubling our income would solve our irregular expenses problems, but I guess I was wrong! Our targeted savings accounts were our budgetary saviors during grad school. Our income was pretty low, so irregular expenses like plane tickets and car repairs would have totally overwhelmed our available cash flow in a given month. Our targeted savings account converted large irregular expenses to small regular expenses and helped us plan, save, and make spending … Read entire article »
Filed under: targeted savings
What Triggers Frugality: Net Worth or Income?
My mindset toward frugality has changed quite a bit even during the few short years I’ve been blogging. While I’ve never felt poor, Kyle and I used to be very careful with our money. I mean, we would still do a lot of things like travel domestically and pay for entertainment, but we would be very deliberate and tight in how we went about it. We traveled to Chicago to attend a wedding, for instance, but road-tripped … Read entire article »
Filed under: frugality, funemployment, income, net worth, targeted savings
Revamping Our Money Management System
Kyle and I have had a fairly stable money management system for the last few years, which we laid the basis for shortly after we were married. I have trumpeted its benefits in many blog posts over the years and think it worked very well for us for those years, though it was probably more hands-on than most people would like. In brief, our money management system between 2010 and 2014 was to: Practice percentage-based budgeting in … Read entire article »
Filed under: budgeting, targeted savings
Targeted Savings Accounts and Funemployment for the One-Car Win!
I had a great experience last week – about as good of an experience as you can have running errands, that is. 🙂 This funemployed spouse/homemaker gig is pretty nice, both for me and for Kyle. We noticed that our car needed to be repaired, so we made an appointment with our mechanic to drop off the car one weekday morning. The last time we did this, we dropped the car off together and then took … Read entire article »
Filed under: cars, funemployment, targeted savings
A New Appreciation for Living Below Our Means
Kyle and I are coming up on our first big financial transitions – something I’ve anticipated since the founding of this blog. I always thought that our post-PhD lives would offer an opportunity for lifestyle inflation, but instead I’m grateful that we live sufficiently below our means to absorb an income cut. This week, I have a new appreciation for our budgeting system and how clearly it delineates between wants and needs. On top of … Read entire article »
Filed under: budgeting, career, savings, targeted savings, transitions
Financial Tweaks for Our New Year
Kyle and I have been so busy with work in the past few months that we have really left our money management on autopilot. I haven’t even played with spending scenarios recently, as I love to do! But even without me looking for issues to tweak, three areas of our budget have popped up with some needed updates. Take-Home Pay Increase We noticed that the take-home pay we received at the end of in January was slightly … Read entire article »
Filed under: budgeting, food, savings, spending, targeted savings, taxes
How Do You Decide If You Can Afford a Purchase?
Lately I have been thinking about how to determine whether to make a purchase of a “want” and I’d love some feedback from you all about how you make that decision. One of the purposes of a budget, in my mind, is to help you make that decision. A budget gives you guidelines for what you want your spending to be, and then all you have to do when contemplating a purchase is ask yourself … Read entire article »
Filed under: budgeting, spending, targeted savings
I’m Grateful for Automation in Our Finances
I know I’ve been repeating this ad nauseam in the past few weeks, but Kyle and I have been working a lot in the past couple months. I’ve been running into problem after problem with my experiments and am under a deadline to produce. Kyle has been writing his dissertation in typical Kyle-style – to the exclusion of everything else. We barely have time to keep up with our laundry and dishes and I’m falling … Read entire article »
Filed under: spending, targeted savings
Money Updates from the EPF Household
Today’s post is a collection of odds and ends – thoughts and observations about our life as it intersects with our finances. None of these topics are enough for a full blog post at this point so this is a clearinghouse for our thoughts at this moment. Townhouse Water Damage We had a bit of a scare a couple weeks ago with the townhouse we rent. A leak developed in the ceiling of the lower floor, directly … Read entire article »
Filed under: budgeting, cars, housing, marriage, personal, savings, targeted savings, transitions, travel
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