The Zen Dollar

Yesterday I combed through the massive amount of purchases I have made in the last month. I was a little bit ( a lot bit ) depressed seeing my balances and where the money actually went.

Here is a breakdown of the graph generated by yodlee. These numbers are all very accurate and account for every single dime I spent in the past month and how it was spent.

Rent: $563.00 –Pretty self explanatory. Rent is $550 a month and I owed my roommate :10bux:

Travel: $475.21 –This is for two plane tickets, and the money spent in the airport on food and also my rental car.

Pets/PetCare: $467.50 –This one actually has nothing to do with pets. I had owed someone money and it was a one time payback. I categorized it under pets since I don’t actually have pets so I would remember what it was.

Automotive Expenses: $415.75 — The cost of having my brake line repaired and the diagnostic fee at the dealership.

Clothing: $372.31 — This is the cost of the suit and shirts I bought and also the two pairs of shorts I bought when I moved to Florida.

Entertainment: $322.75 — Sadly, this is how much money I spent at the bar…Looking to cut that number down quite a bit.=/

Electronics: $210.28 — HDD, phone, HD enclosure

Restaurants: $ 200.74 — Not bad I must say, this is lunch every day @ work and all the money I spent eating out.

Groceries: $128.27 – Again, doing okay in this category for a month.

Gasonline: $121.53 — Little below average since I didn’t have a car there for a bit.

From this I look at where my money actually goes and was a little disappointed with myself. $322 on bar tabs is quite the cost. That was only money spent in bars too, nothing else. I know I did have a little excess here this month because of the move and the wake and meeting new people, but still, that number needs to go way down. I am looking to keep it under $150.

Things that should trend toward $0 this month are automotive expenses, pets/petcare, and probably travel. These three things amounted to about $1350, which came out of mostly my emergency fund. They make this month look very bad on paper. With any luck, I won’t have any “emergencies” anytime soon.

Clothing was another $372 which also came mostly out of the emergency fund. I’d like to cut back to $0-50 for this upcoming month. I think I’ll need some new socks, maybe a pair of shoes.

The other things on the list were misc. expenses, gas, household items, haircuts, and books. I did very well on my casual spending this month.

Overall, In the past 30 days I spent $3421. 60. An astronomical number. If I subtract the bulk of my emergency expenses, and $300 in clothing costs, I get ~$1800 in expenses. This is a lot closer to what I want to be spending, but still a fair amount over. Under $1400 this month is the goal.

I’ll need to cut down on my entertainment costs and not buy anything this month. It is time to tighten my belt for the next few months. I have my sights on buying a motorcycle, so I really need to start putting some extra away for that. This should help save on the rising cost of gasoline and also the future repair costs on my car.