Adventures in shared finances: The case of the missing rewards points

I should open by saying the Mr. FIRE and I keep our finances separate. This is pretty important to household harmony, because it means when I come home and find packages on the doorstep I can shrug my shoulders and think "when I'm retired and he heads into work on a Monday morning, I'm going to remind him of this." I'm a wonderful girlfriend aren't I?

One thing we do share is a FlyBuys account. Enter the case of the missing rewards points.

Sometime last year I was sent a promotion from FlyBuys telling me to switch my insurance to Medibank and earn FlyBuys points. After investigating their offerings I laughed and went back to my cheaper, lower cover with NIB. There is only so much health insurance I need at 26, and Australia has a pretty good health care system, so if I'm not covered by my private insurance I can just get treated in the public system. It takes longer but it costs next to nothing.

But Mr. FIRE is with Medibank on an old deal that they don't offer anymore. He had also just switched jobs and now his local supermarket was a Coles instead of a Woolworths. So with minimal badgering from me he set up a FlyBuys account linked to mine. Here's how that went down:

LadyFIRE: Here's my card - you should sign up. I think there's a bonus if we link our accounts. Plus we get points from the household bills and you pay those, so might as well link the accounts.
MrFIRE: K. *dutifully signs up like he was told"

some weeks later

MrFIRE: Hey, I've got like, 2,000 points.
LadyFIRE: That's odd, I've got heaps more than that. We must have separate points pools.

about a month ago

MrFIRE: Hey I've got a fair few points. What's the best way to spend them?
LadyFIRE: Dunno, I haven't really looked into it. I was just going to let them build up till I wanted something.
MrFIRE: Hmmm, well it's mostly crap like football merchandise, so I might just use it for money off shopping
LadyFIRE: Go your hardest, your points not mine.

late last night...

LadyFIRE: So hey... remember how I got you a flybuys account? and how our accounts are linked? You used all my points....
MrFIRE: I... ermm... wait... huh....  didn't we figure out that they appeared to be different pools?
LadyFIRE: Apparently not...

So yeah, that happened. Over the last month Mr. FIRE has quietly used up all my FlyBuys points getting $10 off a grocery shop each time.

On one hand, I know I shouldn't be that concerned. We've been sharing the account for a few months so he would have contributed a lot to the balance and the money was spent on groceries, which I've definitely been eating (yay food!). But, those were my points.

When I opened the account today I was looking to see if we could afford passes to the theme parks in Queensland. I was planning on suggesting we head up in a few months once the weather warmed up and check out the parks, and a few other attractions I have fond childhood memories of. Then I opened the account and saw a zero missing from the balance and my stomach sank.

Here I was, quietly hoarding points like a dragon on a pile of gold. I signed up for every offer, tried out different brands when they had a points special and religiously scanned my card for extra points. I'd been sitting on the points for years, apart from one budget crisis where I used them to cover my ass for a couple of weeks. They were a promise against a rainy day, and a vague dream of a holiday at some point. They were mine, I loved them, I cherished them... and he stole them!

Okay, so maybe I'm totally being melodramatic. The points were worth about $75 in groceries, or two 7-day park passes. Not a massive deal in the scheme of things, but I was so smug about those points, especially after I scored bonus points and $100 of free groceries with a sneaky credit card hack. I was pretty emotionally invested in those points.

It's given me a taste of how people must feel sharing a bank account with their partner, and opening it to see that after a big shop on shared necessaries the money is all gone. Some kind of resigned grumpy where you know it was 'fair' spending, but also totally not fair! It's that feeling of coming home and finding all the snacks are gone. Of having a warm blanket stolen in the middle of the night. Technically Mr. FIRE had as much right to (some of) those points as I did, but they were mine!

All I can say is thank god for not mixing bank accounts. I salute couples who can do that and maintain the harmony. As it is I'm making Mr. FIRE give me a massage since he 'stole' my points. I guess this works out well for me!

Money quotes you missed in pop culture

Did you know that popular culture is full of inspirational quotes about finances? They're hidden in plain sight. From Shakespeare, to Monty Python and back again, the world is full of pearls of wisdom, and I've collated some of the best, just for you. Have a read, your eyes will be opened, your horizons expanded. You will never view the world the same way again.

Doctor Who: Don't Blink (2007)

The Doctor: People assume that money is a strict progression of income to expenses, but actually, from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly... money-woney... stuff...

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010)

Kim Pine: [unenthusiastically] We are Sex Bob-omb. We are here to sell out and make money and stuff.

Suckerpunch (2011)

Dr. Vera Gorski: ...I want you to budget.
[Bjork's "Army of Me" playing over speakers]
Dr. Vera Gorski: ...
[Music stops]
Dr. Vera Gorski: If you do not budget you have no savings. And we don't keep things here that have no savings. You see, your fight for financial independence starts right now. You don't want to be judged? You won't be. You don't think you're strong enough? You are. You're afraid. Don't be. You have all the numbers you need. Now budget.

Hamlet (First performed 1609)

Hamlet: To spend, or not to spend- that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the wallet to suffer
The costs and expenses of outrageous spending
Or to take arms against a sea of pointless consumerism,
And by opposing end them. To save- to invest-

Airplane! (1980)

Stewardess: Ladies and gentleman, this is your financial advisor speaking. We regret any inconvenience the sudden portfolio movement might have caused. This is due to periodic value corrections we encountered. There’s no reason to be alarmed and we hope you enjoy the rest of your investment journey. By the way, is there anyone on board who knows how to fly a plane?

Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)

Old Man from Scene 24: Stop! WHAT is your name?
King Arthur: It is Arthur, King of the Budgeters!
Old Man from Scene 24: WHAT is your quest?
King Arthur: To seek Financial Independence!
Old Man from Scene 24: WHAT is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?
King Arthur: What do you mean? African or European swallow?
Old Man from Scene 24: I, I don't know that! *gets pulled to the sky and thrown down the Gorge of Eternal Debt*
Sir Bedevere: How do you know so much about swallows?
King Arthur: Well, you have to know these things when you're king, y'know.

Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979)

Brian's mother: He's not the Financially Literate. He's a very naughty boy! Now, piss off!

The Princess Bride (1987)

“My name is Inigo Montoya, you budget poorly, prepare to die!”

Star Trek: The Original Series (1966)

Narrator: FI. the final frontier. These are the voyages of the moneyship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new investments, to seek out new income and new financial habits, to boldly go where no man has gone before.

Firefly (2002)

Mal: "I swear by my pretty floral bonnet, I will invest."

So you see, financial quotes are everywhere if you keep your eyes and ears open! What's your favourite finance quote?

Saving is boring! Stay on track

Alright guys, I have a confession to make. I am bored of savings. Putting aside $20k for my emergency fund is easily the most dull and meaningless savings goal I've ever had. I love investing, pushing money into accounts that fund my retirement is thrilling. I've had to slow that down to save for my emergency fund and I'm bored.

So I prowled the internet for some tips. While there are plenty on ways to change your saving / spending habits, finding ways to stay motivated was harder.
Let me start by saying that I haven't held more than $10,000 in cash since I discovered that I could invest. At first I thought the money on a high interest account was exciting and at 18 I had something like $30,000 in my account earning 6% (from memory). At the time it was great, but then interest rates dropped and I discovered shares and bonds. The first set of bonds I bought were paying 8.7%. From that moment I was hooked, I kept $5,000 in my account for 'emergencies' and every time I hit $10,000 I pushed half of it into an investment.

That system worked for me for years, until I refinanced my home loans and forgot I had to pay for my renovations on my rental property. I had approximately $15,000 free in those home loans, then I refinanced and had nothing. Then the renovation bills came in for $10,000. Oh, and I was about to go on three weeks unpaid leave. In short it was monumentally stupid.

I scraped through on a combination of credit cards and goodwill (renovations went on a payment plan, Mr. FIRE picked up the slack). I managed not to pay any interest on the credit cards but it was a close deal, in some cases by a day or two. So I understand the value of having an emergency fund with six months worth of expenses, but it's just, so, boring.

Stay accountable

My 2016 savings chart
The green line is total of all accounts,
the black line was my target.

Firstly, it's a pun, so this is clearly the best trick. Get it, account-able? Oh never mind, it's a bad pun... I have filled my life with ways to keep this goal in the fore-front of my mind. I have a giant multi-page google spreadsheet that tracks my spending. I have another one on my home computer that tracks and charts my savings. I have this blog. I have a note pinned on the side of my computer (It also tells me to buy an investment property and renovate my bathroom before the end of the year). I have this blog. Writing about this goal is keeping me interested in it. And it stops me from throwing the whole thing out the window and investing, just, it's a close thing...

I also have charts, I love charts!

Colour me rich

With the surge in popularity of adult colouring books it's not surprising that someone figured out how to link colouring to their savings goals. Amy Jones has even kicked off an online business devoted to colouring in bit by bit to track her progress. She sells really cool progress maps that you can download, print off, stick to a wall and colour in bit by bit as you march towards your goal.

Of course, you'd have to pay for Amy's designs, which is probably not the greatest move if you're swimming in debt, even if they are only $20. You can buy a whole book of kaleidoscope patterns for $2, but then you have to count all the spaces and decide how you're going to represent each savings goal on it. Or you can just start one from scratch on your own.

Grab a sheet of paper, decide what appeals to you, how you're going to colour it as you go and sketch away. You'll be far more invested if you drew the progress map yourself, and you can make it the right size for your needs. Plus if you're savings for a house, you can colour in an actual house, rather than something abstract.

I have to admit though, I absolutely suck at art. As much as this is a super cool idea, i don't think it's for me.

Roll six for rewards

Combining my love of board games and conventional motivational wisdom I have just come up with this idea on the fly. Turns out most motivational information on the internet is abstract and boring. Here's what I've just thrown together for myself to get through the last couple of months.

So, here's how it works. At each goal point ($13,000, $15,000, $17,000 and $19,000) I roll two dice. The dice on the left tells me what reward table I get to use. 1-3 is a boozy reward, 4-5 is a fancy dinner, and six is both! The next dice then tells me what reward I get. So in the picture I've rolled a five (fancy dinner) and a three. So I get to have roast for dinner! As dinners go it's on the more expensive scale, especially compared to our usual meals like Chilli Con Carne, so we don't have it too often, but it is delicious!

To be honest though, I really want nachos for dinner, so I might give myself the right to re-roll each dice once when picking rewards, haha, oops! Since I record my current savings once a week, I should have plenty of chances to get some tasty rewards!

What works for you? How do you stay on track for these long drawn out goals. Savings takes time, are you straying off track?

Another way of looking at 'cost' (and a Chilli Con Carne recipe)

 It's not a secret that I like money. I like having it, I like investing it. I'd like to have enough of it invested that the invested money makes enough money to cover my living costs. Then I can stop trading time for money. Time is pretty finite, I can't earn more of that.

Most Early Retirement blogs will tell you the process is simple, earn more, spend less, invest the difference. Then the negative comments on those blogs will try and tell you that spending $5 less per day isn't going to make you a millionaire, or significantly delay your retirement. It took me a while to really cut into the heart of this, but there are a few ways of looking at your expenses, and what they really cost you.

Number 1: The actual cost per week/month/year

 This is pretty obvious, and it's the first on that people think of. $5 per day is $35 per week, $150 per month, or $1,825 per year. Put that way it doesn't really seem like much.

Number 2: The ten year value of that money if you invested it

 This is the number that Mr Money Mustache always tells people to consider. Assuming 7% interest (which is a viable number, stop being so negative!):

• to calculate a weekly expense compounded over ten years, multiply the price by 752
• for a monthly expense, multiply by 173

That $5 a day could be $26,320 in ten years if you invested it, rather than spending it.

Number 3: The amount of money you would have to invest to cover that $5 per day.

This is my favourite way of looking at the long-term cost. It's also the best because I didn't directly steal it from someone else. I'm sure other people look at on-going costs this way, but I've never seen it formally written, so here I go.

If you want to retire on the income from your investments, that income needs to cover your ongoing costs, plus covering inflation. Most financial gurus will accept that you can (reasonably) safely withdraw 4% of the value of your portfolio each year and stay ahead of the game. This assumes that your portfolio is continuing to grow through reinvested dividends.

Now - what we have is a $5p/day ($1,825) expense that needs to be covered by your portfolio. You can only withdraw 4% of your portfolio, so therefore your portfolio needs to be 25x that expense to cover it (that 25x comes from 100/4). So to cover a $5 per day expense, which is costing you $1,825 actual dollars per year, you need $45,625 invested to cover that $5 a day. The Australian Bureau of Statistics says that in November 2014 the average full time salary was 76k per year. That means you would need to invest 60% of a years income just to cover a $5 a day habit (probably take-away coffee).

Is a daily coffee really worth $45k to you? Cause it definitely isn't to me. But another perspective is the food budget. Currently my food budget is $6.50 per day (plus whatever Mr. FIRE spends), which means investing $60k to cover my food expenses. $6.50 per day averages $2.15 per meal. I can make Chilli Con Carne for $1.15 per serve.

Of course, I don't eat that cheap every night. Some nights we have steak and chips, for about $6-$7 (good steak is pricey!). For one meal it's barely $5 difference, but if we were to eat that way every meal we could easily need another $100,000 just to maintain our lifestyle. A few nights of delicious budget chilli con carne brings our early retirement much closer.

Chilli Con Carne

This recipe made me 20 serves.

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 large onion
• 1 red pepper
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled
• 1 heaped tsp hot chilli powder (or 1/2 level tbsp if you only have mild)
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 500g lean minced beef
• 1 beef stock cube
• 400g can chopped tomatoes
• 1/2 tsp dried marjoram
• 1 tsp sugar
• 2 tbsp tomato purée
• 200g dried red kidney beans
• 5 cups (uncooked) rice

Method

1. Cook your kidney beans the day before. Boil for 10minutes, then toss in a slow cooker for about 5 hours.
2. Put your pot on over a medium heat. Add the oil and leave it for 1-2 minutes until hot. Add the diced onions and cook, stirring, for about 5 minutes, or until the onions are soft, squidgy and slightly translucent. While the onion is cooking slice open red peppers, discard the seeds and dice.
3. Add the garlic, red pepper, chilli powder, paprika and ground cumin to the pot. Give it a good stir, then leave it to cook for another 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
4. Brown the beef. Turn the heat up a bit, add the meat to the pot and break it up with your spoon or spatula. The mix should sizzle a bit when you add the mince. Keep stirring and prodding for at least 5 minutes, until all the mince is in uniform, mince-sized lumps and there are no more pink bits. Make sure you keep the heat hot enough for the meat to fry and become brown, rather than just stew.
5. Crumble beef stock into 600ml hot water. Pour this into the pan with the mince mixture. Open the can of chopped tomatoes and add these as well. Tip in marjoram and sugar, if using, and add a good shake of salt and pepper. Squirt in tomato purée and stir the sauce well.
6. Simmer it gently. Bring the whole thing to the boil, give it a good stir and put a lid on the pan. Turn down the heat until it is gently bubbling and leave it for 20 minutes. You should check on the pan occasionally to stir it and make sure the sauce doesn’t catch on the bottom of the pan or isn’t drying out. If it is, add a couple of tablespoons of water and make sure that the heat really is low enough. After simmering gently, the saucy mince mixture should look thick, moist and juicy.
7. Bring on the beans. Rinse red kidney beans in a sieve if you haven't already and stir them into the chilli pot. Bring to the boil again, and gently bubble without the lid for another 10 minutes, adding a little more water if it looks too dry. Now replace the lid, turn off the heat and leave your chilli to stand for 10 minutes before serving, and relax. Leaving your chilli to stand is really important as it allows the flavours to mingle.
8. Serve with rice. To get the $1.15 per serve value I served 2 scoops of rice with 1 scoop of Chilli Con Carne.

DTF: dollars to fun ratio

What is your DTF rule? Do you have a pretty loose DTF ratio? Or are you super tight when it comes to DTF?

No, I'm not talking about the Urban Dictionary definition, I mean the Dollars To Fun ratio.
As part of the Financial Independence and frugality movement, I think a lot about the value of my spending. Does buying the expensive name brand bread increase my happiness enough to justify the extra dollar on the price tag when compared to the sad floppy home brand stuff (Hint, it totally does).

There is a huge difference between cost and value. Cost is what you pay for it. Value is what you get from it. Put simply, a loaf of bread costs me $3.40. I value it because I'm hungry, and it goes well with soup. When it comes to the DTF ratio, I use it to consider whether the cost of something is worth the value I got out of it. Specifically, I use the DTF ratio to look at entertainment.

Before I stumbled across this whacko idea of retiring early, I would look at home much I earned per hour and I decided that I would pay about half that for an hours entertainment. I should probably clarify that this was back when I was living at home and I could afford to blow every dollar I made. This rule worked out great for me! Movies for $10 fit well within the DTF rule. I could buy a video game at $80 because it was easily going to consume every night for a few weeks. Gigs met the DTF rule because I had to listen to all the music before I went to the live show (yes, even factoring in the cost of the album, it was still DTF-approved).

Thankfully this hasn't come through to my adult life, but for many people it has. That motorbike I'll hardly ever ride is $2,000 but I make $100,000+ so it's DTF-approved. A yacht spends most of it's time tied up at the dock, but I'm rich so DTF. I've had a lousy day at work earning $30 an hour and these shoes are only $50 and so cute, DTF!!

Consumer spending has got to be the number one cause of debt in Western society. We are constantly advertised at and told we deserve bigger more expensive things. In my quest for FIRE I have tried to move away from this.

My ideal Dollars To Fun ratio is a mere $1 an hour. For $1 an hour I'm DTF.

Amazingly, a dollar an hour goes a really really long way. Mr. FIRE and I went fishing on the weekend. We spent $7 on bait and spent five hours down at the seashore. We would have had dinner from it but it turns out we need to learn to fillet properly, but my hens got a good feed of fish scraps!

A dollar an hour pays for most books of the Amazon Kindle store. Assuming you read them more than once, and don't buy books the day they are released. My favourite author has a new book out for $17.99, but the one she released last year is a mere $6.99. By employing the magic skill of waiting, I can have the book and still meet the DTF ratio.

Video games used to be my biggest wealth thief. A new release console game sells for around $80 to $100. Despite the hours of game play they swear they have, most games fizzle out for me around 20-30 hours, and then the cost of buying the console on top of that means that I don't buy or play as many games anymore. However I still play all my old games, some of which have over 200 hours play time across two or three different play through.

According to Steam my most played game is The Sims3 (I'm not proud of that) for 68 hours. I bought it for $12. On the other hand my library is full of pointless games that I paid a dollar or two for and only played for 10 minutes. Even worse is the collection of games I bought in a bundle and never touched. Frugal fail.

Of course, not everything can be bought for a dollar an hour. I love rock-climbing. I play roller derby. I've been wearing a True Grit wristband for years even though I've only been on two events (I should really take that off...) These things weren't even close to meeting the DTF rule. Rock climbing is about $5 an hour, plus gear costs. Derby is $80 a month for 24 hours worth of training. Rather than berate and guilt myself for these 'expensive' pleasures, I simply crowd out other expenses with low cost activities.

I might spend $80 a month on roller derby, but slacklining is free (apart from the initial purchase of the line). Fishing was $7 for two people for a few hours, hiking is free and if you know what you're doing both of them give you a chance to pick up a free dinner.

In my quest for financial independence, if the balance is right, I'm always DTF.

Thanks for letting me write a blog entirely devoted to DTF. I'm looking forward to the google traffic for this one! Leave a comment and let me know what you consider a fair price for entertainment.

Goals Update: March 2017

All in all, this has been a pretty great month! For the first time I actually feel like I might be able to hit my target.

Do physical fun stuff 4x a week

It's been a hard month. I got my new weights, and immediately did some damage to my left thigh. After getting an ACL reconstruction last year it means that both of my knees hurt now. At 26, urgh. It's not the best feeling. I've been skating a bit more than in past months and went out slack-lining a couple of times. I still haven't gotten back out rock-climbing since derby came back, but I did go fishing once!

Next month I'm actually going to record what I do and what day. I don't feel like I'm achieving this goal, so I need a bit more transparency on it.

Grade: C

Create something each month

Ermm, no. I launched a Facebook group for this blog and I've seen a massive spike in readers (690 views in February, 1,800 in March) but I haven't created anything else. I guess the blog counts as a creative outlet, and I love doing it, but it doesn't have the same satisfaction as building something new like my superannuation calculator, the million dollar calculator, or building a new chicken coop.

Grade: C

Apply for one freelance task a week

Finally some success! I wrote four short articles and made $29.60. I've also got another article in the pipeline that I'll be paid $16 for.

Grade: A+

And now, the money!

Here we go

March Totals

Income

Salary	$4129.98
Sidegigs	$7
Home	$600
Investment Property #1	$1097.30
Investment Property #2	$0
Cash Dividends	$83.50
Total	$5,896.54

Salary

Nothing exciting here. I work, I get paid.

Side gigs

I made $29.60USD on UpWork, but I haven't cashed it out yet, so I haven't listed it here. UpWork charges a flat fee every time you cash out, so I like to do it in bigger chunks. I made $7 from selling eggs though! Pets that make a profit are wonderful!

Home

I bought home entirely in my name, but my partner lives here. He pays half of all the bills, plus $300 a fortnight in rent. Pretty sweet deal.

Investment property #1

A standard month.

Investment property #2

*gasp* Oh my, where did that come from!? Well, technically it doesn't exist yet. But I have some expenses for going out researching, so I added the zero income - watch this space! Although with settlements being over a month don't expect anything too soon.

Dividends

Trucking along nicely. I have some bonds that will be redeemed next month and I'll have an extra $5k to play with, you can weigh in on what I should do with it in an earlier post.

Investment performance

	Deposit	Reinvested Dividends	Annual Return
RateSetter	$100	$84.78	5.72%
ASX	$0	$0	5.71%
Vanguard	$400	$0	4.61%
Acorns	$24.15	$0.03	8.45%

Disclaimer: I'm definitely calculating my returns in a weird way. Current Value divided by Amount Invested equals Overall Return. The number is then adjusted to be annual. It means if I dump in a huge sum of money my return appears to go down. Therefore the return quoted here is a conservative number and I'm okay with that.

Expenses

	Spent	Budgeted	Annual Average
Home	$1,279.89	$1,250	$1,319.95 (down $2.14)
Investment Property #1	$909.39	$1,250	$1.613.60 (down $82.86)
Investment Property #2	$598.73	$600	$49.89 (up $49.89)
Personal Bills	$140.60	$147.08	$102.68 (up $6.30)
Groceries	$102.30	$200	$183.26 (down $11.83)
Pets	$44.69	$30	$21.67 (up $3.72)
Derby	$97.26	$100	$78.51 (up $3.94)
Travel	$0	$108	$131.19 (no change)
Other	$46.94	$250	$533.51 (down $10.03)
Total	$3,219.80	$4,026	$4,034.26 (down $42.63)

Home (Over $28.89)

Gas and Electricity bills this month. And we're over by less than $30, so I'm calling that a massive win! Bring on a bill free month.

Investment Property #1 (Under $340.61)

Just one bill for the annual insurance.

Investment Property #2 (Over $1.27)

Woah, where did this come from! Mr. FIRE and I have been working with a property coach for a few months and we hopped a plane on Saturday to do some research in Melbourne. I might have something super interesting to share soon...

If we go with the place we're looking at I'll be putting in $230 a fortnight towards this property once it's settled. In theory it will be slightly cashflow negative at the beginning (about $10 a week). Mr. FIRE and I have agreed to put money towards it as if everything went wrong and we were bleeding money. That way we'll have a buffer and pay down our mortgage faster.

Personal Bills (Under $6.40)

This is my phone bill and health insurance, it should never change - except it did! My premiums went up on my insurance this year, an extra 7.5%. Huge increase and still the best on the market, hey at least I'm not living in America! I've upped the annual budget in this one to account for the change in premiums that start next month. Urgh.

The average is low because I upgraded my health insurance to include hospital cover in January. So the average is reflecting the old, lower cover and will steadily come up across the year.

Groceries (Under $97.70)

We're riding on the coat tails of a big stock up last month and using credit card rewards I bought $125 of groceries for a mere $25. Thanks giant supermarket chain, I'll happily take those freebies you're offering!

Pets (Over $14.69)

I bought $35 worth of chicken pellets which should last a couple of months and Mr. FIRE paid for a round of cat food. After tracking this properly for a few month I can see that $25 a month was far too low and I've upped the budget to $30 a month.

Derby (Under $2.74)

Dues and I booked my return flight from Queensland for TWELVE DOLLARS! Hell yeah! Paired with my $40 flight there I am thrilled with all the credit card rewards I've been able to take advantage of. I spent $4 at the second hand store on a striped shirt because the proper uniform I ordered still hadn't arrived when I needed it!

On the plus side, derby has been consistently cheaper than I expected so I've shaved a bit out of this budget. Let's see how that turns out.

Travel (Under $108)

No travel, no spend. Easy peasy :) Any travel for derby is counted in the derby category. The average isn't dropping because I also spent nothing this month last year.

Other (Under a massive $203.06)

$4 on a friends birthday. Good start! $70 on a massage and $10 on beers, but I got a $50 rebate on my credit card that went towards the massage. I also spent $6 on a gorgeous pair of tights second hand that probably would have sold for $30+ when they were new.

I am so proud of me! I had a massage, I bought some beers, I generally had a wonderful month and I spent absolutely bugger all on it! By making a list of things that I want I've been able to feel like I'm progressing towards having them and appeasing my immediate "I want" reflex, but I haven't spent on those things and I don't miss not having them. The list is working well!

Mike and I also went out fishing! Watch this space for a blog about it, but for $7 worth of bait we spent 5 hours on the beach. We went as the tide was coming in and fish where everywhere! Unfortunately they were all little ones so we only brought one home. Then we discovered that we need to learn how to fillet properly. After completely stuffing it up, we ended up throwing the entire fish to the hens, woops!

Savings Goal

High Interest: $5,075.06
Offset Balance: $8,450.54
Owing on Credit Cards: $1,720.78
Total: $11,804.82

Increase from last month: $3,069.20
Amount remaining: $8,195.18 (approx $2,731 a month)

I finally saved more in a month than I needed! Finally. I'm less excited than I should be though because I need to pull off the same trick three more times, and there will be bills. I'm also lining up to buy another property (detailed post to come, I promise) which will mean a whole new layer of expenses. Yes there will be income, but there will be all the purchase expenses up front.

It also goes to show what procrastination can do to you. If I had stuck to the path back in December I only needed to save $2,100 a month, 36% of my income. After a couple of unexpected costs and not watching my spending I'm up to needing to save $2,731, or 46% of my income. I can't go back and change what I've done but I can sigh, shake my head at myself and push to do better.

Check out this handy-dandy chart to see how well I'm (not) doing.

Check out the history of this goal:

• December 2016 - $6,992.39
• January 2017 - $7,088.91
• February 2017 - $8,735.62