Digging deeper for the junk food failure

For years I've been tracking my spending. It started in my first year of university over a decade ago when I wondered how I could make so much money and still have none left at the end of the week. Back in the day it was a simple notebook where I wrote down everything I spent, and totalled it up at the end of the week. Over the years it has grown bigger, more complex, and thanks to Google Sheets, easier to use. and yet somehow I still can't keep control of the 'miscellaneous' spending category.

Pen and Paper

In early university I wanted to buy an investment property, so I knew I needed to properly track my money in and out. At the beginning, all I did was write down what I spent in a notebook, and tally it up at the end of the week. Then I started recording my income at end of the week, directly next to my expenses. Then I started writing down $50 a week for 'bills' and $50 a week for 'savings'. Each time I had a bill I would deduct it from the saved amount. Then I found that making big luxury purchases was hard to fit into the budget, so I started making a list at the end of each week of things I wanted, and putting $5-$10 aside for them each week.

It was a good starter system, but I couldn't really see what I was spending on over the long term. Was I a booze hound? Did I blow all my money on video games? Should I stop buying books? (never stop buying books...)

Technology revolution

A couple of years ago I graduated to Google Sheets. Now I had 12 months of my expenses in my pocket at all times. Recording my spending was easy with my phone. I never had to worry about my pen running out of ink, my book running out of pages, or explaining to everyone what I was doing.

My spreadsheet has morphed and changed over the years, to a point where I now have 1 tab for each month, with columns for each spending category. Another tab collates all that spending into one easy to see snapshot. Other tabs track money being diverted into spending, and my income - which allows me to pull out spending and saving percentages at the drop of a hat.

This visibility of my money habits has dropped my spending from $46,000 in the 2015/16 financial year, to $42,000 in the 2017/18 financial year. While not a dramatic amount, watching my spending going down, and my lifestyle staying steady (or going up?) despite inflation has been a warm fuzzy feeling of success.

Yet somehow, in all of this I've been completely unable to get a hold on my 'miscellaneous' spending category.

Digging deep for expenses

For about a year I've been ending every month by kicking myself and saying 'stop spending so much on miscellaneous crap! It's your early retirement you're wasting!'. Turns out this isn't the most effective method. A lot of things sneak into this miscellaneous category. Some I can control, some I can't. Things like care packages for my derby team mates when they break limbs, and (very occasional) lunch meetings with my co-workers are things that I agreed to when I signed up for these communities. Some things I know are wasteful (hello Red Wine!) but I love and so I choose to continue spending mindfully. And some things are just plain stupid habits, like $7 coffees every time I'm at the airport...

After utterly failing to control this spending, I did a one year review, and here's what I found:

Books - $99.91, $7.93 a month

I am absolutely okay with this! I re-read books all the time, and since I was a small child I've had my nose glued to the pages. I could get more out of this time / money by reading investing books, personal development and all that other nonsense, but I love the escapism of reading about dragons and magic. (Right now I strongly recommend The Waking Fire: Book One of Draconis Memoria )

Video Games - $46.54, $3.70 a month

This is great. Once upon a time I had a bad habit of buying Steam games that I never played because they were on special. It's nice to see I've properly kicked this habit. All the games I've bought recently have twice as much playtime as dollars spent, which is a great Dollar To Fun ratio.

Alcohol - $382.56, $30.38 a month

This is one where I know I could spend less but I don't want to. The majority of my spending is on Red Wine, and I am super sneaky about it. I buy bulk, mixed packs from places like Virgin Wines, and Qantas. I always wait for a sale, and always get things at significantly reduced prices, generally with bonus frequent flyer points.

I do have long term plans to brew my own beers and ciders, but I'm not sure what the savings will be. It's something I plan to do for fun, rather than financial gain.

Clothes - $52.00, $4.13 a month

I have a confession to make - I hate buying clothes. Nothing fits properly and nothing suits my style. Why are bras so expensive? Why does underwear come in 7 different cuts and what is the different between 'boy leg' and 'full brief''? Why is it so hard to find a comfortable pair of jeans that aren't blue or $100?

The end result of my clothes shopping hatred is a super low bill, clothes that come pre-worn from the thrift shop, and underwear that is a decade old....

Medical - $226.60, $18.00 a month

This is excluding my health insurance, which is $91.61 a month for hospital and extras. $18 a month this year has covered contact lenses, 2 trips to the GP, multiple trips to the physio, and a trip to the dentist. I actually think I should spend more here and take better care of myself.

Comfort food - $785.15, $62.35 per month

What, what, What!!! What madness is this!! I've written before about the Latte Equation and the stupidity of paying $5 for takeaway coffee when you can make your own for barely 50cents (using the expensive milk). I've gone on and on about the virtues of baking your own treats and making your own snacks. And here I am spending almost $60 a month on comfort food, how is this happening!

First of all, December happens. In December all your friends want to go out for dinner. All your coworkers want to go out for lunch. And I want to buy Christmas treats. All of this is expensive. In December alone last year I spent $215 on comfort food.

I'm not too mad about December. I love my family and friends, and we're all pretty quiet throughout the year, so having a month of events is okay by me. What is not okay by me is keeping up this crazy spend throughout the year. I found $50 worth of coffees, $100 worth of pizzas, and over $100 worth of entries just labelled 'Junk Food'.

Alone, each of these entries isn't too offensive. But when over $60 a month is disappearing into this chasm of cheap, lazy snacks, something has to change.

Everything else - $2,059.08, $174.95 a month

Inevitably, when sorting out the miscellaneous column, there will be things that don't deserve their own category. Items left in this everything else category include crafting supplies, that time I paid for parking at the hospital, concert tickets, and odds and ends like replacement charging cables, some rammekins and a pair of scissors. While there is a lot of uncategorised spending here, this is a number I'm happy to live with for now.

Where to from here?

In case my rant and the title of this post didn't give it away, I'm less than thrilled with spending $60 a month on comfort foods - especially when I'm more than capable of baking better tasting things myself. 

I'm a very firm believer that what gets measured gets done, as long as the measuring is accurate. To bring the comfort food spending back to a happy level, I've created a new column in my budget, and allotted $50 a month to snacks, junk food, takeaway and other deliciousness. I'm 'funding' that column with $10 out of my groceries budget, and $40 out of my miscellaneous budget.

I'm under no illusions that this will be properly managed in December. While I believe in controlling my spending, I don't believe in cutting out my friends to do so. When I get invited to Christmas outings, I'm absolutely going to go. Then when January rolls around and everyone is burned out from celebrating and feasting, I'll tackle this in earnest.

Budget Reboot Challenge: Good Ol' Fashion H20

Hello Budget Reboot, have you tried turning it off and on again?

Money saving posts are always the same - stop doing this, stop buying that, stop having any fun and live a sad deprived life while watching the numbers in your bank account tick up and up. Of course, they don't frame it that way, but when someone asks you to give up something you love in the name of money, we get pretty defensive.

Instead of 'giving up' let's try something new. Hit the refresh button on your spending habits with this Budget Reboot Challenge.

This month's challenge: Replacing all your bad habits with a glass of water

Did you try last months Budget Reboot Challenge: Fast Fashion?

Asking you to replace a bad habit with a glass of water sounds like a joke, and not a funny one at that. However there are plenty of things to consider, starting from the mundane to the obscure.

Firstly you can replace expensive drinks with water. Sweet teas, fruit juices, soft drinks, and especially energy drinks add up to hundreds of dollars marching out of your wallet each year. However water (and I'm talking about water from the tap, not expensive bottled water) is just a few cents per kilolitre.

Replacing habits with water

If you are tired and need a pick me up it's easy to reach for a coffee, an energy drink or something sugary to try and spike your energy. But if you are dehydrated you'll only experience a small rush, followed by feeling even worse than before. If you are dehydrated a couple of glasses of water will be a better pick me up than an energy drink.

More than replacing drinks with drinks, you can reduce other expensive unhealthy habits as well. If your dehydrated, your brain will send hunger signals. Rather than buying an expensive packet of chips from the vending machine, first have a glass of water.

To truly stretch this experiment - can water help you quit smoking? Maybe. If you're smoking is an excuse to walk away from your desk and go outside, consider swapping one cigarette a day for a glass of water. It may satisfy that need to step outside, to fidget with something, to have a break.

Reducing needs by drinking enough

There are other things that are indirectly connected to how well hydrated you are that are costing money on a daily basis.

I have three different moisturizer tubs - one on my work desk, one in my bag, and one in the bathroom. Despite this I have been dealing with dry cracked hands for more than three months. The moisturizer is covering up the symptoms, but the cause is that I am dehydrated.

Just as I carry two lip balms around - instead, I could be carrying around a bottle of water.

Lastly, I very rarely take painkillers for headaches. For small pains I drink a glass of water and go on with my day. For bigger aches I have a couple of glasses and a nap. Only when the pain is bad enough that I can't nap I take painkillers. I only need to use painkillers once or twice a year - in most cases an extra glass of water solves the problem.

Click to embiggen!

Turn it off and on again: Bad Habits vs. Water

The point of the Budget Reboot Challenge isn't to force you to change your ways, but to commit to something for a set period and see what it's really like. Turn off snacking, smoking, your moisturizer reliance, and turn on water instead, and at the end of your commitment, ask yourself if you really need to add that habit back in again?

How long can you replace a habit with a glass of water? One Week? One Month? One Year? How much can you save doing it?

I can commit to drinking two litres of water a day for a month!

At the end of that; well to be honest this is a habit I'll probably keep. I have been using a lot of moisturizer as my hands have been extremely dry and scaly. In the last week drinking two litres of water a day I've already noticed an improvement. I'm hoping that by simply drinking more water, I can stop moisturizing every day.

Whatever you're replacing with water, ask yourself at the end of the month:

Do I need my old habit?
Do I feel healthier?
Did I save money?

Budget Reboot September, how did you go?

Back in September I asked you to try buying less clothes, or even none! I committed to buying nothing, except for one costume. And I have to say, I failed. Wondering what I bought? What super exciting item was it that ruined my plans. What glitzy, glamour piece caught my eye? Nothing exciting, I bought socks... wheee!

Total cost of socks? $8 which I will wear until the holes are so big they don't stay on my feet.

Budget Reboot Challenge: Fast fashion

Hello Budget Reboot, have you tried turning it off and on again?

Money saving posts are always the same - stop doing this, stop buying that, stop having any fun and live a sad deprived life while watching the numbers in your bank account tick up and up. Of course, they don't frame it that way, but when someone asks you to give up something you love in the name of money, we get pretty defensive.

Instead of 'giving up' let's try something new. Hit the refresh button on your spending habits with this Budget Reboot Challenge.

This month's challenge: Clothes Shopping

Did you try last months Budget Reboot Challenge: Eating Less Meat?

Spring is finally here! Not just according to the calendar, but according to the weather as well. The Spring Equinox is tomorrow which means warmth, long days, sunshine, and a whole new wardrobe! Time to start shopping for new shoes, shirts, shorts, light-weight summer jackets, and all those things that you bought this time last year.

Wait, bought this time last year? If we bought all these things last year, why do we need to buy them again?

According to the ABC's War on Waste, Australians go through a ridiculous amount of clothes. In this documentary they work with a group of girls to teach that that clothes can be worn more than once. These girls actually had to be encouraged that it was okay to wear the same outfit twice, whereas I have a jacket in regular rotation that I have owned for more than eight years.

Apparently I'm doing it wrong though - apparently at the end of every season I'm supposed to throw out those clothes and buy a new set. All my winter clothes, out the door to make room for all my Spring-wear. That I'm going to toss in 3 months to buy Summer wear.

If you couldn't tell by my dripping sarcasm, I think this is bloody ridiculous. To be fair I am removing all my winter wear from my cupboard - and stashing it elsewhere in my house. When it gets cold again next year I'll shift it all back into my cupboard.

The cost of a whole new wardrobe

Clothes these days are cheap. T-shirts for $5, pants for $10, jumpers and dresses for $20. With a few hours shopping effort (why would you want to!) you could purchase a whole new wardrobe for under $300, giving you a whole new look and variety of choices for summer. 

With so many cheap (poorly made, sweatshop) clothes available it's easy to get suckered into the fast fashion movement. It doesn't seem like much at the time to spend $30-$40 on a whole new outfit. But over time, it adds up to a ridiculous amount - which chains you to your 9-5 desk for years longer.

Let's assume you replace your wardrobe each season for $300. On top of that, you buy some outfits for special occasions (weddings and such) that you absolutely cannot wear again (oh the shame of outfit recycling!). These special occasion outfits cost another $400 a year.

Each year you're spending $1,600 a year on clothes. While it might not seem like much at the time, after 10 years you've lost out on $22,000, all for clothes that only stay in your wardrobe for a few weeks. 

If you were to put that extra money towards shortening your mortgage you could knock 9 years off your mortgage. If you've got a credit card debt, letting your clothes last through the seasons could be the quickest way out of the hole - by not spending any more, and freeing up money to make extra repayments.

Why buy new when there is so much excellent
under-priced stock in the thrift shop

Turn it off and on again: Buying any new clothes

The point of the Budget Reboot Challenge isn't to force you to change your ways, but to commit to something for a set period and see what it's really like. Turn off clothes shopping, and at the end of your commitment, ask yourself if you really need to add it back in again?

How long could you go without buying a new item of clothing? Big Kid Little Adult has started a challenge, to buy nothing new for a year (underwear excluded, you can buy that). Going in to summer if you need a few more singlets, just cut the sleeves off a ratty old shirt. I have so many of these, I actually have to hide shirts from myself in summer, otherwise I'll cut them all up!

How long can you commit to not buying new clothes? One Week? One Month? One Year? How much can you save doing it?

I can commit to Buying Nothing for a month! (Except for one costume... I've got dress-up needs! But I promise to buy second hand)

At the end of that, Turn It On again: This is the fun part. After the end of your commitment, you're free! You can buy as many new clothes as you want, but first I need you to do a status check for me.

Did you miss shopping? Did you find new ways to wear existing clothes?
Did you save money? How much?
Did you really feel like you were missing out? Maybe you could keep going with it?

Budget Reboot August, how did you go?

Back in August I asked you to try eating less meat. I committed to finding a meatless meal that Mr. FIRE would enjoy, and I failed. Drat. I fed him Miso Soup and Eggs on Hash Browns. While he enjoyed both of them, he argued that the Miso left him hungry, and that Eggs on Hash Browns made a great breakfast but weren't enough for a dinner. The search continues!

I did eat a lot of meat free meals myself while Mr. FIRE was away for work. Mostly because it was easier (being lazy helps some times). While I normally spend $200 a month on groceries, September is on track to be closer to $150. This is a pretty big saving, but to be fair it might be more that Mr. FIRE was away, than that I spent less. Then again, while he's away I have to buy everything myself, rather than sharing the cost - so maybe I did save?