Frugal 2018// Quarter 1

As you may have noticed, I stopped doing monthly budget reports. I figured it would be kind of difficult to top last year's frugality. Honestly, I recognized that I probably wanted to live a little LESS frugally this year. Mostly, I missed going out to eat. :) Surprisingly, we have been MORE frugal this first quarter of the year!

In fact, we spent 27% less than the previous year!

Auto & Transport: No doubt a lot of our savings is due to just not having a car payment anymore. If we factor that out, our spending is only down 8%. Gas cost is actually up +23%. Francisco recently celebrated his one-year work anniversary at his "new" job, so this is a reminder that he has a decently further commute than he used to have.

Bills & Utilities: Our Internet spending is +19%, but this looks to be due just to the timing of expenses.

Food & Dining: Alcohol spending is up compared to previous years, but only by about $20.00.  We bought a large bottle of rum and a regular-sized bottle of tequila in early February, but this will last a while. We also just don't go out to eat as much, so we're not spending as much money at restaurants on cocktails. Since I had been missing going out to eat, I thought we'd be going out to restaurants more, but restaurant spending is -29% lower than last year. Also, worth noting that it is down -62% compared to 2016 spending!

Our grocery expenses are also down -23%, but I will bet that is at least partially attributable to a stack of Target gift cards we were able to deploy to help cover some of our basic expenses.

Gifts & Donations: No spending this year, negligible spending last year, and we spent hundreds of dollars less than 2016.

Health & Fitness: Things are going to look a little weird in this category because I only this year started tracking the cost of our health insurance that is directly deducted from our paychecks.  I'm tracking all of our paycheck data separately to get better tabs on where all of our money is going. This is already over $500 for just the first quarter of the year! How lovely it is to pay for something you actively avoid using. :P

Home: Consistent expense over the past three years. Sometimes I think we should buy a house...mostly I don't think that's the best decision for us.

Pets: Spending is actually down 25% compared to last year and 56% compared to the previous year. Some of our Target gift cards could be responsible for the decreased cost here as well.

Shopping: Wow, we have spent 87% less than last year. 90% less just within the Personal/Health Care category. You've probably noticed the lack of beauty subscription reviews. Those $10-$20 boxes do add up after a while!  Francisco has his own separate budget within the Shopping category, and he's notably spent all of 6 dollars and 39 cents.

Summary: In reality, we know there are always odd circumstances that might distort the true financial picture. Yes, we spent -27% less in the first quarter of 2018 compared to the first quarter of 2017, but we also didn't have a car payment. Last year, I even had to pay out our $500 auto insurance deductible after getting in a car accident. However, we didn't have the cost of Medical Insurance recorded or account for anywhere. If we factor these three anomalies out of the picture, we still spent -9% less this year. There will always be variations in spending, but I am happy with where we are for now.

Side note: I am tracking 401K contributions and Taxes as well, but these are not currently in any of the numbers here.