the extra challenge that is budgeting

i am inspired to write this because there were other misis who were curious on how our household was able to save when only one of us is working and yet we can afford little luxuries like traveling. according to them, it is so hard nowadays to budget their income and to see some money left for savings. the truth is, our household is not actually an exception. i am doing the envelopes system and logged our expenses diligently to track where our money is going but at the end of the day, i still get headaches over managing our budget. it doesn't help that the cost of grocery items we usually buy, the diesel, and the electricity keep on increasing that's why i have to cut corners in some of our expenses to afford them.

am not sure if these tricks would work for you but let me share them anyway...

1. we keep aside our savings first... then the expenses follow. had it been the other way around, it's definitely, surely zero savings for us. temptations are everywhere especially when you live in makati where restaurants surround you and malls are just a few kilometers away from the house. how do we do this? jude has two deductions from his monthly salary which goes to their company's cooperative and company's stocks. aside from this, we started to invest last year in a club share which is payable for three years thru post-dated checks. so definitely we have to allot for this.

2. we work on a budget most of the time, if not always. we always set a limit for our eat-outs, shopping, trips, parties, etc. i work on budget which is not only our household can afford but is also comfortable for us to spend (capacity is not the same as willingness). even for our monthly expenses I set a limit for our groceries and allowances. it's nice to have yogurt and expensive fruits everyday but that would mean more thousands of pesos to add in my budget. and oh... we also set limit on the financial support we give. this must be tough to some but we chose to limit it if we want to realize our financial goals for the family.

2. we go for the cheaper alternative if possible. it was three or four months ago when i started to observe that my monthly budget for food and groceries was already small. but instead of increasing its budget, which is not possible anyway since our disposable income is fixed until jude gets another raise, i downgraded to  cheaper brands for products like detergents, theo's diaper, cleaning products, etc... but that is, if quality isn't an issue.

there's also a wisdom in surf's lumen advertisement years ago... why buy oranges when you can get vitamin c from dalandan? and that's what we do now... :)

3. if applicable, we buy second-hand items. we realized the practicality of buying second-hand items for some of the things we want for ourselves. tour yourself around our house and you'll find some things which we bought as second-hands but still in good condition and at very affordable prices. the kids' slide, the narra chairs, and this desktop am using right now are just some of the few.

4. i raid sales and buy much as i can. i don't shop much at divisoria especially for our personal things... why? because the quality of most items there really suck. there may be good finds but i have to spend hours to scour the alleys--waste of time! what i do instead is raid warehouse sales of branded products during christmas season.  thanks to my network as am always updated. and as much as possible i hoard from these sales, usually for a year-long of use. this really saves as a lot of money since i seldom buy at regular prices.

5. we avoid unnecessary expenses. - other mommies were scrambling to have tickets for disney live but i did not not bother--i found its rates too expensive! and since my kids had already been to disneyland why would i bother to see them here in metro manila? i also cannot find the reason why i have to pay php 500 to run when i can jog or run in the park without touching my wallet. these things are really waste of money if you ask me.

and oh, by the way, i seldom check the groupon sites. if i want to purchase something at a promo price, i ask friends to alert me. such sites are full of temptations so avoid it if i must! hehehe.

6. we indulge, but there were trade-offs for this. our family loves to travel and we do this as long as budget and time permits. no, we don't feel guilty for doing this. because we do deprive ourselves too of some things we want like watching concerts or musical plays. cirque de soleil was here in manila last july and i was like, "oh, i need to watch them!" jude already gave me the approval to book a ticket for myself (plan was i will be just going out with a friend) but i backed out since it will still take php 3,000 from our savings and we just came from a trip.

we also teach the kids the same thing. we also let them splurge in some things they like but it's always that they must let go of another thing.

7. generosity doesn't have to be pricey for us - i cringe whenever people declare after christmas that they made their loved ones very happy with their gifts BUT rant about their outstanding balance in their credit card bill/s. this made me ask:. do we really have to put ourselves in a financial mess just to prove that we love our family and friends?

8. we try to be money-smart - hmm... how should i explain this? it's like when we have arrears in our dues but we're not in a rush to settle it since it doesn't earn any interest over time. so what we do instead is we use that money first for other things which can bring savings for us in the long run.

in a nutshell, it's analyzing first the pros and cons of spending, especially one which involves a big amount of money.

this ends my list of wise-spending tips. budgeting for me is all about setting priorities. we listed down what values to us most and it's where we bring our money.

hope i was able to help. :)

i pay it forward

there's a discussion in the forum i'm subscribed of about giving financial support to our parents as one member shared her problem to the group, which i no longer want to divulge, and received a quite substantial amount of replies and/or advices.

it struck a chord on me and made me think deeper on how should someone, especially a married person, should deal with this kind of concern. i know the bible already told us how and it's reminded to us in our wedding. but because we're only mortals and we either forget or ignore, that's why time comes when we feel we're clueless on what to do.

when i was still single i was obliged to give a part of my salary to help my parents afford our monthly expenses, especially when my ate settled down and stopped giving her contribution, which i understood. but when it's my time to settle down, my financial support also stopped. (though i was thankful that my parents small business which i partly funded was already flourishing and they no longer need my help) because for one, i had to divert my income to the family which i'll be raising with jude. except for car and some appliances which were gifted to us, jude and i had to buy and invest in a lot of things. then babies came along and we need to fed, clothe, and entertain them; hence, more money is needed. i left the workforce and it's only jude who's working for us and we need to budget his income wisely to afford everything we deem necessary. luckily his income now is quite better compared to what he had been receiving from his former office that's why we can also give a little to our own families.

another reason why i also chose to prioritize our family's (jude, me, and the kids) needs over our parents is because we also need to save for our future, including our retirement. another member of the forum said, "i want to end the cycle (of passing on the obligation to the children) with us and let not my future kids suffer the same fate as us." very well said. and i share the same reason why i asked jude to save for our retirement. i know future doesn't really guarantee that our savings would be enough to pay for our food and medicines in our old age but at least, our kids saw that we prepared for this stage as no preparations mean that we really intend to rely on them.

if there's one thing that i should do now as married child is to pay the goodness of my parents, but i know they understood that it's by paying forward and that is to secure a bright future for my own kids, and that includes parents who won't be a burden during their old age. i  know that's ingratitude in our culture, but i call it 'good parenting'.