Thursday, December 06, 2007

November 07 Recap: Income and Expenses

Here's a run-down on my income and expenses in November. Some of my mutual funds paid dividends this month, so the "Other Income" line is higher than usual. I try to ignore this line anyway, and focus on how my expenses compare to my actual salary.

Inflows

  • Salary $7,750
  • Other Income $4,540 (dividends, interest, 401K employer match, etc.)

Total Inflows $12,290

Outflows

  • Business expense $293
  • Clothing $586 (blame it on the thong)
  • Dining $582 (under budget! yay!)
  • Entertainment $54
  • Gifts Given $245 (It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...)
  • Household $194 (I decided I needed a humidifier and a shelf for my bathroom)
  • Housing $1,944 (when oh when will my tax abatement kick in?)
  • Medical -$214 (flexible spending account reimbursement received)
  • Misc $282 (most of this represents my ridiculous efforts to buy a new backpack. 6 purchased, 6 tried, at least 5 in various stages of being returned. Gotta love those free returns at ebags.com)
  • Payroll Taxes, Self $2,544 (a little higher now that my 401k deductions have ended)
  • Subscriptions $61
  • Travel $77
  • Utilities $195 (gas, electric and telephone)

Total Outflows $6,843


Net Inflows/Outflows $5,447

If you back out the atypical dividend income, I managed to save $907 in cash. My 401k contributions were only about $16 this month, as I hit the $15,500 annual maximum. That meant I had a higher net paycheck, and higher taxes. This wasn't my greatest month ever for savings, as I did buy some clothes and "stuff," but I did at least get my dining expenses lower than they'd been for the past 6 months. I'm definitely over budget for the year-- my spending habits are still showing the effects of buying a new home, and also, as a commenter pointed out, catching up on all the spending I was reluctant to do while saving money for that new home! I think the only areas where I'll end the year under budget are education, entertainment, and travel. Next year I definitely want to take a big trip, so I'll be taking a hard look at my spending plans to budget for that!

3 comments:

Andrew Stevens said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

I'm a new reader and haven't had much of a chance to check out the archives except for your rules so you'll have to excuse me if you've already discussed this someplace else.

Are the categories you listed above the only ones you use? Or do you have smaller categories that are just not shown in this particular breakdown? Any groceries or transportation costs (subway, taxi, car, etc?). I could think of many other expenses also, but maybe you've just eliminated them?!

Madame X said...

Hi Ann, and welcome!
The categories shown here are only a simplified, stripped down version of what I use in Quicken. Groceries are included in Dining-- that covers all food expenses, but in Quicken I have sub-categories that break out Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Liquor and Groceries. And subway, taxis, etc are included in Travel.
But I'm not hiding any expenses-- this month these were the only categories where I spent money, and the amounts shown equal the total expenses for the month. (Sometimes when I do these recaps I get lazy and don't post all the detail and just show a few of the largest categories instead!)