One Year Financial Summary

Jan 2, 2018

Before starting out, one of the most helpful things I could find on other blogs were details of budgets.  Based on those numbers I guessed I could come in around $600, and after traveling for the last few months of 2016 I revised that number to $650.  To avoid ever being stranded without money, my number crunching sets my available budget at $800 so even a major issue won't be an issue.

Although the numbers didn't line up correctly in their categories, I still ended up pretty close to my proposed budget.  There were more repairs than I planned for (muffler, two new batteries, valve adjustment) and Rabies shots for the cats in July messed up the health budget a bit (also the price of my thyroxin more than doubled in Dec because apparently the plant is in Puerto Rico).  I spent almost nothing on clothes and less than expected on lodging.  Some time in friends' driveways cut the gas bill down as did same friends and family buying a few meals.

Most of the descriptions make sense, but 'food' should be called 'grocery' as it includes food, cat food and accouterments,  anything small I might pick up at the store and probably some clothes.

'Gym' is for Planet Fitness that I started mid year to have a guaranteed place for showers.

Dumping my tanks and getting water (when I had to pay for it) falls variously under 'entertainment', 'lodging' or 'misc' depending on what else I did (stayed overnight, spent the day in the park, etc.

Item	Proposed	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	average	total
Gas	150	176	96	91	97	139	69	48	135	153	71	161	189	118.75	1425
Propane	8	29	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	24	0	0	0	4.42	53
Food	250	370	370	286	354	312	216	230	387	303	300	209	318	304.58	3655
lodging	20	5	29	0	0	56	15	0	45	0	0	0	0	12.50	150
Insurance + tags	50	30	30	30	30	51	51	51	51	51	51	51	51	44.00	528
maintenance	20	0	46	11	185	0	0	60	36	0	15	57	0	34.17	410
emergency	20	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	276	0	222	0	41.58	499
entertainment	20	0	25	0	0	24	35	25	15	0	5	31	25	15.42	185
gym	23	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	19	58	19	19	19	11.17	134
misc	10	15	0	0	11	19	22	31	0	0	0	103	5	17.17	206
phone	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40.00	480
health	10	25	0	0	20	0	0	89	0	20	0	0	71	18.75	225
laundry	5	0	6	0	0	5	0	9	0	8	0	5	5	3.17	38
clothing	20	0	0	1	0	0	0	5	11	0	0	0	0	1.42	17
	646	691	642	459	737	646	448	588	739	933	501	898	723	667.08	8005

Obviously I adjusted the 'proposed' column when I added the gym and the insurance/tags went up but everything else was set at the beginning of the year.  For 2018 I'll adjust the numbers again to reflect the reality 2017 provided and set a budget for about $670 a month. 

Hopefully there won't be so many repairs this year.