Savings rate challenge results – December 2019

< cue Bon Jovi > Ooooooh, we’re half way there! Yes, six months down, six to go.

Despite it being the “silly season” I had a pretty quiet month, really. There was minimal socialising, and my family always keeps Christmas a low-key affair. As for what I got for Christmas – well, I got a cold. 😦

UPDATED: I should’ve known this was too good to be true. As usual, the Personal and Discretionary spending were over budget, but this was offset by under-spending in all the other expenses categories. So, while expenses this month were a bit of a case of swings and roundabouts, I ended the month with the smallest variance so far between budgeted expenses and actual expenses – a whole 48 cents in the black! I’d better not spend that all in one shop. 😀 Thanks to my forgetting to a) clear some receipts out of my purse, and b) include my cash spending, I’m not under budget for December, I’m over. 😦 Not horrifically so, though – a little over $200 over. Previous months have been considerably higher. I have to keep reminding myself that my budget is a work in progress, having not kept one for many years.

On the whole, December was very still quite positive. A win on the wages front for Queensland state government employees saw me pick up a pay rise backdated to September plus an included one-off payment, which got paid in the first pay period of December. That pay period is also when our annual leave loading gets paid, so that gave me some extra $$$ to put towards my Mojo money. My union is also going to arbitration over our Enterprise Bargaining Agreement in January, so with any luck another pay rise might be in the offing soon. (Most Qld govt employees are way behind in terms of real wage rises, thanks to the Newman government of 2012-2015, so while these may appear to be rapid and frequent rises to those outside of the Qld public sector, in reality they’re just making up for lost time.)

Now that I’ve reached the halfway mark of this challenge, I thought it might also be good to take a look at how my expenses break down as percentages across the categories, so here’s a pretty pie chart. The only thing that I suspect is quite high (relative to what would be typical) is the Pet category – this was primarily due to additional vet visits, medication and tests, and, sadly, cremation costs. Most of the other categories seem to me to be within the bounds of expectation.

The wash-up

Thanks to the additional income this month, I ended December with a regular savings rate of 43.56% and a net cash flow of 22.46 19.90%, for a total savings rate of 66.02 63.46%. Winning!