Can you hear the cackle of evil, witchy laughter in the distance? I can! It's the Ghost of the Past Financial Year giving me a razzing. Yep, July was a significant failure in the 'reducing my discretionary spending' challenge. However, it did bring into focus something that I kind of knew already, but to which … Continue reading Reducing the discretionary spend – July 2020 results
Well, this is it! My twelve months is up - achievement unlocked! This process I've followed of running a proper budget and tracking everything I spend has been a really interesting, if sometimes tedious, exercise. It's certainly brought sharply into focus those areas where I knew I was probably wasting quite a bit of money … Continue reading Savings rate challenge results – June 2020 and overall year
Eleven months down, one to go! Finally, as mentioned in April's savings rate challenge post, I hit one of my financial goals in early May - I now have 6 months' full pay saved in my emergency fund! Boy, it's nice to hit this one. It's interesting how achieving a goal like this significantly reduces … Continue reading Savings rate challenge results – May 2020
Four months down, eight to go. This month's savings rate was 37.81% from planned savings, plus 1.08% net cash flow, for a total of 38.89%. The categories where spending was over budget were Car, Personal, Pet and Discretionary. While I had budgeted for the car service that was due, it didn't take into account replacing … Continue reading Savings rate challenge results – October 2019
Three months down, nine to go. Things worked out a bit closer to budget this month, with a little more income than expected thanks to a couple of weeks of higher duties and a small dividend payment, and expenses overall being a little lower than budget (only by a minimal amount, but hey, that's a … Continue reading Savings rate challenge results – September 2019
FIRE for One 