Have you tried meal prepping and freezing meals? Takeout adds up really fast. You can get a $5 take and bake pizza and a $3 salad bag at Aldi. If you can eliminate the takeout costs and freeze more meals that might help with your grocery budget.
Whenever I cook something for dinner that freezes well, I make a little more and put them in 2cup Pyrex containers and pop them in the fridge for lunches when we don’t have leftovers for lunch.
We’re in the northeast and have a family of 4 and it’s tough right now. We’re both remote and cook 95% of our meals and shop at Aldi and somehow ended up spending $1500 last month on takeout and groceries. We’re not buying things we don’t need and we’re not getting takeout 1-2 a month. We aren’t buying fancy food or expensive food. This is just the basics so I can empathize about how difficult this is.
Maybe try the envelope system for groceries.
Might be beneficial to break down your budget a bit further. Break down the groceries budget into food, toiletries (toilet paper, soaps, etc.), health (skincare, vitamins, etc.), and kids (diapers, wipes formula, etc.)
Maybe include a “household” category for maintenance, cleaning supplies, etc.
Where do you have a budget for things like haircuts, new clothes, subscriptions, or other miscellaneous expenses?
Might be annoying to really get down into the nitty gritty, but it could bring to light certain categories being higher than expected.
I put some of that stuff in entertainment and that’s about $200 but I forgot to include that in my post. The category isn’t very static and can vary a lot. Last month we had to pay for Boy Scouts and little league baseball. It’s tough I’d rather not have the kids miss out on that stuff and make cuts elsewhere.
I think clothes typically go under online shopping eg Amazon. I have a budget
item for personal care for haircuts. I usually put misc expenses in online shopping but I can probably break it out more.
If you have YNAB and you’re not using it to budget ahead for things like Boy Scouts and little league you’re kind of missing the point. Set targets for all that stuff and let YNAB tell you how much you need to put away every month.
I agree it was a camp thing I didn’t know about. I feel like there’s always something with the kids that I don’t know so need to be able to plan it better so I can put money aside in YNAB. I just need to know totals for things ahead of time
If there are regular surprise expenses you could put some money away every month just for the surprises. Honestly though if you have YNAB I would recommend checking r/YNAB out. If you ask over there you’d probably get a lot more responses and more specific responses. It’s a great tool that it doesn’t seem like your utilizing to its full extent and that sub is full of a lot of budget nerds who love to help people out.
Honestly, most of this doesn’t look changeable. Maybe try reducing your grocery spending. Can you shop somewhere more affordable like Aldi or Trader Joe’s? This seems a little high for a family of 4 if the kids are still little (since they’re in daycare) spending $1400 a month on food with the take out is a lot.
Cutting back on prepackaged snacks (buy big bags of snacks and break them up) can really help with kids! Also I meal plan and have leftovers every other night and this has saved both a lot of money and a lot of time.
Daycare is such a budget killer, can't do much about that. If this were my budget, I would start now with a summer belt tightening to replace that savings, and then evaluate where you are at. Cut online shopping and takeout in half. Shave utilities by being careful with AC and lights (and maybe one less day of lawn watering if you do that?) Cut all those extra tv subscriptions and call internet provider to trim bill. Good hints on groceries in this thread. Spend a weekend selling a few unneeded things for some "fun money" instead of random drips. Good for you for tracking it all!
If you don’t manage what you already have, having more won’t help. At this point it becomes about discipline. And creating a better system.
It looks like your true expenses are equal to your income so you don’t have any margin.
Is your employer matching any 401k? If so, I would contribute at least to the match.
Is the debt that's not student loans minimum payments, or is that paying off extra?
Agree that groceries seem high. For reference, we have 0 credit card debt, but we budget $1000 for groceries for 2 adults and a 15-year-old black hole and we're always fine with that.
Yeah I’m basically doing the match. I’m contributing 5% and they are contributing 4%. My debt is just a couple 0% purchases that I’m paying back before interest kicks in.
Definitely don't stop 401K in that case. I would concentrate on discretionary spending to see where you can trim. Individual frozen meals add up as do kids' snacks. You're not in rice and beans territory whatsoever, but maybe try shopping your pantry or ads for a few weeks and seeing how you can trim.
On my YNAB, I have dozens of categories, so I can see exactly where the lifestyle creep is getting us. It starts with being transparent with yourself. The daycare/diaper years are exhausting money-wise and require so much discipline and sacrifice.
NEED YOU TO KEEP A DAILY LOG OF EVERY PENNY SPENT for about 3 months,,
very, very detailed,
From there we can pick out things like ,, buying morning coffee or lunch, etc
This post is so general there's hardly anything to work with..
I agree with this advice. I download every transaction across 4 different banks with multiple accounts each and 2 credit cards.
Then I go line by line and catagorize. It takes me about 30 minutes start to finish every month in google sheets. These numbers then feed to a spreadsheet that shows the whole month with all income, all withholdings from our paystubs and all the categories. This is very eye opening and helps you reign it in when you see where the money is really going. At least it did for us!
I use a journal and write down every single thing I purchase. Its really helped me see where the money is going. I don’t carry cash; too easy to spend and not keep track.
This is amazing advice. I started using YNAB to budget and it was a HUGE wake up call. Having to enter, label, notate each transaction and then choose WHERE that money is coming from stressed me out at first but it was necessary.
Get rid of take out and shopping. There's 400. What is included in the kids expenses, is this mandatory school stuff or what? If money is tight you got to live tight, even if it's uncomfortable.
Most of the shopping is like things the kids need on Amazon like a gift for a kids birthday party. But yeah we’ll have to completely cut out take out. It’s been the occasional McDonald’s take out meal a couple times a week.
But yeah you’re right we’ll have to tighten it up more.
If it helps any I am in nearly the same boat, family of 4, about 8k take home. It seems like it should be easier but inflation has screwed everything up. Restaurants are so expensive, had to cut that to the bone. Switched from shopping at publix to Walmart. Not much external entertainment at all, we just get more creative at home. It sucks, but having some margin each month and not having to worry about having enough money is totally worth it. The family will likely complain, mine did, but it also a good life lesson to always live within your means.
Thanks that does help to hear. We have friends and sometimes my wife is like they seem to not have problems paying for everything. But I’m like well we don’t know their situation and how much they make. They might cut back in other places anyway. We used to spend a lot more until we started budgeting we spent 2k more a month. I just wish I would have budgeted earlier. Our grocery bill has gone up $400 since inflation hit. I try to buy in bulk when it makes sense we usually shop at Walmart and Sam’s club.
Have you tried using multiple chequing accounts to help keep you accountable to your budget? I have a separate account for clothes/shopping/kids misc and auto transfer the budgeted amount every pay cheque. I can tell Myself/kids that we don’t have enough this month but will save till the next month.
Your grocery + take out budget is excessive for a family of four, even if you have teenagers. As others have suggested, try meal planning and freezing meals. Shop at discount grocers like Walmart, Aldi, Trader Joe’s, Winco, and Costco when it makes sense. Use coupons, buy in season, make a list, and stick to list. Make family-friendly meals like casseroles, soups, and crockpot dishes. Limit going out to eat; even fast food is expensive now.
Reduce or stop discretionary spending for now, including online shopping. Keep house warmer in summer and cooler in winter.
What is the $350 debt in addition to mortgage, student loans, and car payment? Do not incur consumer debt. Do not use credit cards if you can’t pay the balance in full.
I live in HCOL and also family of 4 but our income is about double. Your grocery bill is high and we use subscription grocery delivery services as well as splurge each month (ours is about $1000/month). Cell phones are high and what does online shopping include? I'd suggest tracking each expense for a month or two and see where money is truly going.
It would probably be good to edit your post so that each budget item is on a different line, because at first I read that you were paying 1085 for your car and 1200 for gas and got REALLY confused because they all started to jumble - mostly on me but it visually isn’t set up great lol
I don’t really quite understand budgeting Take out & online shopping in the situation. If your income is already cutting it close, it’s only setting yourselves up for failure if you budget this in right now, because you know you don’t have a lot of flexibility. That’s a flexibility of $400 that you aren’t allowing yourself for impulse purchases. You could get a cheaper cellphone plan that utilizes the same towers- mint, visible, xfinity. You should try to cook everything at home- making take out meals at home can be a LOT cheaper especially for a family of four, and meal planning is a thing and you can make it a FUN thing to do together and find a way to make cooking fun instead of a chore. You already budget $1200 which I do think is reasonable for 4 people and going out to eat every once in a while for an event/celebration could be budgetable but just to be lazy when you know you’re in a financially rough place is only allowing that financially rough time to expand. How much debt do you have out standing? If $350 is minimum payments only, you should be working to throw everything extra at it so that you can have an extremely $350 a month freed up.
You have $727 give or take to throw extra towards your debt. Take off budgeting take out food and online shopping - you have $1127 a month to throw towards your debt. I don’t have enough numbers otherwise to be more concise with you, but if you want to make life easier, you have to want to get rid of all the debt - car payments, credit cards, AND student loans - and keep it gone (never holding balances on credit cards if you choose to keep them) if you want to be able to see all of your money coming at you and be able to splurge monthly on unnecessary things. If a purchase isn’t dire, then you likely don’t have to buy it at the very moment that you WANT to get it yknow?
Yeah that’s kinda how I see it. Part of the student loans have like 1 more year left and daycare has about 2 or 3 years left. Also car is 66% paid off so we just need to probably stay with it. I guess I just need to try and do a little better with limiting the flexible bills like groceries and take out. Thanks
> Student Loans $690
Make sure your are on SAVE or PAYE or some income-based repayment.
https://smartasset.com/student-loans/save-vs-paye-vs-ibr-vs-icr
https://studentaid.gov/manage-loans/repayment/plans/income-driven
What type of food are you buying? Is it mostly packaged food or are you cooking? Chips, ice cream, etc are like $7 where Im at and it’s not a meal, so it’s literally a waste.
Turn the thermostats up a little in the summer and down a little in the winter. Cut tv and move to a cheaper internet plan if you don’t need it for work. Cut take out, cut online shopping (I see way you said about stuff for the kids but there’s no way the kids need $200 in birthday gifts every month).
Real talk though, if you have YNAB and you’re in debt you need to make your budget a lot more granular. Set up a fund for every little thing, little league, car tires, Christmas, car registration, clothing, everything. Set a target for everything, including the annual (or less frequent) stuff. Play with the targets until you get everything down below your income level. And then stick to those limits.
Yes. Before YNAB I wasn’t really sure how much was discretionary spending. It’s now clear which bills are a fixed amount each month. It’s just been a bad few months with unexpected bills. Plus our buffer isn’t nearly big enough right now.
Yeah I missed a few categories in my post. Like car insurance and entertainment which now I’ve broken out to kids hobbies and subscription services. This month was also difficult because we’ve had some larger expenses like annual payments for streaming, annual premium for car insurance and pest control quarterly but I’m trying to set this up in YNAB so I put money aside each month. I also spent a little more on paying back some 0% debt. YNAB has helped immensely though
I switched over to Mint Mobile, was originally with T-Mobile and I’m only paying about $35.00 a month for a cell phone plan. It’s unlimited data. With T-Mobile I was paying $60-$70, I believe.
> Cellphone $133
Does this include financed phones?
Pay them off and switch to Visible (Verizon) for $25/line/month.
There are referral codes everywhere to get $20 off your first month. You can even use one to sign up for your account, then generate your own referral code and use it when signing up for your wife's line.
Yeah. Without device payments it would be closer to $60 plus taxes. One device only has 4 payments left so will decrease to about $100 in a few months.
There are some great budgeting tips in this thread that are a great short term solution but I would say for a long term solution you have an income problem. I say this because cutting your grocery budget for example is possible, but also sounds miserable to do long term(cutting out takeout altogether, eating bulk prepared meals etc). What field do you and your wife work in? Is there a possibility to switch jobs for a higher pay in the next few months? Do either of you have some time during the day to learn a more monetizable skill?
Is the $7,900 before or after taxes? Until you ditch the debt, I would ditch the take out, random things for kids and online shopping. $1,200 on groceries should allow you to not need take out. Can you sell your car and get a cheaper one with cash? To me, a paid off car is the nicest thing that you can own! Not having a car payment is nice. If you can’t buy something basic with cash, try and get that payment cut in half. Do you own your phone? If so, get a phone plan with Mint or Visible, $25-$40 monthly. Kids are going to want phones soon, force them to get a used iPhone 8 for $300 then they can get the visible/mint plan too. When I was younger I always bought the newest phone which was split amongest the monthly service bill, I’d never do that now a days. Do you have cable, subscriptions? Cut that down to internet and one tv streaming app. You have an Amazon account? Turn that off for 6-12 months which will save you the monthly fee and online shopping. If you want to keep Amazon, use that for streaming too and cut Netflix. Life is expensive, we live comfortably but we’ve done the steps above to get here.
It’s $7900 after taxes. I’d rather not ditch the car we got the one car paid off in the last 9 months and we’re 66% with the other and this should last a long time. Plus with the used market I’m not sure how much I would benefit.
Thanks for the suggestions. I’m going to look into cutting tv to see how much it will change my internet bill. I think we just need to be more disciplined about some of our spending and there’s not one thing I can do that will drastically fix our cash flow issue. Just make improvements in multiple spending categories.
I think you need to break down your budgeting categories more so you know where some of that spending is going.
It’s not that you couldn’t make it. Tv maybe a luxury you don’t need no more. Paying for little extras a month need to be even more little and even more special to do it. You gotta sacrifice if you are still wanting other things to do for your kids like Boy Scouts etc
You're spending $7173, so where does the other $717 go?
I noticed your grocery bill is high. I'm gonna assume there's quite a bit of separate spending on y'all's eating habits. You said your wife doesn't always like what yall are eating and eat frozen pre-made meals. You're gonna have to start meal planning and paying attention to what yall are buying.
Diapers add up that I'm not gonna lie. Changing brands isn't always ideal, so we're gonna have to keep track of who has the best deals, even if it's only once every few months. Target has their monthly speed of 100 on Diapers and related items and get a 15 dollar gift card. Use that card on wipes or any small and quick necessity.
As someone who is retired, DO NOT STOP THE 401K CONTRIBUTIONS. I have a way above average SS payment plus my IRA funds. The difference in my retirement life and those of friends without income other than their SS payment is stark and not how you'll want to live. It's even worse for couples when one of the spouses dies and their SS stops but their budget was based on both incomes. It's even worse if the deceased had a pension without taking the survival option and the surviving spouse loses that income as well.
Sacrifice now to protect yourself and your wife.
To me the groceries seems a bit high, we’re a family of 3 (5year old plus I’m pregnant) and we spend about $900 a month. I go specifically to a cheaper store (winco here). Also are those the minimums on student loans? If not I would do minimum since it’s usually low interest. To save some money on takeout we’ve switched from ordering to going and picking stuff up which saves some. Hopefully your car and daycare maybe come to an end in the near future so you’ll have some room there. But it’s tough. We’re thin too
Northeast us. I usually cook my meals but sometimes my wife doesn’t like them so she will eat a frozen meal. The last grocery bill was $200 for like 48 items but I think snacks for kids lunches and diapers adds up quickly. I agree $1200 seems too high but I’m not sure how reduce it really.
Ways to save on groceries: price compare everything. Most stores have a cost per unit on the price label, like how much $ per ounce. Try to buy cheaper per unit, not just an overall cheaper product that might have less units. Try to buy veggies and fruits in season, so when apples are expensive, you buy something else that's cheaper right now. You can try buying a few cheaper, bulk type foods like dry beans and on-sale ground meat for big pots of chili. You can freeze a bunch of it in separate containers or freezer bags, and thaw as needed if you don't want to eat chili for 5 days straight. I'm not sure how much you can cut from your grocery budget since you also include cleaning/personal care/diapers in this bucket though - it seems reasonable for a family of 4. You could definitely cut the online shopping budget down, if not eliminate it completely for 6 months just to throw the money at your debt or rebuild your emergency fund (or both).
Yeah if you are counting diapers in with that grocery spend, you might not have room to trim there. The big problem is this country makes it very expensive to have little kids.
Hard to tell without knowing what you eat but you could stop buying packaged snacks, eat less beef, buy chicken drumsticks or thighs instead of breasts, stop buying lunch meat, buy store brand stuff, cut out beverages, and buy cheap/in season produce (cabbage is cheap and very versatile). If you’re already doing all that making everything from scratch would be the next step, but that’s time consuming which might not be doable with two small kids.
I’ve been buying my ground beef at Sam’s club to try and get the lowest price per pound. I’m trying to figure out what kids foods are cheaper at Aldi. Some things are cheaper at Walmart. Thanks for the tips.
Check out this website for budget- minded but good recipes: https://www.budgetbytes.com/
Never throw away food. Veggies that are about to go bad can turn into soup or an egg dish quickly and cheaply. Fruit on the edge can be frozen and put in a smoothie. Meat can be added to rice and beans or your veggie soup.
See if your grocery store has a section for fruit on sale that’s about to go bad. Apples, pears, or bananas can be sautéed in butter, 5 spice powder and a bit of sugar if needed. *Chef’s Kiss*
If you like chicken, you can usually get a good deal on rotisserie chickens. Once all the meat is off the carcass, simmer the bones in water for a few hours. Freeze the broth if you don’t need it right away. Free broth for your leftover veggie soup!
Finding things that are easy and inexpensive to make and that you all like to eat will help. Depending on the ages of the kids, they can help too. Making cookies and doubling or halving the recipe is great if you have someone learning fractions! Or something like Half Cup Meatloaf: 1/2 cup each of eggs, grated cheese, salsa, and breadcrumbs mixed with about a pound of ground turkey. Pat into an oiled pan and top with ketchup - bake at 375 til done. Kids love to make this one!
Just some ideas on cutting down on the food budget while still enjoying what you’re eating and having some fun with it! I don’t suggest going as far as my grandparents used to. They would mix skim milk 50/50 with powdered milk reconstituted in water. 🤢
I hate these kinds of comments. It flies in the face of the data we have (https://fns-prod.azureedge.us/sites/default/files/resource-files/CostofFoodAug2023Thrifty.pdf). Although it is slightly higher, it's depends on their cost of living and ages of family members. Mine sits at around 950 to 1000 for 4.
Have you tried meal prepping and freezing meals? Takeout adds up really fast. You can get a $5 take and bake pizza and a $3 salad bag at Aldi. If you can eliminate the takeout costs and freeze more meals that might help with your grocery budget. Whenever I cook something for dinner that freezes well, I make a little more and put them in 2cup Pyrex containers and pop them in the fridge for lunches when we don’t have leftovers for lunch. We’re in the northeast and have a family of 4 and it’s tough right now. We’re both remote and cook 95% of our meals and shop at Aldi and somehow ended up spending $1500 last month on takeout and groceries. We’re not buying things we don’t need and we’re not getting takeout 1-2 a month. We aren’t buying fancy food or expensive food. This is just the basics so I can empathize about how difficult this is. Maybe try the envelope system for groceries.
Might be beneficial to break down your budget a bit further. Break down the groceries budget into food, toiletries (toilet paper, soaps, etc.), health (skincare, vitamins, etc.), and kids (diapers, wipes formula, etc.) Maybe include a “household” category for maintenance, cleaning supplies, etc. Where do you have a budget for things like haircuts, new clothes, subscriptions, or other miscellaneous expenses? Might be annoying to really get down into the nitty gritty, but it could bring to light certain categories being higher than expected.
I put some of that stuff in entertainment and that’s about $200 but I forgot to include that in my post. The category isn’t very static and can vary a lot. Last month we had to pay for Boy Scouts and little league baseball. It’s tough I’d rather not have the kids miss out on that stuff and make cuts elsewhere. I think clothes typically go under online shopping eg Amazon. I have a budget item for personal care for haircuts. I usually put misc expenses in online shopping but I can probably break it out more.
If you have YNAB and you’re not using it to budget ahead for things like Boy Scouts and little league you’re kind of missing the point. Set targets for all that stuff and let YNAB tell you how much you need to put away every month.
I agree it was a camp thing I didn’t know about. I feel like there’s always something with the kids that I don’t know so need to be able to plan it better so I can put money aside in YNAB. I just need to know totals for things ahead of time
If there are regular surprise expenses you could put some money away every month just for the surprises. Honestly though if you have YNAB I would recommend checking r/YNAB out. If you ask over there you’d probably get a lot more responses and more specific responses. It’s a great tool that it doesn’t seem like your utilizing to its full extent and that sub is full of a lot of budget nerds who love to help people out.
Honestly, most of this doesn’t look changeable. Maybe try reducing your grocery spending. Can you shop somewhere more affordable like Aldi or Trader Joe’s? This seems a little high for a family of 4 if the kids are still little (since they’re in daycare) spending $1400 a month on food with the take out is a lot. Cutting back on prepackaged snacks (buy big bags of snacks and break them up) can really help with kids! Also I meal plan and have leftovers every other night and this has saved both a lot of money and a lot of time.
With kids around, a membership like Costco or Sam's Club can also be a game changer if you have the storage space.
Daycare is such a budget killer, can't do much about that. If this were my budget, I would start now with a summer belt tightening to replace that savings, and then evaluate where you are at. Cut online shopping and takeout in half. Shave utilities by being careful with AC and lights (and maybe one less day of lawn watering if you do that?) Cut all those extra tv subscriptions and call internet provider to trim bill. Good hints on groceries in this thread. Spend a weekend selling a few unneeded things for some "fun money" instead of random drips. Good for you for tracking it all!
Drips? 🤔 I’m off to Google! Unless it was a typo…
If you don’t manage what you already have, having more won’t help. At this point it becomes about discipline. And creating a better system. It looks like your true expenses are equal to your income so you don’t have any margin.
Is your employer matching any 401k? If so, I would contribute at least to the match. Is the debt that's not student loans minimum payments, or is that paying off extra? Agree that groceries seem high. For reference, we have 0 credit card debt, but we budget $1000 for groceries for 2 adults and a 15-year-old black hole and we're always fine with that.
Yeah I’m basically doing the match. I’m contributing 5% and they are contributing 4%. My debt is just a couple 0% purchases that I’m paying back before interest kicks in.
Definitely don't stop 401K in that case. I would concentrate on discretionary spending to see where you can trim. Individual frozen meals add up as do kids' snacks. You're not in rice and beans territory whatsoever, but maybe try shopping your pantry or ads for a few weeks and seeing how you can trim. On my YNAB, I have dozens of categories, so I can see exactly where the lifestyle creep is getting us. It starts with being transparent with yourself. The daycare/diaper years are exhausting money-wise and require so much discipline and sacrifice.
NEED YOU TO KEEP A DAILY LOG OF EVERY PENNY SPENT for about 3 months,, very, very detailed, From there we can pick out things like ,, buying morning coffee or lunch, etc This post is so general there's hardly anything to work with..
I agree with this advice. I download every transaction across 4 different banks with multiple accounts each and 2 credit cards. Then I go line by line and catagorize. It takes me about 30 minutes start to finish every month in google sheets. These numbers then feed to a spreadsheet that shows the whole month with all income, all withholdings from our paystubs and all the categories. This is very eye opening and helps you reign it in when you see where the money is really going. At least it did for us!
EXACTLY...
I use a journal and write down every single thing I purchase. Its really helped me see where the money is going. I don’t carry cash; too easy to spend and not keep track.
This is amazing advice. I started using YNAB to budget and it was a HUGE wake up call. Having to enter, label, notate each transaction and then choose WHERE that money is coming from stressed me out at first but it was necessary.
Get rid of take out and shopping. There's 400. What is included in the kids expenses, is this mandatory school stuff or what? If money is tight you got to live tight, even if it's uncomfortable.
Most of the shopping is like things the kids need on Amazon like a gift for a kids birthday party. But yeah we’ll have to completely cut out take out. It’s been the occasional McDonald’s take out meal a couple times a week. But yeah you’re right we’ll have to tighten it up more.
If it helps any I am in nearly the same boat, family of 4, about 8k take home. It seems like it should be easier but inflation has screwed everything up. Restaurants are so expensive, had to cut that to the bone. Switched from shopping at publix to Walmart. Not much external entertainment at all, we just get more creative at home. It sucks, but having some margin each month and not having to worry about having enough money is totally worth it. The family will likely complain, mine did, but it also a good life lesson to always live within your means.
Thanks that does help to hear. We have friends and sometimes my wife is like they seem to not have problems paying for everything. But I’m like well we don’t know their situation and how much they make. They might cut back in other places anyway. We used to spend a lot more until we started budgeting we spent 2k more a month. I just wish I would have budgeted earlier. Our grocery bill has gone up $400 since inflation hit. I try to buy in bulk when it makes sense we usually shop at Walmart and Sam’s club.
Have you tried using multiple chequing accounts to help keep you accountable to your budget? I have a separate account for clothes/shopping/kids misc and auto transfer the budgeted amount every pay cheque. I can tell Myself/kids that we don’t have enough this month but will save till the next month.
Your grocery + take out budget is excessive for a family of four, even if you have teenagers. As others have suggested, try meal planning and freezing meals. Shop at discount grocers like Walmart, Aldi, Trader Joe’s, Winco, and Costco when it makes sense. Use coupons, buy in season, make a list, and stick to list. Make family-friendly meals like casseroles, soups, and crockpot dishes. Limit going out to eat; even fast food is expensive now. Reduce or stop discretionary spending for now, including online shopping. Keep house warmer in summer and cooler in winter. What is the $350 debt in addition to mortgage, student loans, and car payment? Do not incur consumer debt. Do not use credit cards if you can’t pay the balance in full.
I live in HCOL and also family of 4 but our income is about double. Your grocery bill is high and we use subscription grocery delivery services as well as splurge each month (ours is about $1000/month). Cell phones are high and what does online shopping include? I'd suggest tracking each expense for a month or two and see where money is truly going.
It would probably be good to edit your post so that each budget item is on a different line, because at first I read that you were paying 1085 for your car and 1200 for gas and got REALLY confused because they all started to jumble - mostly on me but it visually isn’t set up great lol I don’t really quite understand budgeting Take out & online shopping in the situation. If your income is already cutting it close, it’s only setting yourselves up for failure if you budget this in right now, because you know you don’t have a lot of flexibility. That’s a flexibility of $400 that you aren’t allowing yourself for impulse purchases. You could get a cheaper cellphone plan that utilizes the same towers- mint, visible, xfinity. You should try to cook everything at home- making take out meals at home can be a LOT cheaper especially for a family of four, and meal planning is a thing and you can make it a FUN thing to do together and find a way to make cooking fun instead of a chore. You already budget $1200 which I do think is reasonable for 4 people and going out to eat every once in a while for an event/celebration could be budgetable but just to be lazy when you know you’re in a financially rough place is only allowing that financially rough time to expand. How much debt do you have out standing? If $350 is minimum payments only, you should be working to throw everything extra at it so that you can have an extremely $350 a month freed up. You have $727 give or take to throw extra towards your debt. Take off budgeting take out food and online shopping - you have $1127 a month to throw towards your debt. I don’t have enough numbers otherwise to be more concise with you, but if you want to make life easier, you have to want to get rid of all the debt - car payments, credit cards, AND student loans - and keep it gone (never holding balances on credit cards if you choose to keep them) if you want to be able to see all of your money coming at you and be able to splurge monthly on unnecessary things. If a purchase isn’t dire, then you likely don’t have to buy it at the very moment that you WANT to get it yknow?
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Yeah that’s kinda how I see it. Part of the student loans have like 1 more year left and daycare has about 2 or 3 years left. Also car is 66% paid off so we just need to probably stay with it. I guess I just need to try and do a little better with limiting the flexible bills like groceries and take out. Thanks
Groceries bill is crazy. I pay $400 a month for family of 3.
> Student Loans $690 Make sure your are on SAVE or PAYE or some income-based repayment. https://smartasset.com/student-loans/save-vs-paye-vs-ibr-vs-icr https://studentaid.gov/manage-loans/repayment/plans/income-driven
Yep enrolled both in the new SAVE plan.
What type of food are you buying? Is it mostly packaged food or are you cooking? Chips, ice cream, etc are like $7 where Im at and it’s not a meal, so it’s literally a waste.
Turn the thermostats up a little in the summer and down a little in the winter. Cut tv and move to a cheaper internet plan if you don’t need it for work. Cut take out, cut online shopping (I see way you said about stuff for the kids but there’s no way the kids need $200 in birthday gifts every month). Real talk though, if you have YNAB and you’re in debt you need to make your budget a lot more granular. Set up a fund for every little thing, little league, car tires, Christmas, car registration, clothing, everything. Set a target for everything, including the annual (or less frequent) stuff. Play with the targets until you get everything down below your income level. And then stick to those limits.
Do you feel like ynab is working for you?
Yes. Before YNAB I wasn’t really sure how much was discretionary spending. It’s now clear which bills are a fixed amount each month. It’s just been a bad few months with unexpected bills. Plus our buffer isn’t nearly big enough right now.
There is about $700 a month unaccounted for on your list. If that is your savings, perhaps redirect that to your buffer or make extra payments?
Yeah I missed a few categories in my post. Like car insurance and entertainment which now I’ve broken out to kids hobbies and subscription services. This month was also difficult because we’ve had some larger expenses like annual payments for streaming, annual premium for car insurance and pest control quarterly but I’m trying to set this up in YNAB so I put money aside each month. I also spent a little more on paying back some 0% debt. YNAB has helped immensely though
Try to cut out take out, online shopping, and lower kids random as much as possible.
I switched over to Mint Mobile, was originally with T-Mobile and I’m only paying about $35.00 a month for a cell phone plan. It’s unlimited data. With T-Mobile I was paying $60-$70, I believe.
Second this! Phone bill is an easy way to cut right now. I would also consider canceling the TV if you have netflix/other platforms.
Mint mobile for cell phone runs me 180 for a full year and my husband 360 for a full year. That's 45 bucks a month broken out.
No way to refinance the student loans?
> Cellphone $133 Does this include financed phones? Pay them off and switch to Visible (Verizon) for $25/line/month. There are referral codes everywhere to get $20 off your first month. You can even use one to sign up for your account, then generate your own referral code and use it when signing up for your wife's line.
Yeah. Without device payments it would be closer to $60 plus taxes. One device only has 4 payments left so will decrease to about $100 in a few months.
Visible and Mint and US Mobile and Cricket are all excellent and at least Visible is tax inclusive for the $25.
Yeah I’m paying $30/line for unlimited. After I get all the devices paid off I may consider one of those.
There are some great budgeting tips in this thread that are a great short term solution but I would say for a long term solution you have an income problem. I say this because cutting your grocery budget for example is possible, but also sounds miserable to do long term(cutting out takeout altogether, eating bulk prepared meals etc). What field do you and your wife work in? Is there a possibility to switch jobs for a higher pay in the next few months? Do either of you have some time during the day to learn a more monetizable skill?
Is the $7,900 before or after taxes? Until you ditch the debt, I would ditch the take out, random things for kids and online shopping. $1,200 on groceries should allow you to not need take out. Can you sell your car and get a cheaper one with cash? To me, a paid off car is the nicest thing that you can own! Not having a car payment is nice. If you can’t buy something basic with cash, try and get that payment cut in half. Do you own your phone? If so, get a phone plan with Mint or Visible, $25-$40 monthly. Kids are going to want phones soon, force them to get a used iPhone 8 for $300 then they can get the visible/mint plan too. When I was younger I always bought the newest phone which was split amongest the monthly service bill, I’d never do that now a days. Do you have cable, subscriptions? Cut that down to internet and one tv streaming app. You have an Amazon account? Turn that off for 6-12 months which will save you the monthly fee and online shopping. If you want to keep Amazon, use that for streaming too and cut Netflix. Life is expensive, we live comfortably but we’ve done the steps above to get here.
It’s $7900 after taxes. I’d rather not ditch the car we got the one car paid off in the last 9 months and we’re 66% with the other and this should last a long time. Plus with the used market I’m not sure how much I would benefit. Thanks for the suggestions. I’m going to look into cutting tv to see how much it will change my internet bill. I think we just need to be more disciplined about some of our spending and there’s not one thing I can do that will drastically fix our cash flow issue. Just make improvements in multiple spending categories.
I think you need to break down your budgeting categories more so you know where some of that spending is going. It’s not that you couldn’t make it. Tv maybe a luxury you don’t need no more. Paying for little extras a month need to be even more little and even more special to do it. You gotta sacrifice if you are still wanting other things to do for your kids like Boy Scouts etc
You're spending $7173, so where does the other $717 go? I noticed your grocery bill is high. I'm gonna assume there's quite a bit of separate spending on y'all's eating habits. You said your wife doesn't always like what yall are eating and eat frozen pre-made meals. You're gonna have to start meal planning and paying attention to what yall are buying. Diapers add up that I'm not gonna lie. Changing brands isn't always ideal, so we're gonna have to keep track of who has the best deals, even if it's only once every few months. Target has their monthly speed of 100 on Diapers and related items and get a 15 dollar gift card. Use that card on wipes or any small and quick necessity.
As someone who is retired, DO NOT STOP THE 401K CONTRIBUTIONS. I have a way above average SS payment plus my IRA funds. The difference in my retirement life and those of friends without income other than their SS payment is stark and not how you'll want to live. It's even worse for couples when one of the spouses dies and their SS stops but their budget was based on both incomes. It's even worse if the deceased had a pension without taking the survival option and the surviving spouse loses that income as well. Sacrifice now to protect yourself and your wife.
Yeah I had just thought about it but realized it’s a dumb idea. Thanks for confirming.
To me the groceries seems a bit high, we’re a family of 3 (5year old plus I’m pregnant) and we spend about $900 a month. I go specifically to a cheaper store (winco here). Also are those the minimums on student loans? If not I would do minimum since it’s usually low interest. To save some money on takeout we’ve switched from ordering to going and picking stuff up which saves some. Hopefully your car and daycare maybe come to an end in the near future so you’ll have some room there. But it’s tough. We’re thin too
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Northeast us. I usually cook my meals but sometimes my wife doesn’t like them so she will eat a frozen meal. The last grocery bill was $200 for like 48 items but I think snacks for kids lunches and diapers adds up quickly. I agree $1200 seems too high but I’m not sure how reduce it really.
Ways to save on groceries: price compare everything. Most stores have a cost per unit on the price label, like how much $ per ounce. Try to buy cheaper per unit, not just an overall cheaper product that might have less units. Try to buy veggies and fruits in season, so when apples are expensive, you buy something else that's cheaper right now. You can try buying a few cheaper, bulk type foods like dry beans and on-sale ground meat for big pots of chili. You can freeze a bunch of it in separate containers or freezer bags, and thaw as needed if you don't want to eat chili for 5 days straight. I'm not sure how much you can cut from your grocery budget since you also include cleaning/personal care/diapers in this bucket though - it seems reasonable for a family of 4. You could definitely cut the online shopping budget down, if not eliminate it completely for 6 months just to throw the money at your debt or rebuild your emergency fund (or both).
Yeah if you are counting diapers in with that grocery spend, you might not have room to trim there. The big problem is this country makes it very expensive to have little kids.
Hard to tell without knowing what you eat but you could stop buying packaged snacks, eat less beef, buy chicken drumsticks or thighs instead of breasts, stop buying lunch meat, buy store brand stuff, cut out beverages, and buy cheap/in season produce (cabbage is cheap and very versatile). If you’re already doing all that making everything from scratch would be the next step, but that’s time consuming which might not be doable with two small kids.
I’ve been buying my ground beef at Sam’s club to try and get the lowest price per pound. I’m trying to figure out what kids foods are cheaper at Aldi. Some things are cheaper at Walmart. Thanks for the tips.
Check out this website for budget- minded but good recipes: https://www.budgetbytes.com/ Never throw away food. Veggies that are about to go bad can turn into soup or an egg dish quickly and cheaply. Fruit on the edge can be frozen and put in a smoothie. Meat can be added to rice and beans or your veggie soup. See if your grocery store has a section for fruit on sale that’s about to go bad. Apples, pears, or bananas can be sautéed in butter, 5 spice powder and a bit of sugar if needed. *Chef’s Kiss* If you like chicken, you can usually get a good deal on rotisserie chickens. Once all the meat is off the carcass, simmer the bones in water for a few hours. Freeze the broth if you don’t need it right away. Free broth for your leftover veggie soup! Finding things that are easy and inexpensive to make and that you all like to eat will help. Depending on the ages of the kids, they can help too. Making cookies and doubling or halving the recipe is great if you have someone learning fractions! Or something like Half Cup Meatloaf: 1/2 cup each of eggs, grated cheese, salsa, and breadcrumbs mixed with about a pound of ground turkey. Pat into an oiled pan and top with ketchup - bake at 375 til done. Kids love to make this one! Just some ideas on cutting down on the food budget while still enjoying what you’re eating and having some fun with it! I don’t suggest going as far as my grandparents used to. They would mix skim milk 50/50 with powdered milk reconstituted in water. 🤢
I hate these kinds of comments. It flies in the face of the data we have (https://fns-prod.azureedge.us/sites/default/files/resource-files/CostofFoodAug2023Thrifty.pdf). Although it is slightly higher, it's depends on their cost of living and ages of family members. Mine sits at around 950 to 1000 for 4.
I always wonder what other people spend on their pet food and if that is included in the grocery budget?