We tried to live within a budget, but we can't

[RunningBum]

I think our biggest downfall spending wise is that we’re pretty inflexible with what we eat. We eat a lot of fish (salmon and tuna at least once a week). And tons of fresh fruit/berries. I just feel like I invest a LOT of energy trying to spend less and we’re still way above what other people spend!

I'd look at cutting just about anything else before I cut back on healthy eating like this seems to be.

 

[tb001]

I'd look at cutting just about anything else before I cut back on healthy eating like this seems to be.

Ha! Yes, we are very focused on healthy eating. But I see super low budgets and feel like we should be able to do better! Our berries aren’t even organic!

 

[daylatedollarshort]

Ha! Yes, we are very focused on healthy eating. But I see super low budgets and feel like we should be able to do better! Our berries aren’t even organic!

Berries are a lot cheaper if you don't mind frozen, plus there is no spoilage with frozen. We buy organic, frozen blueberries, cherries, strawberries and mangoes at an outlet store for $2.50 a pound and make smoothies every day. EWG has strawberries and cherries on their dirty dozen list of produce worth buying organic.

Per your chicken thigh comment, the doctor behind the eat to starve cancer Tedtalk, says chicken thighs are good for you because they are high in vitamin K2. He has a shopping list here - https://drwilliamli.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Shopping-Guide_Mobile_Icon.pdf

We weren't very careful with expenses when we working and raising kids, and had a lot of waste and overpaying for goods and services in our budget. We've been able to chop $40K off our annual budget since we retired now that we have more time to price shop groceries and optimize all other expenses for the same quality of life. That is like enough extra after tax cash to buy a low end Tesla every year, so it is worth it to me to do the optimizations.

 

[Gumby]

The young wife and I spend what many would consider an insane amount of money on food and wine, both at home and in restaurants. On the other hand, we don't spend on fancy clothes, professional sporting event attendance or most "toys". That's just the way we like to live. Others have different priorities, and that's fine too. As I have said many times - it's your money, do what you want with it (which encompasses both how you invest it and how you spend it). I'll do what I want with mine, and we can both be happy.

Oddly enough, even though I always have tracked and probably always will continue to track our spending to the penny -- I can tell you precisely what we spent every month on about 57 different categories over the past 20 years or so -- we do not have a budget. While I have become very adept at predicting how much we will spend on each category, we actually spend what we want, when we want and how we want.

And, based on my knowledge of what we actually spend, rather than what we we "budget" or feel we should spend, I am confident we will never run out of money.

 

[RobbieB]

I wouldn't. Gimme $400 worth of caviar and I'll down it in 2 days. With frozen vodka of course -

 

[jollystomper]

Berries are a lot cheaper if you don't mind frozen, plus there is no spoilage with frozen. We buy organic, frozen blueberries, cherries, strawberries and mangoes at an outlet store for $2.50 a pound and make smoothies every day. EWG has strawberries and cherries on their dirty dozen list of produce worth buying organic.

+1 my go-to healthy snacks are frozen pineapple/blueberries/strawberries, usually from Costco. I use them in protein smoothies as well as "ice cubes" in my zero sugar drinks.

 

[Sunset]

^^^^ It is social media. It is varying net worth and expenses at play here. Our food/groceries/dining run at about $60K a year. This does not include travel and other entertainment expenses. As long as each spends within what their net worth supports, there is no reason for anyone else to judge how the other person should spend their money.

You Win

Ours is 1/10th that number.
If I was wild I could double possibly triple ours to $18K , but it would be hard.

Feel free to provide instructions in the BTD thread, I might learn something

 

[RetiredHappy]

You Win

Ours is 1/10th that number.
If I was wild I could double possibly triple ours to $18K , but it would be hard.

Feel free to provide instructions in the BTD thread, I might learn something

I already feel like I am bragging here. I will venture over there to take a look. The impression that I have with BTD is one-off as opposed to sustaining lifestyle.

 

[tb001]

I already feel like I am bragging here. I will venture over there to take a look. The impression that I have with BTD is one-off as opposed to sustaining lifestyle.

I just want to eat what you’re eating! Do you do a lot of dining out? I can pretty easily see hitting those kinds of numbers with frequent good meals out, especially if that includes alcohol.

 

[NW-Bound]

We spend about $60K a year on food, groceries and household stuff. Golf runs about $20K a year. Travel is another $25K a year...

$60K on food is hard for me to do. That's $1200/week. I can see that a couple may spend that money going out to nice restaurants several times a week, but I would get tired of it quickly, and would crave some simple food cooked at home.

I have no interest in golf, but the $25K of travel is quite easy to do, and pleasing too. I would not be able to spend even more on travel, because I would then miss home, and travel would also become a chore if it was overdone.

Different people have truly different interests and fancies. That's why one must pursue his/her happiness in his/her own way, and cannot mimic or envy someone else.

PS. My aunt and her husband have taken quite a few world cruises. She told me that once she got tired of food on the ship, and managed to acquire some Cup-o-Noodle. Yes, instant ramen! She needed something else, other than what they were serving.

I have not taken any cruise longer than 1 week, and craving of instant ramen has not happened to me yet.

 

[Amethyst]

All you'd need to do is dine often at expensive restaurants, order their best wines, and treat friends. I'll bet it would not be hard to get up to $60K/year that way.

You Win

Ours is 1/10th that number.
If I was wild I could double possibly triple ours to $18K , but it would be hard.

Feel free to provide instructions in the BTD thread, I might learn something

 

[Closet_Gamer]

For the OP:

Sounds like clothes are your partner's hobby. Perhaps encourage a second part to the hobby where she sells them on the Internet.

My brother has a car hobby. His wife tried to institute a "car-in = car-out" policy...but it never stuck.


More generally:

What a hilarious thread! Money, stories, judgement, angst, accusations, malfunctioning closets...its all in here! "Days of our FIRE Lives"

My personal favorite sub-thread is the "I'm a 50 year single dude who lives in gym shorts and has holes in my underwear. How does anyone spend lots of money on clothes?"

My bathroom is a cautionary tale. I have one bottle of green shampoo and a bar of soap. DW has no less than 10 bottles of something or other and three kinds of a scrubs.

Women are different.
Vive la difference.

 

[finnski1]

Oddly enough, even though I always have tracked and probably always will continue to track our spending to the penny -- I can tell you precisely what we spent every month on about 57 different categories over the past 20 years or so -- we do not have a budget. While I have become very adept at predicting how much we will spend on each category, we actually spend what we want, when we want and how we want.

And, based on my knowledge of what we actually spend, rather than what we we "budget" or feel we should spend, I am confident we will never run out of money.

This is exactly how I operate as well. I am very precise in recording our spending on everything but at the end of the day I don't have a budget at all. I guess I just like spreadsheets.

 

[brett]

Complete opposite.

We do not have a budget.

I keep track of after tax spending only to understand how much we need to draw down over and above our pension incomes or how much we need to transfer to our HISA.

That takes all of five minutes a month. I take a tape from our check account. Often less than five minutes because so much goes through our credit card(s) or pre-authorizations.
Add any periodic tax instalment payments and we are finished.

Do not care what we spend on books, beans, gas, airfare, or anything else. We only care about the bottom right hand number.

 

[RetiredHappy]

We have lunch at the club almost everyday and we always leave extra tips. On average we eat one dinner out a week, always at a very nice restaurant. My husband does alcohol and I don't.

We try to only buy organic produce, wild caught seafood and USDA prime grade beef. We also entertain frequently at our home.

When we travel on land, we almost always have both lunch and dinner out even though we typically book a 2BR/2BA timeshare (Marriott and Westin) with kitchen and invite friends to join us. Some of our friends have even more expensive taste than us.

 

[ivinsfan]

We have lunch at the club almost everyday and we always leave extra tips. On average we eat one dinner out a week, always at a very nice restaurant. My husband does alcohol and I don't.

We try to only buy organic produce, wild caught seafood and USDA prime grade beef. We also entertain frequently at our home.

When we travel on land, we almost always have both lunch and dinner out even though we typically book a 2BR/2BA timeshare (Marriott and Westin) with kitchen and invite friends to join us. Some of our friends have even more expensive taste than us.

So 60K...lunch for 2 6 to 7 days a week..dinner for 2 once a week.. 1 drinker one non drinker. Even with organic food how does that total 60K a year?


This goes to show having a "food" budget means different things to different people.



To me food budget is basically food bought and prepared to eat at home.


Eating out and entertaining would merit two separate line items.



It sounds like lots of your socializing and enjoyment are connected to food. Party on and good on you for enjoying yourselves.

 

[RetiredHappy]

So 60K...lunch for 2 6 to 7 days a week..dinner for 2 once a week.. 1 drinker one non drinker. Even with organic food how does that total 60K a week?


This goes to show having a "food" budget means different things to different people.



To me food budget is basically food bought and prepared to eat at home.


Eating out and entertaining would merit two separate line items.



It sounds like lots of your socializing and enjoyment are connected to food. Party on and good on you for enjoying yourselves.

60K a year, not 60K a week. Nothing to get huffy about. We all decide how we live and spend our money.

 

[braumeister]

To me food budget is basically food bought and prepared to eat at home.

Eating out and entertaining would merit two separate line items.

You would hate looking at my spreadsheet.

I have just seven categories, and one of them is "Cash/Ent/Food".

• Cash means what I get from ATMs and spend on whatever (the whatever is not accounted for).
• Ent means all entertainment (tickets, etc.)
• Food means anything bought at the supermarket plus whatever is spent in restaurants.

I actually keep very close track of all our spending (within my seven categories) and I always marvel at how others break their spending down into what I would consider sub-sub-sub-sub-categories.

My point is that it doesn't really matter, as long as you know, to your own satisfaction, where your money is going.

 

[ivinsfan]

60K a year, not 60K a week. Nothing to get huffy about. We all decide how we live and spend our money.

That would be a lot..no one is huffy..just saying food means different things to different people

Curious how you got huffy from my post

 

[ivinsfan]

You would hate looking at my spreadsheet.

I have just seven categories, and one of them is "Cash/Ent/Food".

• Cash means what I get from ATMs and spend on whatever (the whatever is not accounted for).
• Ent means all entertainment (tickets, etc.)
• Food means anything bought at the supermarket plus whatever is spent in restaurants.

I actually keep very close track of all our spending (within my seven categories) and I always marvel at how others break their spending down into what I would consider sub-sub-sub-sub-categories.

My point is that it doesn't really matter, as long as you know, to your own satisfaction, where your money is going.

Some people break out the cost of TP..

 

[Dtail]

Some people break out the cost of TP..

17 categories for me, but not TP. Some on this site clearly use more categories.

 

[braumeister]

17 categories for me, but not TP. Some on this site clearly use more categories.

What, you make your own?

 

[Teacher Terry]

I separate groceries from eating out also.

 

[Dtail]

What, you make your own?

Hey, could have made some monies last year if I made my own.

 

[LarryMelman]

• Cash means what I get from ATMs and spend on whatever (the whatever is not accounted for).
• Ent means all entertainment (tickets, etc.)
• Food means anything bought at the supermarket plus whatever is spent in restaurants.

My categories go back to the 1980's. "Groceries" includes everything at the grocery store. Food and TP and the National Enquirer. However if I buy TP at Wal-mart, it probably gets categorized as "Misc". As opposed to weed-killer at Walmart which I'd probably spilt out as "House & Yard Stuff". A meal just for myself at McDonald's also goes under "Groceries". Unless I'm out with a group, then I'll put it as "Dining" which I split off from "Groceries" a few years back to encourage myself to do more actual dining out. I spend almost no "cash" any more but when I do, I break it into the various categories.

Clear as mud, right? Well it makes sense to me.

However I still can't wrap my brain around $60K/year of food-related expense.