I am constantly revising my retirement budget as I am super close to pulling the trigger. I am wondering how you account for things like:
Toy/Fun Purchases
Gifts
Clothes
ATM/Other
Also, I assume I should have these:
Healthcare
Car Depreciation
Trips
Thanks,
I don't exactly budget, but I keep very close track of what I spend and then if I feel like my spending is exorbitant I try to cut back and to wait before buying discretionary stuff. I keep a running projection of how much my annual expenses will end up being and compare with prior years. Recently I wanted (but did not actually need) a Dyson vacuum cleaner and my projected spending was $2300 less than last year, so I bought it.
My major spending categories are:
Miscellaneous
Video games
Food
Car
House
Utilities
Fitness
Clothes
Medical
Income tax
Some of these have sub-categories, like Food which has subcategories for groceries and restaurants.
Video gaming is my most expensive hobby.
Clothes has its own category and includes shoes.
Toy/Fun stuff, gifts, and ATM are in Miscellaneous although I keep track of what I spend that ATM money on. For example, a haircut would be from ATM money but I specify that when I record spending that money on it.
Health care expenses, insurance, Medicare, prescriptions, dental, and so on, are under Medical.
I don't track car depreciation since I don't spend all that FIRECalc says I can spend. If/when I need a new car, I'll just buy it out of that excess.
As for trips, we don't like to travel although now and then we have to for hurricane evacuations and so on. When we did that in 2012, I tracked the expenses as always and put anything that didn't "fit" under Miscellaneous; I also kept a running tally of how much the evacuation cost out of curiosity.