MXMOM This is one of the sweetest tributes I can imagine for Max. ❤️

Catlover 

The change in your behavior is huge, though, and in such a short amount of time!  You and YNAB have a plan and it's working! 

Now, don't forget to add your true expenses.  Actually, if you're only a week or 3 in, I'd suggest you spend some time googling "YNAB categories" because there were so many categories I'd forgotten to include.  I have about 20 categories for the kids alone (I like things granular).  And the first 6 months will be eye-opening as you have to save so much in so little time for all of those annual or biannual or one-off expenses.  Next year when my insurance policy comes around, I'll have the money up front having saved 1/12 of the expense each month instead of having to come up with the money in two months because I'd totally forgotten it was coming up.  YNAB broke is a thing.  Once you get off the credit card float and get buffered, it releases even more stress over one's budget I find. 

Khaki Storm I just wish I could still pay mine with my credit card for those rewards points lol.  They stopped accepting credit cards a few years ago and now require a check or checking account withdrawal.

TechieM2 mine doesn't accept credit cards either, but $200 cash savings is good

Khaki Storm ours works out the same whether you pay it all at once or monthly.  Since it would be $4700 to pay up front for the year (not even sure they offer all at once payment), I pay monthly.  I do pay hubby and kids life insurance premiums in one lump sum because they are each only a few hundred dollars for the year.

MXMOM our last company was similar, only like a 2% savings to pay at once. Then we shopped around, found the best monthly rate, and learned it could go down even more if paid annual.

MXMOM Just saved another $25 on the car insurance. I noticed they still had one driver as driving to and from work. That driver's now away at college and the car doesn't move that much. They updated the driver's status and reduced the payment by $25 for the year.

Khaki Storm ours is up for renewal in January so we will see what options we have. I used to be with another insurance company for house and auto but in 2015 the house insurance went up by a huge percentage. I was mentioning it at work (where I had just started working) and my boss suggested I look into the employee insurance plan offer we have. It was a lot cheaper so we went with them. As each under 25 male driver in our home has become licensed, we have reviewed car insurance options with other companies and have yet to find something cheaper. Oh, and the new company hiked their home insurance rates the following year.

(Side story, 6 days after changing insurers, I was hit by another driver and my car was totalled and I was slightly injured. Dealing with the new company was way harder than dealing with the old company. You get what you pay for.)

MXMOM I don't change every year, but I do shop around every other year or so. Overall, to your point, we've only switched twice in the past 15 years for auto ins. We stayed with Nationwide for the longest time, but made the change due to rising costs. We only shop around the top rated providers with strong financial reporting. That usually eliminates the 1-800 tv commercial places that cover you before you get off the phone. 

Khaki Storm 

Wow, I only save like $3 a month by paying bi-annually.  Big whoop dee do, but I still do it. 

Actually, our car insurance was the reason we started to regularly put money into savings each month almost 20 years before YNAB.  If we couldn't see it, we couldn't spend it.  While I can only imagine how much better our situation would be now if we'd found a good budgeting tool some 15 years ago, we've still managed to save more than we spent over the long run!*

 *except for the mortgage, but I expect we'll pay it off some 5-7 years early if we can continue our current pace of overpayment.

Technicolor Cheetah Yep. It wasn't anything they advertised. Just had to ask.

MXMOM Have you checked Geico? We pay monthly for 3 people and 2 cars (1 is a new driver) and our insurance is about $320 per month (used to be $200 with just hubby and I, but DS19 was added last year), which is a lot less than $4700. 

Stacy C geico doesn’t operate in Canada. 😒 

MXMOM Oh......I didn't realize you were Canadian. Pretty cool how everyone is from everywhere. 

Stacy C We're paying 1,600 a year, 3 adult drivers, 3 cars, 1 car on full coverage, other two on comprehensive (between full and liability only). Insurance limits maxed out, because we dont want to be paying out of pocket if I cause a 27 car pile up. Ins. Co. has good ratings for claims and financial health. That meets our needs, there is cheaper, but I want to have claims proceed without denials. 

Khaki Storm What company do you use?

Stacy C It's Owners Auto. We have them on the house too. We go thru an independent agent. I though adding someone in the middle would raise prices, but it's been the opposite. 

Stacy C yes there are people here from all over the world. And it’s amazing how much we all have in common. The currency may be different and the laws vary but fundamentally we are all trying to do our best with our money. (Cue We are the World montage). 

Vibrant Nice ! Coffee can be expensive ! Nice save !

Purple Foal Are you using the KonMari method? I am reading her book right now and am interested in learning more. 

Purple Foal I keep all the receipts in an envelope in my purse and then every few months clear them out. Helps with returns especially with things like Home Depot purchases where we buy 3 of something and only need 2. Or Costco where you buy something like clothes or an appliance that may need to be returned.  100% grocery only bills do get tossed right away.

PerceivingPerdita Yes I am! Listened to both the books in the car. Way better to listen & really think about the philosophy (except *gag* about objects having emotions). I'm just finishing up the miscellaneous category then will tackle sentimental. Brought all my photo albums to a room & watched a movie which ripping out 6 photos from a trip 30 years ago & keeping them then tossing the album. Feels great to only keep the ones you love. Digital purging is an entirely different beast! 

MXMOM I input my receipts daily in YNAB, and only keep the ones for warranties or things I might want to return too. Even HD purchases can get dumped since HD has your purchases on file so I return without a receipt right to my CC. 

MXMOM  I love this idea.  I keep receipts for things I think might need returning.  But I probably need a more organised place (like a small box/tray) in a central location that they can be chucked in and reviewed after a couple of months.  I agree on chucking grocery receipts (but I do keep, then tear the fuel discount vouchers).  Also I've started not getting a receipt for small purchases - I input very regularly (daily/every second day)!  In practical terms I check the POS screen at the time of purchase (to make sure I'm not being overcharged), and then just use my banking app to enter the transactions later.  Certainly I feel 'lighter' for not bringing home all that paper...plus since YNAB I just don't spend as much/often!

MXMOM 

Shamefully, I ask the Costco employees to look up the purchase in the system.  That reminds me, I have a sweatshirt (NWT!) to return that has been deemed too itchy for tolerance by my kid.  

Which reminds me that I need to remember to ask for my veggies to be refunded when the checker put like 5 lb of other food on fragile lettuce and fruit.  

Purple Foal That's awesome!  Now that extra money can either sit there waiting to help out with your next trip, or can be socked away to help grow or fund some true expenses! (Or whatever category you want to build up)  That is great you found so many ways to save!

Bruce Absolutely! It will be used for an upcoming ski trip, of which I will make a budget for! :)

TooClumsy 

Wow, you've paid off so much since 2018!  That's really quite impressive!

Technicolor Cheetah thank you! we aren’t really overpaying anything, it’s just we are spread so thin when a quarter of combined income is going on debt. Our snowball just started in September 2019 and we’ve paid off one line of credit which was interest free and then one other credit card. Snowball is just under £280 to go on the next priority card, which we’ve had to switch up as the promotional 0% interest offer ends in Jan 2020. 
 

fingers crossed we can prevent ourselves from eating through our income (is an actual problem, tackling work lunches and groceries at the moment!)

😱

TooClumsy 

Ah, the whole "eating out is fun, tasty, but OMG, did we really spend $700 eating out last month?!?" thing.   Meal planning, freezing meals.  If you can stand leftovers, I realize there are those who don't (I don't understand it, but I know it's a thing that exists ; ), make 2-3 meals of x or y at a time. We alternate, though, between 2-3 different meals, I don't like eating beef stew for 3 days straight.  If you eat meat, explore meats that can be eaten many different ways.  Like, we cooked some carne picada.  Tacos, burritos, dinner salads with carne picada, quesadillas.  If we cook a pork roast, there's lots of different things I can do with shredded pork.  if I make refried beans, I make a double batch and freeze one.  Same with meatloaf (uncooked).  Buying in bulk can be good if you have the space to store food.  Chest freezers mean that I can freeze meat bought on sale and lots of meals we've frozen (am thawing a lasagna we made several months ago in the fridge right now).  

Also, batch cooking.  Crock pots, instant pots, all good things.  Another thing you can do is buy big flats of meat, more than you can eat, and portion them into ziplocks pre-spiced or with marinade.  before I had one of my kids, I bought about 30lb of meat and we portioned and seasoned all that meat.  It's easy to cook a veggie (fresh or frozen) and make a carb to go with (bread, potatoes, rice, pasta).  Good luck!  There are certainly millions of resources on line on how to spend less money on food!  We eat well on about $6 per person per day, on average ( £4-5).

Good luck!  It's not easy to change habits when it's about what and how you eat!  Be gentle on yourselves.  Maybe one thing at a time?  Like if you can make lunches 50% of the time at first, that's still a 50%  reduction.  Maybe you can work on 6 lunches every 2 weeks made at home once you're used to doing half.  

Technicolor Cheetah Yes, exactly! Tbh I'm not a fan of having dinners for leftovers for a few days in a row, but if we alternate, it's bearable :)

We have been batch cooking where possible, I double a recipe when cooking it so we can stock up our teeny freezer. We want to get another freezer (small one as space is limited) when the budget allows so we can stock up even further.

I have just purchased a vacuum sealer from Aldi, which I tested out at the weekend and I think this is going to allow us to take advantage of any meat and fish deals that come up. We can also use the 'seal' only feature to store pre-marinated meats etc. Can you tell I'm excited about it?

I have a crock pot too, I'll be taking it out to make some dals as it's getting colder in London (it's always cold, but my internal temperature is telling me it's dal season now :D). Do you have any crockpot recipes you can recommend? 

Agree, it's the habit part of the equation that is harder to change, plus for me personally it's having something that's quicker to eat than calling for a takeaway etc. We are doing a £10 a week lunch challenge at the moment, so October is doing okay lunch wise :) I just realised that I'm increasing my grocery spend (by purchasing more food to cook) but I'm still leaving £10 in my lunch budget to spend elsewhere....will need to rectify that!

Thanks for your comments :)

Congratulations!! I just started with YNAB with two overdrafts totalling £1.5k and a variety of CC. 

But I am ready to work for it! 

Stacy C - InboxDollars is awesome! I just recently received my first payout and it was slightly over $40! 😁

Violet Rain I agree. I cashed out $89...but they are making me wait a few weeks to get it. 

Stacy C Interesting!I thought once you received your first payout you became a Gold member and got faster turnarounds. 

Violet Rain This will be my first payout...perhaps that's why. 

Stacy C Ah, okay. That makes sense, then. Your next one should be quicker then!

Violet Rain 

Yeah!! IT works!! Please PM me if you guys want the referral link! I'd appreciate it! 

(Hope this post is allowed)

Stacy C Sending the link via PM is okay! 👍

RecklessOptimism hurray!

Powder Blue Pony From one yarn project enthusiast to another, I hope you'll share what you're working on once it's done! I think my biggest issue is when I get a new project I immediately think "Need to buy more yarn" and then "This one too, just in case" instead of "I'm pretty sure I already have that color". Great job sticking to a list!

Faness could I? Share it here? Don’t want to bore anyone...😊. Though as you just proved to me: yarn enthousiasts are everywhere! I do use Ravelry for that as well, as breitijd.

I recognise your “just in case” reaction! Oh, and yesterday they had a big sale basket outside! Yes, very proud of myself 😊

Powder Blue Pony I will be taking a look at your Ravelry later 😉 Yes, you can share your projects in the forum! If you start a journal, we could even follow along with progress reports (or anything else you'd like to share!).

Powder Blue Pony I absolutely have a line specifically for yarn, but I definitely have to keep a close eye on it when I'm at the store. So hard to say no to those beautiful skeins.