Planning 1 Month Ahead of Time

Hello,

Although it's only the 26th, I've went past my monthly budget. The plan is to have enough money left over to roll over into a ROTH IRA, stocks, an emergency fund and, if I am lucky, a vacations/splurges fund.

I won't give figures of what my budget was or how much I was planning to save but I initially went $30 over.

Some of you may be thinking "well $30? that's not that bad." But the whole point of a budget is that it has to be concrete. Definite and Precise. An end all, say all of what you can spend in a month including fixed and variable expenses. You can spend less, always, but not a penny more!!

What happens if you're car breaks down or your boyfriend surprises you with a weekend get away? Then use the money in your emergency or vacations fund. Then immediately start rebuilding it back. That's what they are there for! What you have in those saved away funds gives you figure of what you can spend in those situations.

Well, then I needed some bins and a shoe rack from Target and then I bought some books to read on the airplane so now I'm about $150 over budget. Great. I'm such a hypocrite.

On top of that, there are some medical bills I would like to pay off because the longer you wait the more detrimental it is to your credit score (which will cost you hundreds by the point in the future.)

So my plan is to take that out of next month's budget. To come into August with the mindset that I have $500 less to spend on movies, clothes, food etc... touch but doable and very necessary.

Anticipating is part of the strategy. When you do your budgeting for the month, anticipate what needs to be paid next month, also anticipate what you want ( a new handbag? new face cream?) and make sure you have enough dough. Don't have enough? Delay gratification and spread out your purchases. Do you really need that new Louis that bad?! Will you be just as happy without it? Also, don't forget any upcoming trips/concerts/special occasions because if you don't set a spending amount you'll usually spend a lot more than you expected. eeek