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Back in september I started lurking this forum - I read about what other people have done with their personal finances, how much they monitored them, what they did, and then I discussed with my wife if we should do some of the same measures. We bought a budget/follow-up piece of software (Money for the mac), and since then we've monthly done the following: 1. Register all cash-flow (all bill's, purchases etc., all accounts - no exceptions) 2. Create a plan for financial improvement, and follow-up on all tasks already in progress 3. Evaluate the baseline, and rebudget 4. Give explanations for any deviances from budget or plan - Now it may seem like going quite overboard - but this methodology is something that we both use at work, and which we're both quite comfortable with. Our bank automatically categorize our purchases for us, but that is somehow insufficient for us - we need to do it ourselves to gain a complete understanding. Suffice to say that just the awareness has improved our finances substantially, furthermore that our constant meeting with this primary topic has brought the needed focus in our everyday expenditure. I have contacted several of our most used vendors, and documented our yearly spend with them, demanding a fixed rebate - and gotten accounts giving me from 10 to 25%. We have moved expenses away from certain stores and vendors whom we perceive as having too low value for money to see that kind of activity from us, we have gotten our taxes in complete order, getting money back. We have contacted the people who owe us money, and gotten that out of the way too. Now I believe we're ready for the next step - namely start saving with a purpose - not only to see numbers grow. We have yet to agree what we should save towards - I am wanting an appartment in Rome, my wife is not yet sure if we should get something in Tuscany instead. What I guess I am trying to say is - Thankyou for the inspiration. Edit: I guess I forgot to mention that the first target is having 1 yrs pay in our accounts to be able to walk the via francigena, and not give a gently caress about money while doing it. Happy Hat fucked around with this message at 11:32 on Mar 29, 2013 |
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Mar 29, 2013 11:30
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Cicero posted:Wait what? You were just like, "We spent a lot of money at your store, give us some of it back"? And they did it? No... The proper way of phrasing it is probably 'discount on future purchases' - sorry.. English is not my first language.
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Mar 30, 2013 00:22
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Cicero posted:Hmm well that does make more sense. Basically what it means is that I've taken my expenses, categorized by place of purchase, and gone to some of the places that we frequent often, asking them for an account to get a rebate on all future purchases. This works with smaller businesses, not with large ones. It won't get me any money back, but if I plan on spending a couple of thousand somewhere during the next year, I will now save a couple of hundred when doing so... I did this with 4 different stores, and all of them have given me rebate, the largest one being 25% - the smallest 10%.
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Mar 30, 2013 11:56
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Orange_Lazarus posted:Any examples of the stores you managed to pull this off at? I can't think of one I frequent that would offer something like this, I suppose it would have to be a really small business. 2 Clothes stores - 25% and 20% Outdoors store - 20% Kitchen equipment store - 10% Clothes stores are a good bid, because their markups is in the several hundred percents. They're all small business (well - not small, but owned by someone identifiable), except the outdoors store which is a chain. What I did was demonstrate to them that I had substantial purchases with them, but some of those guys just gave out the discount at the mere mention of me wanting it, which leads me to believe that it is something that should be done more often. Edit: Sorry - corrected the kitchen store - had stated that one at 15%, is 10% Happy Hat fucked around with this message at 06:35 on Apr 9, 2013 |
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Apr 8, 2013 06:45
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