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Another thought is that while you've grouped everything together under "Entertainment," a lot of couples find it helpful to parse that out a bit and have a specific category of "his" and "her" fun money. So for example entertainment could be: Joint Entertainment: $200 His Money: $50 Her Money: $50 This gives you a way to save for things that you want that may not be fun and entertaining for your significant other. It can be a real bummer in a relationship to have $300 in entertainment money and then one of you goes and spends it on tickets to a game with guy friends or at a wine night with your girlfriends or something. This also gives you a way to save up for things that you might want for yourself like video games, fancy clothes, etc. and then neither person can play the blame or guilt game -- that was your money only and she has no say in what you spend it on and vice versa.
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Apr 8, 2014 22:59
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Hand of the King posted:I put clothes money into Entertainment because I call that shopping and wife finds shopping to be fun. I'm wearing some Cole Haans right now and they're comfy as heck! I would erase the idea of "shopping as fun" from your mind and your wifes. Shopping shouldn't be something you or your wife do just because you're bored or need something to do - window shopping, maybe, but not the actual act of buying something, not at this moment, anyway. That's something that you do when you need something in particular - clothing, household item, etc. and since it comes out of the joint entertainment budget, it's also going to have to be something that's discussed at least slightly in advance/right after the fact/you guys have to be honest about so you guys know where you are in the budget. It doesn't seem like your wife has followed a budget before so while this may seem obvious and easy to you, make sure she really realizes that when she buys a pair of shoes, it means you guys both are affected and are going out to one less dinner that month or whatever. As of right now, all of your shopping needs would seemingly come out of entertainment, so if your wife needs a new bra or you guys need a new pot/pan/whatever household item, things that don't sound FUN -- be aware that has to come from somewhere else in the budget. You can shuffle things around a bit, but try to pick from discretionary categories rather than simply just reducing the amount you put towards debt that month.
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Apr 9, 2014 01:18
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Hand of the King posted:The reason why I have saved all that cash is because I thought it was perfectly normal for people to have tens of thousands of dollars saved up. Well, maybe it's normal if you are not $80k in debt It is a good and normal thing -- its an emergency fund, which is always recommended. Once you pay off the high interest credit card debt, rebuilding an adequate emergency fund should probably be your next step before you tackle your lower interest debts. Can I ask what age range you're in?
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Apr 9, 2014 03:06
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Why wait until May to dump the money on the Amex? You can make payments towards your cards whenever you want. I'd dump the money there asap (right after a conversation with your wife) while you're still gungho and have no big wants on the horizon. You guys are 29 - I definitely wouldn't touch your retirement funds. I know you said you have tons of tons in your 401k but most people suggest you have .5x your salary in retirement savings at 30 and 1x your salary at 35. I could be wrong but I imagine you guys aren't too far ahead of those numbers at this point since you mentioned you contributed only up to your employer's match. Also since you guys are approaching 30, are kids anywhere on the nearby horizon? I would definitely aim to get out of the AMEX debt before one year from now. April 2015 would be about $1,179 a month. Your budgeted expenses, even without making cuts anywhere and including the minimum on debt repayments for the other two cards, is $,4530 -- that should leave you with $1870 left to put towards the AMEX each month. You should attempt to stick to your budget as closely as possible each month and hit that $1,870 in AMEX repayments each month. Assuming you dump your checking account into the card and bring it down to $13,000, that would mean that your AMEX debt would be paid off in 8 months.
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Apr 9, 2014 12:52
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Saxon posted:Maybe I'm wrong, but wouldn't your income be ~$5,000/mo per person? From the monthly income that you've posted, your combined income would be ~$76800... Taxes, pre-tax things like health insurance, 401k contributions.... I make $6958/month (83,000) but after taxes alone its only $5008/month. Then there's health insurance and 401k contributions...
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Apr 30, 2014 17:26
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