Thursday, June 7, 2012

Current Financial Goals

One of the things I've found since I've started to pay attention to my finances, is that my financial goals are regularly shifting.  How I think about my finances and of what importance goals are have been slowly moving around.  This makes reaching those goals a bit tough as they are moving targets.  Here are my present goals:

CASH

Cash Emergency Fund:
I live in an earthquake area.  I think it's important to have cash (and water!) on hand just in case...

SAVINGS LINKED TO CHECKING

Slush Fund:
The goal is to have one full month's worth of expenses.  I know many people set aside some money every month for upcoming and irregular expenses such as car insurance.  None of my irregular expenses are more than a typical months worth of expenses.  In addition, I like to have a full month of savings easily accessible to my checking account such that I can pay the bills if something happens to my paycheck (there were 5 months straight that my university messed up my paycheck...I may have become paranoid) so I aim to have a months worth of salary in my slush fund.

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Actual Expenses: May 2012

Of course my actual expenses are always a bit different than I expect at the beginning of the month.  My May budget was posted here.  Overall, I think this month was a bit expensive, but I'm starting to feel a bit more in control of my spending.
Apartment: It's nice to see this percentage going down.  I had to pay for a week in my old apartment but from now on I'm paying cheaper rent every month! Yay!

Utilities:  I'm happy with this for the moment.  Splitting internet, electricity, water etc. among three people is nice.  We'll have to wait and see what the summer heat does to this.