20 Feb
About
We are married and in our late thirties with two kids under 5 years-old. We do not go by our real names here… at least not yet, although The Dad’s parents do read this to keep us honest.
In February 2009 we found ourselves at the bottom of a deep hole of debt. We decided we were done and were getting out no matter what.
This blog will chronicle our experience good and bad at climbing out of the mess we’ve gotten ourselves in. We will post updates as we reach milestones, make mistakes and claw our way forward.
Hopefully it proves entertaining if not a little helpful to someone out there.
the Dad
Posted by Sandra on 03/18/09 at 9:11 am
I am following your blog in my bloglines page. You guys inspire me to get more “gazelle” about my finances.
I have a question for you. I got to your page from the My TTMO boards. I am working on our budget using Dustin’s excel workbook (so awesome!!). Some of the categories in our budget are not used every month (for example Christmas). Is there somewhere in the workbook that carries the balance left over each month?
(For example if we are budgeting $100 out of each check for Christmas starting in January, then by November there should be $1100 set aside. Problem is I have several categories that I don’t pay each month as to build a balance to pay out later (insurance, etc.). I cannot keep track of this in my checking account with out opening a separate account for each category… which I think would be a huge pain.)
I was just hoping since you have the link on your page, maybe you are using the budget yourself and have figured out how to solve this. If you could e-mail me that would be very helpful: [hidden for privacy]
This is probably not the page to ask you a question like this but I just couldn’t find anywhere else to post this or e-mail you. Thank you in advance.
Posted by Dustinc109 on 03/19/09 at 5:39 am
Hey Sandra, yes there is a spot to account for those issues… Dave calls them sinking funds.
On very last column of the budget entry page (column AB) (it is yellow) there is an option to assign each budget category to a living expense, a savings account, a sinking fund, etc.. Just go down to your Christmas, Birthday, Vacation, whatever item you are saving for and tell it to be a “sinking fund”
Once you have done this then there is a special page that keeps tract of the balances. It is called “Sinking Funds” there is a drop down box (filter) in cell D6 that lets you only look at the items you have deemed as sinking funds. There is a current balance and a monthly entry cell for each item you have called a sinking fund.
Now…. Once you actually deposit, transfer, cash the money you want to save for your sinking fund you must enter it in your ‘monthly check register’ page so that your budget will balance. What happens then is if you have labeled the item a sinking fund then it treats it like a deposit and pushes the balance to the sinking fund page. And you will notice that your sinking fund page page balance should go up when you enter an entry in monthly check register.
Finally… when you do actually spend the money from the sinking fund just enter how much you spent on the “Sinking Funds” page under the correct month (enter a positive amount) this will draw down the appropriate balance, but it will not effect your monthly budget items (ie. budget entry page & budget departure page)
Hope all that makes sense, it really is pretty simple once you set it up.
Dustin
Posted by Sandra on 03/19/09 at 9:06 am
Makes perfect sense!! Thank you!
Posted by Thomas on 01/16/10 at 2:43 pm
Hey, glad I found your blog. Do you mind it I link to it from my blog? We just started one for our debt.
http://www.thesixfigurediplomapayoff.com
Good luck!
Thomas
Posted by Dara on 01/20/10 at 7:32 am
Hi,
I have heard wonderful things about the execl spreadsheet budget forms! They look complicated, but I am SOOOOO excited to start using electronic ones instead of the paper ones- which I keep mis-placing and have to fix every 20 minutes.
Good luck on your journey!!
Posted by the Dad on 01/20/10 at 8:10 am
Welcome, Thomas and Dara! Thank you for the kind words.
Dustin’s spreadsheet is pretty incredible and we are honored to host it for him.
Cheers!
the Dad