A few weeks ago, my wife and I decided to clamp down on the budget. Our spending had gotten out of hand and we needed to bring it inline with our income. We went through a few months worth of statements and plugged it all in to Excel. Housing was by far the biggest category (mortgage, taxes, insurance, maintenance)... about 40% of our income. Wow. That's a lot but we really like this house and we plan on staying here a long time. And there's not much we can do about that item in our budget.
But one item that stuck out like a sore thumb: Food! 16% of our budget was going to groceries (which includes store-bought food, toiletries and household items) and eating out. It was a real eye-opener.
There are some things we can do about the grocery shopping, and I'll talk about that in a separate post. But the REAL killer was the eating out. We looked through and see what we spend at various places... Chili's, Olive Garden, Max & Erma's, etc. And it is way out of line from what we can afford. As I posted on the forums, the cost of food at these places has gone way up. When you tack on the ever-increasing tax (8%... grrr) and tip (20% minimum... double grrr), it's unreasonable. Let's not even talk about appetizers, drinks and desserts.
We've resolved to drastically reduce eating out. It will be for a special occasion. Also we are faithfully bringing lunch to work rather than eating out. The McDonald's/Potbelly/Chipotle cycle has been broken!
In fact, I'm really enjoying my PB&J and chips. I don't feel bloated the whole day like I do with a McChicken and Big n' Nasty from McD's.
No more eating out
August 10th, 2007 at 06:42 pm
August 10th, 2007 at 07:07 pm 1186772834
August 10th, 2007 at 07:07 pm 1186772849
August 10th, 2007 at 09:25 pm 1186781149