BudgEEting - Month 1
While looking at my expenses and bills over the past few months, I realised that I had been quite the spendthrift. With that in mind, I've started to budget, and just finished my first full month of it!
Calculating my Allowed Daily Expenses
To see what I could spend on my monthly basis, I first looked at my take home salary after CPF (social security).
Next was to look at what my fixed expenses. Those are:
1. Club membership fees
2. Utilities bill
3. Phone bill
4. Forced Savings/Investments
The last one warrants another post - what I've started doing each month is trigger a disbursement from my bank account to StashAway, AutoWealth, and my self-investment account at Saxo two days after my salary is deposited in my bank account.
This is a fixed amount that forces savings for me, which I consider an expense, something that I can't touch for my daily expenses.
From that, I have the remaining amount that I can spend, set at $3,000 a month. To ensure that I'm tracking my expenses properly, as well as stretching my dollar to get the best bang for buck, I've been using a few apps.
Tracking Expenses
To do this, I've been using an app called Expenses Ok. It's 100% free, and has a simple interface that allows the user to create their own categories. The difference between an app like this and one like Mint or Seedly, is having to manually input each expense. This had made me consciously think about each purchase before I make it.
Overall, I think it depends on each person and how much control they have. For me, this helps with making sure that I see how much each purchase is, and how it's affecting my daily, and consequently, my monthly budget. For example - I've never really thought about how lunch adds up, but since I've gone along with this budget, I often eat cai fan (which i enjoy), and lunch is often less than $5!
This month, I stayed UNDER my budget goal of $3000, ending at $2422.42!
Savings Apps
Savings apps are one way I've kept my costs down. In Singapore, specifically, there are two apps that I use - one that provides direct savings, and one that gives cash back (above and beyond card points and cash back). For the record, I do not subtract the cash back from my expenditures. Rather, I count that as a bonus that I can further add to my StashAway or AutoWealth account monthly.
ShopBack
ShopBack started as a cash back app for people that purchase items (and vacations) online. I don't really participate in e-commerce here, so it didn't really help me, till they launched ShopBack Go, which gives you cash back at restaurants and other dining establishments around Singapore).
Since then, i've been on a tear! The Go portion of ShopBack often has 15-20% first try bonuses for multiple establishments, so I find the ones I like, then try it out.
The best thing about it is how simple it is to use. Just add all the cards that you might use to pay (only Visa and MasterCard). After activating the shop, just pay with the card, and the cash back will immediately be tracking in your ShopBack account!
One of the things I've been able to do is stack the cash back. An example: I made a reservation through Quandoo, but went through the ShopBack app, that gives $4 (or $6 upsized) cash back when you think through to Quandoo to make the reservation. That restaurant also happened to have 20% cash back through ShopBack Go, so I got cash back for both!
One of the things I've been able to do is stack the cash back. An example: I made a reservation through Quandoo, but went through the ShopBack app, that gives $4 (or $6 upsized) cash back when you think through to Quandoo to make the reservation. That restaurant also happened to have 20% cash back through ShopBack Go, so I got cash back for both!
I've gotten more than $90 in cash back on top of keeping to my budget this month! When I pay for something and get cash back, I don't subtract that - but, rather, keep and track that salary, and count it as a bonus that I can reinvest in one of my investment accounts.
Eatigo
This is seriously the best app ever! Restaurants provide different discounts based on the time that you eat there, and the discounts vary from 10% to 50%. Half the time, I've been to these restaurants without knowing that the discount existed.
If you enter the Eatigo app through ShopBack, you can also get cash back of $1.50 to $3, on top of the discount that you get on the food!
If you enter the Eatigo app through ShopBack, you can also get cash back of $1.50 to $3, on top of the discount that you get on the food!
It's been a fun month learning how I can better save and stretch my dollar! Hope this helps you in your quest, if you so choose to do the same!
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