Nicki and I went to the ReThink Money Workshop today that our church put on with Casey Graham. Casey talked about using one of three plans to pre-designate your monthly funds: 1. A written spending plan 2. A Cash Envelope System or 3. A computer method (Quickbooks, Quicken, Etc.). If we used the cash envelope system, here’s what it would look like right now:
We are not going to use a cash envelope system, because cash is easier to spend, and we don’t have money to spend, period. Hopefully, applying the principles we learned today will help us save money and cut spending where we can, it is not going to help us overcome my need to start a second job for a while, but it will reduce the amount I need to earn in that job. If you hear of a ReThink Money Seminar in your area, I highly recommend you go to it.
Join the Conversation: Do you use a budgeting system or a spending plan, if so what is it?
Hi Nick,
I just found your site browsing through and I can say that my wife and I took the Dave Ramsey course a couple of years ago.
We have been using the envelope system since then and it works great. Here is how we use it.
Any monthly bills, such as utilities, insurance, mortgage, etc that are more or less fixed, we pay out of checking with checks or direct debit.
Other items, such as personal spending money, food, gas, clothing, etc. that is a “budget” item, we pay cash. We take out a set amount every two weeks when I get paid to keep our envelope and its categories at a specific amount. This way we don’t end up with too much “left over” in each category.
This has really worked well for us, and every couple or three months we review how we are doing and adjust depending on how things are going. We had to do that quite a bit with the gas prices the way they were.
Hope that helps, and if you would like more info on how we do it, let me know.
we also did dave ramsey and I’m really really thankful for it. we will be debt free for the first time in about 9 months (well besides house payment). we don’t follow his system to the tee, like everything else – but just took the major principles and what to pay first, etc…. it was great.
we DO use cash for all the groceries/gifts/walmarty stuff… and it has been SO helpful. I would never go back to card use for groceries again. I never realized how much I missed cash anyway. to actually see the money leaving my hands adn see what’s left – rather than swiping a card.
🙂
I attended the workshop today and loved it! I learned a lot and learned how doable paying your bills without going into debt is, how easy getting out of debt it is, and how to plan for the future.
We’re blessed that we don’t have any real debt. We bought a dining room table for my fiance for the purpose of building credit and are already making $42 extra dollars towards it.
Their spreadsheet for keeping up with you bills can be found here http://rethinkmoney.org/blog/?page_id=150 . It’s an excel spreadsheet and is very easy to use.
The very best thing about this is it gives you a system. Most people don’t have a system. Those who do probably don’t do it with their spouse. If you both choose to follow these guidelines you’ll be on the same page. How great is that?