I can’t believe it’s time for another budget report. The summer is flying by! This is our first month with a taste of variable income. I mentioned earlier this month that my husband’s income is switching from a draw system to strictly commission. We’re optimistic about the change and the way it can help us in our huge goal to pay off all of our student loans in the next year and a half.
Debt Repayment
During June, we put $2,312 toward our student loans! This went toward the 0% APR balance transfer that we’re using to save money on interest. On Income Based Repayment with our current income and family size, we don’t have any payments actually due, so we can focus all our attention on the balance transfer without having to worry about any minimum payments on the remaining untransferred loans.
Income
Our total net income for June was $5,992. Since we live on last month’s income, this is income that we haven’t touched yet. We will budget and spend it in July.
Attorney Income– $4,487 The first paycheck this month was normal (what the draw used to be) and the second check was totally commission (based on the money Mr. SixFiguresUnder collected during the first two weeks of the month). Next month, both checks will be commission. I wrote about our switch to variable income recently for those who want more details. This time it’s about 50% more than we made with the draw, but it will vary from month-to-month.
Blog Income– $1,316 This is the income I actually received this month, which means I earned it a month or two ago (payments always lag a month or two). I have already subtracted my blogging expenses, but taxes are not taken out yet.
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Etsy Income– $189 With my blog and baby taking more time, Etsy has taken the back burner, which is fine for now.
Spending
Each month we budget down to zero using last month’s income. Our spending in June came from the income we earned in May. In addition to the debt payment above, here’s how we spent money in June:
Tithing– $635 This is our normal 10% tithe on our income. We pay tithing at the first of the month on the total income we had the previous month. You can read more about why we pay tithing even though we’re in debt.
Other Giving– $20 Other charitable donations this month.
Mortgage/Rent– $0 We don’t pay any rent living in my in-laws unfinished basement. This not only frees up money in the budget to put toward debt, but it provides a constant reminder of our goal to get this debt paid off as fast as possible.
Internet– $70 We are still loving our unlimited internet! It’s wonderful not having to budget my bandwidth anymore! My in-laws take care of all the other utilities, so this is the only utility we pay and we pay it with a smile.
Republic Wireless Cell Phones– $22 We both have smartphones through Republic Wireless (you can read my review here). With tax, each phone with unlimited talk, text and WiFi data is around $11. It’s lovely!
Health Insurance– $148 Our insurance went down slightly because our subsidy went up when our family size increased in April. I’m sure we’ll end up paying more because we expect to make more money than we did last year. It will all get straightened out at tax time.
Car Insurance– $97 We have auto insurance through USAA for our two older vehicles (both 1997) with a $250 deductible.
Renters Insurance– $14 We also have our renters insurance through USAA. It doesn’t cost much and it’s really great to have when you need it.
Food– $357 I didn’t plan very well this month, so we went over our normal goal of $300. We took a trip at the end of the month which required an extra grocery trip. I was also out of bread (and too lazy to make any), so I had my husband go out to lunch twice (a very rare occurrence). I did a six month average when I was adding our budget to the BareBudgetGuy’s database today and found that our average is still under $280 per month.
Gas– $411 Gas is almost below $3/gallon here (a few times I actually did pay less than $3). I was happy to see that even with a road trip (about 5 hours away) we stayed well below the $500 that we usually budget for gas.
Fun– $27 We took the kids to a county fair. For the ride tickets, the kids paid for half with money they earned and we paid the other half. I also bought Money Saving Mom’s Make Over Your Mornings video course.
Household– $24 Besides some toothpaste, Zote soap and some spray bottles, I can’t remember exactly what I bought. I went to Target. At least I split and categorized my receipt, even if I didn’t put a note as to what I actually bought! 🙂
Clothing– $38 I got some long-sleeved shirts that were clearanced down to ultra cheap, along with some packages of socks. I put them all away for fall. We also bought flip flops for most people in the family. I found some shirts for me at a thrift store out of town. I don’t have much patience for shopping for myself, but the thrift store was really small, so I didn’t get so overwhelmed. My husband always gets excited when I buy things for myself since he doesn’t feel qualified to do clothes shopping for me.
Medical– $1,200 We put this money aside for when we pay my labor and delivery bill in July. We got a bill, but are waiting on the insurance company’s Explanation of Benefits before we pay it. We’ll be budgeting more money for this bill next month as well.
Baby– $15 I bought some girly cloth diapers on Ebay. You can’t beat five super cute reusable diapers for $15.
Car Repair– $647 We put two new tires on the van and then got new brakes and calipers. Our mechanic always sends coupons in the mail. I used one they sent for Father’s Day and saved $50 on the brakes. We have decided that we’re not putting any more money into the van. The registration and smog/emissions is coming up in August. Hopefully we’ll get something else before that so we can avoid putting $200 more into our van that’s on its last legs.
Car Registration– $94 Mr. SixFiguresUnder had to renew his car registration this month.
Law Practice– $44 This is the monthly subscription for law practice management software that we pay for out of pocket.
College Savings– $100 We contribute $25 per month per kid to 529 accounts. More on our decision to start saving for college in this post.
Off budget Spending– I had a few purchases that didn’t come out of the budget.
I surprised my husband with new Chacos for Father’s day. He had his old ones for nearly a decade and they were at the end of their life. I was very excited that I could get them completely with Amazon gift cards that I earned through MyPoints and Swagbucks. I even had enough leftover to get a new dough hook to my KitchenAid.
I also got clothes for the kids and for me from Schoola. I signed up through someone’s referral link, so I got $15 to start out with, then I had a couple of others sign up, so I had more credit to use.
I mentioned that I added our family budget to BareBudgetGuy’s database of budget profiles. I think it’s a really cool thing he’s doing. It’s fun to look through everyone’s budgets. You can also get Mark’s input on your financial questions. He’s having a $50 giveaway right now that you can enter by baring your budget. Don’t be shy, head over and share your numbers!
How did your finances go in June? Next week we’ll revisit our 6-month goals. I can’t wait to hear about your accomplishments!
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I love seeing y’all’s progress every month! And I have never heard of the Bare Budget Guy, but wow, he’s awesome and I’m going to submit my budget! Nothing like public accountability. 🙂
I’ve been seeing a lot of Schoola lately but haven’t checked them out yet, but now you’ve got me amped-up because Free.99 is my favorite price. 😉
Thanks Jessi! I always say that free is my favorite price too!
Nice work!
I saved about $2800 this month, but my investments dropped quite a bit (thank you Greece) so my net worth only went up about $700.
The stock market fluctuations are all just noise so I’m not concerned. I’m at a 48% savings rate YTD which is more important.
That’s a great savings rate!
Congratulations, Stephanie!
Thanks Linda!
Congrats Stephanie! I’m impressed by your intensity. Normally at the halfway point in debt pay off i’m burnt out, but I have to remember that a gazelle doesn’t run all day and night.
We went back into debt last fall after being debt free for six months. It was due to a strange series of events. We were able to pay off almost $1200 last month in addition to some unexpected medical bills! We had our lowest grocery bill yet. $188! Hopefully next month will be about the same once our garden starts producing.
This time we are MUCH more serious and intense about paying off our debt, and staying out of debt! Before we would bend the budget for a night out with friends. This time we are getting used to saying no, and offering alternative plans. I love saying, “We are choosing not to eat out right now, but if you would like to come over we can fry chicken and make some sides to go with it.” Most people enjoy a yummy home-cooked (southern-style) meal. The people who grumble that we “make enough money” are the same ones who are in debt, and will stay in debt!
Good for you CeCee! You rocked that debt the first time, so I’m sure you’ll do it again! Congrats on that low grocery bill!
That was a nice increase in your husband’s income – hopefully you’ll come out ahead overall with the switch to commission. Also curious when (if?) you’re going to start setting money aside for a new-to-you vehicle (I thought I remembered you saying something about that in an earlier post.)
That’s a good question Kathryn! We have $1,000 set aside in our July budget. We’re looking at vans from private parties in the <$3,000 range, so we'll borrow what we need over $1,000 from our emergency fund, then pay it back over the next couple of months (maybe $500/month payback to EF until it's back where it was). We're going to look at one tomorrow!
Thanks for the details, Stephanie. Good luck with your car shopping!
Great progress! I have a question about income taxes. Now, that your husband is 100% commission are taxes withheld and accounted for in his monthly income number?
Do you save separate for you self-employment income? I never see it in your budget.
Great question Maureen! His taxes are still taken out through his employer according to the size of the check, though I’m sure there will be some balancing out in the end. The number that we report for my husband is after taxes are taken out.
My husband’s withholding covers my tax liability on my self-employment income, so I don’t set aside anything specifically earmarked for my taxes. Now if I start making bunches and bunches of money (that would be cool), then we will increase my husband’s withholding. Since we’re a single tax entity, we can just increase his withholding so I don’t have to go through the administration of quarterly estimated tax payments.
Thanks so much Stephanie!! And well done this month! $76K even, I love the round number!
Me too! Didn’t even plan that! 🙂
Stephanie, this is so exciting seeing your debt total continually decrease each month. You’ve really come a LONG way! So proud of your family. I also LOVE that you faithfully post this on the 1st of each month…I always get excited knowing it will be there to read. 🙂 I’m so glad that the first 1/2 month of your husband’s new way of getting paid was decent… That will be exciting to see the fruits of his labor decrease your debt total, hopefully at a faster rate! Good luck on the new-to-you van hunt…I hope we will see a future blog post on the buying process with pictures. 😛 Question: Do you anticipate that buying a less than 3K van will mean it is mostly problem-free for upcoming years, or will you have money set aside to work on it as needs arise? I’m sure you’ve thoroughly weighed the pros and cons in coming up with your number, I was just curious. Again, great job this month! That debt total number keeps looking better and better and is highly motivating to the rest of us that it CAN be done!
Hi Liz! Thanks for your encouragement, as always! As for a new-to-us van, we will have it checked out by a mechanic to make sure everything looks good. We are looking for lower mileage for its age (well, something between 120K and 160K probably), no transmission problems, no major problems, etc. We don’t have our hearts set on any particular make, model, color, etc. We’re fine with cosmetic issues and some other quirks.
We didn’t set a price before we started looking since we didn’t know what the market would be like. After looking on Craigslist, contacting some buyers, and even some test driving, we’re pretty confident we can get something decent for under $3,000.
We bought our current van in 2011 (it’s a 1997) with 170K for $2,250 and it has been great (aside from the A/C going out a couple years ago!). It has made it to 234K+.
That $67K will be gone before you know it! Great progress made on the debt repayment and it’s awesome to see your financial priorities month to month.
Thanks for the encouragement Dane! 🙂
Wonderful and inspiring progress! I want to thank you, Stephanie. for sharing about Wireless Republic which I shared with my husband (he has a smart phone.) He made the switch and is very happy with the service and savings! And we were so inspired by your debt reduction goal that we made one this year and are determined to be debt free by March 2017. Our home is our only debt and we are making amazing progress in paying it down this year!!! Your story made us believe it was truly possible – thank you for sharing it and your progress reports!!!
Congrats on setting a goal Midori! That will be awesome to not even have a mortgage! I’m glad you’re enjoying the Republic Wireless savings too! 🙂
You have to feel great! Congrats!! I am down from $206k from law school to $130k. I cannot wait to be below $100 – hopefully soon!!
Wow Natalie! That’s some great progress! You’ll be under $100K soon!
You’re doing such an amazing job at getting rid of your debt and still living a vibrant life – such an inspiration!
Thanks for your kind words Candice! 🙂
Nice work! We love going to the county fair each year. It’s so much fun and a frugal way to spend time together.
Thanks Julie! The kids had so much fun entering their artwork and baked goods. They love showing people their ribbons too!