Living on a budget is freeing!

Not living on a budget is a roller coaster (and addictive behavior)!

In the last 6 months I have take up living on a budget as fully as I can and actively using YNAB as my budgeting tool.

I’ve learned some things in the last few months:

• 1)My previous financial life was completely out of control. I thought I had systems to save and spend, but in reality I didn’t, at all.
• 2)I had substantially too many credit cards, too many checking accounts this caused what I would call “overwhelm”
• 3)I wasn’t saving, not really, because I was always overspending because I had no tracking systems other than separate checking accounts.

Transitioning to a fairly strict budget takes time! It’s a very different mentality and at first I was feeling really down that I couldn’t spend money whenever I wanted. As I desired bigger things I would put them into my budget to save for, 6 weeks later I realized I didn’t really need that big item, and rolled the savings into something else, and instead bought something totally different over the first item. This has happened several times and it’s very telling of my previous habits. I would have just bought it, put it on a credit card, dealt with it later and probably wondered why there’s more month than money.

So I make a fair amount of money for being employed, over 110k per year in my job. So if you’re thinking that just making more money will solve your budget problem, you’re wrong. Making more money just makes the budget problems bigger. I’ve been over spending for years and getting raises just gave me more excuses as to why I should spend more, or allow myself a splurge, every month. So with problems that big, it’s taken a while to fix.

I’m on the right track though,

• My credit card debt is slowly falling.
• The amount I contribute to long-term savings is increasing every month.
• The amount I need to put in my “general spending” line item falls a little each month.

My Goal is save enough of my income that I can buy one new single family house ~$60k or equivalent every year.

If you’re in the same boat here’s some tools and motivational sources:

The Millionaire Real Estate Investor

The Millionaire Next door

YNAB (You Need A Budget)

Want to discuss your personal finance progress, struggles?  Or want to talk Kansas City real estate (what's where I own property)? Send me a message.