Building Up An Emergency Fund

This month my husband and I sat down and decided it was time to rebuild our emergency fund. This money is used for unexpected repairs, vet visits, and any other emergencies that come our way.

Another thing we are working on is getting our monthly bills paid up a few months in advance so that we can always stay ahead. For some, I know that this is not feasible, but my husband has some extra side work that he is doing, so we are putting this money to good use.

We have made a pact that we are not going out to eat at all for at least 30 days. The money that we would have normally paid for a nice dinner out for our family, we are going to take and put in either our emergency fund, or use it to pay a bill up ahead.

If you really think about it, there are many ways that we spend our money wastefully, when we could in reality save that for a rainy day. Here are just a couplethat I have come up with:

~Movie Rentals: This one was a big one for me. We had a membership at Netflix which was costing us around $18 a month. We also rented from the Redbox kisosks and every now and then we would hit the Blockbuster. Roughly we were spending about $30-$40 a month just in movie rentals. I have found that I can watch lots of movies online at Hulu, and sometimes Amazon Video on Demand has free movie rentals. You can also rent movies from the library. Another option is borrowing from a family member or a friend who is a movie buff.

~Snacks at the Grocery: This one was a biggie for us. Last month, we tallied up our grocery money and saw that we were spending about $25 a month in junk snack foods. We cut those out this month and are making homemade goodies now instead.

Just remember that there is always somewhere that we can cut our spending. I will keep you posted on how we are doing with not eating out and finding other places to cut out expenditures.

Continue reading Building Up An Emergency Fund …

From Econobusters.

August 14, 2010 | Filed Under Frugal Living | Leave a Comment

Dan on Frugality

This question is part of FAQ Friday. If you have a question you would like me to address, please add it to the FAQ section.

Question

Does your husband support all of your penny pinching endeavors?

Answer

Dan and I have very different takes on frugality, actually. Although they are different, they compliment each other well. His frugality could be summed up in no debt and don’t spend money. I like that and add in penny pinching.

Passive Frugality

Passive frugality is stuff we had to do once and are still benefiting from. I shopped around for auto insurance and got the least expensive apartment we could fit into. Those two items save us over $100 per month. We got a nice used car in good shape and haven’t needed many repairs on it. Choosing a good car didn’t take too long, but we have reaped many rewards from that good choice. Dan has given me the task of researching these and has been pleased by what I can do.

Active Frugality

Active frugality is what we do now, today to pinch our pennies. This is divided into how to spend and how to not spend.

There are some things we must spend on, food, gas, and clothes. Dan loves my cooking. His one complaint is that he wants more snack foods, like cookies, crackers and chips. My take on snack foods is that making them feels like trying to fill a bottomless pit. They cost money, provide little nourishment and are eaten too quickly, so I do it by request. I count on him forgetting to ask for them and he does.

Not spending money on stuff like new shoes or DVDs is pretty easy for both of us. For example, I won a $25 gift card to Marshall’s from We Are THAT Family in December and I’ve only used $7 so far. I’ll write about what I get when I use it all. Dan would have spent the whole gift card within a week, but not been tempted once it was gone. So, we have different styles of not spending money, but the same outcome.

Future Frugality

Future frugality is in many ways up in the air. We talk of pursuing a pastorate the most, but really we don’t know exactly what it is God has for us. We have both at times felt we might be called to the mission field, yet God continues to direct our step toward a pastorate in Maine. Whatever we may do, financial discipline now is great training.

So, future frugality is in many ways hard to pin down, but it is in some ways wrapped up in housing. We’ve talked about where we might want to live once he graduates and have discussed ad nauseum housing options. He wants something a little more traditional than a yurt or tipi, but is still open-minded. He’s all for a small home as long as it doesn’t mean we have to get rid of all of his stuff. He’s generally okay with me gradually putting more of his stuff into storage.

Authority

Finances are something Dan gave me general authority over when we first got married. We run our family kind of like a government, but with less paperwork. He is the President/Prime Minister and Secretary of Defense. I am the Chief of Staff, Minister of Finance, and Secretary of Agriculture. He lets me handle most of the financial decisions, but he holds the red veto pen.