Happier With Less

I LOVE  reading stories on people who achieve financial independence. What these people have done for their financial lives is truly inspirational. What's more amazing is that most of these people who achieved financial independence never made over 6 figures in income. These people were marching to the beat of their own drum. They managed to shield themselves from materialistic pressure of society. I aspire to be like them. I believe they're happier in general too.

When I was younger, I thought being successful meant being able to afford expensive designer things. To me, part of being successful is looking successful. And I have to admit, having designer stuff does make me feel good about myself. I feel like I've climbed higher on a social ladder of sort. And honestly, I cared about what other people think. I certainly didn't want them to think I was poor. I didn't want them to think my their money is greener than mine. Looking back now, no one was thinking that, no one cared.

I started the no spending month as a way to kickstart my savings in 2016.  As a result, I'm happier now. Partly because my mindset has changed; my desire for having money for bigger things (like a house) over powers my desire for purses and shoes. I'm delaying instant gratification for something even better, financial independence. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I said no to a Chanel. Yup! I've changed.

January- No Spending Month- Update: Week 3

It's the third week of no spending month. I somewhat broke the rule and bought something. I didn't spend any of my money though. I got a $10 credit from Wilson's Leather from when I bought something with them last month. This came to me as a surprise and I used to it buy some leather protecting spray and wipes.

So far, we're at $176 for grocery and $43 for take outs. I want to round off the grocery bill to $200, because I bought some stuff with cash but do not remember how much. I feel good about my progress. Before, shopping was something to do when we're bored and felt like we have to do something. Setting challenges really changes things up for us and makes saving money fun.

I'm happy to report that I've only hit up Target once so far. But baby girl is growing fast and has outgrown most of her pants. Just score two pairs of pants on the Target website for $4.66 :) Not a bad deal. 

January- No Spending Month-Update: week 2

Just completed week two of no spending month. I must say, I feel liberated. I never thought I would say this but shopping can be exhausting.  Hours of browsing and decision making, hunting for discounts codes to makes sure I get the best deal. And then when it arrives, it might not fit well and you have to go return it. I don't know about everyone else, but every time I buy something, I always hang on to it a little longer before I use or wear it; just in case I change my mind. My husband often gets annoyed with the bags and boxes I leave on the floor because I haven't decided on what I want  to do with them, keep or return? What's annoying is having to keep the receipts. Not to forget, having to find time to make returns, it feels like a chore. See, shopping is exhausting. 

Oh, that brings me to another update. I cancelled my subscription to the Sunday newspaper. Most of the things I need I can find coupons for online. The newspaper sometimes has really high value coupons, but it's just not worth keeping it. And I hate throwing on all these paper every week. Even though we recycle, it's still a process that takes energy and resource.

I bought something

Ok, so January is no spending month, unless it an absolute need. I do consider the following purchases a need.
Reusable produce bags- I've just recently learned about the no waste movement. Although, I feel like this is nearly impossible for me to do. I'm going to do every little bit that I can to waste less. A bit ironic that it's going to take some packaging to get it deliver to me. But on the bright side, I won't be tearing off those plastic produce bags at the store anymore.
Breastmilk storage- I ran out of the storage bags. But instead of buying more plastic ones I bought the reusable ones. I mean, I can always use it for the next baby :)
Toothbrushes- Mine is so old, I don't remember when I bought them and you're suppose to replace them every three months. This is an emergency. Less than $9 for 4? That's an awesome deal and it requires no coupons. I also get to use the $9 cashback from Discover. So that cut the cost a bit. Total was around $31.

Update on my other allowable spendings:
I did say that I'm not going to put a $ limit on the each of my expenditures, but I will keep an update on the amount I'm spending. So far, 1/3 of the way into this month, we've spent $143 on groceries. You can spend a lot of money even at the grocery stores. I did stock up on some sales, and the food I bought is suppose to make quite a few meals for us. I just hope we'll be spending minimally on small stuff to supplement our upcoming meals.

Tips to not get tempted to buy stuff: 
You know how you buy something online and then you get emails everyday from that store with sales they have going on even thought you check off that you don't want any emailed updates or alerts?  This annoys the hell out of me. And a lot of time, I would just click in to see what they have and one thing led to another by seeing something on sale, it makes me feel like I needed it. That unsubscribe button does wonders if you don't want to spend money. But, if it's your favorite store and you do shop there occasionally, just simply deleted as soon as you see that email, out of sight out of mind. So every morning it's delete, delete for me.

January-No Spending Month-Update: week 1

It's only been a week? OMG! Time goes by so slowly when you can't buy stuff. There were some great deals to be had. But they weren't things I needed. There was a coffee machine on sale for only $15 bucks, it was the same one we use at home and perfect for our little kitchen. The old me would have bought it and save it for when the one we have breaks, but the new me says no to the extra clutter. No more just in case purchases. I did buy something that I feel like was as splurge, that is the pre-made salads from Trader Joe's. It would cost the same if not more if we make our own. And we save time because it's pre-made, so it's splurge I don't mine paying for once in a while.
 I was up about $63 bucks by returning some clothes that I purchase that didn't fit well. I could have made exchanges, I chose not to. Every little bit counts and that's $63 less I have to pay the credit card company.
 I scored on some diaper and wipes (things I'm allow to stockpile) from Target, it was 50% off with the subscription. I can't miss this deal. You can always cancel after.

The first thing I did with our paychecks was pay the rent. I then double check with my husband to see if there are any big expenses before the next payday. There was none, so I paid off one of our credit cards. $1027! I don't really wait till the due date to pay my credit cards, I just pay if off as soon as I use it.  Now we have about $600 to last us for a few more days till our next paychecks. There is not much to buy except for groceries.

I can't keep a budget

Like the title says, I can't keep a budget. I've tried, I really did. But it's so tedious writing and recording everything. Limiting the amount you can spend on something is like going on a diet, when you put a restriction on something, you want it even more. It just takes too much discipline. So, I'm done with budgeting, sort of. The book "The Automatic Millionaire" by David Bach really speaks to me because it tells me that it's ok to not have a budget, in fact, it's better that you don't; as long as you're automatically paying yourself first. I'm going to design a plan that works for me, now that I know what doesn't work.

I 'm already putting away 12% with a 3% match on my 401k. Forty percent of my take home goes to another bank account as emergency savings. Now, I'm going to create an account that takes care of the annual payments or payments that are infrequent.  I tallied up my annual expenses, that is about $4k- this includes, our term life ins, car ins, car maintenance, and our dog (this is more just for medical expense that may arise). The goal is to put away as much as I can in the beginning of the year, once that account is replenished, I can breath a little easier knowing that there won't be any surprises.

I'm no longer putting a dollar amount on every category of spending, like $200 for grocery, or $100 for entertainment or $100 for clothing. That just doesn't work for me. Instead, I'll pay the fix expenses first, like rent, child care, car payment, and our other life insurance (I'm a big believer in life insurance) and our utilities ( this number varies month to month but not by much and it's there every month). With the left over money, I can do what ever I want with it. I might want to do a bit more shopping one month and when I do, I don't want this voice inside telling me I'm going over my set budget.

January-No Spending Month

Happy second day of 2016. Like many people out there, I wish I could go back in time and tell myself to invest early. But I use the excuse "oh, my employer doesn't offer a retirement account." I wish I would have sock away at least a $100 since the day I started working 7 years ago at my current job. That would have given me a good $11k today if that money was growing at 8%. It was my first real full time job and I wasn't making much. There was credit card debt and the fact that I was young, I wanted to do things like going out to eat, make trips to Vegas and buy a nice Coach purse or two. I remember how I was budgeting my money so I can spend, not save. I guess I was trying to make it look like I was an adult and  I have money to buy things. But now I realized, the more adult thing to do was to invest and secure my financial future. 

I've learned now that the only person I need to impress is myself. I want to start my family to a solid financial future. The first thing we're doing is making January a no spending month. This isn't an effort to save money, but I'm pretty sure we'll save a good penny. It's more of an effort for us to be conscious consumers. Besides the usually necessities like food, toiletries and diapers, we won't buy things that are wants. But we're not going to do this cold turkey neither, we're still allow to buy some things like lattes because we have a gift card for it.  
We'll do our best to recycle more too, I just can't stand that we're throwing out a big pile of trash every day or every other day. 

Happy 2016

Happy 2016!!!! As I sit here with my coffee, I'm super motivated to get my financial life to an even better start. I've been reading so many blogs- J Money, Mr Money Mustache, Blonde on a Budget, Go Curry Crackers and many more. My everyday pleasure of listening to Farnoosh Torabi's So Money podcast. I just finished listening to an audio book- The Automatic Millionaire by David Bach. After listening to the Automatic Millionaire, I upped my 401k contribution from 10% to 12% and with the 3% match, I'm socking away 15% of my income- paying myself first!

I'm 30, married with one child-the love of my life, cliche, but it's true. I'm grammatically challenged as you soon shall notice. I live in Southern CA, it's 52F  right now and that's freaking cold. The title of this blog is It Makes Too Much Sense. It's more of an inside joke, but I find it fitting for this financial blog. Because, more often than not, people know what they're suppose to do and what makes sense to do, but they often don't. Always coming up with excuse why not to do something.

I often blame my inability to save as much as I want to the fact that I live in CA. First of all, the cost of living is really high, and second, people are a bit more materialistic and always want to keep up with the Jones', I know this because I used be one of them. I love to shop 'GASP.' Now that my storage is full and half of the things in there I rarely touched or are still brand new, I realized I need to stop buying things. I found a nice brand new jacket in my closet yesterday and I don't even remember when I bought it.

The reason why I wanted to start a financial blog is because none of my friends are interested in personal finance. Maybe they don't see me as someone who's financially responsible because I'm always saying I'm broke. I only say I'm too broke to do something is because I've not allocated money to do that thing I said I'm too broke to do. Perhaps I should change my wording.  It's hard not having someone to talk to and this blog is way for me to get my ideas out and hoping to find other like minded people. One thing I've been most proud is putting away 40% of my take home income. Been doing that for a few months and my emergency fund is steadily increasing.

This year,  I vow to consume less. I will not buy any new purses, wallets or shoes. I will ask myself before I buy something is this what I want or what I need? I will stop stocking piling things with the exception of diapers and the specific toothpaste that my husband and I like to use, oh and toilet paper, you can't have too many toilet paper. I will start that 529 for my baby as I've been meaning to do.

Happy New Year and here's a to a great beginning. Cheers!