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Making a Contingency Plan

May 25th, 2008 at 09:05 pm

We have been going over our budget to anticipate increased expenses in our food and gasoline categories. We have kept the food budget under $350 to $400 a month utilizing coupons and store circulars. A phenomenal feat with DH, 20 yr old and a 16 yr old sons! To put it bluntly we gave up the processed junk food. This at first was not a popular action but after two months the young men stopped complaining about it. I guess they use their own money for the junk food addiction or they prefer the home made cakes,cookies and fruit.

The gas budget increase resulted with DH using the metro for his daily commute to work. Unfortunately, the metro is not an option for me. I will start to telecommute from work once a week starting in July. My DS#1 work and school is only 15 - 20 minutes away from the house. DS#1 normally fills up his gas tank at least once every 2 1/2 weeks. DS#2 commutes to his part time job by bike.

Our game plan is to cancel our premium channels on our satellite subscription in the event of gas prices are $5 or more. This expense was a luxury that can be better utilized for a necessity. The young men are hardly home anyway due to their activities during the summer. I am pretty sure they will notice it by the time football season starts.

Posted in Household Funds | 8 Comments »

8 Responses to “Making a Contingency Plan”

  1. noexcusebudget Says:
    May 25th, 2008 at 09:11 pm 1211749881
    1211749881

    Wow! you are doing a great job! I agree when football season somes around I bet they'll notice!

  2. klbb90 Says:
    May 25th, 2008 at 09:20 pm 1211750443
    1211750443

    Its smart that you are thinking about it now. Then if $5 hits you will be ready to act. Hey if the DSs have a problem with no premium stations then they can pay for it. With part time jobs they have money.

  3. Amber Says:
    May 25th, 2008 at 11:00 pm 1211756408
    1211756408

    Way to go, I am thinking about cancelling my home phone

  4. paulettegoddard Says:
    May 26th, 2008 at 01:24 am 1211765042
    1211765042

    You are so smart to have a contingency plan! What I noticed after giving up processed foods: I couldn't go back. I had the craving for potato chips last night, went to the store, saw the Lay's at $3.79 whereas they used to be $2.99, so I bought some Pringles and ick! oh gross. And I used to LOVE those. Gross also was the Nalley's chip dip I used to buy: the homemade with sour cream/mayo and VegIt is so much fresher and tastier...

  5. aevans1206 Says:
    May 26th, 2008 at 11:58 am 1211803129
    1211803129

    I KNOW I need to trim our grocery budget. And I was just telling DH a few days ago that I'm thinking about canceling our HBO. You can get so much off the internet nowadays anyway. Thanks for inspiring this! I gotta get crackin'!

  6. koppur Says:
    May 26th, 2008 at 01:18 pm 1211807939
    1211807939

    You're on a great plan. We need to start our own, but our budgets are kinda tight already adn we really have to work on our extra spendings. Thanks for the post!

  7. Aleta Says:
    May 26th, 2008 at 02:08 pm 1211810910
    1211810910

    What a great post. Most people wait for the worst to happen and then change their spending habits. I think that it's a smart idea that you stay on top of your budget wherein you know where you would have to cut if you needed to. I believe that stopping satellite service even temporarily wouldn't hurt anyone and it could get families to come together more to do more activities. I hope that alot of people will read your post because I think that it very proactive.

  8. Joan.of.the.Arch Says:
    May 26th, 2008 at 03:37 pm 1211816224
    1211816224

    Smart cookie! And I mean homemade, reduced sugar oatmeal cookie with homegrown raisins --not some hard, dry, layered thing with sweetened hydrogenated oil blended into white sugar (Oreo).

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