My NewlyWed Tightwad Husband

by Susan Peterson
(Toccoa, GA USA)

Our Family At Our Wedding July 21

The funny thing is when we met I was a tightwad single mom trying to raise two children on my own.

At least all my friends called me one, until I met Dennis, my Newly-Wed husband.

We have been married for 3 months come the 21 of this month and he by far knows how to spend wisely.

Here are our tips on how we make our budget with enough to splurge if we wanted to and also save:

The Numbers:
Combined we bring home $2600 a month.

I work from home and he works for WalMart.

Our basic bills monthly (our tithe, house payment, electric, water, seuage,phone, internet, satalite tv) total to about $1110 per month.

So when we are all said and done we only have limited funds to splurge and save(always put back for your 6 month car insurance premiums, family vacations, and unexpected medical bills).

Minus groceries we end up having put $100 in savings each month. With my two stay-at-home businesses and also my own business (a work in progress) we manage to afford to live comfortably without being broke.

You see the key to budget is to look for the unexpected.

Utilities:
When you are budgeting utilities the best thing is to look at your bill last year to see what it was or call the utility company and ask them for your average usage cost. Always round up to the next tens so if your average is $146 a month for utilities you want to budget for $150 this way when the bill is higher you know that you have the extra left from the previous bill to cover.

Car Payments:
My next advice is don't buy a new car if you are already paying out more than 1/3 of your bills to other creditors.

Credit:
Avoid using credit cards if you can and use cash or checks to pay bills.

Emergency Fund:
Keep at least 3 moths prior bills in a folder so that you can go back and adjust your budget when necessary.

Mortgage Savings:
If you are paying off a mortgage, pay half payments on the 1st of the month and the 15th of the month. This will cut your interest in half and may cut off up to 5 years on your mortgage. We manage to do it every month without feeling a pinch.

Sometimes it takes two tightwads to do it.

We also budgeted our wedding and came out with only spending $1,200.

See the picture of us along with our family.