Do You Have A Budget?

[Anonymous]

• This discussion was created on June 9, 2021.
• If yes, we would luv to hear from you! Lol, maybe we can pick up some tips from you.
• If no, ever thought of having one or did you have one in the past?

[Anonymous]

💥June 9, 2021💥

Lol, sometimes I do 🤣😂 I think I have finally overcome my massive addiction to Dollar Tree!!! Luv their everything is $1. Now I shop without one of their shopping baskets or carts. When my arms are full = time to head to the register 👌 I pay my Studio Apartment rent early, on the day my Social Security arrives. No need to forget and have to pay their $35 late fee = my famous senior moments 😱 The rest goes for car insurance, electric followed by gas for car, food and of course Dollar Tree 😁 Angela

[fffred]

@Anonymous 

I always want to pay my bills on time. In the olden days I wrote checks and mailed them. I thought I was smart because I'd hold the mail until closer to the due date and then post them. Except one time I forgot to mail a check to Visa. I was able to go to the grocery store business desk and pay without missing the due date. Phew! Never again. I already had direct deposit for my payroll (I was one of the last at my company to sign up for that), so then I signed up for everything that I could possibly pay "automatically"... utility bills, credit card bills, etc. This saved me the stress of having to remember to perform these tasks, and when.

Since that time, around 1990, I have never had a problem with such direct automatic payments. I know that many people worry over this sort of thing. But really I have never had a problem with it, and the relief from the worry of having to remember, and to sit down and write out payments, has meant a lot to me.

In the modern world where everything is done "on line" we can pay these bills "on line" very easily. But I still prefer the "automatic" bill payments because I don't want to think about these. With "bill pay" I would still have to remember to log into my bank and take action to make these payments. Not convenient for me.

I will comment that I keep a "checkbook register" in a computer spreadsheet and I actually plot out all "expected" transactions for the following 12 months (my system is pretty easy  and semiautomated for me to update). When a transaction changes from "expected" to "actual" I simply check it off my in spreadsheet. This is the method I use to keep track of those automatic payments, I review them and the actual bank draw very closely. I also seem to be one of the few people these days who (1) actually keeps a check register (mine is electronic) and (2) reconciles their checking account with the bank statement each month.

My financial planning/recording/reconciling system is as automated and idiot-proof as I can make it (I am the idiot in this equation). Especially as I start rolling into my twilight years where my mental faculties are "more frail" than they used to be. I can still apply the concentration to build my "systems" and then I just go along without stressing out and having to really give things much thought on the detailed level.

[AvocadoDog]

How funny — I normally don't shop Dollar Tree with a basket but today, I don't know why, I did. Ended up buying a few things that I really didn't need in addition to the toothpaste I went in for. I think the shop-until-arms-full approach is the smarter one!