Here is a breakdown of my expenses for December.
| Household | $35.65 |
| Mortgage | $455 |
| Entertainment | $39.72 |
| Transportation | $21.77 |
| Food | $221.50 |
| Phone | $32.93 |
| Health | $167.24 |
| Travel | $492.01 |
| Total | $1465.82 |
My December expenses were a little higher than normal due to being in Cancun for most of the month.
Entertainment expense was for three movies and a one month digital subscription to the New York Times.
The mortgage payment includes a $100 extra payment made to the mortgage. I’m considering not including extra mortgage payments in my expenses since they are a form of savings. What do you think?
Transportation was for one tank of gas and a few bus trips in Cancun. This category was much lower than normal since I can mostly walk everywhere I need to go in Cancun.
My food expense was much higher than normal. This isn’t surprising since I ate out almost every day and sometimes ate out twice a day. These meals brought me quite a bit of enjoyment so I think I received good value for the expense. I’ll be returning home this month which should result in this expense going down considerably.
My phone bill was just a tiny bit higher than normal. I had to use my phone as a hotspot for work for a couple of hours and I needed to use my phone’s data to try to solve a problem with Airbnb which resulted in more data use than usual. This month should go back to normal
Household expense was for laundry, a haircut, a small gift and some small items that I needed while away from home that I didn’t pack.
Health expense was for a dental visit and some medicine.
Travel expense was for a hotel room for one night in Cancun and switching to a different Airbnb which was about $300 more expensive than the one I originally booked. My experience with Airbnb was somewhat of a fiasco which I should write a post about. The details are too much to include here.
This month my expenses should return to normal since I’ll be back home for most of the month.
How was your month?
I’ve debated whether the house payment should only include the interest portion of the payment, since interest is definitely a cost while the principal part could be viewed as an investment that you should be able to get back one day. For now I do include the total payment, but if I make an extra payment I haven’t been listing that as an expense.
You definitely should post about your Cancun trip. You’ve got me curious about what happened with the first Airbnb and why you had to change to a different one.
I think I’ll report my mortgage payment the same way. The additional payment will be considered savings and not an expense.
I will eventually get around to posting on the Cancun trip and my Airbnb problem. Airbnb support was a big disappointment.