Andy Hough

July Income – $955.36

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Here is a breakdown of my income for July.

Online Income

 $467.09
Interest

$1.77

Dividends

$19.06

Cash Back

$19.92

Class Action

$35

Job

$377.02

Mystery Shops

$35.50

Total

$955.36

My July income was a bit low, but it was about what I expected.  Unfortunately, my income was a little lower than my expenses.  It wasn’t too bad considering I only worked the last half of the month and I haven’t gotten paid by that job yet. Having several sources of income does help. I got another random class action suit check.  This one was from Sprint for an early termination fee suit.  I’m pretty sure I never paid them an early termination fee and I don’t recall joining the suit, but I’ll take the money.  My online income was down a bit.  Since I haven’t really been putting too much effort into my online endeavors lately, I can’t complain about what I am making.

My August income will be good since I will have two paychecks from my current job.  The other sources of income will probably not be dramatically different.

July Expenses – $1139.31

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Here is a breakdown of my expenses for July.

Household $245.89
Entertainment

$53.10

Transportation

 $376.17

Food

$176.01
Travel $113.85
Phone

$26.81
Health

$120.97
Electric

$26.51

Total

 $1139.31

My July expenses were a little higher than I prefer. I was hoping to get my expenses way under $1000 for the month which I didn’t come close to doing.  I did at least keep my expenses under my other goal of $1274 a month.

My transportation expense was way too high.  This was a result of driving from Harrisburg, PA to KC and getting my A/C fixed.  The gas from PA to KC probably should have been counted as a travel expense, but it was simpler to count it all as a transportation expense.

The travel expense of $113.85 isn’t too bad, especially considering I was gone for 9 days.  The total is somewhat deceiving though since some of the travel expenses were absorbed by the food and transportation categories.

Food was way too expensive.  I’m not going to worry about my overall food bill in August.  I’m just going to make a goal of keeping my dining out portion of the food bill under $50.  Since I count dining out with my girlfriend or friends as entertainment this goal shouldn’t be too difficult to meet. It will be a major adjustment to my usual spending though so I expect it to be somewhat of a challenge.

I hope to keep my August expenses a little lower.  That may not be possible since I will leave on another trip at the end of the month.  I’ve gotten a little lazy with my spending and plan to tighten up my spending this month. Even if my overall spending isn’t much lower, hopefully I will at least get more value for my spending.

2013 Goals – Halfway Point Review

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My two goals for 2013 are to save 50% of my income and to live on less than a minimum wage income of $1274 a month. I have shared on the blog if I met the goals for each particular month. Now that the year is more than halfway over, I want to see how I’m doing towards my goals overall.

For the first goal of saving 50% of my income I’m doing pretty good. Through the end of June I had made $18,360.73 and I had saved $9550. That comes to savings rate of about 52%. The rate won’t improve in July, but since I will make good money in August I should be able to save way over 50% of my income for that month and get the rate even higher. Unless I make almost nothing the last few months of the year or I have a financial emergency this goal should be easily met.

For the goal of living on less than a minimum wage income of $1274 a month I’m not doing too good. Through the end of June I had spent $8257.51, which comes out to $1367.25 a month. Car repairs are the main reason I’m not currently meeting this goal. I still think it is possible to achieve this goal. July spending should be slightly less than the target amount and I’m hoping for big improvements in the following months.

I will continue to update how I’m doing on my goals monthly and once the year is over I will share the results.

Hitchhiking – Frugal Transportation or Death Wish?

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During my recent hike I hitchhiked one time in order to avoid having to hike a section of trail twice. When I go hiking I often hitchhike into a town since that is usually the only way to get into town other than walking. I would guess not too many other personal finance bloggers hitchhike. It is frugal transportation since it doesn’t cost anything. People don’t usually ask or expect anything for giving you a ride. I did give one guy a little money on my own accord since it appeared that he was living in his car and probably needed the money. Most people don’t hitchhike or pick up hitchhikers since they are afraid of being raped and/or killed. That is a possibility, but I think it is unlikely. Serial is an interesting story of a killer driver picking up a killer hitchhiker that illustrates what many believe are the dangers of hitchhiking.

I’ve found that there are three types of people who will stop to pick me up. The first is older people. I think they give me a ride just because they are bored and lonely and want someone to talk to for a while. They often have pretty interesting stories and a little conversation in exchange for a ride is a pretty good trade. The second type is other hikers or relatives of hikers. People who hike understand that sometimes the only easy way to get to a town is to hitchhike and can recognize a hiker hitchhiker when they see one. I do give rides to hiker hitchhikers as a form of paying it forward for the rides I have received. The third type is poor people. I’m not sure why but the poorer a person is the more likely they are to give me a ride. These rides can be interesting since the drivers are sometimes under the influence, but I haven’t had a problem so far.

Even though hitchhiking is frugal transportation it is only something I do when I’m hiking. And I only pick up hitchhikers if they are at a trail head and I think they are hikers. I like to think that makes the process of hitchhiking safer, but I don’t really know. I think it would be interesting to hitchhike all the way across the country, but I probably won’t ever do that. Have you ever hitchhiked? Would you consider it?

Change of Plans – Back from Hike

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CAM00151I cut my hike short and have been back in KC since last Tuesday. The heat and humidity combined with my being out of shape made the hiking very uncomfortable and put me at risk of heat exhaustion or heat stroke. Despite drinking lots and lots of water I had a hard time cooling off. On the more strenuous days I was sweating so much that my fingers would prune up. Luckily, some of the days were fairly easy days and I spent quite a bit of time in trail towns along the way so overall I still had a good time on the hike. I also spent a lot more money than I planned, although it was still fairly cheap for a 9 day getaway. It seemed prudent to cut the hike short though since a strenuous (for me) section was coming up, the forecast was for more heat, and I was at a place where it was easy to bail from the trail.

I ended renting a car one-way from Harrisburg to KC. I drove a little over 1000 miles in 17 hours so I would only have one day of rental charges. I got an early start and was driving towards the sun so all but the last few hours were in daylight and I didn’t really get tired. Adding the cost of gas, the cost was about $150 to get home or about $30 cheaper than a flight would have been. Driving 17 hours to save $30 probably isn’t a very good deal but I didn’t check the airfares until after I rented the car since I assumed a last minute airfare would be much more expensive. Next time, I will know to check.

The plan was to stay here for a couple of weeks and then return to the trail with my car. I was going to park at different spots on the trail and complete the PA section of the trail with day hikes. Being able to return to my car every night would allow me to just drive to a nearby store or restaurant for food and water. This option would be more expensive than my initial hike plan but it would allow me to finish the PA section of the trail.

Those plans have changed since I will be starting a new job on Thursday. The trail will have to wait. I’ll be working on a document review project. This will allow me to save up some more money and since the project is only a month and a half long I’ll still be able to get back to the trail. Hopefully, it will be a little cooler by then.