Expense/Income Tracking

The last half of the month I got very lazy with keeping up to date on these spending reports. I also got very lazy about not eating junk food and fast food. This month was a significant improvement from December. That said, I know I can do a lot better and plan to do so in February.

Jan 22 – spent $5.46 on 2 sausage egg & cheese Mcmuffins and a large Dr Pepper at Mcd’s. This was a breakfast before work. I really need to stop having these since in addition to costing me money for the meal it also causes me to arrive at work about an hour later costing me an hour of wages.

Jan 23 – Spent $8.25 for a double steakburger w/ cheese combo at Freddy’s. I did limit myself to only having Freddy’s twice this month. Since Freddy’s is my favorite I should probably have it more often (maybe once a week) and cut out 2 or 3 other fast food meals a week instead.

Jan 24- Spent $2.08 at Savealot for BBQ Kettle chips. I gave in to my craving for chips. I spent $4.36 at Burger King for a 2 bacon cheeseburger combo.

Jan 25 – I spent $29.75 at Aldi for a 3 lbs of oranges, peanuts, soup, fries, frozen pizza, salsa, buffalo wings, cheese melt, tortilla chips, 8 pack burritos, 2 lbs grapes, oatmeal, and package of dried cranberries.

Jan 26 – I spent $2.75 on laundry. I spent $5.37 on 2 sausage egg & cheese Mcmuffins and a large Dr Pepper at Mcd’s. I need to eat or bring snacks when I do laundry so I won’t end up eating at Mcd’s while I’m waiting for my laundry to be done. I also spent $8.84 on a large popcorn at the movies. This is a very poor value and I need to stop buying it.

Jan 27 – I broke the string of bad spending days and didn’t spend any money today.

Jan 28- The string of no spending days was short lived. I spent $5.47 on a 2 jr breakfast burrito combo at Burger King. I spent $1 for a bag of Cheetos from the vending machine.

Jan 29 – I spent $3.27 at Burger King on a double cheeseburger combo.

Jan 30 – I spent $5.46 on 2 sausage egg & cheese Mcmuffins and a large Dr Pepper at Mcd’s. I’ve got to stop having this breakfast. I spent $6.27 at Dollar General for 2 bags of Doritos and a package of peanut clusters.

Jan 31 – I spent $5.46 at Jack in the Box for a Triple Cheeseburger combo. This was breakfast before work so it also cost me about an hour of wages. I’m going to stop having these meals in February. When you add in the hour of lost wages the pre-work meals ending up costing me over $25. That’s not a good deal for a fast food meal.

Well, I did stay with my commitment to track every bit of my spending for the month even though that spending included an embarrassing amount of junk food and fast food for the last half of the month. Looking back at what I ate over the month it is no wonder that I’m overweight and out of shape.

January 19- I spent $4.30 on a Wendy’s Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger, 4 piece chicken nuggets, fries, and a soda. I spent $11.22 on a 6 pack of socks and a pair of slippers at Walmart.

January 20 – I spent $4.30 on a Wendy’s Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger, 4 piece chicken nuggets, fries, and a soda. Yes, I had the same meal two days in a row. I spent $18.64 on gas.

January 21- I spent $3.18 on Lunchables and a bag of Taco Doritos at Hy-Vee.

January 12 – I spent $5.37 at McDonald’s for 2 sausage, egg, & cheese McMuffins and a large Dr Pepper. I spent $2.75 to do a load of laundry. Mcd’s is right across from the laundromat and I gave into temptation and had breakfast there while waiting on my wash. I do this almost every time I do laundry. I need to get out of this habit.

I spent $2.36 at Walmart for a dozen eggs and a half gallon of skim milk. I was wanting a smaller size of milk since I just needed a little to finish the cereal in my pantry, but the quarts and pints of milk were sold out. I also spent $10.50 at Sam’s Club for gas.

January 13 – I didn’t spent any money this day.

January 14 – I spent $4.54 on a two bacon cheeseburger combo from Burger King. This was just because I wanted fast food.

January 15 – I spent $3.41 at BK for a double cheeseburger combo. This was due to not bringing enough food with me to work. I greatly underestimated how hungry I would be.

I spent $4.18 at Walmart for cereal and a bag of Taco Doritos. Since I bought a half gallon of milk on Sunday, I now needed more cereal to finish the milk. When the milk runs out I’ll eat the rest of the cereal dry as a snack. The Doritos were an unplanned purchase. When I saw them I wanted them so I bought them and ate them. I need to do better at not giving in to my cravings.

I also spent $3.10 at Savalot for donut sticks, snack cakes, and a Lunchable. The snacks were to have for desserts with my work lunches.

January 16 – I spent $5.46 for at McDonald’s for 2 sausage, egg, & cheese McMuffins and a large Dr Pepper. I need to cut back on the fast food. I also need to switch back to diet soda or just have water with my meals.

January 17 – I spent $3.27 at BK for a double cheeseburger combo. The fast food consumption is still out of control. We were supposed to have a lunch at work. It was postponed to Monday since the roads were icy in the morning and most people didn’t come to work. I should have bought something from the grocery store to make up for the missed lunch rather than defaulting to fast food. I also spent $1.05 at Dollar General for a bag of cheese curls. I’d decided earlier in the week to not have any more chips for the rest of the month. I guess cheese curls aren’t actually chips, but still I shouldn’t have had them.

January 18 – I spent $50 for internet. This is my last internet bill. Now that I’ve finished paying the installation fee my internet will be free for as long as I live in my apartment. I spent $25 on gas. I spent $3.85 on a six-pack of Coke Zero and some snack packs of peanut butter M&Ms for my work lunches. I should now have enough sodas and snacks for the rest of the month.

I spent $99 for the annual fee on a new American Airlines credit card. I should get at least a $1000 worth of flights with the miles I’ll receive for getting the card so this is a good use of my money.

I ate too much junk food and fast food this last week. I’ll do better next week. I will make it through today without eating fast food and I don’t plan on having fast food tomorrow either. It’s a start.

Here is a breakdown of my income for December.

Interest	$3.41
Amazon FBA	$16.27
Bank Bonus	$100
Cashback	$10.38
Dividends	$19.10
Job	$2283.63
Total	$2432.79

My income for December down a bit since I had four paydays compared to five in November. This month I’ll have five paydays again so my income will be higher.

My Amazon FBA side hustle made a small profit for the month. 2019 was my worst FBA year since I started selling with FBA. This year I’ll spend less time on FBA and concentrate on just a few profitable deals.

Dividend income was up a tiny bit. Since I don’t plan on adding to my dividend stock portfolio until after I achieve some other savings goals this income will stay roughly the same. I do my dividend investing with Robinhood. If you sign up using my Robinhood referral link we will both get one share of free stock. Thanks to anyone who signs up using my link. Every little bit helps.

There was once again no online income or expense for the month. I’m still considering making a new wager with HealthyWage and blogging about the process which will hopefully lead to some affiliate commissions. I need to lose some weight before I can make another wager though. My links for Bluehost (aff link) web hosting didn’t result in any commissions. I’ll keep trying. I need to do some review posts or something different to create interest. Next year once I’m not working two jobs I will concentrate more on trying to increase affiliate income.

The job income provided almost all of my income for the month and that will be true again this month. Once tax season starts later this month I should be consistently getting 50 hours or so a week which will increase my job income. I need to work extra hours now since I plan on doing a lot of traveling later this year.

How was your month?

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for December.

Household	$286.36
Rent	$450
Entertainment	$48.62
Transportation	$211.64
Food	$245.35
Travel	$100.60
Phone	$33.37
Student Loan	$132.58
Health	$61.47
Total	$1569.99

My December expenses were slightly lower than in November, but still a little higher than I prefer.

Entertainment was for movie concessions and my Regal Unlimited monthly membership fee. This expense should be lower this month since I won’t be purchasing popcorn and won’t be able to see many movies this month.

Transportation expense was for gas, an oil change, an air filter, a car wash and a couple of other small expenditures. This expense should be lower this month since I won’t need to spend any money on maintenance.

My travel expense was the annual fee on a my Chase Sapphire Preferred credit card. This card allows me to transfer my points to different airline and hotel loyalty programs. It also allows me to redeem my points for 1.25 cents each for travel. These two perks will more than offset the annual fee since I will be traveling quite a bit this year.

My food expense was once again way too high. I’m on track to spend $150 this month on food which would be a significant improvement. I’d like to get that total even lower.

My phone bill was normal. It will usually be in the $28-$35 range and I expect it be in that range this month.

My health expense was for one month’s dues for a fitness center membership, some medicine, and a $43 for a dentist visit. This expense was much lower than the previous month due to not having a health insurance bill. I switched to a cheaper plan that doesn’t cost me anything out of pocket. This expense will be slightly higher this month since I had a more expensive dentist already this month.

Household expenses were quite a bit higher than normal. This was partially due to spending about $140 on a new memory foam mattress. The new mattress is much more comfortable than the air mattress that I was using and I think it was money well spent. Trying to get by the next few months sleeping on an air mattress was being too cheap. It is worth spending more money to get a good night’s sleep. I also had to spend $100 on my annual bar fee. That is for an inactive license. An active license would have cost $410. I don’t like spending $100 a year for nothing, but it keeps my options open in case I want to practice law in the future or obtain a job that requires an active license.

This month I have a good chance of keeping my expenses under $1000. How was your month?