Expense/Income Tracking

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for July.

My July expense were rather high. This was due for paying for my dental implant surgery which was an expected expense. Other than that my expenses were fairly typical and were just slightly over my $1000 a month target.

I will still have to have at least one more oral surgery since I need three implants and they only placed one. I’m hoping the other two will be placed at the same time. I have already paid for all three implants so I shouldn’t have any more dental expenses for a while. Unfortunately, I will have another medical expense in September or October. I was scheduled to have a biopsy in June, but the doctor wasn’t available on the scheduled date and canceled the appointment. I decided not to reschedule the biopsy, but I’ve since been persuaded that it would be wise to have it done and I’m thinking I’ll be able to schedule it for sometime in September.

Entertainment expenses came in at $0 which is the first time I think I’ve ever had that happen. We went to the movies a couple of times using free gift cards.  The main reason this category is $0 though is because the local casinos have been generous in supplying us with free slot play and free meal credit. This provided us with free entertainment and even made us a little money as well.  The casinos will eventually figure out that we’re only playing the free money and not using our own money. Until then we will get all we can out of their comps.

My health expense should return to normal this month. We are traveling to Portland for four days later this month and at the end of the month I will begin an extended hiking trip. The airfare for both of these trips has already been paid so these trips shouldn’t add too much expense to the travel category. Other than those exceptions my expenses this month should be about the same as last month.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for June.

My June expenses were once again fairly low.  I missed my goal of $1000 or less in spending for the month by just two bucks.  My health expenses were lower than I thought since I had only a $4 prescription and a $14 lab fee to pay in addition to my monthly health insurance premium. This month’s expense will be a lot worse since I’m having my dental implant surgery which will cost about $2700. That is a pretty good deal for three implants, but I still hate to pay it.

My transportation expense was slightly inflated since I bought a $100 gas card for $90 which I didn’t completely use during the month. I bought another $100 gift card for $90 this month so the expense will be slightly inflated again.

We may book some airfare to Portland this month. Otherwise, all my expenses will probably be about the same this month as last month. The health category where I have to pay for my implant surgery being the notable exception.

Here is a breakdown of my income for June.

June was another terrible income month although it was at least better than May.  My various sources of income just don’t add up to a very significant amount.  They have a long way to go to provide replacement income for a job.

I did have three sources of income this month that I didn’t have last month. The first was a bank bonus of $150. That was pretty easy money. I need to find a new bank bonus to do now. The second was mystery shopping. This income is a month behind so this is from shops I did in May. I did a couple more in June so I’ll have mystery shopping income in July as well. The third source of income was unemployment. This is the first time I have ever filed for unemployment. The process wasn’t too difficult. The pay isn’t great though. I only received one week of unemployment since one week counted as a waiting week and the week after that I was employed again. The one week I did receive was a small check since it was based on my Missouri earnings last year and I made about 40% of my income in Kansas last year. My Uber earnings also reduced my check. I’m glad I don’t have to depend on an unemployment check to pay my bills.

The good news is that I did find employment and work the last two weeks of June. This is a document review job that I have done before. It is project based so my employment and hours fluctuate depending on whether there is a project available for me to work on. I only worked two days this week since my project came to an end. I’ll be starting a new project on Monday that will hopefully last until the third week of July when I’ll have to take some time off for my dental implant surgery. With the paycheck I received today and the one I’ll get next week my July earnings will already be more than my June earnings. I’m hoping I can add a lot more earnings before the month is over.

Here is a breakdown of my income for May.

May was a terrible month for income. I was supposed to start a temporary document review job in May, but the start date was delayed three separate times. I’m still not sure when (or even if the job) will start. I was way too lazy in May. I kept off working Uber more or doing other things to make money since I thought I would be starting my document review job soon and making good money from that. Since I’m not sure that I’ll have any job income this month I need to start driving for Uber a lot more and start selling a lot more stuff. It is doubtful those two things will be enough to replace my job income, but I should be able to make a lot more money than I did in May. My savings took a hit in May and I can’t continue to let that happen.

One tiny bright spot was my FBA earnings.  This month’s profit was about $5 higher than last month’s making for my new best profit month ever. Unfortunately, this month will most likely not be a good month for FBA income. Since I didn’t make much money last month my Amazon payments mostly went to paying my personal living expenses rather than being used to buy more inventory. I have very little inventory left to sell on FBA. Unless I can find some really cheap inventory to sell or my job starts I won’t be able to buy any new inventory this month and the FBA income will dwindle.

I do have a lot of stuff around the house I can sell on eBay,Craigslist or Facebook. I need to concentrate on doing that this month rather than buying new things to sell. I should be able to make at least a few hundred dollars from selling stuff if I get most of it listed online for sale.