Frugal Five Meet Anne

Welcome to the Frugal Five! This week Anne  a newlywed  who just became debt free from Virginia answers the Frugal Five! 

What is your financial life?

Our financial life is simple really. We were just married 2 months ago. I am the sole income while my husband finishes his Civil Engineering degree. 

What is your budget buster?

Our budget buster right now really isn't anything out of the ordinary. Our monthly expenses, to include gas and groceries, are slightly more than half of our monthly income. We were paying the majority of the other half of the income on paying down our debt but now we can put money away for my husband's tuition and books for the next year or so of school that he has left. The lack of a budget buster I attribute to our monthly budgeting habits.

What is your favorite money saving tip?

Our favorite money saving tip is to work from a new budget each month so that we know exactly where each cent is going before we get paid. This way, we know how much "fun" or "personal spending" money we have after we meet our expense and saving needs. Other ways we cut back on our spending was getting rid of all unnecessary expenses such as Direct TV, dining out, etc. The way that we have coped without cable TV is subscribing to Netflix which is great for an AMAZING price. No additional charge on our internet bill either. Cut the unnecessary expenses.

If you had an extra $1000 what would you do with it?

 If we had an extra $1000 we would have put it toward paying down our debt which would have put us a month ahead of our goal. Now that we are debt free, we will add it to our saving goal of 6 months of expenses in our emergency fund.

What is your best resource for frugal living?

) My best resource of frugal living is the guidance of Dave Ramsey and his book "The Total MoneyMakeover" and and his "Financial Peace University". We follow a monthly budget every month along with an allocated budgeting form. We've done this for 2 years now and it's been so wonderful. My husband is also a great resource. Any major purchase, we discuss it first and then do some research if necessary. Our "major" purchase is anything over $50-$100 that is not related to regular expenses such as bills, gas, etc. We've cut back a lot on eating out and spend our money on groceries. This is a huge saving.

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