Can you believe that we’re already done with the first month of this new decade? Time 🥔fries🥔 when everyone is busy with the near year after the holiday break!

Two of my 2020 goals this year are to track my net worth and increase my savings rate. In order to accomplish both, I need to track my monthly expenses to make sure that I’m on the right track.

To start the year off, I decided I’d review my January 2020 expenses on how I did this month and areas where I can see room for improvement. I won’t be posting these monthly, but I’ll continue tracking them on my own.

JANUARY 2020 MONTHLY EXPENSES

Overall, I think I did a great job on my budget this month (excluding the medical costs). I made it a goal to eat in as much as I could this month, and I’m proud of myself for sticking through with it. I came in under my budget for most of my categories by shopping less (both in person and online) and buying just the right amount of groceries each week.

I think I was able to do well because it was one of the slower ‘social’ months for me, where either friends were busy or I was busy. I don’t believe in being so caught up in saving, saving, saving at the expense of constricting my social life, but if it happens to be one of those months where schedules don’t align, I will try to spend a little less when I’m on my own.

For most of the month, I was right on track. I planned my budget at the beginning of the month, and I estimated to save X amount of money. I had opened a fresh new Vanguard account and was going to fill that baby up with all that saved money. 2020 was about to be all about #adulting. My plan was airtight… too easy, smoooooth sailing… I was like, my first month of budget review on the blog is going to be A+++. MY MOM’S GOING TO BE SO PROUD ⭐!!…. That is, up until the last 2 weeks of January when I had to go and see the doctor.

My plans went in a different direction than I had originally set it out to be. And after all the pouting and frustration, because “I was so good this month and this just ruins my progress!!”, I realize this is just part of life. We set out goals that we have execution plans for, but rarely is it ever a simple walk from point A to point B. Most of the times, we’re thrown in so many other sideways and tangential directions until we finally reach our goal. The journey takes longer than we originally planned for, but there are lessons at every turn, and this is how we grow, by overcoming these unexpected challenges that come our way. Expect the unexpected.

It’s unfortunate that it’s going to be a costly treatment, but health is something not worth skimping money on. And I am fortunate that I am able to have this as an option. This is also why it is important to have an emergency fund in case unexpected costs like this happen.

• Home: $2,595 budget vs $2,593 actual. Includes rent and house supplies. The costs for this month was primarily rent, with about $100 covering house supplies.

• Groceries: $350 budget vs $317 actual. Includes all food prepared or cooked at home (breakfast, meal prep lunch, dinner, snacks). I do 99% of my grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s. Although I’m happy I didn’t break my budget this month, I do admit my weekly groceries didn’t have much variety. I pretty much stuck to chicken breasts, eggs, salmon, broccoli, kale, frozen veggies, apples, chickpeas, rice, corn puffs. I think if I tried to include more variety or higher quality foods (i.e. heavier plant-based diet with more types of vegetables and vegan-based products like non-dairy cheese or milk), I would have met or exceeded my budget. Clean food is costly, ugh!

• Insurance: $235 budget vs $193 actual. Includes insurance for car, rent, pets and umbrella. Most of the costs are related to car insurance and pets insurance. I came in under-budget because my car insurance came in lower this month for some reason - not sure why, but I’m not complaining!

• Utilities: $191 budget vs $203 actual. Includes internet, electricity, gas, trash, water and sewer. My internet was $61. My electricity/gas was $69. The $73 went to trash, water and sewer. Most of the costs are fixed despite the usage amount (i.e. internet, trash and sewer are the same cost no matter how many people live in the apartment), so that’s one of the setbacks of living alone.

• Medical: $200 budget vs $1,509 actual. Includes doctor visits or medicine. This. THIS. THIS. This was the completely unexpected and largest expense (aside from rent) that I had this month. Completely threw off my budgeting efforts for the month. I destroyed my budget for this month due to a medical treatment, and unfortunately it will continue to be high over the next few months through the duration of the treatments.

• Personal: $70 budget vs $5 actual. Includes toiletries and grooming (i.e. hair cuts) costs. When I originally budgeted this cost, I was planning on going to the salon for a hair cut. But I only needed a trim to my bangs, and the hair cutter only charged me $5 for it LOL #littlewins.

• Pets: $100 budget vs $43 actual. Includes any costs related to my 2 purrtatos (food, litter, medical, toys). The $43 covered food for next month and litter for the next 2 months. I came in way under-budget, but I think I will continue to over-budget in at least $30 for medical costs just in case. Those two are trouble makers, I just never know :)

• Gas: $120 budget vs $102 actual. Includes car gas. This is pretty typical of the amount I spend per month for car gasoline, probably a little less than average.

• Dining out: $300 budget vs $139 actual. Includes buying takeout (for myself) or eating out with friends and family. I want to pat myself on the back for doing such a good job this month! But what this also tells me is I was clearly a hermit all of January!

• Streaming subscriptions: $28 budget vs $28 actual. Includes subscription for Netflix (shared), Spotify and Adobe Photoshop. These are essential monthly subscriptions that I use regularly!

• Entertainment & shopping: $170 budget vs $106 actual. Includes any fun or hobby purchases, shopping and gifts. This came in a little lower this month post-holiday season.

• Transportation: $5 budget vs $5 actual. Includes any transportation-related costs, except gasoline (parking, maintenance, repairs). This was an expected small cost related to valet tipping related to a work event.

• Travel: $330 budget vs $336 actual. Includes anything travel-related (flights, hotels, activities, food). Booked hotel for a Valentine’s weekend getaway in February :)

• Education: $20 budget vs $0 actual. Includes self-development costs (education, books, online classes). I always budget $20 per month for online courses or books. There were a few books that I had my eyes on, but I recently discovered the Libby app, and it’s been one of my favorite apps to use nowadays. Basically if you have a library that uses Libby, you can borrow digital books on the go, and read them anytime, anywhere, for free!! It’s so amazing, I will share more on this in a separate post because it’s so spudtacular.

• Donations: $50 budget vs $160 actual. Includes donations for any causes. The Australian wildfires have been truly horrific. One of the few budget items that I don’t mind exceeding on.

• Miscellaneous fees: $0 budget vs $7 actual. Includes any fees that don’t fall in any particular category. Normally this should be $0, but this was a mailing fee related to opening a Vanguard account so it was only one-time.