Monitoring Household Expenses

whizzard

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Am trying to set up a spreadsheet to record and monitor my household expenses. I am sure some of you have that already. I have not done this yet although I have a spreadsheet to record and monitor my income from various sources. Hence, I am now trying to set one up to monitor my on-going expenses.

Since having the income list, it has made me more motivated to try and increase the income. As the saying goes, what doesn’t get measured doesn’t count.

What are your typical household expense items? This list below is what I can think of:-

(1). Electricity
(2). Water
(3). Handphone & Internet
(4). Property Tax
(5). Road Tax
(6). Petrol & ERP
(7). Car servicing, maintenance & repairs
(8). Carpark
(9). Car insurance
(10). Medical insurance
(11). Club membership
(12). Food & groceries
(13). Entertainment
(14). Personal grooming
(15). Holidays
(16). Chidren’s School & tuition fees
(17). Household maintenance sinking fund

Feel free to add on to the list.
 

nydeidith

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Below is how i categorise mine. Every year me and my wife will have a discussion at the end of the year to decide the budget for next year and how much we want to save.

There is a software call YNAB that you can use to track your income/expenses easily.

Monthly
Mortgage
Car Loan
Car Insurance
Car Fuel, Parking & Toll
Income Tax
Property Tax
Term Insurance
Groceries & Supplies
Internet & TV
Telecommunications
Utilities
Childcare
Allowance
Club Membership
Entertainment-Dining
Entertainment-Others

Quarterly
Condo Maintenance Fees
Term Insurance

Periodic
Home Maintenance & Repairs
Car Maintenance & Repairs
Clothing, Accessories & Grooming
Health, Medical & Dental
Furnishings & Appliances Renewal
Wedding & Condolences Gifts
Family & Friends Gifts
Education, Lessons & Books
Magazine & Journal Subscription
Phone & Computer Upgrades

Annual
Car Road Tax
Mortgage Fire Insurance
Home Content Insurance
Life Insurance
Hospital Insurance
Charity
CNY Celebrations

Special
Overseas Family Holiday
Any special one off expense (e.g., baby birth, house renovation, etc)
 

punkster

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I just use the seedly app to pull all my transactions from banks given 90% of my monthly expenses are via credit cards or GIRO, and input the cash portions manually (mainly for hawker meals :s13:)
 

whizzard

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I just use the seedly app to pull all my transactions from banks given 90% of my monthly expenses are via credit cards or GIRO, and input the cash portions manually (mainly for hawker meals :s13:)

Thanks! Will check out this app .....
 

Minimalists

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Doesn’t make one very comfortable to see the categories loan, mortgage together with entertainment, club membership, magazine subscriptions. A person with loans is better off clearing those debts than using the cash for entertainment.
 

havetheveryfun

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Doesn’t make one very comfortable to see the categories loan, mortgage together with entertainment, club membership, magazine subscriptions. A person with loans is better off clearing those debts than using the cash for entertainment.

probably just put there to cover all areas, maybe that amount is $0 every month for most of the time.
 

focus1974

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I've not track my expenses all my life... as I believe in spending more time and effort on creating income.

However, I do try to budget/saved up for future projects or items or expenses instead.

Example, if you want a laptop worth $1k, how much should you saved from now till the time you want it.

This indirectly affects how much you spend daily.
 

Dividends Warrior

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I categorise mine as follows:

Survival
- Food & drinks
- Groceries
- Utility bill

Modern life needs
- HP bill
- Broadband bill
- Insurance
- Clothes & footwear
- Transportation fares

Responsibility as a son
- Allowance to parents
 

existential_reality

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Tracking has has it own benefits, it tells you if you CC bill tallies with your expected expenses down to deposits made for various childcare and whatnot and when to expect their returns.

Usually I find it helps when your obligations grow, out of curiosity do you have kids expenses?


I've not track my expenses all my life... as I believe in spending more time and effort on creating income.

However, I do try to budget/saved up for future projects or items or expenses instead.

Example, if you want a laptop worth $1k, how much should you saved from now till the time you want it.

This indirectly affects how much you spend daily.
 

whizzard

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I categorise mine as follows:

Survival
- Food & drinks
- Groceries
- Utility bill

Modern life needs
- HP bill
- Broadband bill
- Insurance
- Clothes & footwear
- Transportation fares

Responsibility as a son
- Allowance to parents

Very good son!
 

revhappy

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I dont breakdown and track my expenses, because we are very frugal while spending. So we are sure that whatever we are spending on is a necessity, so there is no need to individual tracking. However, I do record my total monthly spend each month, so I know my running costs.
 

revhappy

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Tracking has has it own benefits, it tells you if you CC bill tallies with your expected expenses down to deposits made for various childcare and whatnot and when to expect their returns.

Usually I find it helps when your obligations grow, out of curiosity do you have kids expenses?

Are you suggesting, you want to track how much you spend on your children? Geez!
 

whizzard

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Are you suggesting, you want to track how much you spend on your children? Geez!

Maybe to track the expense run-rate.

Good for retirement planning to see what expenses are elastic and can be cut back and what are the sticky items which can’t be cut back.

Without full tracking, can only guesstimate where the money goes each month.
 

ixoral

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What’s wrong with tracking how much we spend on kids? I think it’s a sensible thing to do, given a bulk of our monthly expenses will go to kids if u have to spend on childcare, enrichment, etc

Are you suggesting, you want to track how much you spend on your children? Geez!
 

existential_reality

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Yes of course I do what is wrong with that? I set up recurring bill reminders for quarterly payments I need to make for my kids preschool, after which my software puts them out monthly so I know my monthly run rate to achieve that FIRE you love talking about so much.

My kids preschool alone cost me 3 grand a month, those checks don't write themselves mate!

Are you suggesting, you want to track how much you spend on your children? Geez!
 

goldnut

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I used to blow my cash on frivolous time wasting crap when I was young (anime, pc games)

Now I budget everyday. I keep an excel spreadsheet and every time I spend something I make a note of it

eg.

1st Jan
---------
Groceries - $30
Transport Concession - $40
Misc spending cash - $30

5th Jan
---------
Misc spending cash - $30
Internet bill - $50
Groceries - $30

You get the idea. At the end of the month, I consolidate all the Groceries, for example and compare with how much I spent last month and see if I can cut down. Naturally I seldom if ever, go to the movies anymore thanks to torrents.
 

existential_reality

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I'm not sure how detailed you want to go on this but if you are going to track networth and expenditures at relative detail for a start you can consider using Microsoft money. It was a great finance product MSFT developed but they stopped support as it did not generate much income, they did give it away for free though (link below)

https://www.microsoft.com/en-sg/download/details.aspx?id=20738

I use a more hardcore version called Quicken, I use it for generating invoicing my for my property tenants and attach large transaction receipts which is very useful when retrieving just among some of its capabilities.

Unfortunately it was developed for the US market so its very US centric, they also changed the software to subscription model which sucks.


Maybe to track the expense run-rate.

Good for retirement planning to see what expenses are elastic and can be cut back and what are the sticky items which can’t be cut back.

Without full tracking, can only guesstimate where the money goes each month.
 
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