Cheddarblog

(The Swiss_Mouse has written, edited, rewritten, deleted and rewritten this article several times. On a whole the Swiss_Mouse was missing the topic of his own entry. The Swiss_Mouse will simplify and keep to the subject at hand: The Budget)

If there is one thing anyone could say about Dave Ramsey it’s that he is consistent. The Swiss_Mouse has been listening to his show for almost 10 years and the message never changes. One of the basic foundations of his financial philosophy is “The Budget”.

The Swiss_Mouse has used a budget in one form or another since he started to earn cheddar. Initially starting with the “envelope system”, progressing to written on paper ledger sheets, evolving into computer spreadsheets and finally a spreadsheet that isn’t just for a budget but controls the Swiss_Mouse’s entire set of finances.

Dave Ramsey promotes that to create a budget you should “spend every dollar on paper” before you earn it. The Swiss_Mouse will alter this a bit. The Swiss_Mouse suggests that you should budget for “every expense to which you can set a specific dollar amount during the year.” Close to the same, just a little different. One reason the Swiss_Mouse can make this adjustment is that he has lived on a budget and tracked his expenses for over 15 years. The Swiss_Mouse doesn’t allocate his money ahead of time, he actually has 15 years of data to support where his money has gone! Thus this helps predict where any money will go when it shows up. Not perfect, but not bad either. The Swiss_Mouse calls this “automatic budgeting” and this should be a topic or indeed a series of articles in the future.

But for now, let’s look at the Swiss_Mouse’s budget categories. Every paycheck, the Swiss_Mouse allocates his money to the following categories:

• Dry Cleaning
• Clothes
• Computer
• Eating Out
• House Items
• Gifts: Children
• Babysitting
• Child Care
• Activities (Swim Lessons, Guitar Lessons, etc)
• Swiss_Mouse Spending
• Mrs. Swiss_Mouse Spending
• Emergency Fund
• Vacation
• Insurance
• Xmas Account
• School Related (books, lunches)
• College Funds for Mouse-lings
• Gifts: Family/Friends
• Medical/Dental
• Car: Maintenance
• Car: Gas
• Car: Licenses
• Car: Payment
• Groceries
• Mortgage
• Church/Charity
• Utilities
• Magazines
• Allowances
• Haircuts

Whew! That is a lot! But wait, the Swiss_Mouse is actually going to add another budgeting category soon: Pets. Pets will be for things like Vet visits, etc. Pet food already comes out of Groceries.

Yes, those are a lot of categories and some might not make sense: Haircuts? Magazines? Car Licenses? The key is that if there is ANYTHING that has an ongoing expense of any significant amount, it becomes a category of the budget. Recently Mrs. Swiss_Mouse said “Is that all you give yourself for spending? That is stupid!” The Swiss_Mouse had to explain to her that since the budget took care of most things, the Swiss_Mouse only needed a small amount of money. Everything else was covered.

Ultimately it boils down to listing out your ongoing expenses (even those you don’t have monthly) and allocating a slice of every paycheck(even if it is small) to that category. THEN spend only what you have accumulated in that category, do not spend more.

In the future the Swiss_Mouse will go into more detail about his tracking expenses and “automatic budgeting”.