Where does the $ MONEY $ go?
 

I have been making a descent living now for many years as an airline pilot. As a captain for CAL, I make more than most occupations but find that no matter how much money I make it never seems to be enough. Does anybody else out there ever scratch your head wondering where all your money goes? I know Starbucks gets a good percentage of my income.

No, I don't have that problem. ;) Although my dog is doing a good job of eating too much.

Do you track it?

I know it's going to sound anal, but I track all my expenses for a year on an Excel spreadsheet. Everytime I get a bill, it goes on the spreadsheet. I pay for everything with a credit card (and pay the full balance every month) just so I have a log of everything I spent on groceries, gas, restaraunts, etc. Once you get it going, it really doesn't take much effort.

It's sort of a revelation when you can actually see where it all went. The stuff that usually surprises me are things like Christmas shopping, medical bills, vet bills, and home repair type stuff. I tend to forget about those fairly quickly and then wonder where all my money went, but when I can see it on paper (or a computer screen), it makes sense and I relax. You may also see something that's just totally out of wack and needs to be changed that you may not have noticed before.

I helped my mom get her finances in order last year after she went through a bankruptcy. It was amazing to see how clueless she was about where her money went. When we put everything on a spreadsheet, she couldn't believe it. We did some major cost cutting just based on that spreadsheet. It was easy to point at individual items and say "You need to cut this, that needs to go away, we need to pay this off completely, etc." If we had done it 5 years earlier, she probably could have avoided a lot of suffering.

Sorry about the ramble. I know your comment was probably more rhetorical than anything, but thought I'd share my take on the subject.

I think that's the case with most everyone. The more you make, the more you spend. Mine mainly goes to the sushi joint down the street, not to mention a house thats worth a few pennies. I can't believe how when I get $100 out of the ATM, how fast it disappears. I remember when it seemed like a lot of money and would last me all week.

Use nothing but your credit card or debit card. Then go get quicken and upload your statement to it. I do that with my discover card. Right from discover's website to the computer. Just one click. Then it pumps out a graph and shows me.

I decided to do a test. I went 30 days without eating out once, without buying a coke from the vending machine or anything like that. Cooked my own food. Made my own lunches. Bought soda's from Wal-mart. I cut my monthly spending by over $200 just there and actually lost 3 lbs of strait fat:D

*Also I cut 30% off my electric bill by doing a google search on ones availble in my area. CP&L was the highest here and that was who i was with at 19cents a kilowatthr. Now I'm at 11.9 cents and killowatt hour. My electric bill went from $180ish to $120 ish.

*Another thing I did was call my cable company (time warner cable) and cancel everything. Then I looked in the yellowpages for someone that is a salesman for them. I was paying $115 a month for internet and cable. Now I pay $59 a month(before taxes) and I get 5mbit cable internet, all the regular cable shows including HBO, Encore, Starz and DVR. Now I don't have to miss my episodes of Lost, House, The Shield, Entourage, or the Sopranos!


However the correct answer could be women. No lie. I spend more money buying gifts and taking women out on dates than just about anything. Flowers have gotten expensive. August-Nov is like Birthday season for all my girlfriends and I sent 7 sets of white roses, well one red, and that nailed me too lol.

I just wanted to let all my friends know that I am not broke and am not asking for advice on staving off bankruptcy. I am just making a casual observation that money goes fast. Like Skygirl, I too hit the ATM's - usually for $200 and the next day I have like $40 in my wallet. Things are so much more expensive these days than they used to be. I am also too generous with my friends and family. I usually buy coffee for the crew and usually end up picking up the bill when I go to restaurants with friends or family. Gas too has taken it's toll. I figured it out the other day that I bring home on a monthly basis 24 times what my father did when I was still at home. We lived comfortably with very few money worries. Why is it so hard to make it all fit today? Do we all think we need things we really don't?

Do you have kids? Do they think you have money worries? It's possibly you never knew where your dad was saving the money :) Keep in mind there were no "monthly payments" on things and people didn't get ass deep in credit as much and they didn't have these things like bottled watter and coffee houses to spend $4 on a coffee at. I remember my mother sending me to school with a packed lunch everyday, grandfather(we call him dedaddy) always took a thermos everywhere he went and we didn't know what eating out really was. I'm learning too. Last night I cooked a sirloin steak, ranch style beans, sweet potato's, and cream of corn for the price of a grilled stuffed chicken burrito and pepsi at Taco bell!

In college i lived off 1200 a month and that included rent, bills, and bar tabs lol. Dunno how i did it. Guess I'll find out when I hit a regional.

800 a month....zing

would be cheaper if the slum lords charged less for rent (400 per person)

Wine, women and song.....
 

Your reputation as a Pimp on these forums precedes you, :D so I don't think I'm going out on a limb by guessing that a good percentage of your Captain's salary is spent on wine, women and song. (Not necessarily in that order!). Money well-spent??!! Am I warm?:p ;)