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Home > Archive: July, 2012

Archive for July, 2012

Not much to report

July 28th, 2012 at 04:15 am

Finally feeling better.

Had 3 NSD this week.

Last night DH went to Aldi after work. No more grocery money in the budget, I think we went over about $5. Not too bad we wouldn't need anything until next month.

Tonight we are going out for dinner, teppanyaki, I got a good deal from groupon but it will still be pricey. This will push us way over the entertainment budget this month, I think over $50.

Still a bit off

July 24th, 2012 at 10:05 am

I haven’t done much lately. I still got this annoying head cold. I stayed home all weekend. DH did the grocery shopping and all up only spent just over $33 on the weekend. The only positive thing about being sick I don’t have the energy to spend money.

I asked DH to get me Vicks VapoRub and he ended up getting it for free because it register the wrong price at the check-out and it is their policy that if they charge you the wrong price you get the item for free, so that was $6 in saving.

Still no news at DH’s work it has been 3 weeks and some of DH’s workmates are working without a signed contract. Apparently, they are waiting for the boss (who will make the final decision) to come back from his holiday. Hopefully they have sorted this out for the next round of contract negotiation which DH will be part of.

Mortgage July Extra Payment

July 21st, 2012 at 03:58 am

Yesterday was payday.

DH paid $1500 into the mortgage. A lot less than the $2500 that I hope to pay extra a month but we should be able to achieve Goal#1 even if we only put this much per month. Hopefully we can catch up a bit towards the end of the year. I will probably put about the same amount of money towards the holiday and household fund. We are not going on a big holiday this year so if we need to get cash for emergency we will raid the holiday fund first before touching the actual EF.

Current Mortgage Balance = $127,807.25

I'm not feeling too great at the moment so not much plan for spending this weekend. DH and I both agree to just take it easy he is trying to make sure he doesn't get it.



Update

July 19th, 2012 at 03:43 am

Had 3 NSDs in a row – yeah!

On Monday DH and I went to the Eye Hospital, we thought he will finally get his surgery done but the doctor suggested for him to try compression in the next two months first. I think because his eyes are normal and the cyst is a lot smaller than what it used to be, and also 50% of the time doing the compression helps. And it will hurt getting it out. If it doesn’t go away after two months the doctor suggested going to a private hospital instead, that way we won’t need to wait another year to make an appointment. It might cost some money though.

Carbon Tax

July 11th, 2012 at 04:41 am

As of the start of this month the government is now charging carbon tax to those company that emit carbon. Inevitably it will be passed on to us consumers. The other day we just received a letter from our Electric and Gas Company letting us know that prices will go up again this time it is due to the new carbon tax. It will go up on average around $8 a week, over $5 for electricity and around $3 for gas. The government when campaigning about this new tax promised that it will only increase living expense by about $9 per week and that a lot will be compensated by decreasing income tax and will be giving cash to low income and family with children. For DH and me it means we get nothing. I think the estimated $9 p/week was a big joke when electricity and gas alone accounts for $8 already. Again I am so glad that we got the solar panels last year.

Weekend

July 8th, 2012 at 03:59 am

We went for a another run yesterday. And then we came home had showers and went out for dinner near where we went for a run (25mins away from home). We didn't plan it very well yesterday. We had a voucher for this place it was for $29 but parking cost $10, actually more than in the CBD. I haven't been to this area for almost ten years. It's nice area, by the beach there are lots of nice restaurants but parking is crazy.

Today we might go grocery shopping, we need to get some meat.

In the last few days I have been sewing holes from DH's socks. There were about half a dozen that had small holes in them, I don't know how he does it holes in exactly the same spot. They are still relatively new, normally I would just throw them away. This is my first time trying to fix holes in socks, they turned out well and I'm glad I took the time to fix them now we won't need to buy new ones for a while yet.

NSD and Job issue

July 6th, 2012 at 04:44 am

Yesterday was a NSD. We will need a lot of these this month.

I think after this month we will need to keep as much cash in hand. DH’s contract is finishing in two months’ time. At this stage he is not sure yet whether it will get renewed. He works for the state government and last week they just announce around 35% job cuts in permanent positions. There is also a lot of restructuring going on at the moment, at least the new structure chart they got recently still show that DH’s position is still required. Some people in his team whose contract expired last month is working at the moment without a signed contract this is after they were interviewed and asked to take a pay cut, it is really crazy at the moment. Some have left because it is getting really frustrating waiting for the government to make a decision. This job cuts and changes were announced at the start of the year but the details have been very last minute and to this date still not clear. At this stage, DH is just taking it one day at the time.

July Mortgage

July 5th, 2012 at 03:26 am

Mortgage got paid yesterday.

$669.10 = Interest
$548.90 = Principal

Current Balance = $129,307.25

July 2012 Budget

July 3rd, 2012 at 04:19 am

Grocery - $230
Utilities - $180
Home Phone - $25
Mobile - $20
Internet - $50
Fuel & Fare - $170
Health Insurance -$250
Entertainment -$170
Gifts -$50
Personal/Medical - $50
Clothing - $40
DH Allowance -$100
DW Allowance - $75
Miscellaneous - $30

TOTAL = $1,460

June 2012

July 2nd, 2012 at 02:02 pm


Grocery - $213.76 (under $6.24)
Utilities - $158.45 (under $21.55)
Home Phone - $14.95 (under $10.05)
Mobile - $20 (under $20.00)
Internet - $49.95 (under $0.05)
Fuel & Fare - $266.12 (over $46.12)*
Health Insurance -$249.21 (under $0.79)
Entertainment -$165.50 (over $15.50)
Gifts -$5.00 (under $45.00)
Personal/Medical - $31.86 (under $28.14)
Clothing - $15.00 (under $25.00)
DH Allowance -$100 (even)
DW Allowance - $60 (even)
Miscellaneous - $31.65 (under $3.35)

TOTAL = $1,361.45 (under $98.55)

*DH got a monthly train pass in the middle of the month; he wanted to see if it was better deal, not really. I think during winter it is better for him to get the monthly pass but when the weather gets warmer he can go to work early and get free pass for early bird. I’ve lowered this month’s budget for transport.