The Budget Breakdown aims to broaden the conversation on money and offer insights into various approaches to spending, saving, and investing.

✨ Want to share your monthly budget breakdown with us? Please fill out this form here and we will get back to you (can be posted anonymously like this one 😉).

—

💰 Income

Monthly Gross Income: $ 15,416.00

Other Income Sources: $ 334.00 — Gym and internet stipend

Monthly Net Income: $ 9,346.50 — After taxes and deductions for retirement savings

Dependents: No dependents. I am married and my income represents half of our total household income.

Important note:

My husband and I keep separate accounts. We divide up the responsibility for regular shared expenses. Specifically, he pays for the mortgage, utilities, internet, streaming services, pet care, and home repairs. I handle groceries, dining, travel, cell phones, car insurance, house cleaning, and Spotify. All in, we each contribute ~$3,000 to our shared household expenses (fixed and variable) every month. Everything leftover is personal fun money or going into shared savings for a major home renovation.

🏡 Monthly Fixed Expenses

Mortgage: $ 1,712.87

Utilities (Electricity, Water, Gas): $ 200.00

Internet: $ 97.00

Transportation: My husband and I share a car which is paid off.

Car Insurance: $ 162.00

Gas: $ 50.00

Car Wash: $ 40.00

Lyft: $ 200.00

Insurance: $ 180.00 — Health, vision, dental, and life insurance are deducted from my husband’s paycheck)

Debt: $ 0.00 — Right now, our only debt is our mortgage 🙌

Streaming subscriptions: $ 200.00 — HBO, Netflix, Hulu, Paramount Plus, etc.

Business Subscriptions: $ 70.00 — Zoom, Slack, Canva, Calendly, GoDaddy, Squarespace

OpenAI: $ 20.00

Spotify: $ 16.99

Personal App Subscriptions: $ 12.79 — Ate, Daylio, Sunnyside, NYT Crosswords

Amazon Prime: $ 12.27

YNAB: $ 9.08

Cell phones: $ 80.00

🛒 Monthly Variable Expenses

Groceries: $ 1,000.00

Eating Out: $ 1,000.00 — Restaurants, bars

Entertainment: $ 180.00 — Movies, live shows

Clothing:

$ 1,000.00 — Clothing, shoes, jewelry, handbags, athletic wear

$ 50.00 — Dry cleaning, alterations

Personal Care: $ 275.00 — Skincare, haircuts, spa visits, mani-pedis for special events

Travel: $ 500.00 — Domestic travel plus lodging for trips and vacations

Other: $ 50.00 — Books

💸 Monthly Savings and Investments

Emergency Fund Contributions: $ 2,500.00

Retirement Savings: $ 1,541.66 — 5% into 401K, 5% into Roth IRA

Investments: $ 250.00 – Stocks and ETFs

🎁 Monthly Miscellaneous

Gifts and Donations: $ 500.00

Pet Care: $ 200.00 – Food, grooming, vet appointments

Yoga: $ 75.00

Doctor copays: $ 30.00

Therapy: covered by insurance

Home:

$ 300.00 – House cleaning, twice per month

$ 300.00 – Household goods, sheets, bath towels, art, furniture, plants, etc.

⚖️ Final Balance

Total income: $ 9,346.50 – My half, excluding my retirement savings

Total expenses:

$ 3,042.00 – My half of shared household expenses

$ 5,546.13 – Personal spending, saving, and investments

Final balance: $ 758.37

💭 Money Reflections

1. How much does tracking your personal finances influence your spending, saving, and investing habits?

Tracking my finances allows me to quickly understand whether my allocation of funds matches up to my core values and goals.

YNAB is great for watching spending trends and measuring my net worth over time.

2. Is there anything you wish you would spend less money on?

Fashion. I would like to cut my clothing budget in half and reallocate the difference to other categories.

There’s a mix of creative expression, class shame, and body image weirdness driving my over-shopping. I want to think I’m “dopamine dressing” or “building a capsule wardrobe of luxury staples” but it’s a bit more dysfunctional than that.

Right now, I’m actively cleaning out closets, donating items, and planning a “no buy” challenge. Since we’ll be moving 95% of our belongings into storage soon, I want to make sure I’m only keeping my absolute favorite items for the next stage of my life.

3. What do you consider important to spend money on?

Health, happiness, and elevating the everyday. Giving generously and impulsively.

4. Do you have any short-term or long-term financial goals?

Short-term: We are saving up to start a major home renovation. My #1 priority is stacking my savings so we have a solid emergency fund if our project goes over budget.

Long-term: I want to start my own business and help my husband retire early.

5. Are there any specific saving or investment strategies you follow?

I automate my savings. 50% of each paycheck goes directly into my HYSA. If I need to, I pull some of that out later to pay down my credit card every month.

For retirement funds, I rely on an advisor to allocate funds based on market predictions.

For additional investments, I try to trust my gut and take calculated risks. I buy stock in companies that I love, either for their values or their products. I exercise stock options based on my personal belief in the founders. Sometimes this pans out, sometimes, it doesn’t.

6. What was your relationship with money like growing up? Did you talk about it with your parents/caregivers?

Growing up, my relationship with money was confusing and stressful. My parents hardly ever talked about our financial situation, but I understood from an early age that we didn’t have enough money to cover all the bills.

My parents dropped out of college, got married, started a small business, and had three kids under the age of two when they were only in their mid-twenties. In their mid-thirties they both went back to school and started their careers over. Just when they started to get up on their feet, the 2008 recession hit and they were affected by layoffs.

I got the message that life isn’t fair, you have to sacrifice big to make good money, and you should never feel safe because the bottom can drop out at any minute.

As an adult, I have been trying to build my own safety net and reclaim a sense of home.

7. Did you receive any formal or informal financial education growing up? If yes, where did you learn to manage your personal finances?

No, I did not receive any formal education about money growing up.

In college, I studied economics and accounting and learned about business finance.

After college, I worked briefly as a bankruptcy paralegal. I got to review a lot of family finances. My main takeaways were: most people are only one serious medical diagnosis away from losing everything, and women should always stay involved with household finances, ideally with some personal cash set aside.

At one of my first jobs, they provided a financial wellness coach as a benefit to every employee. That coach taught me that I could intentionally align my budget to my core values, even with the small salary I had at the time.

8. Do you feel well-versed in personal finance? What resources have you used to educate yourself?

Yes, I feel pretty well-versed in personal finance today, even if I don’t always practice it perfectly.

I love the Money With Katie podcast, and I am a frequent listener of Money For Couples, although it’s more like entertainment than education.

I read a lot of books and subscribe to newsletters about investing.

9. What advice about money would you give to your younger self?

“Know your worth” doesn’t apply to you if you have low self-worth and no frame of reference. Find out what the most successful and confident people think they’re worth. Ask for that.

💡 Ask the community

Any advice for financing large home renovations and keeping projects within budget?

Open to any advice or insights!