Annual budget overview

[AAM2012]

I like to have convos about the following:

Short term and long term goals and how to reach the goals
Budget
How to handle large purchases (I.e we agree to talk to each other if it's over $100)
Who will handle bills and how
How often you want to meet to get a financial overview



That's all I can think of right now.

[illgetthere]

We have a monthly meeting and just go over the expenses, see what we have leftover, and decide how to break it up. I do our budget, so I have an idea and h approves. He did request a certain debt have priority and I have no problem with it.
I also figure out when we will hit certain milestones if we continue as we are

Edit: what we do isn't truly a meeting, but a simple conversation. Our meeting for November and December was today, and we quickly went over Christmas budget expectations to make sure we don't overpay on debt and can cash flow gifts

[oswin]

So I handle our finances, and about monthly we look together at the budget, what we spent in the last month, and what we have available to spend. The main outcome of the meeting (and sometimes it's not really a meeting, just a super quick update) is a list of money available to spend in various categories. Spending decisions for the month are based on that list.

Since it's hard for me to imagine not having a budget anymore, I would suggest that you talk to your DH about making a rough budget based on past spending. Having a budget helps set expectations so that you know when it's okay to splurge on something more expensive. I would also have been taken aback if DH randomly put $500 where I wasn't expecting. Without such a system (and indeed when I am behind on keeping track) DH is constantly asking if we have enough money for such-and-such - it's guesswork.

[Poppy]

We budget pretty loosely - we have certain fixed bills but then we each get a fair amount of discretionary money but don't track things like clothes, haircuts, even food - it all comes out of discretionary. So as long as we're both staying under that number, we can allocate whatever is left and not stress about the details month to month.

Generally, on an annual basis we review the year's spending at a high level and make sure that we're as aligned as possible with our values and discuss whether there's anything we want to change (eg reduce minutes on cell plans since we don't use them up, and increase charitable giving). Then we set goals for savings/retirement and set priorities for additional funds (so if we have an excess, do we add to the investment account or do we pay down the mortgage or do we split the difference? - that type of stuff).

[Deleted]

Annual is not often enough, in my opinion.

I do a quarterly meeting - don't have the agenda handy but can share later if you are interested.

Glad you are engaging in money talk and planning, though. So many couples don't and miss out on opportunities or mismanage $$.

[juliabug]

I do an annual "state of the union" address in which we go over our net worth and how much it changed from the prior year. We also set new short term goals and review/update our medium and long term goals.

[fromage]

Oct 30, 2014 16:48:55 GMT -5 kylerules said:

Oct 30, 2014 16:26:52 GMT -5 @shoegal said:

Annual is not often enough, in my opinion.

I do a quarterly meeting - don't have the agenda handy but can share later if you are interested.

Glad you are engaging in money talk and planning, though. So many couples don't and miss out on opportunities or mismanage $$.

I am interested! Thanks!

I'd love to see it too @shoegal if you're willing to post it or PM me. Thanks

[bostonmichelle]

If in a given month we have excess money, we discuss what we want to do but this is rare. And if it's under $100 I just put it in savings.

We usually discuss at the beginning of the month that we get extra paychecks what to do with them but lately those have been going to cash flow house repairs.

Annually we usually go through all of our goals for the upcoming year. We usually do this the week after DH gets his first check of the year and I do an annual budget vs actual for the prior year. I usually adjust our budget for the next year for certain line items (such as groceries, gas, utilities) based on this comparison. We also make changes to our 401(k)/IRA holdings at this time. We usually discuss at this time too what we will do with bonuses/tax refunds/extra paychecks so I know more or less what we are doing with them.

We also sit down when DH gets his raise in April (used to be May) to figure out what to do with his raise. I'm pretty much self-employed so I don't really get raises, just bonuses if there is extra at certain times of the year.

[Deleted]

kylerules & fromage - here's an outine of what we cover. We meet quarterly, and do a bigger annual update for our December meeting.

I build a PowerPoint document and run most of the analyses in Quicken and Excel.

Agenda:
- Reviewing Annual Goals
--- Table of our top $ actions, ranking, goal description, and grade (A, B, C). Here's an illustrative example: Cash Savings - Achieve $50k in cash savings this year by depositing $500 / monthly.
- Early Retirement Status [This is our #1 financial goal, so put yours here!]
--- Progress against goals, analysis on progress, trends, current expected retirement date.
- Mortgage Progress
--- Balance, equity, expected payoff date
- Income
--- Income trends over time, for us together & jointly, % increases over time, bonus analyses
- Expenditures by Category
--- Quicken analyses against budget and also YoY expense analyses by category (focusing on biggest % increases & biggest % decreases), goal to identify any areas to continue to be efficient
- Investments & Savings
--- Investment analyses, any cash savings updates if needed, etc.; Retirement account analyses & graphs
- Net Worth
--- Progress on net worth and associated graphs, etc.
- Action Planning & Next Steps
--- Discussion of recommended action steps (based on the agenda, above) - that's where we write down exactly what we want to change / adjust based on where we are

Hope that helps!

[iheartbanjos]

@shoegal is definitely the guru when it comes to this stuff, but my H and I have a very informal convo once a month about our budget where we discuss our investments, stock options, mortgage balance, and house reno account balance. We have had more detailed talks where we established our goals that included hitting X amount in cash savings, contributing X amount per month to our non-retirement investments, exercising options, budgets, etc.

At this point, we don't have much to discuss, so we just keep chugging along. Right now, our goal is to pay off our mortgage in the next few years. Any extra money goes towards our mortgage. If you and your H decide that paying off his student loan is your goal, then you could expect any extra money to be going toward that. As long as you agree and share in the same goal, then there will be no surprises when it comes to finances. Good luck!

[Deleted]

One more practical tip - the day we do our State of the Union (usually a Saturday), we always go out to a fun dinner afterwards as a "reward."

[Deleted]

We don't have planned meeting really. I handle our finances but we did make out initial budget more or less together. If I plan on sending a large amount extra on a bill or anything out of the norm I do mention it to H before I do it.

[WinterWine]

Thanks for the agenda @shoegal

We do monthly meetings rather than quarterly. I manage our finances for the most part. But once a month H and I sit down and assess our spending via Mint. I also track the balances of all accounts monthly, in excel. Mortgage balance, home value, student loan balance, IRAs, 401k, and all save to spend accounts. Gives us a quick glance of where we are and it helps H get involved as I need his balanced to update. We also discuss any extra checks or large expenses coming up so that we can plan. It's helped a lot in making me feel like I'm not the only one doing the money.