We were terrible with our budget in July, though not quite as bad as the raw numbers below suggest.
Excuses
I'll try to explain a couple of the highest budget overruns here. The biggest reason is that we're pretty new to budgeting and may take a few months to get the hang of it.
Double Rent
We started paying rent electronically in July. Previously we would pay with a check by the fifth, which meant that the payment was processed in the month the rent was for. With electronic processing I wanted to make sure the rent wasn't late and sent August's rent at the end of July....so technically it was spent in July, but it's for August.
Post-tax Babysitting
With my new job we suddenly didn't have the Flexible Spending Account available. Previously whatever we spent on babysitting was taken from that pre-tax account and we didn't include it in the budget.
Last Run On Costco
We decided not to renew our Costco membership next month. We're hopefully moving in January and don't know if there will be a Costco nearby. We decided to buy enough of bulk supplied to last us till January, including 50 lbs of rice and flour, 25 lbs of sugar, lots of diapers and toilet paper.
...
I'll finish this post with charts, percentages and a budget for August tonight after we finish making the budget!
