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The Best Way to Stick to a Budget

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You eat less to get rid of obesity, stop smoking and drinking. I bet you can save at least $400 a month.
 
I've found the same to be true for myself. I tend to have a problem with impulse buying things I want. I don't spend more money than I make, but I spend all the money that I make, except for what goes into savings. The money I'm saving (some for retirement, some into a general savings account, and some into a brokerage account) gets deducted automatically when I get paid, so I basically never see that money, and I won't spend it.

So when I decided that I wanted to start saving a little more money, I took a couple hours to analyze my spending from the last few months, decided how much I was spending on impulse buys that I really didn't need, and increased my automatic transfer by some part of that amount.
 
most wage earners spend their income
as their income rises, so does their standard of living - and the costs associated with it
my method was not to acknowledge any annual cost of living increases or promotions once we had a house/mortgage
from that point forward, any increases of income were either assigned to prepay the mortgage and/or build a retirement fund. when you do not 'see' the money as available to spend, you tend not to spend it
i had a second job, which provided for family entertainment/vacations, non-essentials, maintenance/repairs and unconventional investments
dining out was the exception rather than the rule, forcing me to learn to cook from scratch
my federal employer required me to use its government backed credit card for travel, otherwise i have never used plastic. and vendors look forward to doing business with me because cash is always preferred to electronically documented payment. i am able to negotiate favorable rates for goods and services as a result
yep, my kids complained at the time because we live in an affluent community and many of their peers in high school enjoyed much that i could/would not provide for them
but now that they are on their own, they are also smart shoppers and frugal investors. my son lives (well) on 1/5 of his gross income and invests whatever uncle sam does not take. my daughter allocates her quarterly bonus checks to her mutual fund account
so, to the OP, i guess my point is that by saving, you may also be teaching your kids to save when they become of age to need to
 
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