Be Prepared!!!!

Week 4: Spices and Herbs: Buy the ones you use most often, pepper, cinnamon, bouillon, oregano, etc. (remember, they can be used for Medicinal purposes too.)

Week 5: Make up week, Get Back on Track!!!

Keep your receipts, and write on your budget tracking worksheet all your expenses. Don't forget to also track all purchases made with cash, including small items. These will be more difficult to track (if you don't get a receipt), but try to write down as much as you can with a paper and pencil. You may want to keep a little notebook with you to write down expenses as they occur.

Also, at the end of the week, you should try to estimate any payments with cash that you made, that you did not write down that week. If you are not good at tracking your cash expenses, at least keep track of how much cash you put in your wallet, so you know how much you are spending. Then add that amount to your budget tracking worksheet.


TYPES OF EXPENSES
As you start to track your expenses, it is helpful to break your spending into different categories. There are two main categories of expenses: essential and non-essential expenses. Essential expenses are expenses that are required for living. Non-essential expenses are the extra things you spend your money on. In addition, essential expenses may be broken down into fixed expenses and variable expenses.


ESSENTIAL EXPENSES - FIXED AND VARIABLE
FIXED EXPENSES
Fixed expenses are expenses that are the same each month. Examples include rent or mortgage, car payments, car insurance, property taxes, home insurance, and school loans.

VARIABLE EXPENSES
Variable expenses are expenses that vary each month. Examples include car maintenance, gasoline, food, electricity, heating gas, phone, etc.
One good way to create a budget is to track your income and expenses for one month, by keeping track of each type of expense and if that expense is a fixed expense or variable expense. For the month, Caleb earned $594 and tracked expenses for the month to help create a monthly budget. Fill out the table below using the expenses Caleb tracked. Then total fixed and variable expenses. Also calculate total expenses. Was income greater than or less than expenses for the month?

Expenses: Donations $20, Going to a show $22, New shoes $30, Tax on earnings $222, Food shopping $59, House Mortgage payment $144, Phone bill $49, Music CDs $30