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Our 'lab rat' checks in on her finances
Gail George
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TEXT OF INTERVIEW
Tess Vigeland: We're checking in now with Gail George, our Marketplace Money lab rat, who's agreed to track her spendings this month and tell us all about it. Hi, Gail.
Gail George: Hi, how are you, Tess?
Vigeland: I'm good. I suppose I shouldn't be calling any human being a lab rat.
George: No, no that's fine. I work with 30 of them every day.
Vigeland: So how did it go? I know last week you had a couple of unplanned-for expenses and that made things a little harder. Was it any easier this week?
George: No, I had more unplanned expenses this week.
Vigeland: Oh my.
George: I had two tires from my SUV. So yeah, I was debating whether I should make that a line item in the budget or whether I should just have car maintenance. So it's good. It's forcing me to think more creatively about how to get the budget working. But I didn't get it on paper. I ended up going out of town. And gosh, I thought, "How do people do this when they have to plan this on a regular basis."
Vigeland: Yeah, it is almost an extra job. Especially if you're tracking every penny. That's a lot to remember.
George: Yeah.
Vigeland: Well, so you're in the home stretch, only one more week to go. Any big insights you'd like to share?
George: Always make sure you budget your public radio membership.
Vigeland: I like that one. Good one. Everybody needs to remember that one.
George: I thought that might work for you.
Yeah, make sure that you've got your emergency expenses. I think I'm going to try and go for four months of emergency expenses. I know, at its best, from listening to your show a lot, that four to six months, they really would like have saved. But I think in the beginning, if I could just go with four months.
Vigeland: Hey, if that's going to make it so that you can actually do it and feel good about it, I think both Chris Farrell and I would agree with that.
George: Well, good.
Vigeland: Well, last week you agreed with our suggestion that you try to do some of this tracking on a computer instead of a pen and paper. Did that work for you?
George: It will work for me. It did not work this past week. I think I will get to it this week for sure.
Vigeland: Well alright, we'll look forward to that. Gail George, nice to talk to you again.
George: Thank you so much, Tess.
It's good to see people are trying to budget. I work for the bank and I would say that 1/100 of our customers actually keep track of their spending and blame the bank for overdrafts. I like to keep track off all of my wife and I's bills and keep a checklist. As I pay the bill, I check it off. Unexpected expenses go on the credit card. That gets paid off with leftover money at the end of the month.
Last year I made a resolution to go on a budget and spent the first few months tracking my expenses. I lumped all the car expenses together, and found that I averaged $240 a month on gas, 6-month insurance payments, and vehicle maintenance. My car is used and purchased with cash representing 5 months worth of savings. I save about half of my income, for the car last year and 20% down on a house this year.
I love Dave Ramsey and his teaching. Now I don't follow it to a t, however all of the advice is very good. I am speaking as a graduate of Financial Peace University. We live within a written budget and have walked out of debt and only have a home mortgage for debt. You would not believe the freedom that it offers. Someday I will have the freedom of not having a house payment and then the kids will graduate. But with the plan I am saving for retirement and the 4 kids' education expenses. Not all the college will be payed for a pittance is more like it but it is a plan and a plan we can stick to. Also, With tithing a tenth of my income one might wonder where all the money comes from but we are a 1 income household on an RN wage with four young children. The only thing left to say is Thank you Mr Ramsey.
