It comes down to a routine, and enforcing it so it becomes habit. My strategies:
* I use clearcheckbook.com to track all my accounts. One personal checking, one joint checking, one personal savings, one joint savings, and two ING accounts.
* I limit my cash on hand each day. $20 stash, and $6 for daily "blow" ($10 on weekend days). This forces me to make choices and decisions EACH day, which flexes my "no" muscles...It's amazing how much less I spend when I simply don't have the cash.
* All of the funds left in my checking account after paying bills and taking out spending cash is set aside for gas for the month. Everything else is transferred to the billpay account, or savings.
* I get receipts for everything. I typically do the data entry in clearcheckbook every couple of days or so, and then make sure it reconciles with the bank accounts. the actual process of the data entry reinforces what I choose to spend my money on.
* I also have an overall monthly budget plan. Each month is one Excel workbook, and starts with my gross pay, taxes, retirement deductions, health insurance premiums, FSA account, billpay amount, cell phone bill estimate, cash spending money, etc. I tweak it several times each month, to stash as much into savings as possible (for example, if I budget $140 for gas, and I spend $120, I transfer that extra $20 into savings at the end of the month).
This workbook allows me to see the forest (instead of the trees, like with the spending transactions in clearcheckbook) - and I can easily copy it over month to month and accommodate specific costs or expenses for that month - such as a personal property tax bill, or the Costco membership renewal fee.
The focus and plan and attention paid really pays off. Literally. Because I've gotten so disciplined this past year, I was able to absorb a 10% pay cut due to furloughs, and it hasn't affected my retirement contributions except by $200 a month (I still contribute $1500 per month!)
Good luck! Starting now, you'll be way ahead of the game when you're in your 40's.
Sandi
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