Unexpected Bills

[cschin4]

What unexpected bills did you have this month? Mine are mostly medical. One vet trip yesterday for a sick dog - $170. Multiple doctor trips for all of us at $20 per visit (x5 $100), and a couple of prescriptions ($60).

[bjl584]

None this month

[MonkeyMama]

Doctor visits $100, extra daycare $35 for sickness, flat tire $30 (replace with used tire). Off the top of my head - hasn't been a nice month. Oh yeah - prescriptions $30.

[Ima saver]

New tires, almost $500, but at least it was for the van. My tires run $1200 or more.

[threebeansalad]

$15.80 at the dentist (co-pay) and $18 for new glasses. Not too bad. The glasses weren't totally unexpected. I've been looking around for ~ 1 month for a pair of frames that wouldn't cost much out of pocket after the measly insurance benefit.

[jlvkfyang]

Death in the family. Flying across country to attend the funeral. Total trip budget is $1,000.

[scfr]

New battery for the Taurus, $49, paid very gladly since we thought it was a problem with the starter. [Looks like everyone's posts so far are related to medical/dental/vision or cars.]

[fairy74]

$20.00 baby gift for SIL who's baby was born 2.5 months early

[Elgin526]

A vet visit for the dog, they switched her thyroid medication doseage and want to run a blood test to make sure her levels are right. Should only be $50 though.

The big one was DH's trip home to visit his very ill grandmother. The airline ticket was free (used airline miles) but we had to pay for his car rental, about $120 and for parking at the airport (DH needed to leave his car there, long story) that was another $60 I think.

[pearlieq]

$1700 to fix DH's car (actually only about 2/3 of that was unexpected) and about $200 to clean my cat's teeth.

[tinapbeana]

as it's not the end of the month yet, i'm gonna keep my mouth shut in effort to not anger the money gods

[frugalmomof1]

$100 doctor bill for DH and $690 to replace the tires on my car. ..I hoped to hold off on the tires for a few months, but we wanted to have good tires for the winter.

[LittleGopher]

A visit to the dr for one daughter. Two new meds for two daughters. Dental bills for two daughters that didn't get included in the huge bill we received quickly before the year's end. A field trip fee for one daughter. New athletic shoes for my youngest - her shoe size went from 5 directly to 7 since fall (thought we'd go a little further in the old ones.) Nothing big - and all were easily covered in the budget. With four kids, I could have a budget line for 'unexpected expenses', but I've opted to keep a cushion of money in the checking account instead. So goes my money!

[PrincessPerky]

A dryer.....though I wouldn't say totally unexpected, I knew it was dying for ages, just a matter of time.

[icantsave]

A new bookbag for my son who broke his old one, extra dog food for the new momma dog (she's eating for her and 9 pups now). I think that's all that was unexpected but I'dont wanna tick off the money gods either.

[vsjhoc]

Originally Posted by jlvkfyang

Death in the family. Flying across country to attend the funeral. Total trip budget is $1,000.

So sorry for your loss.

This tip is probably too late to help you, but some airlines have a "bereavement" rate (which of course they don't advertise). It may only apply if you've lost an immediate family member, and I believe you have to fax them a copy of the death certificate. Most people won't want to deal with this and just want to get on a plane.

[jodi]

A trip to the mechanic for an inspection was blessedly uneventful - we planned on spending several hundred, but got away with $40.
I have been putting off my ophthalmologist appt. for several months now, but I finally have to go - I'll be out of contacts in a few weeks. That will run about $290 ($240 contacts, $50 exam).

[LuxLiving]

Depends on how you define 'unexpected', doesn't it?

We all know we are going to have these kind of expenses and would be wise to figure them into our spending plans so they don't catch us off guard and end up having to be charged to CCs as a result or depleting our emergency funds.

If we find it hard to fund them all, that just tells us that we really can't afford to go blow $50 on a night out when it's possible that the car could blow or we might have a sick animal and not have the money for it. We all hope these things won't happen, but they always seem to, don't they? Therefore - they are really EXPECTED, it's just that many of them happen so infrequently that we forget to plan and budget for them.

[greedy4chips]

Originally Posted by fairy74

$20.00 baby gift for SIL who's baby was born 2.5 months early

Put this in the money saved in March category...

Congrats and hope the baby is doing well!

We had a flat tire on the car, which needed to be replaced, but luckily I had a used tire we saved from 2 years ago that almost perfectly matches the current wear. Cost to mount, balance, new valve stem, and scrap old tire $24.92.


I agree with Lux, that these unexpected expenses are actually expected expenses we hope do not happen at the worst possible financial moment.

[sakigt]

Screw in tire, unrepairable (even I said not to try fixing it, there were two holes...one in and one out) = $140

Good news is I purchased insurance for all 4 tires for $50, which includes free balancing and rotating. I figure 4 trips in will pay for it, so why not. Rotating the tires on a lowered car is NOT fun.