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How much do you spend on dining/groceries/household

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  • #16
    Originally posted by james.hendrickson View Post
    GS, if you have a few spare moments, I'd love to hear how you are able to keep your home on budget. I spend that much for a family of 2.
    I will be honest. It only works if we meal plan and say no to eating out when we don't feel like cooking. Also, the eating out only works if we don't eat at too expensive of places. If I don't make a two week plan, and buy for that and stick to it it won't work. We do overspend a lot of times, but not a by a large amount. Maybe 20-30$, and that is usually because of some unknown or unplanned thing we didn't say no to.

    Also, apparently I'm the only one that makes that happen. If my wife does the shopping it never works. She has admitted that she can't do the groceries like I can. Usually it isn't a matter of overspending, but rather she over buys. She simply buys more food than we really need.(I think that is what most do when they say they spend too much on food) You go shopping when you still have a lot of food in the freezer, cabinets, etc, just not complete meals or preferred meals. I have asked my wife why did we spend more than I budgeted because we needed it, yet we have food left over when I go shopping?

    Also, I have found you need to leave a couple meals out of your plans and you need to leave 30-40$ in the account to cover those nights things don't go according to plan. If you spend all your money in the first day, you will overspend before you replenish your money. You also can't just go buying random food or you will come home with a ton of stuff that doesn't make meals, which makes you go back to the store. What I do is make a two week meal plan3 meals a day, then make a food list to that meal plan to buy what is needed, and put in prices. if it is too much, I adjust. If I don't do this, it never works out.
    Everything happens for a reason. Sometimes that reason is you're stupid and make bad choices.

    Current Occupation: Spending every dollar before I die

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    • #17
      Hi My first post here

      Hubby & I, 1 dog and 2 cats $480/mo. Includes all groceries & eating out, animal food, cleaning products/tp/hair & shower. Everything is made from scratch, no frozen meals/pizzas etc.

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      • #18
        Originally posted by tschwenn View Post
        Hi My first post here

        Hubby & I, 1 dog and 2 cats $480/mo. Includes all groceries & eating out, animal food, cleaning products/tp/hair & shower. Everything is made from scratch, no frozen meals/pizzas etc.
        Welcome tschwenn!
        That sounds very frugal. Good for you. You do better than we do and we only have one cat

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        • #19
          We have:

          2 adults
          1 teen boy (17) that is here full time
          3 boys ages 10-12 that are here 50% of the time.
          3 cats
          1 snake
          1 tarantula

          Human food is $75/wk
          Household items including cat food/litter is $25/wk
          Snake and tarantula food and supplies are $15/mo
          Dining out is rare and pricey for the number of people. Maybe $50/mo averaged out over the year?

          About $500/mo for us.

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          • #20
            Originally posted by annibe11e View Post
            We have:

            2 adults
            1 teen boy (17) that is here full time
            3 boys ages 10-12 that are here 50% of the time.
            3 cats
            1 snake
            1 tarantula

            Human food is $75/wk
            Household items including cat food/litter is $25/wk
            Snake and tarantula food and supplies are $15/mo
            Dining out is rare and pricey for the number of people. Maybe $50/mo averaged out over the year?

            About $500/mo for us.
            I am thinking that Costco or a bulk place is going to work well for your family.
            Why not get rid of the tarantula and the snake?
            james.c.hendrickson@gmail.com
            202.468.6043

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            • #21
              Why get rid of pets? $15 a month is cheap. I spend more than that on goldfish food and I don't even like them. Just one bag of dog food is $50, and she likes to have a choice of 3 brands. Don't even get me started on the cats. They have refined tastes.

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              • #22
                Well maybe giving absolute figures is a bit meaningless because you should take cost of living into account, which as everyone knows can vary greatly from one location to another. I think it makes more sense to talk about percentages, which in my case is roughly 20%.
                Sagalamora

                The mind behind MoneyBrio

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                • #23
                  Originally posted by Sagalamora View Post
                  Well maybe giving absolute figures is a bit meaningless because you should take cost of living into account, which as everyone knows can vary greatly from one location to another. I think it makes more sense to talk about percentages, which in my case is roughly 20%.
                  I think percentages make sense in some areas like housing costs but not so much for food costs because those are less variable by location. The cost of a gallon of milk is relatively similar regardless of where you live.

                  Also, giving a percentage without giving your income figure is meaningless. If you are spending 20% on groceries and you earn 30K that's a lot different than if you are spending 20% and earn 300K.
                  Steve

                  * Despite the high cost of living, it remains very popular.
                  * Why should I pay for my daughter's education when she already knows everything?
                  * There are no shortcuts to anywhere worth going.

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                  • #24
                    I dont think percentages make sense for the reason disneysteve mentioned. You can apply a multiple to dollar values to account for cost of living differences. But if someone makes 1 mil a year, his spending on food is going to be maybe 1%, while someone who makes 10k a year might spend 50% on food.

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                    • #25
                      4 in our household, we have 2 kids (11 & 12 years old)
                      We used MINT to track all our expenses. Over the past 3 months, our food related expenses have been $1149 a month on average. That's include groceries, restaurant, luncheon, and any take out fast food dinner. We do set our monthly groceries at $800 a month. We like to be under $1000 a month going forward, but with the holidays, it's usually higher than normal.
                      Got debt?
                      www.mo-moneyman.com

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                      • #26
                        Originally posted by tripods68 View Post
                        4 in our household, we have 2 kids (11 & 12 years old)
                        We used MINT to track all our expenses. Over the past 3 months, our food related expenses have been $1149 a month on average. That's include groceries, restaurant, luncheon, and any take out fast food dinner. We do set our monthly groceries at $800 a month. We like to be under $1000 a month going forward, but with the holidays, it's usually higher than normal.
                        The holidays used to completely annihilate our budget. I could easily spend over $500 just on Thanksgiving, and sometimes I would have to host Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. Thankfully, most of our family isn't talking to each other anymore and I didn't have to host anything this year.

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                        • #27
                          Originally posted by msomnipotent View Post
                          I could easily spend over $500 just on Thanksgiving
                          I can't even wrap my brain around this. How many people were you feeding?

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                          • #28
                            Originally posted by scfr View Post
                            I can't even wrap my brain around this. How many people were you feeding?
                            Anywhere between 15 to 30 people. Everyone else does a potluck and BYOB because they can't cook well, but they like my food and love my alcohol. The last time I asked someone to bring something (corn), they brought a small bag of frozen corn for 30 people. It wasn't even cooked. And they will either bring some swill and then drink my better alcohol, or just tell me that they aren't bringing anything because they like what I serve. We have severely cut back on our alcohol spending, though. It could be why we don't get invited as much anymore!

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                            • #29
                              Originally posted by msomnipotent View Post
                              Anywhere between 15 to 30 people. Everyone else does a potluck and BYOB because they can't cook well, but they like my food and love my alcohol. The last time I asked someone to bring something (corn), they brought a small bag of frozen corn for 30 people. It wasn't even cooked. And they will either bring some swill and then drink my better alcohol, or just tell me that they aren't bringing anything because they like what I serve. We have severely cut back on our alcohol spending, though. It could be why we don't get invited as much anymore!
                              Alcohol can very easily shoot up the cost of entertaining. Even if everyone only has one or two drinks, if you are serving good quality stuff, it gets expensive quickly. Even just for my wife and I, we see that. We visited a local craft distillery a couple of weeks ago and bought a bottle of their whiskey for $55. When we were in Mexico in December, we found an almond tequila that is out of this world. I think it was $65. We're about halfway through the bottle and I'm on the lookout for any friends who are heading that way so I can ask them to pick us up another bottle or two.
                              Steve

                              * Despite the high cost of living, it remains very popular.
                              * Why should I pay for my daughter's education when she already knows everything?
                              * There are no shortcuts to anywhere worth going.

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                              • #30
                                About $300 in food and household expenses for me, two small dogs, and a cat. That doesn't include eating out or entertainment. That's another $125ish.


                                Things are pretty tight but I have a lot of student loans so I don't have much choice. Plus I'm used to living cheaply so it's not really a big deal. I do look forward to the day when I can be freer with my money.

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