I know, it's not exactly a burning question, but I am still curious.
The way I see it, it's easier to budget monthly when one is paid a certain number of times per month; for instance, I'm paid the 15th and the last day of the month. I can tell you exactly which bills come out of which check, which makes it much easier for me to determine when to siphon money off to savings. In my case, it's the 3rd and 18th.
DH, however, is paid bi-weekly. The dates jump around (not fun) and twice a year he gets 3 paychecks in a month (FUN!). Since the dates aren't consistent, it makes it that much hard to say X bill for next month comes out of the 2nd check this month, etc.
So I'm looking at my budget wondering if it makes more sense to work it monthly or weekly. What did you choose, and why?
Question: Do you Budget Weekly or Monthly?
December 20th, 2006 at 09:49 pm
December 20th, 2006 at 10:10 pm 1166652624
I once was paid only once a month, so I had to do a budget for once a month. That was hard, cause that last week, we were so broke.
If I was paid twice a month, I would do like you, and pay certain bills in the middle of the month and certain bills at the end of the month.
December 20th, 2006 at 11:08 pm 1166656139
December 20th, 2006 at 11:48 pm 1166658489
December 21st, 2006 at 01:10 am 1166663441
December 21st, 2006 at 01:40 am 1166665210
December 21st, 2006 at 02:38 am 1166668738
In my last job, I was paid bi-weekly, and therefore, my budget was bi-weekly.
Currently, I am paid weekly, so guess how my budget is set up?
To me, following your paycheck makes more sense. If budgeted correctly, it won't matter when the bill is due. You should have incrementally saved up enough to pay it off by the time it becomes due. Monthly, quarterly, annually, it doesn't matter.
December 21st, 2006 at 04:48 am 1166676523
Budget monthly -- Regular bills & payments on the 1st
Spend weekly -- Run the household on a weekly cash draw for food, gas, incidentals.
December 21st, 2006 at 06:45 am 1166683544
rent - last day of the month
credit card (if I've used) - 15th of the month
utilities - 15th of the month
4 times/month (1/week) for groceries, so generally 2 taps/ paycheck.
ATM (or POS cash draw) - every 3-4 days
The idea is to establish a routine and spread out the bills. I put all expenses on my PDA, and I overestimate slightly the check that I'm going to write before the bill comes in. So I keep a mental total of what I have at all times, and I short myself slightly.
December 21st, 2006 at 12:15 pm 1166703351
December 21st, 2006 at 12:21 pm 1166703670
i've been budgeting monthly for ages, but with all the scenarios i've been running for next year i started to take a year wide view. this makes it painfully obvious that a monthly budget doesn't properly account for my weekly line items of groceries and allowance. i budget 400 a month for each of these but actually get 100 a week. usually it's a wash, but by the end of the year i've used 5200 for each of them, as opposed to the 4800 budgeted... an $800 difference is fairly significant!
December 21st, 2006 at 12:48 pm 1166705298
DH gets paid weekly so the bills that are paid out of his paycheck get multiplied by 12 and divided by 52.
I am paid biweekly so the bills I'm responsible for are multiplied by 12 and divided by 26.
December 21st, 2006 at 12:59 pm 1166705985
December 21st, 2006 at 01:16 pm 1166706982
For example, my gas money for my car is $25 per week. If I was still on the bi-weekly schedule, I would have put away $50 for it when I got paid.
Hmm. Now that I think about it, I guess I've always thought in increments of weeks, even if I don't end up budgeting that way.
December 21st, 2006 at 02:53 pm 1166712818
On disability I was paid bi-weekly and hated it. Extra frustrating since it was 1/2 my normal check - hehe. But it was very frustrating to plan the bills around checks that come different times each month, just added to the challenge of living on 1/2 as much...
Right now I kind of budget around my paycheck though - check the 1st of the month pays for some things and 2nd check pays for others. If it were me I would use my check to pay the fixed bills, and the ones with strict due dates, and dh's check to pay the stuff that doesn't matter so much on due dates - savings, extra debt payments, etc. But I don't know how much you can work that out. It is a challenge to work around.
Oh reading your second comment- yeah I generally budget annually and divide by 12. Maybe you do need to take a wider view... It helps to reign me in and account for EVERYTHING. But I then just track it monthly.
Good Luck!!
December 21st, 2006 at 04:44 pm 1166719494
December 27th, 2006 at 08:49 pm 1167252587
I also have a sheet for each account that lists every allocation that I have deposited and is there and I cross it off as it is paid. I always know where I am in my checkbook.
December 28th, 2006 at 09:59 pm 1167343181
We have a few CC bill in addition to the more fixed bills and I know to the day when the cycle ends on all of them. I also use my bank's billpay feature. I only write checks when I absolutely have to. That way I can set up a few payments to go out on the same day a few days in advance and not worry about it.
December 30th, 2006 at 11:30 pm 1167521457
Like Diolla we use last month's income to pay this months bills. January's bills will be paid with December's income. (Thanks to Jesse's You Need A Budget.)
On the first of the month I transfer to checking what we'll need to pay that month's bills including all the savings for future payments such as saving all year to pay taxes, car-insurance, etc. All auto-drafts come out of checking on the 5th of the month.
For the longest time I budgeted biweekly, but it was always a hassle. Once a month at the beginning of the month allows the stuff to clear out in the first part of the month and usually makes balancing the checkbook easybreezy as most things have cleared by the time the statement comes out.