Throw It Out the Window
The Budget: Our monthly eating out budget is $150. We’re currently averaging $132/month. Of course, we’ve already spent over $100 on eating out in April. Okay, that’s not true, we spent that $100 in March, but I’m paying the credit card bill in April and that’s when it gets counted. I’ll admit I’ve been inconsistent, sometimes paying for meals out with the credit card and sometimes with the debit card, so that’s kind of confused things, but still, we’re currently under our budget, so things are good.
Well, they won’t be come the end of May. Our eating out will blow up in April. Some of that will be paid in cash. Some will be put on the credit card and moved to the May budget. It doesn’t matter. We’ll be over budget by the end of May. And you know what, that’s okay.
Planning to Break the Budget: It’s okay for a couple of reasons. First, January’s eating out total was $265, but that included the $128 from my birthday dinner in December that was put on the credit card. In February and March, even with all the stress of everything going on with the MIL, we spent $74 and $84 respectively on eating out. (Okay, plus another hundred, but really, that’s counted as part of April.)
The second reason this is okay is because I plan for it. This is not a random thing. It happens every April, just like my birthday dinner happens every December. You see, we have lots of friends who have birthdays in April, so we plan one giant dinner out at a local restaurant. We have it down pretty good- everyone brings $30 for food and tip. You pay for your own drinks. In general, we have enough to leave a generous tip. But sometimes we don’t. And because we’re organizing it (and I’m the one setting the set amount folks should bring based on menu prices), if we’re short, we’ll pay the extra. So we’re in for a minimum of $60 there and possibly more.
In addition, J has a specific different place he wants to eat on his birthday. We’ll be joining him for that. It’s a small Mexican place. Still, for two of us, I’m guessing $35 including tip.
And lastly, for 10 days this month (Sun-Thurs, April 8-19), it’s Seattle Restaurant Week. (It used to last only 5 days. I’m thrilled they expanded it.) During this event, we can go get three courses at a number of super fabulous eateries around Seattle for $28 each. The restaurants offer limited menus for Seattle Restaurant Week, but they are still really good. And these are places where just your entrée would normally cost $28, not to mention the appetizer and dessert. We almost always go out a couple times during this event. Including tip, that’s $65 per time we go out.
How Much?: So there we have it. We’ve already spent $100 of the $300 we have in eating out allowance between April and May. We have at least another $160 of eating out planned, and possibly $225, taking us to a minimum spend of $260 long before we even reach May.
And none of this even takes into account that we went out to dinner on Tuesday, but J paid for us.
April is always an expensive eating out month for us. I plan for it, which means I don’t have to worry about breaking the bank, even if I’m going over budget for the month.
The important part of budgeting is not whether or not you hit a rigid number; it's that you try and find ways to deal with your costs and live within your means. If that means blowing your budget this month and living under budget next month, then you are certainly using a budget correctly.
In general, my goal is that the average spent each month for the year be at or under what was budgeted. Still, for those months that we know we're going to go over budget, I do have to make sure the money comes from somewhere.
Well, this is one budget area it may take some time to get under control in our house,.Our middle son lives with us, and he and my husband are both fast food junkies—sandwiches, Chinese, pizza–you name it. They both have demanding physical jobs, so it hasn't hurt them terribly.
However, I am a freelance writer and do internet marketing—so yes, I am pretty much tied to my computer for at least 10 hours every day, and eating junk makes it worse. I'm working on that, and I typically now just don't touch it.
Getting these two, however, to see the "financial" error of their ways is much harder. Any ideas?
I don't know that I have any ideas for you. We honestly weren't able to get our eating out budget under control until C lost his job. When it was suddenly pay off the car but not eat out or eat out but lose the car, we were able to go pretty much cold turkey. Then when our finances stabilized, we were slowly able to reintroduce eating out.