Expenses Update: January 2017

Just a month ago, we actually established a budget of $42,000 for our expenditure in 2017. This translates to a $3,500 monthly budget and to give ourselves some leeway in the first few months, I gave an additional $5,000 buffer.

Unfortunately, in this month alone, we have used up $2,000 of the $5,000 buffer as there were plenty of birthday/wedding celebrations and Chinese New Year was also in January this year.Furthermore, we paid another $1,100 for two air tickets to Melbourne.

So honestly, the higher expenditure is not unexpected. I had actually anticipated our expenditure to be above $6,000 this month (1/7 of the budget) so I am actually quite happy for it to come in at only $5,500.

Let’s see if we can keep to an average of $3,300 for the rest of the year to meet the target.

The breakdown for January 2017 is shown below.

Eating Out: $1,060.10

Hawker ($292.80) – $10 a day for two people doesn’t seem like a lot. $5 per pax that covers most lunches and dinners. The occasional more expensive salads are mixed in with the typical cai pengs I eat for lunch.

Fast Food ($39.50) – A Mac breakfast together, two meals at MOS while I was out meeting some fellow bloggers and a Subway lunch for the Mrs. Pretty controlled on this front.

Restaurants ($727.80) – There was only about 10 entries but 4 were pretty mega. We had a semi-buffet at Equinox to celebrate the Mrs’ birthday. $69 since we had a 50% discount. A dinner at Uncle Leong with the Mrs’ cousin and family that was close to $150, a birthday treat for my father-in-law ($125) and another birthday celebration for the Mrs’ god-father ($200).

Groceries: $153

Supermarket ($30.50) – Surprisingly, 4 trips to the supermarket only sets us back by $30. Most of the reunion dinner stuff were either bought at the market or by my mother-in-law.

Wet Market ($122.50) – 4 trips to the wet market and I ran there twice on two occasions alone. It will be part of my Tues morning routine as I go there to grab chicken breasts, thighs, corn, sweet potatoes and vegetables.

Beverages & Snacks: $165

Snacks ($147) – The CNY goodies bought from Johor Bahru cost us close to $150. Most of them were intended as gifts for our students and friends.

Drinks ($18) – Sugar cane, Koi and Yakult bought from Johor Bahru. 

Utilities: $139

Electricity, Gas & Water ($42.45) – Electricity usage was much lower at 292kWh for this month as there were some days when we went without aircon. 28KWh of gas and 7.2 Cu M of water meant the bill added up to $92.45. The U-Save vouchers reduced the bill by $50.

Cellphones ($96.55) – $51.55 for me and $45 for the Mrs for our mobile services. Mine comes with upsized data.

Transport: $122

1 EZ Reload transaction for me and 1 for the Mrs. A wedding lunch at Sentosa and a cab ride in was inevitable.

Miscellaneous: $2,195

Clothes ($120) – We spent another $120 at Padini following two more trips to Johor Bahru.

Books ($60) – Some assessment books for my students.

Gifts ($880) – Two ang baos for the wedding lunch and CNY ang baos for our relatives. My in-laws gave us huge red packets which helped to offset half of our ang bao budget.

Travel ($1,110) – Two Emirates air tickets to Melbourne in May. Still deciding between a self-drive trip or to book guided tours.

Others ($25) – A haircut at JB for the Mrs.

Total: $3,834.10

Overall Total: $5,519.10 (included fixed expenses of $1,685)