SPEAKER_0 [00:00:00]
Dramas, please.
SPEAKER_0 [00:00:13]
Yeah.
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:20]
This is life
SPEAKER_0 [00:00:22]
with a twist of lemon.
SPEAKER_0 [00:00:25]
Happy New Year, John.
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:26]
Happy New Year, Stanley.
SPEAKER_0 [00:00:28]
Did you ever figure out those New Year's resolutions?
SPEAKER_0 [00:00:33]
No. Not really. Alright. Well, looks like we're both in the same boat.
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:38]
Yeah. I'm just kinda
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:40]
living
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:41]
life flying by the seat of my pants.
SPEAKER_0 [00:00:44]
Nothing wrong with that. So are you back in Iowa now? Because you've been traveling all over the place. Right?
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:50]
Yep. Back in Iowa, we went to Milwaukee,
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:53]
and then we went to McHenry, and then we went to Dundee,
SPEAKER_1 [00:00:58]
and then we went back to McHenry,
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:00]
and then we went back to Milwaukee.
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:02]
And
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:03]
Saturday, we came back to Cedar Rapids, Iowa,
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:07]
and Emily, Anna's little sister, is coming
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:11]
tomorrow,
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:12]
Monday.
SPEAKER_0 [00:01:13]
So just to be clear, the places you mentioned that were not Milwaukee are in Illinois, so you were kinda just doing a little tour de Midwest.
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:20]
Yep.
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:20]
Seeing family,
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:22]
both sides of the family. You did not go to Indiana, though. I did not go to Indiana. I I noticed.
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:29]
I did not drive past your house
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:31]
and
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:32]
avoid seeing you this time.
SPEAKER_0 [00:01:35]
Right. Well, we missed you regardless
SPEAKER_0 [00:01:37]
of your proximity, John.
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:39]
You have never seen me in Indiana for Christmas.
SPEAKER_0 [00:01:43]
That's true.
SPEAKER_0 [00:01:45]
But a guy can hope. It's
SPEAKER_1 [00:01:47]
true. You'd have seen me over Christmas, but that's when you were in Illinois.
SPEAKER_0 [00:01:51]
Yeah. So this year, my family all came down to my house. We we piled everyone
SPEAKER_0 [00:01:57]
into my home, so there was not a reason for me to head north. I could have headed north, but there wouldn't have been anybody there.
SPEAKER_0 [00:02:03]
True. You know? So what are you gonna do?
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:06]
Yep.
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:07]
Yeah.
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:08]
So on my
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:10]
on my Christmas travels, I ran into a couple of listeners, some that I didn't know were listeners, some that I did know were listeners.
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:17]
One of them received a sticker, our fancy
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:20]
life with a twist of lemon sticker that we gave to people who donated to the support past Refinery campaign.
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:29]
And the comment was the purple thing is weird.
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:32]
So I kinda
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:34]
gave
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:35]
a half
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:38]
explanation of why your favorite color is lilac, but I think that you can explain it better
SPEAKER_0 [00:02:44]
than I can. Is this the episode in which we reveal
SPEAKER_0 [00:02:47]
the purpose of the color lilac? Is that what you're telling me?
SPEAKER_1 [00:02:51]
Sure. I mean, if you want to. Otherwise, it can just be a thing and we can keep pushing it off until somebody figures out why lilac is your favorite color. So just to be clear, it is not a purple thing or a purple sticker.
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:05]
It is lilac.
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:06]
Not to be confused with purple because they are different.
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:10]
And I am more than happy to go into the nuances of what exactly makes lilac,
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:17]
but that I will save for another episode. Suffice to say, purple for those who care
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:24]
is deeper and darker. So there you go.
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:28]
Man, I don't even know where to begin. So I I when I where I grew up, outside of my bedroom was on a corner,
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:36]
and there were lilac bushes that stretched the full length
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:40]
of the property.
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:42]
And so they were right outside my window. I could smell when they bloomed. I could see them. They were very, very lovely.
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:48]
And that that is the origin of why I have always been particular to lilac. Now the reason that it haunts me
SPEAKER_0 [00:03:57]
in in that friends bring it up and
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:00]
we make logos that are lilac in orientation,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:04]
is because
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:06]
of my wedding in which,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:08]
as a a very foolish young man,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:11]
my,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:13]
at the time, bride to be called me up to let me know that she had just met all of her bridesmaids. They had gone out. They had looked at dresses.
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:20]
They had picked out I don't I don't know. I think it was, like, green or something.
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:25]
And I
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:27]
reacted like, oh, no. No. No. No. No. No. You did not choose green.
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:32]
And
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:34]
missus Lemon rightfully was a little taken aback. I
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:37]
insisted
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:39]
that the color be lilac,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:42]
not purple,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:43]
lilac,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:44]
because I thought that would look really great.
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:47]
Again, mind you, this is
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:50]
the bridesmaid's dresses and arguably the vests
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:53]
of the individual
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:55]
men in the wedding.
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:57]
So,
SPEAKER_0 [00:04:58]
yeah, my wife proceeded to get very upset because she was very happy with the dresses that they had found.
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:04]
I was then upset because she was upset thinking that I was in the right. I proceeded to call up our friend,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:10]
the good right reverend George Borghardt,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:13]
who proceeded to instruct me,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:15]
or informed me that I was going to,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:19]
burn in the depths of hell,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:22]
due to
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:24]
my
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:25]
iniquity,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:26]
which is let let's just say that that was not the reaction I expected,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:32]
and he called me to repentance. I went, and I apologized to missus Lemon. I think we actually ended up having light blue,
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:38]
but the reaction that that
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:41]
reverend Borghardt gave me was more like, are are you kidding me right now? You
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:45]
just told your wife that she is not going to have the color that she chose for her bridesmaids at her wedding.
SPEAKER_0 [00:05:52]
And the line of reasoning was like, it is not your wedding stand. It is your bride's. It is her mother's. It is your mother's. It is your neighbor's best friend's daughter's aunt's second cousin's wedding before it is your own or something like that. And so, thus, my favorite color, lilac,
SPEAKER_0 [00:06:09]
has become a bit of a of a This is very important,
SPEAKER_1 [00:06:14]
on the Borgardt bit for those people listening who may or may not think that Borgardt preaches the law.
SPEAKER_0 [00:06:21]
There you go.
SPEAKER_0 [00:06:23]
He he definitely knows how to put a a young whippersnapper like myself into place when necessary.
SPEAKER_0 [00:06:29]
So
SPEAKER_0 [00:06:30]
that and and just to be clear too, I did not design the logo.
SPEAKER_0 [00:06:36]
You did ask me what I thought.
SPEAKER_0 [00:06:38]
I think you might have asked me for the proper color gradient.
SPEAKER_1 [00:06:42]
Right? I did ask for the for the hex code. Yes. Yeah. For the hex code.
SPEAKER_1 [00:06:46]
But it was not my the choice. Name. Yeah. I came up with the name Life With A Twist of Lemon, and I designed the logo. Nobody believes me when I tell them it was your idea, the name.
SPEAKER_1 [00:06:56]
I just know how to make you do things, Stan. Well, there's a lot about that. Alright, John. Now that we've explained the purple thing. Now didn't didn't you paint your first bedroom lilac or something like that?
SPEAKER_1 [00:07:07]
It Am misremembering? So Okay. The
SPEAKER_0 [00:07:10]
in the townhome, I don't remember what color we painted at first. It was probably this ugly peanut butter. That's just this whole other story. I we've we've moved into this house. We painted every room.
SPEAKER_0 [00:07:20]
What we thought was gonna be, like, this light beige, and it turned out to be peanut butter. And I mean, like, Jif peanut butter.
SPEAKER_0 [00:07:29]
When I finally repainted the master bedroom, yes, it came out a nice lilac.
SPEAKER_0 [00:07:35]
Nice. There's a strong possibility that the master bedroom in this house will also be lilac,
SPEAKER_0 [00:07:41]
and I will say that that both of those choices were not entirely mine.
SPEAKER_0 [00:07:47]
I had input, but missus Lemon has come around on the whole lilac thing.
SPEAKER_0 [00:07:53]
There has not been a lilac lemon mug yet, though. No. There has not. Well, okay. Shutterfly has a limited set of colors. So if
SPEAKER_0 [00:08:01]
I could pick any random color, I would totally choose lilac. That would be, like, a best of.
SPEAKER_0 [00:08:08]
You're referring, of course, to the mug I make every year, which started out as a joke and has long lived past the funny parts where Right. I didn't know what to get my friends for Christmas, so I took a whole bunch of selfies. Actually, I shouldn't say that I did this. Missus Lemon picked out all the selfies and arranged them. And, again, I provided input. Like most things in my life, I'm I'm more a willing participant than people think,
SPEAKER_0 [00:08:31]
on this mug, and then we printed a couple of them through Shutterfly and sent them off to friends.
SPEAKER_0 [00:08:36]
The problem is we're now, what, how many years into this, John?
SPEAKER_1 [00:08:39]
I think I'm the only one with the whole set still. So we have
SPEAKER_1 [00:08:44]
are we at four, or are we at five? I think we're at five. Did just get the fifth one? I think I just got the fifth one.
SPEAKER_0 [00:08:50]
So there you go. Alright. Gosh.
SPEAKER_0 [00:08:53]
You have to take a picture of all of them together or something and put it on the the Facebook page so people have some idea what we're talking about. This year is like weird. It went off it went off the standard design. Yep. Missus Lemon did that on purpose.
SPEAKER_1 [00:09:07]
Yeah. Just to mess with me. You bet. You bet. Still the nice size Shutterfly mug though, so it makes me happy. The big one. The big one. The proper size for coffee.
SPEAKER_0 [00:09:17]
Right. Anyhow, just to be clear, lest anyone think that my my ego really is this big,
SPEAKER_0 [00:09:23]
John named the podcast missus Lemon makes the lemon mugs,
SPEAKER_0 [00:09:27]
and and I just kind of chuckle the whole way through it.
SPEAKER_1 [00:09:31]
Right.
SPEAKER_1 [00:09:32]
Alright. Enough on Lilac and Stan.
SPEAKER_0 [00:09:36]
What do you wanna talk about this New Year? I wanna talk about budgeting because this is something that we we alluded to, I think, in the last episode a little bit, but we way back when,
SPEAKER_0 [00:09:46]
I think, touched on it and said we would pick it up at a at a point later on the podcast. And it seems to me, like, new year, new budget,
SPEAKER_0 [00:09:55]
kinda how to start budgeting. This might be a good thing. Like, an actually interesting thing rather than purple things
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:02]
and,
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:03]
coffee mugs to discuss. Right.
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:06]
So my first question for you, John, is
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:09]
how like, if if I'm going to, I think,
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:13]
summarize you and me in the budgeting realm, we both are avid budgeters. However, I think you are a more manual budgeter.
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:22]
I am a more automated budgeter.
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:24]
You obviously don't have children. I have children. So our budgeting,
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:29]
is very different. I think, if I remember it, you don't have credit cards, and I do have credit cards.
SPEAKER_1 [00:10:34]
Correct.
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:35]
Yeah. So
SPEAKER_0 [00:10:37]
I I think I'd like to start by just you talking about how you do your process, and I'll talk about mine, and we can kinda postulate on a good way to start.
SPEAKER_1 [00:10:45]
So this is interesting because I might take some hints from you when you talk about yours because I logged into Mint again to try to figure that out.
SPEAKER_1 [00:10:53]
But historically,
SPEAKER_1 [00:10:54]
as in all through 2018,
SPEAKER_1 [00:10:58]
basically,
SPEAKER_1 [00:10:59]
I put all the money that comes in in a month in a giant
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:03]
bucket,
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:04]
and that gets budgeted out for the following month. So
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:08]
I got paid what? We got four paychecks that came in in December,
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:13]
so that all goes will be budgeted in January.
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:17]
So I'm always budgeting a month out so I have at least a month buffer there.
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:23]
Do
SPEAKER_0 [00:11:25]
you when you say a bucket, are you you're using, like, a spreadsheet, or what are you using?
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:31]
Yeah. So
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:32]
I do it in a spreadsheet. I started out,
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:37]
actually, I can pull it up and tell you when I started. In 2015, I started this,
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:43]
and I put it in a spreadsheet.
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:45]
Basically, I have a section for income in, like, it's automatically calculated
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:50]
and then goes into available money for the next month.
SPEAKER_1 [00:11:54]
So I list out income source and amount.
SPEAKER_0 [00:11:57]
So how many how many different workbooks do you have in your spreadsheet? Is it just one?
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:03]
I have
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:04]
well, I do it in numbers, Stan, which you'll hate me for.
SPEAKER_0 [00:12:09]
Over
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:10]
here. So I have one per year, and then I have a couple kind of for reference. So I have, like, a saving sheet and a regular expenses of things that come up once or twice a year so that I can reference that when I'm budgeting things out. So let me ask you this. In a given month, roughly,
SPEAKER_0 [00:12:28]
how many
SPEAKER_0 [00:12:29]
expense transactions would you say you have?
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:33]
Oh,
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:34]
see, Stan, that is another spreadsheet,
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:37]
which
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:38]
was
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:38]
basically, I was applying things to our home budget,
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:42]
and my wife wanted to know where those things went.
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:46]
So I have a monthly budget for each month, and I just use the numbers
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:54]
the numbers template for that.
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:56]
So
SPEAKER_1 [00:12:57]
I'm usually around 70 transactions,
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:00]
which is probably far less than you. Yeah. It is probably
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:05]
probably, like, four times less.
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:08]
So
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:09]
out of curiosity then, like, I'm I'm trying to understand how do you how do you see what
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:16]
like like, I'm assuming you have some way of I've I've budgeted $200
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:20]
for this thing, and I've spent a $150
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:23]
for it, and you can see that you're 75%
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:26]
of the way there?
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:28]
So I don't break it out in
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:31]
percentages at all. I just have budget,
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:34]
actual
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:34]
expense, and what the difference is. So, basically, how much I have left to spend.
SPEAKER_0 [00:13:39]
And how do your expense transactions get into your spreadsheet?
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:43]
So following the numbers
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:46]
template,
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:46]
there is a transactions
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:48]
thing, and I manually
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:50]
put them in. There's a drop down category,
SPEAKER_1 [00:13:53]
and I select the category and put the amount in. And how often do you enter transactions?
SPEAKER_0 [00:14:00]
Maybe once a week. Okay. So you do you save receipts,
SPEAKER_0 [00:14:04]
or do you download them or, like, look at a web page? Like, what do you do to get them entered?
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:09]
I look at a web page.
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:13]
I could download them, but it's faster to just input them. So do you do you ever write physical checks?
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:21]
Very rarely.
SPEAKER_0 [00:14:22]
I did more when I was paying rent. What what do you do with those? Do you do you record those in, an old fashioned checkbook? How like I say old fashioned because it's just a piece of paper.
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:33]
So,
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:35]
generally,
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:36]
if it's
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:38]
generally, I'll apply them
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:40]
when
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:42]
the
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:43]
check is actually cashed.
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:45]
So if I budgeted something that I wrote a check out for and it's not cashed until the next month, I
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:51]
basically
SPEAKER_1 [00:14:52]
take those allocated funds and move them over to the next month.
SPEAKER_0 [00:14:56]
Okay. But, I mean, in order to do that, right, you do record that you wrote it. Right?
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:01]
Right. So there's
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:03]
my checkbook has a receipt that gets written out, like carbon copy paper.
SPEAKER_0 [00:15:08]
Okay. But you don't actually record that in your spreadsheets then until it clears? Until it clears. Correct. Gotcha. So do you ever find, like, someone holds on to a check too long and it kinda catches you off guard?
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:22]
Only once,
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:24]
really. I mean, what what the that usually happens is for gifts or wedding gifts, but I figured out how to write wedding checks so that the couple can actually cash them before their names get changed.
SPEAKER_0 [00:15:39]
That's that's also a good reason just to do cash in that situation.
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:43]
But Yeah.
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:45]
So
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:46]
but yeah. I mean,
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:48]
I don't know how many checks. I mean, I wrote a check for rent
SPEAKER_1 [00:15:53]
every month, but otherwise, I might write three, four checks a year. So it's not really
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:00]
an issue. It'd be interesting to see if this changes a little bit as you're a homeowner,
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:06]
because what I've found at least is that anytime I have a contractor
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:10]
of any sorts come to the house to do something, they almost always wanna check.
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:15]
Very rarely will they do a credit card because or debit card for that matter because they take a transaction fee, and they wanna walk away with some I mean, they would take cash, but I never have cash. So as an example, I had some blinds installed. I wrote that guy a check. When we first moved in here, I was writing checks left and right for,
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:33]
you know, cleaners and movers and all that stuff. Right.
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:36]
So I'll interested to see if you see kind of a shift in that. I still
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:40]
I still actually write a check to church. I don't,
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:44]
I don't normally do it electronically. I could, but yeah.
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:49]
So that's about all I write checks for these days. But Right. There are, like, between the contractors and then things like,
SPEAKER_0 [00:16:57]
you know, activities that kids are involved in, because that's another area actually where checks pop up a lot. I record all of them,
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:05]
and I do it I like, I have current copies in the the book, but I actually record them all electronically.
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:10]
I allocate them to the month that I write them out, and then k. I wait for them to clear. And most of the time,
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:18]
you know, thirty to sixty days they come through,
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:21]
every soft one's a little longer. That's that can be pretty frustrating.
SPEAKER_1 [00:17:26]
But See, you should just wait until they clear and then
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:30]
keep moving that along. Well Does Mint handle that some way? Can you mark it as cleared or something in Mint? Yeah. Yeah. I can record it as pending. So that's what I do. Like, we record every check-in there just like you would a checkbook.
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:41]
It allows me to kinda calculate my balances and then, you know, it's the way I view it is it's an expense for this month. And the fact that it hasn't gotten cashed,
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:51]
that's that's, you know, the
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:53]
I don't know. The the person who received the money's problem.
SPEAKER_0 [00:17:58]
But I need to like, I can't
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:00]
I cannot get to next month, right, and spend all of my budget and not have that money in there. So I just accrue you know, allocate it upfront.
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:09]
Interesting.
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:10]
Yeah. Now I,
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:12]
it's so you're pretty manual.
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:15]
I'm the opposite. I use Mint,
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:17]
which for those that are not familiar with it, it's an Intuit product. Intuit makes TurboTax,
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:22]
Quicken, QuickBooks,
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:23]
yada yada yada.
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:24]
I actually started using Mint before they bought it.
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:28]
It's entirely online. You give them all of your bank credentials, and they basically give you a grand old ledger across everything that you use, whether it's, you know, checking, investing, credit cards, whatever. You can see all the transactions. You can categorize them. One of the, I think, frustrating parts for a lot of people with Mint is that it comes with a preset,
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:51]
group of categories that you have, and
SPEAKER_0 [00:18:54]
they're like, the ones that they make, you can't delete. You can add your own, but you can't delete
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:00]
the existing ones.
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:02]
And I think that the primary reason for that is because they give you insight into kinda how you measure up with the rest of your, like, region Mhmm. And age group and so forth. So you can see, okay. I spend 20% more on food or that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:15]
I don't find a lot of value in that part of it, so I don't I don't really like
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:20]
I I never I'm never clicking around. And the categories that they use,
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:25]
I have,
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:26]
kinda pared down the ones that I actually use. So as an example, right, there's both restaurants and fast food,
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:33]
and I could break out,
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:36]
you know, I'm trying to think of a good restaurant. Mimi's Blue Meatballs and McDonald's. I could actually separate those into different categories, but in reality, that's not how I think of those
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:46]
those two expenditures.
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:48]
To me, that's Right. They're just all food. Right? So I just put them both in restaurants,
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:51]
and I ignore the mint fast food one.
SPEAKER_0 [00:19:54]
I think if you can if you can kinda frame it like that, Mint is a lot easier to use. And the nice thing about it is the only transactions that I ever enter in manually
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:04]
are the checks that I write. And again, those are pretty limited, but I I we plug them in, And when Mint sees them in my PNC checking account, it marks them as cleared, which is nice because then, you know, like, that's just happening automatically for me. The other thing is that as transactions are coming in, attempts to auto categorize,
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:23]
and it will you know,
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:25]
using past behaviors,
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:27]
plug in, you know, McDonald's or restaurants next time, that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:31]
So for me, it kinda it reduces the amount of effort.
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:35]
And then I've got my budget view, and it'll very easily show me how much I've spent per category, allow me to traverse over time,
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:43]
all that good stuff. So I'm I'm I'm a big fan. It it's, like, hyper optimized,
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:49]
for my situation.
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:51]
My wife can log in and use
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:53]
the same Mint account. So, you know, whether or not I'm writing the check or she is,
SPEAKER_0 [00:20:59]
that that just that just happens. And that was another kinda like killer feature for me was for both of us to be able to see everything and enter in things that we do.
SPEAKER_0 [00:21:09]
Right. Which I I'm curious, like, how does that work with with you and Anna?
SPEAKER_1 [00:21:14]
So I'm basically
SPEAKER_1 [00:21:16]
CFO of the Kohlmeyer household. She does have access to all the spreadsheets,
SPEAKER_1 [00:21:21]
but it actually happens when I go and do it. So
SPEAKER_0 [00:21:25]
Does she, like so
SPEAKER_0 [00:21:28]
sometimes,
SPEAKER_0 [00:21:29]
as an example, missus Lemon will be doing grocery shopping. Right? And she will be looking at her budget, especially near the end of the month and think, okay. There's x number of dollars left. Like, how does how does that work in your world? Is that something that you have to do yet?
SPEAKER_1 [00:21:43]
Yeah. So, generally, she just asked me, so how much do I have left to spend on groceries?
SPEAKER_0 [00:21:49]
He says, just get an Audible in the moment and roll with it? Yep. Pretty much. Alright. I respect that. I respect that.
SPEAKER_0 [00:21:55]
Yeah. I I feel like our world
SPEAKER_0 [00:21:58]
might just be a little too chaotic for that. So, you know, she might be in the grocery store, like, walking into the grocery store, making a game time decision based upon, you know, what Mint
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:10]
is is up to date with.
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:11]
And,
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:12]
you know, that goes for a number of different categories.
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:16]
It's it's always interesting because it's not like we don't have money to spend, but it's like we haven't allocated it towards that category.
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:22]
And and I think that
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:23]
is ultimately,
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:25]
like, one of the real benefits
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:27]
to budgeting. Kinda gives you a curb, kinda, like, guide you to be
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:34]
what's what's the word? Like, a good steward of what you've got, you know, just kinda tracking and allocating and being knowledgeable.
SPEAKER_0 [00:22:41]
And I'm probably not saying that as well as I should, John.
SPEAKER_1 [00:22:44]
Yeah. I mean, it makes sense. It kinda gives you permission to spend
SPEAKER_1 [00:22:48]
a certain amount in this category. So one that
SPEAKER_1 [00:22:52]
we sometimes have trouble actually using, especially during the winter months, is our entertainment category.
SPEAKER_1 [00:22:58]
So that kinda it serves as a track like, hey. You have this money to spend or clothing,
SPEAKER_1 [00:23:03]
stuff like that. So
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:05]
Do you roll those categories over month to month?
SPEAKER_1 [00:23:09]
Generally, no.
SPEAKER_1 [00:23:11]
Generally, if we have leftover
SPEAKER_1 [00:23:13]
funds from a month,
SPEAKER_1 [00:23:15]
it basically
SPEAKER_1 [00:23:16]
goes back into the big bucket and then gets split out again. So, generally, our savings line is higher the next month.
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:24]
So we there are some items that I span across month multiple months.
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:28]
As an example, the dog's grooming. Right? That only happens every, you know, six weeks or whatever. Mint kind of allows me to do that. Or the dog's food is another good example. But then there are items that in the past, I have set up to rollover.
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:42]
So entertainment being one of those. Right? So if I've got Right. Let's just say $200 allocated for entertainment, I don't spend it this month. It goes into the bucket next month, I've got 400.
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:51]
That kind of thing. I I think that's,
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:53]
like, some pretty
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:55]
purist envelope style
SPEAKER_0 [00:23:58]
budgeting, right, where you where you got
SPEAKER_0 [00:24:01]
what's left in there, you carry over the next month. I think that's a decision some people have to make whether or they wanna do.
SPEAKER_1 [00:24:07]
I think that makes sense for a lot of things like auto maintenance.
SPEAKER_1 [00:24:11]
Like, say, you have a $500 repair that comes up. If you spread that out over the months where you don't really have auto maintenance,
SPEAKER_1 [00:24:18]
that helps out a lot. Yeah.
SPEAKER_0 [00:24:20]
There's there's a whole, like, section of annualized things that I think can be
SPEAKER_0 [00:24:25]
tricky
SPEAKER_0 [00:24:26]
to figure out when you're first starting a budget.
SPEAKER_0 [00:24:29]
As an example, I don't know if you do you do you pay for your auto insurance, like, monthly or
SPEAKER_0 [00:24:34]
quarterly,
SPEAKER_1 [00:24:35]
semi annually, annually? Yeah. So I pay monthly
SPEAKER_1 [00:24:39]
just because there's not a huge difference with my insurance.
SPEAKER_1 [00:24:43]
I've looked into, hey. Let's just pay it a year at a time,
SPEAKER_0 [00:24:47]
and it really didn't save me any money. So Okay. Interesting. So with with my auto insurance in particular, I think my savings was, like, well over a $100 for the year. Yep. And that's, you know, that's a good stake. So I I
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:00]
I opt for that. Now the kicker is, right, you've got a significant chunk of change
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:07]
that has to get paid in a single round,
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:09]
and that can really throw a budget out of whack. I think, you know, Mint's ability to create a budget that spans multiple months so you can take that payment and split it apart and kinda save,
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:20]
I think that's that's really advantageous. We've found that helpful in the past.
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:25]
I think it's something that that folks who
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:27]
switch to more annualized expenditures
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:30]
should consider.
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:33]
So Right.
SPEAKER_0 [00:25:35]
I'm curious. So how did you start budgeting? Did you just start with the numbers template and then roll with it?
SPEAKER_1 [00:25:44]
Yeah. Pretty much. I mean,
SPEAKER_1 [00:25:46]
it really started when
SPEAKER_1 [00:25:50]
when I had
SPEAKER_1 [00:25:51]
moved in had more expenses. So when I moved in my own apartment and had all those things, basically, I was just keeping track.
SPEAKER_1 [00:25:58]
I had working two jobs, and I basically wanted to save the one income completely.
SPEAKER_1 [00:26:04]
And, yeah, I just did
SPEAKER_1 [00:26:06]
basic categorization
SPEAKER_1 [00:26:08]
starting with things like rent and utilities.
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:12]
So
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:13]
when I started budgeting, the first thing that I did,
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:17]
and this is I mean, this is a long time ago, was I wrote down all of the monthly recurring expenses I had, and I categorized those. And I just, like, month one,
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:28]
I just had those items and then everything that was left over. So as an example, right, we were,
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:33]
we we bought a house. We had, like, the mortgage,
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:36]
the electric bill, the gas bill. And granted, those were, like, they were arranged, but I I always chose the higher end of the range. I had a cell bill and, you know, back at in those days, a TV bill. And so I wrote all those down in a spreadsheet. Right?
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:50]
And I knew exactly
SPEAKER_0 [00:26:53]
what that was gonna cost. I knew what my income was, my my two paychecks a month, and, Sarah, there's two paychecks a month.
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:00]
And I took the difference, and then I just made sure that everything else, really everything that was on,
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:05]
my credit card at that time was
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:08]
less than that for the month. And that's how I started budgeting.
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:12]
From there,
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:13]
as I got tools to help me, then I kinda split that up into categories.
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:17]
But I think my first goal was, do I know how I'm spending my money,
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:22]
and can I spend less than I bring in? Right? Right. Which
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:26]
doesn't have to be complicated. I think that's kinda where I'm going with this, is I think sometimes, you know, you log in to Mint and you see the 30,000
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:33]
categories that they have, and it can be a little overwhelming when in reality, all you need to do to to, like, legitimately budget
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:40]
is have have really two
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:43]
places you spend.
SPEAKER_0 [00:27:45]
Right? One for, like, check writing and one for everything else, or maybe you do both. I don't I don't know. Whatever. But, like, you wanna you wanna see your recurring transactions, you wanna be able to split across everything else so that you can kinda see what that intake is. And for me, that was I wrote checks and I had a credit card. Just to be clear, I am not an advocate of carrying over debt on a credit card. I see credit cards like a handy tool to to swipe and track. I actually couldn't tell you what my interest rate is because I've never paid interest on my credit card,
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:13]
but I get a lot of points through it, and that's been pretty advantageous.
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:16]
But I digress.
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:17]
I used the credit card initially to track all of the nonrecurring things. So I wrote checks for everything that was recurring, credit card for the nonrecurring. I just used that as, like, my first boundary.
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:28]
And then from there, I was able to, like, okay, download
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:32]
the
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:33]
credit card transactions.
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:34]
Again, this is, like, a long time ago, over a decade before tooling,
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:38]
and categorize just the things that were a giant eagle because I know those were largely groceries. Right? Right. And I could do the same thing with fuel just by eyeballing it. As things grew, as tooling became better, I was able to, like, move it into mint and kinda leverage all of that. But, again, I I stick to, like, big bucket categories.
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:56]
So,
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:57]
you know, groceries,
SPEAKER_0 [00:28:58]
restaurants
SPEAKER_1 [00:28:59]
How many categories would you say you use? Are you reading through them now?
SPEAKER_0 [00:29:03]
I'm not. I can if you keep talking, I'll pull them up and tell you because I don't actually
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:08]
I'll run through mine. I have
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:10]
15 categories,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:13]
and that's auto maintenance, charitable giving,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:16]
Christmas,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:17]
I budget for Christmas throughout the year,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:20]
clothing,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:21]
dining out, education,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:24]
which mostly falls under,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:26]
stuff Anna spends for school.
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:28]
Entertainment,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:30]
gas,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:31]
groceries,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:32]
home,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:33]
covers things like cleaning supplies, stuff like that. Insurance,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:38]
a miscellaneous category,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:40]
the mortgage,
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:41]
and savings
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:42]
and utilities.
SPEAKER_0 [00:29:46]
So I think that normally,
SPEAKER_0 [00:29:48]
oof, I have a lot more than that.
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:52]
Well, you also have Mentato categorizing
SPEAKER_1 [00:29:54]
them for you.
SPEAKER_0 [00:29:56]
Well, but but on the budget, you get to only specify which categories are part of your budget. Uh-huh. And then when transactions come in that aren't part of the budget, they actually appear
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:05]
down below separated,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:07]
and you so I always go in and I check those and recategorize
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:10]
them.
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:11]
But, you know, for me, I'll just run through these.
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:15]
Gas, like auto gas,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:16]
Internet,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:17]
my cell phone,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:19]
television, which is actually subscriptions like Netflix, utilities, which is actually both my gas and my electric all in one big lump sum,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:28]
life insurance, groceries, restaurants,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:30]
church.
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:31]
I have a pharmacy,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:33]
line item.
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:34]
I have my mortgage. I have the kids dance,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:37]
you know, thing that they do, dance class.
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:41]
I've got pet food, pet grooming,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:44]
and then let me see here. I've got my kid's savings accounts,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:48]
software subscriptions, which is like my Apple Music and whatnot.
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:52]
And then last but not least is my miscellaneous,
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:55]
which is
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:57]
increasingly
SPEAKER_0 [00:30:58]
larger, but it's it's like I go buy paper towel or
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:04]
you know, I'm trying to think of another good example.
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:08]
Just like those oddities that you can't really categorize in anything else because I used to try and, like, break them up into bits and pieces, but they they tended to always come out regardless of how I categorize them into the same amount every month. I was like, you know what? I'm not gonna stress
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:22]
fine graining this. I'm just gonna call it miscellaneous and toss it in there, which
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:27]
budgeting purists will cringe at, but, you know, it is what it is.
SPEAKER_1 [00:31:31]
Yeah. So generally, I put that kind of stuff in home,
SPEAKER_1 [00:31:35]
which could probably be renamed to something now that I actually own a home.
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:39]
Yeah. I mean, it's it's like it's stuff you need. Right? So, like, I'm gonna go out. I'm gonna buy a little bit of spackle
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:46]
tomorrow, right, to do a little bit of patchwork.
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:49]
And do I do I really need to go through and create, like, a home improvement category
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:53]
just for this month? Probably not.
SPEAKER_0 [00:31:56]
So I'll just toss in the miscellaneous. Because, you know, it's like a it's got $4 thing of spackle or whatever. Like, it's not even worth
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:02]
creating it'll take me longer to actually create the the thing.
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:07]
But I I don't know. It's I think it's just a matter of what is helpful.
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:11]
And for me, again, it's just it's just not been worth
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:14]
hypergranularizing.
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:16]
Now I do
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:18]
I start every month with the same core set of categories, and then I do, like, nonrecurring
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:23]
categories as well Oh, interesting. Unique to the month.
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:27]
And so I have a I actually have a spreadsheet
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:29]
of annual
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:31]
things that I know come up. It's like my Amazon Prime subscription.
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:34]
Right? Right. And in that that open buffer that's usually there, each month, I'll create specific items for that. If I need to, I'll plan out ahead.
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:44]
You know, an oil change is another one that to me, it's just not that big of a chain or, like, a transaction, so I'll just create it in the month I need it. But I try to do that upfront.
SPEAKER_0 [00:32:53]
You know, keep an eye on it. So I'm I'm not as I'm not as scientific perhaps as you are, and I don't do as many, like, spread across the year kind of things. Right.
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:04]
I
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:05]
think the bottom line is a budget's a real helpful tool. I think you hit it on the head when you said it gives you permission
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:12]
or it can give you permission
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:13]
to spend your money in certain ways. Right? To know,
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:17]
a a way to spend
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:19]
what you have and not what you wish you had
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:22]
Right. And thus to not get yourself in a pickle. It all also, I think once you go through the process of knowing what's recurring and you kinda get some of those core categories together, it becomes a lot easier
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:33]
to actually start saving.
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:35]
And that's, I think, critical because,
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:38]
you know, regardless of where you
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:40]
sit on
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:41]
the political spectrum,
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:43]
right, people are getting older
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:45]
and Social Security is is getting
SPEAKER_0 [00:33:50]
thinner, we'll just say. Like, there there's not as much money there as the amount of people that are gonna need to withdraw from it. And so I don't know how that ends, and you don't know how that ends. And so it's good to, you know, kinda control your own destiny to have savings
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:03]
and to be able to support yourself. Not to mention, if something goes wrong, like, maybe you lose your job or,
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:10]
you know, your washer breaks down, whatever. Like, you wanna be able to have some savings to be able to deal with those situations as they arise. Right.
SPEAKER_1 [00:34:20]
It makes it a whole lot less stressful then too.
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:24]
Exactly.
SPEAKER_1 [00:34:25]
Like, where are we gonna find money for food because we had to get a new furnace when it's 10 degrees outside.
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:30]
Yep. You don't wanna be in that situation
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:33]
that that causes you to do things you regret, and it also can make things a lot more expensive by, you know, either maybe taking out a a home equity line of credit or
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:44]
using a credit card with really ridiculous interest rates.
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:48]
And then, you know, something that was, let's say, gonna cost
SPEAKER_0 [00:34:52]
a thousand dollars is gonna cost maybe 1,200 or whatever. Right? Like, you know, whatever the situation might be, it becomes more expensive because you didn't kinda plan out ahead of time. And, again, $200,
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:03]
like, that's a trip to Saint Elen's in Indianapolis,
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:07]
you know, steak and a shrimp cocktail.
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:10]
Right.
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:13]
So
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:14]
well, John,
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:15]
I think this is officially our budget episode. What do you think?
SPEAKER_1 [00:35:20]
Yeah. I mean, there's probably more that we can talk about. So if you're listening, you have questions, feel free to drop us a line on social media, facebook.com/twistoflemonpod,
SPEAKER_1 [00:35:32]
SPEAKER_1 [00:35:34]
or there's a contact form on our website now.
SPEAKER_1 [00:35:37]
That's twistoflemonpod.com/contact,
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:41]
I think. Maybe contact dash us. But yeah. It remains to be seen if that contact page will last,
SPEAKER_0 [00:35:49]
though, just to be clear. Yeah. I think we're at a point now where we're getting spam about once a day.
SPEAKER_1 [00:35:56]
One of these days, I'll sit down and work on the website.
SPEAKER_1 [00:35:59]
So
SPEAKER_0 [00:36:00]
John.
SPEAKER_0 [00:36:02]
Sorry, man. One of these days, we're gonna get, like, a legit email through there and I'm not gonna notice it. I'll
SPEAKER_1 [00:36:08]
send it to you, Stan. We both get those contact forms.
SPEAKER_0 [00:36:11]
Alright. There we go. Good deal. Well, on that note, my friend, happy New Year and until next time.
SPEAKER_1 [00:36:17]
Later.