For my first Sunday Spotlight post I decided that I wanted to share with you my yearly totals for spending/saving in 2010. This year my hubby we budgeted for me to spend $150 a month for our groceries/household items. I was hoping to spend less than this amount and was very pleased that when we ran the excel numbers that I spent on average a month…drumroll please…$136.96!
My average was right at $130 a month going into December however this year we hosted Christmas for my in-laws and our total went up as we suspected it would. We are still VERY pleased that we came in under budget! The most exciting part of this is that we eat ONLY organic milk and cage free eggs which is included in the budget. In addition we eat as much organic fruits, vegetables, and meats as we can. I won’t compromise our health by using coupons and feel very good about it!
In addition, I lost 35 pounds in 2010 and my hubby lost 30. We were able to incorporate lots of fresh fruits and veggies by utilizing overage and strategically using coupons. I am going to be posting more on this in 2011 and we have a new coupon class called “Couponing to a Healthy You” that we are teaching in 2011!
Next year my budget is $150 a month for groceries and household and I think that is a very realistic amount for us. I obviously would love to come in again, under budget but I feel very solid with that number.
For the items that I brought into the house I would have spent $5,709.56 however I only spent $1647.08. The savings was $4066.08 or 71%! This is a huge savings for our family. I was basically able to save $4,660.08 this year from our families budget!
As you can see by strategically using coupons to build my stockpile it is well worth the time and energy! If you are interested in learning how to save like we do you can start by reading our Stockpiling 101 series or by taking one of our classes. We are going to be offering Webinar’s later this month for those of you who are not local to us.
Here is an excel spreadsheet for you to use to track your savings.
I would love to hear how you did in 2010! If you know, please leave a comment here or link up to this post with your savings.
Subscribe Box
{ 23 comments… read them below or add one }
Awesome!!! We saved over $12,000! (I subtract my OOP compared to what it would cost if I went in the store and bought it). I could not have done this without sites like your site! Thank you : )
Way to go Mindy!
That’s excellent – good for you! Please don’t take this the wrong way, but I have to say that I never understand when women talk about their husband setting a grocery budget for them. Frankly, I would be embarrassed to say something like that – it makes you sound like an irresponsible child which you *clearly* are not!
I don’t take it the wrong way at all! You have to understand that we “set” it together however we live by a very detailed budget which is what allows us to be both Debt Free and for me to continue staying home. I don’t take any offense at all. Living by the budget is what enables that. My husband is the one who monitors the finances and budget in general.
KBCMOM
Quite the opposite, setting a budget is very responsible. Unless you have all the money in the world to spend you definitely need a budget. I’m sure she and her husband set the budget together and agree on where they want the money to go. Good job Stockpiling Mom
Thanks Nita! Be on the lookout for a great post tomorrow on How to create a family budget, written by hubby
Nita, I have *no* problem with setting a budget – never said that I did.
Melissa, I’m glad to hear you’re both involved in setting the budget – that wasn’t the impression I got from the initial post.
From this post? I did say ‘hubby set” so I changed it to “we”.
We are very much a TEAM here at our house
Thanks for looking out for me, but no worries.
I will be honest that hubby handles our finances because he is a business major and honestly just does a great job at it but I am very aware of everything related to them.
How many mouths does $150 feed? I’m impressed you eat organic for this budget. We budget $300 month for a family of 4 and only drink organic milk, fruit and veggies.
3 and are big milk and egg eaters…
Thanks!
Melissa…that’s awesome. Do those numbers include your stockpiling budget to or is this just the extras you have to buy monthly that do not go on sale? I think I did pretty well this year although I have no records to speak of….just my stockpiling closet. Hope to keep better track this year and to help my church start a coupon swap program. Many of the women at the church say they want to use more coupons and were surprised by the amount that I spent for the items that we donated to the food pantry this fall. Any advice or suggestions? currently we have a lot of ziplock bags pinned to a bulletin board and labeled into categories similar to the way we organize our binders.
Oh no this is our total grocery/household budget. So everything we consume in the month is included. I use an excel spreadsheet to track my expenses.
Do you mean at church this is how you have your coupons organized?
This is amazing! I need you to hold my hand and help me go shopping. And then help me cook. I need more details on how you did this! I mean that’s fantastic!
Krystal are you local to us? You should come to one of our classes
I live in Louisville, KY. It’s not too far. I’d love to take the Couponing to a Healthy You class, because it seems like so many coupons are for the unhealthy junk foods. I may try and get a sitter one day and come up for that class.
Louisville is not far at all
Would love to have you come up!
That is awesome! I am trying to do this myself and would like to keep track using your template, but when I tried to download it, it said that I had to purchase WinRAR license. Am I doing this wrong? Thanks for any info!
Do you have EXCEL?
Yes, I have regular Excel – that’s why I was so confused…
Anyone who has a problem please email me at stockpilingmom @ fuse (dot) net and I will email it directly to you
Do you have any online classes, I don’t live near and would love to know how you do it?!!! The healthy way.
We are going to offer webinars later this month!
That’s fantastic! I can’t wait to see the webinars!
{ 4 trackbacks }