Comments on: Living on Cash

By: Hilary

Hilary — Mon, 25 Apr 2016 00:47:53 +0000

In reply to Jami. Sounds like separate accounts works well for you (and you sound SUPER organized!)

By: Jami

Jami — Mon, 18 Apr 2016 18:05:13 +0000

My husband and I have separate accounts. We decided years ago who would be responsible for what. I have 2 car payments, all groceries, private school tuiton, school lunches, before & aftercare for our child and medicine. I also pay for my own medical insurance, supplemental retirement account, clothes, make-up, lunches etc… I take my account down to mere dollars between paydays. I clothes shop 2x’s a year only. With the 26 pay periods I strategically skip 1 of each of the car payments, One I use the money for school uniforms in July, the other I skip at the holidays and use for Christmas. I have every paycheck planned out on a spreadsheet for the next 10 years with major purchases, holidays etc already listed. I like having the separate accounts, it holds us responsible. If one of us ever has to go to the other one to ask for help, we had better have a good reason why!

By: Hilary

Hilary — Tue, 13 Jan 2015 03:39:44 +0000

In reply to Lynness.

Haha, I’m WAY too tight… probably. But it did get us through graduate school. 🙂 My husband’s the same way….

By: Hilary

Hilary — Tue, 13 Jan 2015 03:36:40 +0000

In reply to Esther - sewpollyesther. Esther! That's wonderful! 70%! It does help you use cash!

By: Esther - sewpollyesther

Esther - sewpollyesther — Sat, 10 Jan 2015 15:42:52 +0000

We started doing this about 6 months ago, It cut our none essential spending by about 70%.

We have sections in a plastic wallet for Lunch Money (for my husband), Dinner money (when the girls and I have food after gymnastics at the local leisure centre each week), Clothes money and Fun/everything else money.

I do all my grocery shopping online which helps massively in terms of controlling costs because I can see at all times if I am over my limit and change items around depending on how much I have spent. If I buy anything else using the card I take the cash from the ‘fun’ envelope and move it into the back of the folder to put towards the next months cash.

By: Lynness

Lynness — Sat, 10 Jan 2015 03:33:18 +0000

Ooh, just think what a tightwad I’d be if I used cash only. My husband already thinks I’m stingy enough! I took back the carrots and lettuce he bought at my request on the way home from work a couple of days ago b/c he didn’t get the freebie and the right ones on sale. I just look at it as wise management: I don’t budget, but I also only buy things we need and only if it’s a good price. I know what goes on sale regularly at what prices and I’m not usually willing to pay more than that, but he doesn’t know prices. And if it rings up wrong, I’m willing to speak up, but he’s not…

By: Hilary

Hilary — Sat, 10 Jan 2015 00:24:47 +0000

In reply to Havok. It's amazing what a little accountability does for a person!

By: Havok

Havok — Fri, 09 Jan 2015 22:23:59 +0000

I used to do this! Every other week after I got paid, I would take out 100$ for spending money – lunch at work, fast food dinner (back when that was an often thing, ha), that sort of thing. Basically, play money. If I needed to make an actual purchase, I would use my debit card, but for just *whatever* stuff, it was all in cash. It helped me be more aware of what I was spending, because I only had that 100$ for the two weeks.
Now, as I’m not at the bank hardly ever, we just use our cards, but I do write down alllll my purchases in a section in my planner, to keep aware of what I’m spending. It’s rough to have to write down more than 50$ for groceries!