Sunday, December 7, 2014

Expenses--from Bottom-Up Data Review to a Top-Down Spending Model

Completing a bottom up approach (looking at past receipts, bank statements, etc) to figuring out your expenses and spending is a key part about this next step--taking a top down approach of to building a spending model to control what your spending should be.  They should really meet in the middle. Any model will have certain assumptions, but they need to be realistic for the model to be useful.  A top-down budget model that isn't achievable or aligned to your lifestyle and goals is just an exercise in frustration.

This spending model should not only accurately depict non-discretionary and fixed expenses, debt payments, and savings, but also capture things like eating out, entertainment, shopping, and similar discretionary categories.  I'd also recommend a reserve budget line (say 2-5%) for unknowns.  The goal at this point is to arrive at a spending model (a budget, if you like) where your expenses are less than your income.  Even if you can't get to that point, you'll now have a model for where your money is going so you can make informed decisions on where it should go.

The next step is for you to examine what you are spending and decide if it's in line with what you want to be spending.  This is where you will begin to shape your spending model so that it captures the things/services/savings/investing that are necessary, meaningful and important to you and your goals. I can't know what's important to you, and we don't yet know what the savings amount should be (though hopefully it's > 0, but we'll get to that, and it depends on any debt you have), but what's important at this point is to know where your money is going, have a basic top-down spending model that you can use to make conscious and informed decision about what you want your money doing for you.  Remember, that money was hard-earned--you exchanged a portion of the time you have left on this earth for it.  Make the most of that exchange.  

Next, we'll look in more detail at optimizing that spending model.

No comments:

Post a Comment