The website that saved my marriage

OK, so it wasn’t really in trouble to begin with. I just like catchy headlines.

Like a lot of couples, though, money and decisions about how it is spent or saved is a tough area.  I originally signed up for PearBudget, the web-based expense-tracking and budgeting tool when we first moved back to the States. But, it’s only been in the last month that we’ve been consistent about using it to track all of our receipts and income.

For some reason, it is tons easier for me to use than stand-alone programs like Quicken. It’s very easy to edit categories and other information. You can budget for both monthly and irregular expenses, and you can easily see where you are in relation to your monthly plan at a gance. We’ve really been able to see where our money is going and set realistic goals for budgeting and saving. I think we were both surprised that the areas we thought we were wasting money weren’t so bad, but we have problems in areas we thought were a non-issue. For example, we really don’t eat out very much, but we do spend way too much on groceries for  a family of three. (The cats eat cheap.) I attribute this to my love of trying new recipes, which has resulted in a cabinet full of rather exotic herbs and spices, and jars of various international condiments in the fridge. We’re prioritizing meal planning and sale shopping this month to see what we can do in that area.

I really liked this post from Small Notebook on what to do with a budget once you’ve got one. Rather than feeling constrained by ours, I feel it makes us both feel more in control and better able to talk about what we want and how to get there than we were before.