It’s Saturday and I decided to go over my monthly bills. Not only personal bills, but for my company as well. As a business owner responsible for employees, it’s really important to budget. Although I do have a healthy bank account, I also like to watch my spending. I’ve been told I am cheap with weird things before, but that’s okay, lol. I would rather spend two hours searching the internet for cheap bins for the warehouse before placing an order for them on Amazon, things like that. But hey, we all have to allocate our money the way we want to. I mean it’s our life, right?

I have friends who spend every dollar they make. Like every. single. dollar. I also have friends who work their asses off to buy a Chanel bag so they can look good for others. I have friends who save and are so cheap that they won’t even go out to lunch throughout the week. I have all types of friends with all different budgets. So, I got to thinking, “Are we really budgeting properly?”

Average monthly expenses can range from $3,189 for one person to $6,780 for a family of five. Without a budget — or come to think of it, even with one — you may wonder how your average monthly expenses compare with what’s “normal”. I guess it all depends on what you make. I don’t know where the internet got this number, but I added up my bills and they are about $15,000 a month, sheesh! And I’m not living in a mansion either (#goals for later this year…). Although this does include various rental costs for my business as well, it’s still high. And we won’t even mention the AMEX bills, because we KNOW how I love to travel, lol.

The basic rule for budgeting is the 50/30/20 Rule. Divide up your after-tax income and allocate it to spend: 50% on needs, 30% on wants, and 20% put towards savings (or paying off credit cards). Unfortunately, with people still feeling the aftermath of the pandemic, most people are not saving.

So, how should you budget? Here’s the process I used today, maybe this will help you as well! I’m also sharing a few websites I found online along with a link for the planner I used.

Personal Budget

-First, take all your monthly bills and add them up.

-Then, add up your after-tax income. Hopefully there’s enough income to cover your bills, but if not, here’s a link with some side hustles to boost your monthly income.

-After that, take your bills and divide them by 4. That’s what your bills come down to weekly. I’m a HUGE fan of prepaying things! I love to mark my bills off my white board and see how far ahead I am.

What I mean by that is, I keep a special whiteboard where I list off all of my bills, make a chart, and mark them off. I add the date each item is due, which card it’s being charged to, and the amount due. These are your hard costs. While I’m not that great of a budgeter on groceries and things like that since its just me and Baron, the hard costs have to be budgeted. I’m fortunate to not have any debt or loans since I grew my company organically, but there are still a lot of costs to maintain the life I live. I mean, Botox isn’t free, and neither are my IV’s or anti-aging treatments, lol. Thankfully I’ve got all the free skincare I need, and that certainly helps! Lol.

Business Budget

If you are a business owner, then you absolutely need to do this. This is how to calculate your economic operating costs projections — what you need to make to keep the doors open!

-First, write down all of your business bills (electric, payroll, insurance, website operating costs, rent, inventory costs per month, marketing dollars, all of IT!!!) then add them up…

-Next, take the total and divide it by how many hours you’re open per week. For me, its 24-7 (168 hours). If you are a retail shop or a business with limited hours, you’ll need to add up those hours of operation. This number will give you the number you’ll need to make per hour to survive.

Example: Say you need to make $20,000 per month to cover costs and you’re open say 10am to 7pm, Tuesday through Sunday. That’s 48 hours a week or 192 total hours. That means you’ll need to make $104/hour on average or your f**ked, lol… OR you’ll need to earn $833 a day or $4,999.99 per week.

If you have an online business, you need to maximize and make sure you are making money 24-7 to get your averages in. I did my calculations for this for my warehouses, factories, and stores today! Honestly, it felt freeing knowing where the money is going.

According to 2019 figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average monthly grocery bill is around $387 per month. That’s very off for me! I think as far as budgeting groceries and household items, you need to take inventory of what you are spending now and see where you need to make cuts. I’m a huge fan of meal prepping, probably because I am extremely busy, and I love to have my food ready to go. Meal planning and juicing has been way easier for me to budget.

Here are some useful links that I found online for budgeting. Inbox me with any questions and I’ll be more than happy to answer them! If you want to share your own budgeting process, tag me with pics and I’ll repost you!

– What Is the 50/20/30 Budget Rule?
– 50/30/20 Budget Rule with Printable Worksheet
– And here’s a link for the budgeting journal I use!