Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Sylvia's Financial Update

She now has two paychecks under her belt, and while she made fun of me after the first paycheck, Sylvia was eager to YNAB her second paycheck!

I've been reading Elizabeth Warren's All Your Worth, and taking a page from that, I insisted she first put 20% of each paycheck in Emergency Savings. Sylvia agrees with this method. [required disclosure: Amazon affiliate link - may result in a small amount of $$ for me]

The book goes on to state that your must-haves should equal no more than 50% of your income, and then the remaining 30% can be spent on wants. My must-haves exceed that for sure, but Sylvia doesn't really have any. So we're left more to YNAB's way after that: what does this money need to do before she gets paid again?

We next give the proper funding to Transportation and Spending Money (for lunches - she can make them at home or spend her own $$). Transportation is for the bus to get her to work.

After that, I let her decide how much to put in each of her Fun categories, which are currently Prom, Grad Night, Senior Ditch Day and Shopping. She is also putting some in her Gifts category.

I'm pretty thrilled that she's got the budgeting bug and hope she keeps this up! How I would love for her to do better than me at this from the start and throughout her adult life!

Oh! And Happy St Patrick's Day!




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