Tallying Up My New Savings Plan: July Edition

Previously, on Nicole’s Budget: After discovering that I needed to save a lot more for freelance taxes than I had been previously saving, I set up a series of sub-savings accounts. Every Friday, I tally up all of the freelance payments I’ve received that week and put 20 percent towards taxes, 20 percent towards debt, and 10 percent into regular savings.

In July, I received $5,239.17 in freelancing income. I also received $383.40 in reimbursements for some of my San Diego/Los Angeles trip expenses, and I can’t remember whether I included those as “income” or not. Let’s find out!

Here’s what I put into my accounts this month:

Taxes got 20 percent, or $1187.36

Debt also got 20 percent, or $1087.32

Savings got 10 percent, or $593.68

It looks like I was bad at math this month. More accurately, I was probably bad at typing. It looks like there was a data entry error that I missed, because Taxes ended up with $100 more than Debt.

I also clearly counted the $383.40 in reimbursements as “income.” (In fact, it looks like I counted $5,930 worth of something as income, and I have no idea why. When I “balanced my checkbook” to write this piece, I did the math four times and I still only came up with $5,239.17 plus $383.40 in reimbursements.) Which means I overpaid into these accounts.

At this point, I could keep the extra money in taxes/debt/savings, but I’m also at that time of the month where my checking account is pretty empty and I need to prepare for my annual August trip to Intervention and a bonus visit with my sister and her husband. So let’s set things right.

If I had $5,239.17 in income in June, I need:

$1,047.83 in Taxes

$1,047.83 in Debt

$524.00 in Savings

And $2,619.59 left over for rent, bills, and everyday spending.

Time to re-do all my math since the beginning of May and make some adjustments. Because I promised myself I would set aside 50 percent of my income and not one penny more.

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