Rant: tracked my spending for a month vs just guessing and the difference was brutal

I spent years winging it with my budget and always wondered where my paycheck went. But after using a free app for 30 days straight, I found out I was dropping almost $200 a month on takeout coffee and gas station snacks. Has anyone else had a reality check like that when they actually looked at the numbers?

2 comments

2 Comments

faithwalker22d ago

$200 on coffee and gas station snacks... that's my exact number too actually. I named it my "stupid tax" when I saw the receipt printout at the end of the month. I did the same thing with an app called EveryDollar and almost cried at the Starbucks category. The worst part was I didn't even remember drinking half of those coffees, so I was basically paying $4 to forget things. Now I pack a thermos and buy a box of granola bars from the grocery store for like $6. Saved $180 that first month and felt like a genius until I realized I just traded coffee for sour gummy worms at the checkout line. Some habits just move around I guess.

christopher_sullivan22d ago

Is $200 really that big of a deal though? People blow way more on worse stuff all the time. A couple of coffees and snacks a day isn't gonna bankrupt you unless you're already broke. And that thermos trick never works anyway, you always end up buying something at the gas station for the road. The real tax is probably just life being expensive no matter what you do.