Budget Babes: On Our Own

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Our Income

Believe it or not, Aissa is doing pretty well as a bartender at the Happy Steps Club. She earns $47,468 a year.

Rebekah still loves fashion, but during the day, she works hard as a firefighter! I know, hard to believe, but true.


She currently makes $28,168 a year, but she hopes to get a raise soon since she single-handedly saved five people from a house fire on Simpson Street in Atlanta, Ga.

They have a combined income of $75,636.

Living Large in Arbor Lakes

While we know the advantages of purchasing a home, we decided to save up our money before plunging into the home market. Living on the southside definitely has it's advantages, but we decided to save money on gas and transportation costs by living in a modest apartment near our jobs.

After fussing and fighting for more than a month, we both agreed that Arbor Lakes Apartment Homes in Covington, Ga. would be the perfect place for us to start. Our new address is 431 Kirkland Road, Covington, Ga.  30016. Please do not drop by unannounced, we love you, but not that much.

At $755 a month for a two bedroom apartment. We try to keep the lights off when not in use, but we can't do without heat in the winter and air conditioning in the summer so our utilities are
$185 a month.

We saved a ton of cash by furnishing our apartment with items we found on Craigslist.com and at local Nearly New stores. You'll be surprised the good stuff some people throw away -- one man's junk is another man's treasure!

Riding the Bus is not the Move: Our Gently Used Automobiles

The Budget Babes are convinced that MARTA is not SMARTA, especially since the economic situations in Georgia have caused MARTA to reduce their routes and adjust their schedules.

Aissa bought a 2002 HONDA CRV LX for 6,853 (includes title and registration). She pays $146 a month .
Rebekah used her graduation money and splurged a bit on a 2003 Toyota Camry for $10, 853 (includes title and registration). Her monthly payment is $200 a month.

Car insurance from GEICO for both cars runs the Budget Babes approximately $185 a month.

We Had to Listen and Learn: The Economic Breakdown

A Little Splurging: Months Where We Had a Little Fun and Spent a Ton

December: Well, we try not to give in to the commercialism of Christmas because we know the real reason for the season, but we wanted to spread a little joy this year.
Our expenses:
Food: $600
Retail: &1,500
Entertainment: $400
New York Vacation: $1,100

February: All work and no play makes the Budget Babes dull and grumpy. This month, we had a housewarming party which caused our month food bill to increase to $800.
We also spent a lot more on retail. In fact, $2,000 was spent this month.

June: Well, what can we say? It was our birthday month. So we had a fabulous party and spent $1,500 on retail items and $300 on entertaiment. We'll have to do some overtime to make up for this, and we'll stock up on peanut butter and tuna.

Budget Babes' Budget Tips

We thought this was great advice. You can learn more at: Think Your Way to Weath

One of the easiest ways to control and manage your money is to create and live on a budget.
Unfortunately, creating and living on a budget is not always as simple as it sounds. For some reason, a budget has become known as the dreaded “B” word – and is something many people try hard to avoid putting down on paper and sticking to it. Perhaps it is the feeling of being constrained, or the feeling that you “earned” your money, so you can spend it however you want. But for a lot of people, using a budget is akin to self-deprivation.
It’s not that difficult in reality, though. In fact, creating and sticking to a budget can be pretty easy if you follow a few simple rules.

Figure out where your money is going.

If you haven’t been following a budget, you may not even know where your money is going.
Tracking a month or two’s worth of expenses from your receipts, bank accounts, and credit cards will allow you to see where your money is actually going. Are you spending a lot in just a few areas? Or is money leaving your account in small amounts- like a leaky faucet, drip, drip drip?

Examine your spending categories for areas you spend too much-and then reduce them.

Even if you cannot cut back on things like utilities, rent or mortgage, etc., you may be surprised that a lot of your spent money is hard to account for. You may be taking regular withdrawals from the ATM in cash, and might be spending it on a lot of different things. You don’t have to cut everything to the bone- in fact, if you trim your budget too much, you will find it hard to stick with your goal of managing your money wisely. So start slowly, but start somewhere.

Set a budget for each spending category, and stick to it.

After you set up your budget, it is important to stick to it. Make yourself (and your spouse or family, if you have one) a promise to try and stick to the budget you have set up.

Allow yourself from freedom.

Whether you call it an allowance, or fun money, you will have much better success with your budget if you have some freedom to spend money however you want. Putting a category in your budget for fun money, or “blow money”, as personal finance guru Dave Ramsey likes to call it, will allow you to spend money on things you want without “blowing” your overall budget, and without making you feel constrained.

Review your performance and revisit your budget on a regular basis.

Reviewing your performance is very important to sticking with your budget. If you don’t know how you are performing, you will lose interest pretty quickly- and will not not be following a budget fairly soon. After you are sticking with your 1st shot at budgeting, you can try to reduce your spending even more by trying to trim from some other areas.