Budget update

We are six months down and have a new update for our budget.  Good news...we are having an amazing time on this trip and are excited to continue exploring new lands, culture and family growth.  Bad news...it is still costing us $8004.74 on average per month for the six months we have been on the road. That totals our spending to $48,028.44 so far ( this includes our fixed monthly expenses of roughly $403 per month).  We still continue to live it up and the spending consequently follows.  As a reminder, we originally hoped to figure out how to average living on $3,000 per month.  We still have that goal in mind and are focused on figuring out how to cheapen the tab for our future travel.  We imagine that in the future, through all we have learned this year, that we will no doubt be best prepared to take extended time for travel and have a more realistic financial plan than we had prior to this trip. It's all a learning curve, albeit a steep one.

Here is the breakdown where I only hit some of the highlighted differences from previous months. For other categories that I skip over just consult my previous blog posts, "Money Matters: Month Two and Three" from my Sept. 21, 2018 post, and assume those budgeted categories are mostly unchanged.

Our month four (Sept.15th-Oct.14th) became our most expensive month in the sixth month period.  Erica and I knew that we definetely needed to reign in our spending when we saw the $10,436.97 figure.  Much of this increase was driven by our prepayments for lodging in Costa Rica of $1127.60 and our payment for New York City lodging for four nights of $1065.71. We chose to keep our RV at a Thousand Trails property in New Jersey for free while we maximized our time in NYC in a hotel in Manhattan. It was expensive but that is always the case in NYC and we felt that we did that four day trip as economically as possible for all that we were able to do there. We also stayed overnight in Philadelphia at a luxury hotel right in the middle of historic downtown as a treat to ourselves for $297.56. We slept like princes and princesses on the plush beds and each of us savored our shower time! Due to the fact that we ate out a lot during this period in the big cities of Boston, New York and Philadelphia, where food is very expensive, our monthly food costs hit a high of $2315.78. This month was our highest month so far in this category which we knew this leg of our trip would be in these East coast cities. Our activities cost spiked to $1046.47 and souvenier purchases spiked to $511.90 over the previous three month average in their respective categories.  Our gas expense dropped dramatically to $495.43 as we traveled shorter distances between our extended stays. Despite this savings on gas our "other" transportation costs were higher as tolls were $162.60, parking was $177.50 and Uber fares were $129.40 as we navigated the congested and therefore costly East coast.  

Month five (Oct.15th-Nov.14th) brought good feelings as we began the month in route to Washington D.C. and our monthly expenses of $7479.75 pulled our average month down.  I guess Washington D.C. is where you go to help lower your budget.  We lodged cheaply at a state park in Boston and absolutely loved it so we planned to do the same outside of D.C. in Virginia. The state and county parks are most of the time far better managed than private RV parks. They, like national parks, are always found in the most protected lands of our country and we are always happy to discover the unique landmarks that justify the protection being given to them.  For purposes of budget they are almost always cheaper than the RV parks...big bonus!!!  Our biggest expense during this month was $1814.02 on activities as we prepayed our three day trip in December to the Disney theme parks which accounted for $1378.00 of that.  Food continues to maintain at $1770.88 (we ate out a bunch the week in DC and continue to pay east coast food prices) and our lodging expense also was high at $1690.52 as we incured a $1285.00 fee for the rental house in Gatlinburg, TN where we stayed for a week with the Thornes family.  This month felt average from an expense standpoint and it ended up coming in slightly lower.

Our month six (Nov.15th-Dec.14th) was our slowest activity month so far as we spent quality time with our friends Joe and Amie in their home for two weeks at Thanksgiving.  We all enjoyed staying put for multiple days in a row. I think I went a full four consecutive days without leaving their property.  Joe and I, mostly Joe with my role as apprentice, spent one week tearing apart the RV to eliminate all the wet moldy wood from the front.  He used his masterful skills to rebuild the front to working order and therefore saved our budget a lot of money.  I estimate it would have cost me a minimum of $2500 to have done at a repair shop and Joe only cost me a few beers and some lunches to make it happen for the low materials cost of $439.76.  We are grateful for this and the monthly budget was too! It comes in at $5445.21, our second lowest month to date!  We did have a new category this period called Postage.  We have had multiple items, both school supplies from the kids CA charter school and some christmas gifts from Amazon, shipped to our mailing address in San Diego (our friend's house) They then had to ship it to another friend's house in Melbourne, FL.  It causes a bit of a mess and we are grateful for these folks putting themselves out to help us. This expense added up to $153.30. We will do our best to avoid this going forward.  This month's lower expenses felt really good and taught us that we can go lower if we just go slower.

The kids continue to live on their $20 a week that they saved up before leaving San Diego.  They are experiencing the freedom of having their own money to spend and of course the feeling of doing without when they spend all of their money within the first day or two of getting paid.  Boyd has saved his last two weeks pay so that he can hopefully purchase a Nintendo Switch in approximately eleven weeks time.  We'll see if he can meet his goal.  Blythe has now fallen in love with collecting LOL Surprise dolls and every Friday for the past month she has spent every penny of her paycheck on a few new dolls and their pets and accessories.  The idea of buying a "surprise" is baffling to me and this craze just continues to grow amongst my kids age group.  I guess it's similar to how I used to buy baseball cards.  The thrill of that coveted rookie card or the autographed card was worth every penny and common throw-away card.  I am writing this blog from my hammock in Costa Rica and wouldn't you know it that Blythe found Costa Rican LOL Surprise dolls in a supermarket here.  They are everywhere!

Peace and Love and Lower

Expenses!