Savings and Budgets

I was a generous kid when young. Every cent that I received for pocket money was spent before the sun goes down. If I have excess cents on my way back from primary school, I would buy sweets or pencils from the mama stall, and then reached home penniless.

After all, my pocket money will come again the next day.
I only realised how important it was to save after I started being financially independent just before my 18th birthday.

On the other hand, my sister was damn thrifty when young. (I used to steal money from her piggy bank now and then) But she grew up being generous to the point that sometimes my mum thinks she spends on unneccessary things.

Fast forward to now...

I have been brainwashing educating my Wifey on the meaning of budget. You see, I gave her 35k budget to decide on the reno, furniture and electrical appliance.

After trying "very hard" to stick within the budget, she decided that it was not sufficient to create her dream home. Can't blame her, she's a perfectionist mah.

So after alot of coaxing, her wonderful husband budge and gave her an additional 5k to up her budget.

But not before reminding her that
(1) A BUDGET of $40k does not mean you spend ALL of $40k. It only means you try your best to spend as little as possible. But in the worse case scenario, you should NEVER spend a cent more than $40k.

(2) Renovation counts for little when you re-sell your house. So basically the more you put in renovation, the more you lose out when you sell the house.

(3) Electrical appliances can be shifted after we moved house. This is however no reason to get the "best" of its own kind. After all, a dollar saved is a dollar earned. And I'm pretty against paying for extended warranty. In the "rare" event that something fails during the extended warranty period, I rather get a new set.

That being said, my Wifey actually makes a good accountant/purchaser. She searches the Internet for recommendations, calls up shops for quotations, bargain down prices like what Aunties do (haha). She has a very systematic Excel worksheet that tracks the prices, the brand and model number of the electrical appliance etc... She knows at a glance how much more we should prepare in cash, and jolts down all those delivery dates.

She's like... almost as good as me. =p

Nothing escapes the planning of Wifey.

And she does all these planning after a long day at work because waiting for me will take forever.

Now that all the stuffs are almost done, lets do a bit of evaluation. The final amount used exceeded the 40k budget by just a little bit. But heck, she did such a great job that I will be inhumane and condemned by The Man above if I were to shake my head with disappointment.

I grade my Wifey a A+ for her efforts.

Behind the back of every successful man, there is a Wifey who helps offload his other burdens.

I heart my Wifey! ^_^