January - February Expenses

The first month of my fiscal year has gone by.  I've made some changes lately that I hope to see bring my expenses down but I might not see the effects of them for a few months down the line.  My recent change to a prepaid plan is one example.  I should also be receiving a raise at work soon as well as the first part of my transportation expense in April.  This should go a long way in helping me hit my yearly goal of stashing 55% of my salary in 2013.

For January to February I had:

Income:
Paycheck: ¥299,904
Part Time Job: ¥16,619
Xmas Money: ¥8,970
Gympact: ¥1,794

Total:  ¥327,287

A respectable month I suppose. For some reason my taxes went up about ¥500 so it's pushed my main pay check under ¥300,000. My forthcoming raise should push my back up over however. I did some moderate work at my weekend job, received some late Christmas money and got paid twice from Gympact.

Expenses:

Total:  ¥173,275

Doing the math that leaves ¥155,012 left over that I invested.  That's a 47.36% savings rate.  Hmmm...  Well, that is below 55% but it's still pretty respectable.  As always dining out restaurants was expensive.  In this case it had to do with "entertainment" as well.  As I outlined before "entertainment" expenses and "eating out" expenses tend to go hand in hand.  In this case we went out with a spend-aholic friend of mine (doesn't make him a bad guy!) to watch sumo.  It was great but I paid for the ticket for both me and my GF and also for lunch and some of dinner.  That right there was probably 10% of my spending for the whole month!  And, just imagine this buddy of mine lives like this all the time!  

Bills were still quite high as I paid off my last month of Softbank postpaid service.  I also had to visit a clinic as I was having some pains in my wrist last month.  

A quick note as well.  Starting next month I will no longer be counting the "House" as an expense.  This will start going under my investments.  I think it's starting to get closer to being a real vacation house that can be rented out and that the money I'm putting into is not just getting thrown down the toilet like on a cellphone.