Budgeting, Britney, and Staying Afloat

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Budgeting, Britney, and Staying Afloat

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During our morning meeting, Brian mentioned reading an article about how much money Britney Spears spends per month. We laughed, since it's a soft story at best, but it reminded me of when I first moved out of my parents' house (kind of a while ago, alas)... in the days before online banking, I saved every ATM receipt and wrote down what the money was used for. At the end of a given month, I'd know what percentage of my income was going toward necessities, and what was going toward fun stuff, or, indeed, useless stuff. As my income was at a lemonade-stand strata, it was a crucial discipline that kept the rent paid.

I recently saw an interesting budgeting video (yes, there is such a thing) by a guy who lives without credit cards, and manages his cash with a series of envelopes. I've done this to some extent when shopping for groceries (bringing only enough cash to cover what I know I need, so that the surplus can be spent on whiskey), but this dude has it down to a science. [q
url="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071102/ap_on_en_mu/people_spears_custody;_ylt=Ai.M5Y.W.xU00oxk3XoiKaIDW7oF"]Court
papers released Thursday in Britney Spears' custody dispute with Kevin
Federline show she spends lavishly on clothes and entertainment, and
doesn't save or invest any of her roughly $737,000 monthly income.

Spears' monthly expenses include $49,267 in mortgage for two houses,
$16,000 for clothes and $102,000 on entertainment, gifts and vacation,
according to her financial declaration.[/q] Britney would need larger envelopes, I guess, at least for now.

(Disclaimer: I am not a financial consultant, as one can tell by the holes in my jeans, but I've never been overdrawn; 14 cents is still a positive number!)