The Secret Society Of Knock-Off Rich People : Our October 2016 Family Budget Update (2024)

THE SHOW MUST GO ON EVEN IF YOU’RE BROKE

I’ve had enough of playing the role of rich person when I’m not and I just want to be normal. This was part of an email conversation I had with a fan who is struggling with guilt over his debt and underlying reasons for wanting to appear rich when he’s just part of a secret society of debt clogged consumers living in Canada.

Pretending to be wealthy won’t make you wealthy, it makes you clumsy with your money which can and potentially will affect your present and future. If you truly believe that you can succeed by sloshing through crowds of affluent people with a line of credit or a slew of credit cards will help achieve your fortress then follow your dream.

Upscale performance of a life-time

The most expensive position you will ever have in your career is the one that you created that doesn’t exist. So you landed a role in the movie titled, “Upper Class” and you’re the star of the show. Is that a real Gucci Bag? Heck ya, I bought it when I was travelling in the UK.

Lights, Camera, Action…you’re LIVE.

In the back of your head you keep the story on fast-forward ahead of conversations so you always have something to say. Messing up your lines might mean that you’ll let people know you’re not rich but rather part of that secret society of people who are in debt and hide it. Many of them hide it well especially if they have been given access to money from banks, credit cards or borrowing it from parents or other family members.

The secret society of debt are composed of financial sinners who;

want everyone to believe they are wealthy
want their family to believe they are wealthy
want their friends and acquaintances to believe they are wealthy
want strangers to believe they are wealthy

The keyword here is, “believe” and although this word can be used as a motivator it can certainly be used as a cover-up which is the case for people who want others to shower them with praise for their financial success.

In fact, most people who struggle in the secret society don’t know how to stop the story they’ve started in order to re-wind and live a normal life with people who don’t care how much money they have in the bank. Often it’s a case of-I don’t want to stop because I like this way of life although I know It can’t go on forever.

You wake up wondering how you’re going to pull off another day of living like you’re well-off when you’re really just an average consumer in a debt coma. It’s a rich person’s hell because these actors spend more time getting ready to act than they do actually paying down debt and building wealth.

I’m almost certain that most of these secret society actors won’t see any projected wealth building for quite some time unless they break-free and quit their acting life for a real life. I don’t know why so many people want to cash in on pretending they are rich because the harder you dig the further down the hole gets.

There is no ladder for you to walk up from your mess, you need to build it and that takes time which is why you need to free yourself from conforming to what you believe you need to do so others view you as affluent and successful when all you are is nothing more than a wanna-be.

Secret Society members pay the price

It doesn’t pain me to see someone claim bankruptcy because it’s not my business for one and it’s not my life. What bothers me the most is when there are children involved or unsuspecting spouses who don’t know they’ve become part of this secret society keeping everything hush for the sake of sculpting the perfect family photo.

Have you ever heard that rich people avoid the poor because they have nothing in common? In part this may be true however not all wealthy people create a wall between themselves and who they believe are worthy to be in their circle of friends or to become business partners. This could be considered a secret society for the rich, except most often it’s not so secret for those who put it on display. An elite club comes to mind.

There will always be a cliques of people most of them consisting of similar wealth levels comparable to high school. You know how the rich kids hang out with the rich kids, the smart kids hang out with the rich kids, the rich kids hang out with the smart kids, the poor kids hang out with the poor kids and the kids who try to fit in with everyone. It happens and it will continue to happen, until we die.

The ultra rich want to extract knowledge from other wealthy people so they can continue to build their fortune. Business is always brewing whether on the job or not for the rich man’s/woman’s club. They don’t sit around complaining about how to pay the bills they talk money because once the ball is rolling they want it to continue to roll. Why stop cashing in on success when you’ve got the network and drive to continue doing so.

Every once in a while you’ll have a knock-off try to join in the group but secretly they don’t have the money to lead the same kind of lifestyle. I can bet that many wanna-be rich people will go broke trying to figure out how to become rich only to fail miserably and still have all that debt to pay off.

You don’t need to go broke to become rich and you certainly don’t need to pretend to be rich when you’re not. There are plenty of wealthy people who want to share their secrets or invest in someone who wants to learn the ropes or champion their business. It’s all about gaining experience and building your expertise level by joining in the conversation and by streamlining your actions towards financial independence.

There’s nothing wrong with taking risks with your money if you want to bring a dream to life however you need money to make money. You also need money to back up the money you are using otherwise you empty one bucket and risk losing it all if things go south. Be careful how you go about trying to step up the ladder because if you fall there’s no one there to help you out.

I’d rather be known as someone who worked hard and did their best to stay out of debt while creating wealth passages for life rather than someone who is pretending to play the lead role in a film I don’t care to watch. Living a Hollywood lifestyle comes with a bit more than just access to someone else’s money that you must pay back. You have to believe in yourself, the motivational kind.

When it’s time to get off the stage

So, to end the conversation with this fan I answered his question.

How do I stop pretending to be rich when I’m not?

You just do, that’s how.

I don’t have a manual filled with answers especially when they are common sense but what I can tell you is that if you aren’t leading the life you want to lead then change it without compromising who you are. If that means you stop spending money that you don’t have, stay in instead of going out every night and exhausting yourself trying to portray what you believe others coin as successful then just do it.

Where our money went in October

Savings, that’s where our money went this month. We are determined to take full advantage of the tax-free or tax reducing savings vehicles offered by the Canadian government. We will be shortly maxing out the RRSP and the TFSA’s all in the name of our future retirement.

We could spend all our savings on new vehicles and other consumables, but what’s the point? Our vehicle may be a little on the older side of things but it still runs great so why trade it in? Just this month I installed the new brakes that I’d bought and paid for last month along with swapping over to the winter tires. We’re all ready for another winter on the roads.

If we have enough saved by for a newer vehicle when it does eventually need replacing we’ll have enough in the bank to go and buy one outright. I don’t like buying on credit, because you never just pay the cost of the vehicle. Why should I make someone else money? Look after yourself first, sort of the point of this blog post today.

Mr.CBB

Pick a budget that’s right for you

I’m currently offering 2 versions of our budget and the reason behind it is simple. Firstly, read the CBB blog disclaimer because what you do with it is your own business so if you mess it up you need to sort that out.

I have not closed off any cells so you can make all the changes you like to the budget to reflect your lifestyle which is what you asked me for in your emails. (See I do listen and read your comments and emails)

Although I would love to help every single fan with their budget I am unable to do so but I am always willing to answer any emails you send me so don’t be shy.

This was after all meant to be our personal budget and although I would love to customize it for every fan that wants to use it but, I’m afraid I cannot.

I’m not selling this budget or hope to make any money from it so enjoy this free budget and I hope that it works for you as much as it does for us.

Our free budget spreadsheet

You can download the free budget spreadsheets here.

Budget 1– You can use the pre-existing categories or you can use your own if you wish and you have the option to use projected expenses or not. Please read all notes left around the budget for tips.
Budget 2– Everything is pre-set so you have to use the pre-defined categories but this budget will generate year-end budget figures where the other one won’t but you must use the categories already in this budget. If you change anything you will mess up the formulas and year-end figures.
Please read all notes left around the budget for tips.

Test the budget for a few months and see how it goes. Trial and error, remember that.

Our family budget plan

How we budget our monthly expenses?

I often have fans ask me how to budget money on a low-income or they simply have a high debt load and want to kill it like my friend Tony who got rid of over $100,000 worth of debt by using a budget.

CBB fans want to know what we do in order to save so much money and the reply I give is simple>> It’s not about the money it’s about the process involved.

We are both money managers of our finances and with our relationship compatibility we have been able to get to where we are in 2016, debt free.

It doesn’t matter if you are using a cash only budget or you use your debit and credit cards, if your budget doesn’t balance you have budget issues you should check it pronto.

Learning how to be your own money manager is important because no one else will care about your money more than YOU!.

Learn how to budget with Mr.CBB

Our Budgeting Series

Do you want to learn to budget like we do?

We explain everything we do and more in this mini-series below all about budgeting.

Please take the time to read through our budgeting series plus read Budgeting in the New Year. I hope the information will help stop you from making common budgeting mistakes that I hear of often and that you take something away from the information and apply it to your financial situation.

If you have any questions about what we do with our budget money tracker feel free to email me.

How We Designed Our Budget Step 1–Gathering All the information
How We Designed Our Budget Step 2– Budget Categories
How We Designed Our Budget Step 3–TrackingReceipts
How We Designed Our Budget Step 4-Note-taking
How We Designed Our Budget Step 5–5S Organization
How We Designed Our Budget Step 6–Who Does What and When?
How We Designed Our Budget Step 7–Balancing Our Budget
How We Designed Our Budget Step 8–Knowing our Coupon Savings
How We Designed Our Budget Step 9–Reading Our Bills
How We Designed Our Budget Step 10–Projected Expenses

Budget percentages October 2016

Our savings of 53.57%includes savings and investments and emergency savings for this month. If you include the projected expenses savings, we actually saved 72.98% of our income. That’s $7211.80 going into savings or investments of some description or another.

The monthly totals comes to 100% which shows that we spent our income this month and used the rest as emergency savings.

The other categories were well within the defined percentage limits. Our projected expenses this month is at 19.41%.

Budget percentages month by month

Breaking down expenses

This is simply a breakdown of our expenses which has helped us to understand where all of our money goes. Since May 2014 we have been mortgage free so much of our money will be directed at savings, investments and renovations.

I appreciate that you enjoy this budget update each month but I do hope you view this as an educational tool rather thancomparing your own financial numbersas our situations are all unique.

Although I encourage your comments and love to hear what you have to say about our budget categories and expenses please don’t tell us to donate our money to charities because we have too much or are fortunate. We are hardly out of the clear with finances for the rest of our lives and have worked and sacrificed to get where we are. We do plan to enjoy the money we’ve saved now since we haven’t over the years with our son.

What we do with our “extra cash” is our business and although we do donate to a charity we won’t be putting it on display for the world to see as it defeats the purpose in my eyes. It is part of the budget as you see it. I hope that clears that up for those of you who had concerns about our extra money.

Almost 9 years ago I started working in Canada making a bit over minimum wage and have since moved up the ladder. I’m now working very hard to secure my dream job with one foot in the door. We aren’t all lucky but if you do the best you can at least you can look back and say you gave it a shot.

Sometimes we wish we had more money to budget with but understand that we only have what we earn and if we want more, we need to earn more. Spending less than we earn and budgeting our money has been the easiest way for us to pay down debt and save money.

Chequing– This is the bank account where all of our debt gets paid from.
Emergency Savings Account– This is a high-interest savings account.
Regular Savings Account– This is a savings account that holds our projected expenses.
Monthly Budgeted Total:$5093.64
MonthlyNet IncomeTotal:$9881.89
(Check out our Ultimate Grocery Guide to see where our grocery money goes)
Projected Expenses:These are expenses we know we will pay for throughout the year =$1917.68
Total Expenses Actually Paid Out:$4132.10
Total Expenses Actually Paid Out: Calculated is$9881.89 (total net monthly income) – $1,917.68 (projected expenses) – $3832.11 (emergency savings) = $4312.10
Actual Cash Savings going into Emergency Savings: Calculated is$9881.89 (total monthly net income) – $4312.10 (actual expenses paid out for the month) – $1917.68 (projected expenses) = $3832.11

How to save for future expenses

What are Projected Expenses?– We project expenses throughout the year so we have the money saved. PE= A projected expense is money automatically saved each month so it is ready when the bill comes in or when you need it as in the example below.

We review our projected expenses at the beginning of the year to set up our yearly budget and adjust as we go along if a new projected expense arises and needs to be added to the budget. Sometimes we remove a projected expense as well so it’s very important to keep an eye on your expenses.

This has happened on many occasions but it’s bound to happen as we can’t predict everything we have to pay for over the course of the year. The important part for us is that we are saving for these expenses and we no longer have to stress about taking money from our savings to pay for them. To learn more about projected expenses read Step 10 in my budgeting series.

When we spend the money in a projected expense category we move that money to our chequing account in order to pay for that incoming expense. So this means the numbers go up and down in the projected expenses account based on what we need to pay for that we saved for in the account over time.

The only thing you need to do is track your projected expenses each month manually as I can’t customize that for you in the excel budget spreadsheet as I don’t know what you will use for projected expenses.

For now we will have to manually track which means month after month we add up what we save in each projected expense category and minus what we spend so we know how much we have and what is left in each category. I have updated our personal excel budget spreadsheet for 2016.

We pay money into the projected expenses account continually throughout the year even when bills come due as its revolving so as one bill gets paid the money continues to come in from the other categories all year-long. This ensures that money is always available. It may not always be enough but having something ready is better than having nothing at all and having to use credit.

So the $1917.68 gets paid into the projected expense account every month no matter what. It seems to be easier to track our money this way but you can do what works best for you.

Sample Projected Expense

If our clothing category was a projected expense we would have a budget of $50 per month for the two of us. If we spend$30on clothes for the month that means we need to pull $30 from the projected expenses account to pay for this expense or we move only$20to projected expenses for the month and leave the$30in your chequing account.

It’s up to you how you do it as I mentioned above. My plan is to create a projected expenses spreadsheet to track the expenses all year-long otherwise you need to do it manually which we currently do in order to make sure we don’t overspend what we haven’t saved or will save over the course of the year.

It’s a fairly easy process and becomes a lifestyle change for your finances but the most important part is that the money is available and saved, which means potentially less stress.

This means we should have$600.00per year for clothing to spend. We have to track that expense as we spend it manually but hopefully for our 2015 budget I can incorporate that into our spreadsheet so it tallies the numbers up as we go along. That way we will be able to know exactly what we’ve spent as an ongoing total.

(Note: I am working on this but slowly as I wasn’t anticipating all the extra hours with my second job)

Budget Results

Time for the juicy category numbers and to see how we made out with our monthly budget. Below you will see two tables, one is our monthly budget and the other is our actual budget for the month of October 2016. This budget represents 2 adults and a toddler plus our investments.

If it is highlighted in blue that means it is a projected expense. You will also see our budget does not include the emergency savings as this is factored in at the end.

Budget for October 2016

Actual budget expenses for October 2016

November 2016 Goals

Here are our November 2016 goals along with whether we completed tasks from October.

Call around to lawyers to talk about getting a Will written up- Nope big fail again.
Start revamping old blog posts (2 a month)- I completed 2 in October.
Finish the master bathroom shower- Fail, however the wife and I started talking about getting it done as we’ve bought more renovation materials. My goal is Jan/Feb as I may be off work then so I can start this project up again and finish it.
Buy a new blind for the garage- Fail It’s just not a huge priority but it’s hanging on. I’ll get there.
Finish the walls in the baby room- We bought our son another bed that is Disney Cars so we are going to re-do the entire room for him.
Start looking at pricing for a new insulated garage door- Fail
Start researching vacation spots for 2017- We’re looking at summer prices
Hang paintings and wrought iron decor on the walls- Fail
Sand and protect the deck for the year- FAIL to-do for next Spring
Purge our clothes little by little– So far we sold a box of baby clothes for $20 in October.
Clean out the entire garage- Pass we can now fit our vehicle in for the winter
Clean out the vehicle inside and out- Pass however I did this myself and in the Spring I will get it professionally done.
Swap over the winter tires- Pass
Put on new brakes- Pass
Change transmission fluid- Pass
Get the van undercoated- November to-do list
Take a look at the Christmas lights– Next on my list for November
Start Fall tidying up outside- Pass
Fix the leaking bathtub faucet- Pass
Put up the Christmas Tree and decorations-
Christmas shopping-
Budget prep for 2017-
Christmas Cards-

Budget updates month by month

In case you missed our budget updates and want to do a quick search I’ve compiled them all on one handy page: monthly budgets. For the 2016 Year I will also keep track of each month below and update the monthly budgets page.

December 2015
January 2016
February 2016
March 2016
April 2016
May 2016
June 2016
July 2016
August 2016
September 2016

That’s all for this month check back at the beginning of December 2016 to see how we made out with our November 2016 budget.

Happy Budgeting CBB’ers!

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