February 2016: Income & Expenses

    February ended up being a fairly standard month for my income and expenses. Work income was a bit lower than usual though, due to working fewer hours. I did mostly enjoy the extra rest though. Also kept my spending down nicely for the most part, with only one irregular expense, but well worth it.

    Generally speaking at the moment I do not usually aim to work full-time hours at my current work position. I prefer to have a bit more free time while I am able to get it for now. Even if that means a slight hit in my income, I value the extra free time higher than a few more dollars. I offset that by being my fairly frugal self, not spending a lot nor going out to restaurants, bars or events too often. Luckily for me, my lovely lady also usually prefers to relax at home as well. Although sorry March's budget, a sushi date is coming up. Yum!

Income	$
Work	1491.7
Dividends	109.53
Bonus	56.91
Total	1658.14

    Dividend income for the month went as expected, although the next second month of the quarter will possibly be a lower amount due to Dream Office REIT having cut its distribution down by almost a third.

    Also had a nice little deposit from the Government of Canada, won't ever say no to free money. Also coming up in March is my tax refund. As last week I finished filing my own taxes using an E-File service, it was very straight forward and simple and did not have to pay anyone to do it for me. I easily see myself doing this for the next few couple of years, or longer. Basically as long as I am able to do them on my own and my tax situation remains relatively simple. Currently all investments are tax sheltered, so I do not have to deal with dividend tax credits or capital gains/losses.

Expenses	$
Rent	750
Phone	22.6
Travel	87
Groceries	189.04
Restaurants	61.16
Entertainment	57.9
Other	57.3
Total	1236.29

    Expenses for the month were quite in line with my usual spending. Even managed to spend about $40 less on groceries than in January. As well as spending less eating out, Entertainment and Other spending. This month my Other spending was on getting a suit jacket and pants fitted. I had gotten the suit as a Christmas gift, and am very happy to be able to wear it now!

    My travel expenses are back in play now after going through my small stockpile of transit tokens I had bought before the price increase. I had also taken a train between Toronto and a neighboring city to visit family, so $87 for the month I did very well!

    Overall, with my income being a tad bit lower than usual at $1,658 and spending $1236 for the month, I managed to achieve a savings rate of 25% for the month. Which certainly is not bad, but is less than the 40% I hit last month, and less than the 40% goal I set for myself in this years goals.

    Luckily for me there are still 10 months in the year to go to get myself on track to hitting this goal. Although March is going to be an expensive one... as I recently Tweeted I have been having some computer problems and need to buy some new parts.