In your post you mention you don’t use your credit card… now I don’t know for sure (I’m not from America and don’t have a credit card) but I think there are certain benefits to using a credit card, and it builds up your credit rating (as long as you pay it off) ?

Anyway I’m looking into getting one (with no yearly cost, of course), and hiding it somewhere in my room… I’ll use it to automatically pay my bills and I’ll set up my bank account to automatically pay back my credit card. This way when I finally want a nice homeloan, I’ll have a good credit history to back me up

So I recommend using it

(also, I have a very similar system to all of you, in terms of bank accounts… Good post!)

I direct deposit my monthly bills into my b&m account, with a little bit of cushion, and then a set amount in my ING checking for spending. This includes food, gas, entertainment. And the rest is split among all my other savings.

I like David’s comment about the rollover fund. That way I’ll have a temp backup on daily expenses without actually dipping into my real emergency fund.

I feel like I’m doing pretty well for most people my age. I’m 22, and I thank everyone who has given their two cents on finances. Between that and the few years worth of me digging my own whole, I finally got it right!

My wife and I each have a Checking and Savings account, plus a Joint account of each in my main bank, for 6 accounts total. All paycheck money gets direct deposited into our individual checking accounts, and we then transfer our portion of “Budget” money into the Joint Checking account each paycheck. Bills get paid out of that account.

In addition, I have approximately 33 Savings accounts (through Emigrantdirect). These accounts are for specific things, and each one is labelled as to it’s purpose. “Budget – House” (for mortgage payments). “Budget – Utilities”. “Budget – Car”. “Trip – Paris”. And so on.

It may seem complicated to keep track of all that, but the beauty of it is, I put a little bit into each account as possible (monthly 10.00 payment into Utilities, for example). The goal is to save about 6 months of savings for each particular monthly expenditure. The benefits of doing it this way are having a better idea of how much is needed to survive in case of trouble, and more importantly, the guilt factor.

Sure, I have 6 months of gas money saved up, and I *could* use it to buy something neat, or to pay off an unexpected bill. BUT because that is “earmarked” for gas, it is a lot harder to justify using it for something else.

This system has allowed me to go from paycheck-to-paycheck living to actually getting some money socked away – right now we are up to about 3 months security should this economy affect our jobs. That peace of mind is worth the extra couple hours each month I spend in allocating our resources (I have a spreadsheet that I keep updated with current spending on every account we hold).

-my long term savings/emergency fund that I never (so far) take money out of
-saving to pay off a 0% financed credit card
-monthly rollover (think AT&T rollover minutes). If I underspend one month according to my budget, I rollover to this account in case I need to dip into it the following month. It also helps for planned large purchases (not spend $100 extra a month for 4 months to buy that $400 thing I wanted).

I use two credit cards. One for personal expenses and another for business reimbursable expenses. I use my credit card for almost everything cause it helps me track my budget much easier. It helps that I have self control and don’t use my CC because ‘I can’.

I just opened a checking account through ING because I am tired of paying atm fees to get money out of my credit union account. I calculated at least $30 bucks this years so far. I learned there are tons of free atms in my area since ING registerd with Allpoint.

I am using the 2nd checking account for my daily expenses and as a method to create a budget. I was thinking about having a set amount automatically transferred each pay period but I only get paid once a month. My issue is with blowing through my money too fast and then needing to rely upon credit cards to get to the end of the month. And I know a lot of it has to do with spending money on food and gas. So I may choose to have a certain amount transferred each week and then not carry the other cards at all. Probably should keep emergency cash stashed for gas.

My paycheck is deposited biweekly into a free checking account at a local bank. The interest rate there is laughable, so my ING Direct account is set up to automatically transfer everything I don’t need for rent or utilities into one of my two ING accounts. Since ING sets a limit of 5 withdrawals per account per month, I use one for regular monthly transactions like my student loan payment and my credit cards (both set up for automatic payments) and the other is for small, regular contributions to stock and bond mutual funds, as well as my Roth IRA, at Vanguard.

I charge every daily expense I can to my credit card. Even $4 for a sandwich goes on the credit card. I rack up a decent number of frequent flyer miles this way, and I get free money for a month at a time since I set up the credit card to automatically pay itself in full every month from the ING account. This avoids all interest charges the credit card is free and I’m earning interest on that money for a month or so until each credit card bill comes due.

Paycheck is split deposited – a set amount (about 15% of net) goes into the accrual account for those once or twice a year expenses (property tax, insurance that isn’t billed monthly) and the budget busters (like vet bills). Overtime and vacation accrual goes in the ’spending money account’ at the bank in my building (where I also have my safe deposit box. The vacation money is transfered out to a saving account monthly.

The majority of my checking account is in a checking account at my credit union. That account is linked to the accrual account and to the online high yield accounts. There are three ING accounts – e fund, saving for future car/major car repairs, save for house (renovation projects/new appliances, etc). Credit card is only used for travel (presaved in one of the accrual accounts) and online purchases (don’t use debit cards – they aren’t as protected).

Yes, it’s somewhat cumbersome to have so many accounts, but I find that when I used to just pool the funds in one checking and one savings account, I would ‘rob Peter to pay Paul’ and end up overspending and undersaving.

I’ve just paid off my credit card so am trying to work out how much is reasonable to leave in my spending account. Lately I think I’ve been too strict, as I wind up dipping into savings every pay period. How did you decide how much to allow yourself to spend?