I did a good job this month of making sure to add my receipts to my Savings Tracker. I just entered the last of them in and here’s how the month turned out:
Basically, I’m $23 under budget! Now that does account for about $20 of rebates I’m owed, but even if you look at my out of pocket, I’m under budget for the month. What a great feeling.
If my overall savings rate looks low to you (45%), there is a rather simple explanation for that. I didn’t do much stockpiling this month. I have a VERY full pantry at the moment (in fact, I need to clean it!), so I only cherry picked a few deals here and there and pretty much bought what we needed for the week. The $58 Winco trip last week was to buy a bunch of items for my mom’s birthday BBQ bash. (And yes, I’m STILL under budget!!) If I wouldn’t have had to make that trip, I’d be under budget even more.
I also want to point out something I’ve said before: shopping sales makes the biggest dent in my budget. Check it out: coupons saved me $98, but store sales and promotions saved me $128.53. This is why I always state you should try to use your coupons on store sales. They combine to give you real money-saving power! All told, I saved $226 this month, which works out to saving about $56 per week.
Tracking my savings in this manner helps me see EXACTLY how much my couponing is saving me. It also gives me a good snapshot of my shopping in general. For instance, I see I had quite a few shopping trips this month. Maybe next month I could try to work on reducing that. Or work on lowering my budget since I did so well this month, etc.
Was this exercise helpful? I hope so. Would you like me to continue sharing what and how I’m saving and spending? I would love to know if this has been of value to you.
Don’t forget; you can download your own Savings Tracker (for Excel) to follow along. It’s free. A quick update on Google Docs: it appears many of my crazy formulas are not compatible for Google Docs and would need to be rewritten. I do plan on creating a Google Docs version at some point in the near future, but unfortunately, it’s not as simple as doing a “Save As” as I’d hoped and I imagine it will take some serious work to get up and running. Stay tuned!
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
I am using your spreadsheet to enter and keep track of every receipt. It is so helpful and GREAT to show my husband. I like seeing what your month looks like because it helps give me an overall picture of what a reasonable savings / expendatures look like.
I just downloaded the spreadsheet to start. I’ve only been couponing for a few months and I would really like to start seeing what I’m saving/spending. Thanks for providing this for personal use!
Thank you so much for this spreadsheet! I started using it in January and I’ve been faithfully putting in all of my receipts. I get unusually excited about inputing them actually.
And you are right about the store deals saving you the most money. I like I Albertsons prints their receipts to show store savings and coupon savings. Now if we can just get Fred Meyer to do the same! 
Jane
No kidding! I didn’t mention this – but I undoubtedly saved serious money just by shopping at Fred Meyer and Winco. In the past, sometimes I’ve tacked on a 10-15% additional amount in the “Shelf Cost” to estimate some of this. This month, however, I left it as is. Glad to hear this has been helpful.
I love the spreadsheet. I havent quite figured out how to download yours, but I have kind of made my own just like it. Its so cool to see the savings in actual monthly numbers. Seeing how much you have spent with a husband and kids really gives me hope that I might get there too
Please keep us updated!
thanks–though I haven’t downloaded the spreadsheet (yet at least) it helps me to see your savings and interpretations. Today, for example, I appreciated your point about seeing a snapshot showing whether you are doing too many trips, etc… It also helps because we shop similarly (freddies etc) so I appreciate that you share what it costs you. So many other sites are all about “extreme couponing” and you seem to have a balance that fits my lifestyle. thanks
You know, I think I’m going to coin my own method: “Common Sense Couponing.” Thanks!!
Your spreadsheet is wonderful! I have been using it since Jan and it is a great motivator to stay below budget. This motivation keeps me from buying somethings just cuz its a good deal…every couple dollars adds up. I don’t know if you have Aldi’s there but it ruins my savings rate every time. They are a low cost low overhead….but no sales or coupons….I like your idea of tacking on a percentage “shelf cost”. Keep it up….love your message!
Glad to have found your site. I’m trying to use the excel sheet you’ve made but I can’t seem to get excel to read it right. Which file am I supposed to use and how do I open it with excel? I have 2007 version. Thanks
Open the primary version. The one 97-03 is for the previous Excel versions. If folks are having difficulty downloading, I recommend disabling pop-ups and seeing if that doesn’t make a difference.
You will want to save a version to your computer to work off of.
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