The Spender and the Spender

With the state of the economy right now, buget management is now the hottest topic in n@w (newlyweds@work).

Seriously, as I was writing my reply to the question of who should be the Budget Manager at home, it got me thinking about our spending. Generally naman, sa mga couples, one is a spender and one is a saver. But this isn't the case for us. Spender and Spender kami!!! Hindi naman sa talagang galit kami sa pera. Impulsive buyers lang kami pareho talaga. I've condensed my contribution to the forum and incorporated it in this blog entry.

When I first got married, I got a lot of advice na dapat ako ang hahawak ng pera, kasi ako ang babae, etc. Yan kasi ang hindi naman mapagkasunduan ni Xian before we got married --sino ang hahawak ng household money? When I was single kasi, I was virtually the head of the household --my meager salary (promise, meager talaga --my take home was below 10k, including OT na yun ha?) paid for everything in the house --the rent, the electricity, water and grocery and baon pa for my then-studying brother. I didn't know how I was able to pay for everything but I remember making a lot of sacrifices. That makes you think I'm qualified to be the Budget Manger, di ba? Pero because I was used to sagad na sagad ang monthly take home pay ko, ngayong married na ako, nasasagad ko pa rin kahit household of two na lang kami! Closet waldas pala ako! Spender talaga ako pala!!!

Xian naman is waldas din kasi ang bisyo nya, gadgets. at cards (yung Magic at Legend of the Five Rings Cards). Kahit nung binata pa sya, puro gamit ang naipon nya, hindi pera. Kumpleto kami sa gaming stuff. We have a top-of-the-line (at the time that he bought it, anyway) PC customized for a gamer, a PS2, and gaming paraphernalia (racing wheel and arcade-type controller). PERO, pag may gusto syang pag-ipunan, marunong naman syang magtiis. From being waldas, he was able to save money for our wedding in one year.

Last month, he asked, are we leaving beyond our means??? Kasi parang nashoshort na kami before paydays pero 2 lang naman kami sa house at wala naman kaming nabibiling malaking item. So, we sat down together and decided to seriously look at our spending and saving. Narealize ko na na spender talaga ako. I can budget pero inuubos ko talaga. Ako si Misis Bili-Tayo-Nyan-Kasi-Kakailanganin-Din-Yan-Later-On. Kahit hindi pa naman magagamit kaagad! Nasanay kasi ako nung dalaga pa to buy stuff by the bulk and anticipate needs. Nahirapan ako mag-adjust ng spending. I find it very difficult to save unless I need to buy something I can't afford right now. Yun bang saving just for the sake of saving? Hindi ko kaya yun.

Xian naman is the same --spender pero mas may discipline sya sa saving kesa sa akin, lalo na kung may bibilhin. Minsan, nakakasave sya nang di nya namamalayan. Gusto nya kasi may natitira sa account nya bago magnext pay day. Kahit konti lang.

So we decided to set a goal amount for our joint account by the end of the year so we can force ourselves to save. Crossing my fingers na we can achieve it. ha ha.

My sister-in-law, Punky, gave us Bo Sanchez' book on How to Be Truly Rich as one of her gifts when we got married. Nakakaaliw basahin. Pero hanggang dun lang ang nagawa namin sa book. Binasa, naaliw. Hindi in-apply. Ang galing. So now we're taking the first step towards handling our finances better: Talking about our spending and working together on how to curb it. We're also trying to remember to save (the operative word here is trying. hahaha!!!).

I realized that we should BOTH raise our financial IQ pero be aware din kung sino ang mas may disiplina at skills to handle the finances. Recognize kung sino ang spender at saver. Set a goal --pwedeng simple lang, gaya ng a certain amount for your savings by the end of a certain period, or medyo complex --like having investments, or long-range, like saving for our retirement. Basta, dapat alam namin kung saan napupunta ang pinaghihirapan naming kitain.

Having one budget manager won't work for us right now kasi neither of us has achieved the discipline na kailangan kaya we're working on it together --we've split the bill-paying proportional to the income, set a goal for our savings and curbed our personal spending.

Bahala na si Batman. :-P