Estimated reading time: 13 minutes
Stay up to date with CBB’s November 2023 budget update. Discover the story of the month’s expenses and the data behind them. Get the complete November 2023 budget insights today!
I hope you enjoy these monthly updates, and if you’d like to see other data, comment below.
If you’re new to the blog and haven’t downloaded my free 2024 Budget Binder, grab it now.
Why Do I Share Our Monthly Budget?
I look forward to putting this post together as it lets us see where our money was spent.
A budget also acts as a diary for your expenses so you can look back to see success and failure.
After all, we can only be successful if we learn from the mistakes we make along the way.
Our budget update also lets readers know that we are NOT perfect and must make changes like everyone else.
We use the tools (Free budget Binder), and I hope you have downloaded your free copy.
If there’s any information that you’d like to know or explain about our budget, please share your comments below.
Alright, let’s get into this.
Discussion November 2023 Budget
Enjoy the read, and as always, I appreciate your kind feedback and suggestions in the comment section.
Percentages For the November 2023 Budget
Seeing our housing ratio drop was excellent as we have slowed the renovations down, and I have to finish the main bathroom.
I’ve already purchased most of the items needed for the bathroom, so I must make time to get the job done.
Our transportation costs increased as I spent around $85 extra for the month.
Starting in November, I will fill the large gas tanks to have extra in the garage.
This has come in handy more times than I can count during winter storms.
Our Life Ratio will increase due to Christmas shopping expenses for November and December.
The good news is that we have a chunk of the money saved as projected expenses.
Otherwise, we seem balanced and focused on reaching our yearly financial goals.
Budget Month Comparison
We had an 8.67% change in total net income for the month, with a decrease in expenses of 69% compared to October.
Renovation expenses increased our October budget, and the percentage dropped since we didn’t spend much in November.
After Christmas, these numbers may ramp-up as I begin renovations again.
November 2023 Household Budget Percentages
Savings of 32.45% in November include investments and savings based on our net income.
The housing ratio, as mentioned, dropped to 15.11%, under the 35% threshold.
Our Life Ratio is 38.19%, which is high due to the holidays and my buying tools for my garage workstations.
The tool expenses aim to complete renovations and fix my truck without paying fees.
Life contains everything from groceries, entertainment, miscellaneous, health/beauty, clothing, etc.
Both housing and transportation stay below the monthly percentage points.
Our truck has no loan, and only one of us goes to work, making things cheaper even though gas prices are increasing.
Equally important is saving money for our projected expenses due throughout the year.
All categories took 100% of our income, showing we accounted for all the revenue in November 2023.
We have zero debt, which helps fund other budget categories to maximize investments and savings.
Grocery Food Savings Jar November Update
Soon, I will be writing a detailed blog post about why we will track our grocery discounts.
Update: Tracking Our Grocery Discounts For One Year + Free Printable
I will tally it at the end of the year to see how much we saved buying reduced food products.
For November, we saved a total of $69.47.
So far, in 2023, purchasing discounted food has saved us $1092.09
That’s Awesome!!
November 2023 Budget and Actual Budget
Below are two tables: Our November 2023 Budget and our Actual Budget.
Our November 2023 monthly budget represents two adults and a 9-year-old boy.
Budget Colour Key: It is a projected expense when highlighted in blue.
Since May 2014, we’ve been mortgage-free, redirecting our money into investments and home improvement projects.
Spending less than we earn and budgeting has been the easiest way to pay off our debt and save money.
This type of budget is a zero-based budget where all the money has a home.
Estimated November 2023 Budget
Actual November 2023 Budget
Canadian Banks, We Use
- Chequing– This is the bank account from which we pay our household bills. We use Simplii Financial, TD Canada Trust, and Tangerine Bank. Join Simplii Financial today! Read more about the best Canadian online virtual banks.
- Emergency Savings Account– This money is in a high-interest savings account (HISA)
- High-Interest Savings Account (HISA)– This savings account holds our projected expenses.
Breakdown Of Our November 2023 Budget
Below are some of our variable expenses from November, apart from investments.
We spent $1980.48 over budget in November, which I will review below.
November 2023 Budget Category Changes
We discussed increasing our budget categories for birthday, pet, grocery, and telecommunications and decided to do this in the new year.
I still have to fix the extended health category but I have decided to wait until 2024.
Household Bills and Expenses
Below is an explanation of the budget categories from November 2023 that were over budget or need clarification.
Grocery Budget November 2023 Budget
Our monthly grocery budget is $900 plus a $25 stockpile budget.
We spent $978.46 or $78.46 over budget for November on groceries.
Since Mrs. CBB’s surgery, she has been instructed to let her body heal and eat certain foods.
This did not decrease the grocery budget, as we usually wouldn’t buy items.
Since I only had to cook, I lived off 50% of salads and tuna and bought any from Flashfood deals.
We will see this increase in the next month, tally up our numbers for 2023, and decide what 2024 budget numbers will look like.
Birthday
The birthday expense in November was for Mrs. CBB’s best friend’s 50th gift, a massive basket filled with gourmet foods and wine.
She lives in a town with little availability for gift delivery, and Mrs. CBB didn’t want to send her a gift from Amazon.
Yes, one of us has crossed over into the “50” half-century, and it’s NOT me. Ha, Ha!
That’s all the birthday expenses for 2023.
Pet Expenses
Starting in 2024, we will increase the budget accordingly based on the expenses for 2023.
It made sense to wait only because we have the money for the monthly overage; plus, we wanted to tally up what 2023 expenses were.
If you do not have the extra cash as we do, it’s essential to update your budget as soon as possible.
We didn’t do wrong for November, spending $206.99, which is still high.
Our cats eat wet and dry food, and different treats are put on the snack tray.
We purchased a snack tray that makes the cats work for their treats.
Clothing
Amazon had a deal for cargo pants to fit our son, so we bought him two pairs.
He’s growing so fast now that we replenish his clothing every few months.
The good thing is that his shirts, hoodies, and pullover sweaters still fit him.
Mrs. CBB bought herself a pair of Puma jogging pants on sale.
I’m not sure about you, but we never purchase clothing at the total price.
There has to be some form of savings or incentive. How about you?
Health And Beauty
Nothing exciting happened in this category, but where we document everything from cleaning supplies, toiletries, vitamins, cologne, deodorant, etc. You get the picture.
I bought myself a bottle of Sauvage cologne but used Optimum points to pay for most of the expense.
Ultimately, it cost me $33, which was a huge savings.
2024, we will see an increase for this category, as $66 is not feasible with today’s prices.
Prescriptions
Our monthly prescriptions are holding steady, and for 2024, we will have a category increase.
In November, our prescriptions totaled $140.41, with my employee benefits covering 90% of the costs.
Since our last union and salary increase, we had a significant benefits change, which saw our prescriptions increase from 80 to 90% coverage.
I’m considering doing a blog post about my benefits package to analyze what our family gets and doesn’t get compared to others.
FlashFood App
In November, we picked up six items from Flashfood, bringing our savings to $380 for the year.
If you want to see what we purchased, I can take screenshots. Let me know by replying to this email or commenting below.
For November 2023, we saved $80.35 by purchasing food that was reduced in price.
Also, we received free food from the Flashfood app using rewards points that I don’t calculate into our grocery expenses.
Every person who signs up gets a $5 credit, a freebie offered by Flashfood for new app customers.
Use my referral code, MOCD28ZN4, to get the $5 credit, and your first purchase must be over $10.
PC Optimum Points
We received an email from PC Optimum with a 2023 review of our earned points.
So far, we have earned 289,785 PC Optimum Points for the year, less than usual.
Shopping at Shoppers Drug Mart is not feasible for our grocery budget unless we find reduced food products or shop on 20x the points days.
Most of our points for 2023 were earned by shopping at Zehrs, which surprised us.
There’s so much involved when planning a shop at Shoppers that I suggest reading my most viewed post about how we earned 4 million PC Optimum Points.
Currently, we have 6,713,177 PC Optimum Points or $6700 that we can spend at either Shoppers Drug Mart or participating Loblaws stores.
Currently, SDM is running a promo where you get an extra $100 if you redeem 200,000 points.
Instead of $200, we would get $300 for every 200,000 we redeem, making our points redemptions very lucrative.
TD Visa Cash Back Amount
Our TD Visa has a cashback balance of $379.89, an increase of just under $10 from October.
We will remove the cashback in December to start fresh in January.
Most of the expenses on this card are for anything we purchase online, including PayPal and Amazon Canada.
Question: What credit card do you use mainly for online purchases?
Comment below or reply to this email.
Canadian Tire Triangle Rewards November 2023
Typically, my expenses are put on my Canadian Tire MasterCard apart from Costco CIBC MasterCard for gas and groceries and PC World Elite MasterCard for groceries.
I’ve made several purchases at Canadian Tire in the last few months, and my balance of $801.32 is from these expenses.
We also only shop on 20x or 30x the Triangle Rewards days!
November 2023 CBB Net Worth Update
The investment portfolios increased in November by $47,714.92 or +3.19%.
Until Next Time!
That’s all for our November 2023 Monthly Budget.
The final 2023 budget update will be posted in January 2024, so stay tuned for that and another post with our year at a glance.
If there’s something you’d like to see in our monthly update, hit reply to this email and let me know.
Thanks for stopping by, and please subscribe if you are new to CBB.
Read our budget updates from 2012-current.
Mr. CBB