[speaker001:] so you keep a budget
[speaker002:] uh not really all I I just have one commitment and that is that at the end of the month that uh that everything is paid and that's basically my budget
[speaker001:] that's your budget eh
[speaker002:] so we use credit cards and uh let's see what else and when I get a when I get a uh a bill in the mail I write a check out for it immediately
[speaker001:] yep
[speaker002:] put a date on the outside of the envelope stick it in my little Franklin Planner and uh I carry it around and then on the day that I'm supposed to mail it why mail it and that way I know how much I'm in the hole so basically my budget is uh based on  if uh the bank account's low why we don't spend very much
[speaker001:] yeah my uh wife and I we're new young couple starting out so we've been trying to budget it's getting a lot a lot tighter and we've actually worked out a very extensive year long budget
[speaker002:] oh wow
[speaker001:] so we know exactly what we're gonna spend when and when we're gonna have money and we've worked out a cash flow we just bought a house which is another reason why we're really keeping track of the pennies and that stuff
[speaker002:] oh yeah
[speaker001:] and so we have this detailed budget and in some ways it's really kind of nice because there's not much of a worry or not much a discussion or any real conflict over whether we should do this or that or we always have a there's a sense of confidence a little bit because we both know that we're going to have money to do what we said we're going to do
[speaker002:] yeah now you have a consensus
[speaker001:] yeah we as my brother told me when he he's in accounting and he suggested we do this as we were
[speaker002:] ahead of time huh
[speaker001:] making these big financial steps and all this stuff and he said well you just do this and you fight once and and that's it once a year and that's it because you've worked out the budget and what you're going to spend
[speaker002:] ah that's very good I've I'm uh I I tried that in the beginning and when when when I say tried it I we tried to sit down there was no consensus
[speaker001:] ah
[speaker002:] uh we both agreed that uh how shall I say it was the best consensus we could get was uh we're both are pretty thrifty and and uh you know it just we'll just watch our we just won't spend money uh big items we'll kind of talk to each other about but we have two we're playing uh Russian Roulette I guess although we've been married uh how many years now uh  let's see twenty six twenty seven years now
[speaker001:] doesn't sound sounds like you guys have gotten something worked out that's gonna work just fine
[speaker002:] well it's it what it is it's just a kind of a commitment not to spend too much
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] and uh so the uh but the uh the budget idea sounds pretty good I think if if if we ever had one of these financial crisis you know like a oh an an emergency of some kind a job uh loss or something like that we'd have to we'd have to do that but neither one of us are predicting what what I do with her is I we have two bank accounts
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] one I I wanted to uh I wanted her to uh to learn how to balance her checkbook because she's she just the the best she can do is is keep it uh current so to speak so what I did was I gave her another checkbook and I said okay you this is your account you can have money anytime you
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] want it just tell me how much is in your account
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] she said no you are trying to control me I said I'm not you know you can have six hundred dollars in there if you want another three hundred just tell me and uh so finally we got we have one of these uh things where we get money the company puts makes a direct deposit
[speaker001:] yes
[speaker002:] so I give her let's see what she gets uh like a third of the money for the household and I pay everything else
[speaker001:] yeah what we've done see we've only been married three years and I my my wife isn't real good with checkbooks and math and all that stuff and so what I did is I just gave it all to her and I said you have to do it everything and then I come in and help her
[speaker002:] I think that's good
[speaker001:] and uh that's been really good because it's you know we've both come to appreciate and understand what's going on and she does most everything now and it's really quite nice actually and uh
[speaker002:] I I think that's good one one of my uh friends suggested that that life would be a little easier around our house even yet if I had her do do that because