Welcome to my November 2020 financial progress!

If you are new here, every month I post the progress I’ve made on paying off my student loans and on my savings. I’ve done this since I first started paying down my loans in July 2017 and it has been so worth it.

I do this to hold myself accountable and to share my progress with others who are also facing debt payments of their own.

Debt paid this month: $880.77

Debt remaining: $47,162.94

I house every month’s debt progress from the very beginning here if you want to check out the progress so far.

Updates for This Month

Nothing new. As it has been since March 2020, I have only made the minimum payments to my private loan while making no payments to my federal loans thanks to the COVID-19 deferment. This will likely continue to be my strategy till the end of 2020 as I work to beef up my savings account.

November Budget

Fixed Spending

Nothing much here, just the usual expenses. I live at home but pay rent to my parents and am also paying back my personal loan to them at $500/month.

Other than that, my cell phone bill and Netflix make up the rest of my fixed spending.

I finally finished my installment plan for my phone which lowered my monthly payment down from $67 to $32 essentially cutting my phone bill by more than half. Lesson learned: definitely not buying another $1,000 Apple phone anytime soon.

Variable Spending

Gas – I officially love working from home. I filled up a full tank of gas at the end of October and realized I haven’t filled up since. So $0 gas expense this month. Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought there would ever be a month like this.

Compare this to the same month, last year and I was budgeting $120 and spending $100 in gas spending each month from commuting every day. Needless to say, I am excited to be tweaking my gas budget to a lower amount come 2021.

Entertainment/dining out – No entertainment spending. And only splurged for one (unfortunately expensive) dine out. 

Groceries – Under budget. Just bought the usual necessities.

Shopping – Over budget. After barely doing any shopping this year, I splurged and bought 1 new pair of jeans, 4 new tops, and 2 pairs of shoes. It was also time to replenish my face moisturizer and shampoo that I buy in bulk and should last a year.

I thought that would be all for my November spending but I couldn’t resist Black Friday deals and bought some candles for the winter season for myself and some for Christmas gifts.

Last but certainly not least, my automatic Amazon Prime renewal was due this month. To be honest, I have a debate with myself every year when I see my renewal bill if my annual Amazon Prime membership is worth it or if I should opt for monthly subscriptions instead. 

Looking at my Amazon order history, I’ve made 22 orders total this year and it looks like I’ve ordered every month of the year in 2020 except for 1 month. The monthly subscription is probably not a good idea as I’d end up spending more. Plus I do sometimes (rarely) use Prime Video to watch movies or shows. So it looks like the annual membership is being continued.

Miscellaneous

Friend Birthday & Gift – Bought gift and food for a friend’s birthday.

Savings

I’m still putting $500 per paycheck (totaling $1,000 per month) to my savings account. My high-yield savings account really shouldn’t even be called that anymore, considering the abysmal <1% APY it is now offering.

That certainly only adds to the guilt I’m already feeling with leaving upwards of $30k now in my savings account rather than investing it while I consider buying a home in my HCOL city.

I finished maxing out my 401k, Roth IRA, and HSA for the year so I am getting a bit more take-home pay each month now which will hopefully be reflected in a higher saving next month.