I need to get back to my strict budgeting... I've definitely noticed lifestyle creep lately. If you don't know, lifestyle creep is a phrase that defines how people's spending increases as they earn more.
I've seen it in my own parents, especially as I was in my 20s. They have admitted to me that they always spend what they earn. So, even though they were earning good, tax-free money in the Middle East for the 10 years before they retired; I don't think they started knuckling down and saving until they had the realisation that they were due to retire in the next couple of years so would need to learn to live on less.
If you're a FIFO worker, think back to when you first started and how much you spend vs. now. Is it more or less? Did you splurge when you got your first FIFO job and thought, "fuck it, there's more where that came from?!"; Or were you more like, "wow, I could save for a house deposit (or whatever your goal may have been) really quickly doing this?!". I was the first version on my first project and by the time I started my second and had spent all my money travelling up the east coast and living it up in Bali, not thinking about the consequences; I turned into the latter.
I used to track my spending manually in a budget planner I bought in K-Mart. I didn't get free accommodation or food on the project I was working on at the time but my rent was only $150 per week and I was pretty strict with my meal prepping and sticking to a small food budget so my outgoings were minimal compared to the $2,000-2,400 I was earning a week. Every payday I would allocate my money into the different savings accounts I had set up for different goals and I really enjoyed seeing my savings grow so quickly from nothing. This motivated me so much and writing it all down physically kept me on track.
I gave up with the budget planner eventually as once I'd saved for the couple of smaller goals I had (paying for my visa, saving a small emergency fund and make a start on a holiday fund), I was ticking along nicely saving $1000 per week into my house fund most weeks. I even started investing smaller amounts into shares and a little crypto so my finances were looking healthier than ever.
However, when I dug out my old budget planner recently, I was actually so impressed with how little I spent back then... And it made me realise how much more I spend on average now. Funnily enough, I'm earning a fair bit less now, although have accommodation and food included on the job I'm currently on. In theory, I should be able to get away with spending next to nothing while I'm at work but I allow myself little luxuries that I wasn't even interested in splashing out on when I was in my hardcore-saving-budget-planner-zone. Maybe, keeping a written record held me more accountable.
I wasn't too worried about the little extra luxuries for a while there, as I was still on track with my house savings goal and I felt that I deserved to loosen up a little with my money as I've worked so hard pretty continuously in not-so-glamourous settings for the last 3 years. "We can afford it", I have said frequently to my partner when he (dares!) question me on what this parcel is now?!?! being delivered to camp.
Now that we've bought our first investment property, I'm feeling a little light in the pocket going from having over $100k across all my savings accounts to less than half of that *tear trickles down cheek*. I've still not really tightened the belt AND it keeps bloody raining so I'm getting paid even less some weeks so I really should be budgeting far better than I am. I don't want to beat myself up over it;- nor should I but I would like to be more purposeful in my savings and set some clear money goals again.
The only absolute, non-negotiable weekly expense I have now is $250 a week into our joint account to cover the excess mortgage repayments after our rent has been paid by our tenants and to give us a little set aside for any unplanned maintenance or expenses that may pop up with the house so that we have a bit of a buffer ready to go in case of any unplanned emergencies.
I want to keep saving for 'House 3' but my main priority for the remainder of this year, I think, should be to build up my emergency fund, now that I have more liabilities and now does also seem like a good time (in my very novice, untrained opinion) to be buying some more shares as the stock market is back in a bear market, due to recessions in economies around the world.
Therefore, on my next day off (which could end up being tomorrow considering how much rain we had at the end of the day today), I'm setting myself the task of sitting down and properly dividing up my pay by percentages into how I'm going to split my savings from now until the end of the year. I always usually think in monetary amounts when it comes to how much I'm going to save in each account from my pay but being casual and receiving differing amounts of pay each week due to weather, like I am at the moment, if I split based on the same percentage each week, it will be easier to be consistent. I'll also be praying for some dry weeks ahead!
I think when you've been earning That FIFO Money for a while, you forget what it was like before you were earning as much as you are now so lifestyle creep is inevitable. Spending your hard earned cash on things that bring you joy in life and make you happy is also well worth it but I hope for myself that I reign it in enough while I'm away at work so that I can truly enjoy my freedom while I'm at home or on holiday. It all comes back to our money values and what we hope to achieve from That FIFO Money. I wrote a blog post recently about 'How My Money Values Have Changed Since Working FIFO', if you're interested, you can read the post here.
Once I've mapped out my specific goals for the remainder of the year and how I'm going to divide my money up based on percentages, I'll do an update post so keep an eye out on my Instagram, @thatfifomoney, where I'll post a link to my latest blog post.
In the meantime, I'll be attempting to spend $0 until AT LEAST my Sunday off! Wish me luck!
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