What We Need to Know When Comparing Budgets

My two littlest ones have been waking up a lot at night over the past week or so, so I am exhausted.  That means I probably ought not try to tackle anything that has the potential to be a “hot topic”!  But I do have a bit of a “pet peeve” I wanted to tackle, that I think should be “safe”: frugal living bloggers providing too little information for readers to determine how their budgets compare.

Let me ‘splain. 🙂

Lots of frugal living bloggers will talk about how much they spend per month on groceries (for instance).  Usually they’ll tell you how many household members that includes.  But there are a number of other factors that come into play which, if not addressed, can leave some of us feeling like we must be budgeting failures – when really we’ve just not made some key adjustments when comparing the information.

So, frugal living bloggers, it would be helpful, when we’re reading your posts, if we could figure out:

• Your area.  Now, I’m not saying we need your street address or something!  But the overall area can make a huge difference.  (I’ve looked at some people’s budgets and thought, “Wow, we could live on that?” and then realized that a whole house where they live costs half as much as here.  That’s a pretty significant difference in a monthly budget.  And as a side note, this regional difference is key when it comes to renting, too.  It actually costs more here to rent, so that’s not a cost-effective option.)  Are you in the midwest, the deep south, the east coast, etc.?  Rural, suburban, or urban?  Do you happen to know that your area has a particularly high or low cost of living?
• Who you’re feeding.  Feeding a family of four that includes two toddlers is not going to be the same as feeding a family of four that includes two teenage boys!
• Whether your grocery budget includes non-foods.  Does your grocery budget include all household products (like paper products and cleaning supplies), or just food?  And, likewise, does all food – including anything eaten “out”  – fall under your grocery budget, or do you have a separate “eating out” budget item?
• If you’re eating whole foods.  “Unprocessed” and “from scratch” aren’t necessarily quite the same thing.  White rice is “from scratch,” and some people would thus call it unprocessed (because it’s not a meal in a box or can, etc.).  But brown rice is a lot more expensive.  Wheat bread is more expensive than white bread.  Butter costs more than margarine.  And so on.  So readers need to know what type of items you’re shopping for on the specified budget
• If you are shopping/cooking for special needs.  Do you have to buy certain brands because of food allergies?  “Double up” in certain food categories because you have to avoid others?  Avoid the least expensive versions of certain things because they don’t fit into your dietary requirements?  (For example, pork roasts are often one of the cheapest cuts of meat.  If you can’t or won’t eat pork, that option is automatically off the table.  No pun intended.)

Of course, this doesn’t all apply to every type of frugal living post!  But if you’re talking budget, it’s helpful for readers to know whether they’re comparing apples and apples or apples and oranges.  🙂  That’s especially so if you’re making a confident declaration to the effect of “X people should be able to manage on a budget of X/month.”

And readers: take note of these things! It can be helpful – even wise – to consider whether you’re spending more than you need to be.  One of the best ways to do that is to look at those who are getting by on less.  But don’t forget to take into account the details that differ, so you don’t send yourself on a guilt trip in an area where you’re doing just fine.

I know that what I could get away with for groceries when I first started blogging was a lot less than what I have to spend now!  Not only is our family larger, making the total higher, but prices have gone up (and up…and up…and up), and we’ve got added health challenges that have placed some limitations and increased certain requirements.

Also pay attention to the food value.  Sometimes posts will talk about foods that are under $1 or how such-and-such a food is so much less per pound than such-and-such a food.  This is good information to have!  But don’t utilize it in a vacuum.  Keep in mind that you don’t buy food for its poundage; you buy it for its nutritional value.  Maybe you can get a pound of lettuce for a lot less than a pound of beef, but that lettuce is not going to fill you up and fuel you like the beef will, so they’re not really comparable.  (That’s not to say the lettuce is nutritionally useless – that may depend on the lettuce! – just that they’re two very different foods that serve different functions.)
Can you think of any other factors I’ve missed?