I used to drink gourmet coffee at home, until I did the math. Never go to Starbucks, occasionally coffee house with friends. But at home I just switched to Folger’s. Cutting back on non essential things that add up fast is easy, but hey, you young-uns wanna use an app, go for it. 
The. What’s the point of living here if you can’t reminisce the old food? We are all humans who feel homesick too.
I had one of the closest things to a pub lunch available in Taipei today at Gordon Biersch: beef dip sliders and a pint of beer. Would have come to about NT$1000 if I hadn’t had enough membership points for a free beer (god, almost $50 Canadian for a sandwich and a beer …). Loved it. Eating that regularly, however, would have me running out of money in a hurry.
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I guess that’s where my money is going. I seldom have local good
Local food? I don’t often eat it either, but I cook for myself most of the time.
The lunchbox at a meeting last week may be the only not-a-breakfast-place Taiwanese food I’ve eaten all month. Even for the most recent visit to the in-laws, we went to a Korean place. Oh, right, mother-in-law gave us zongzi, so there was that.
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The app doesn’t look bad.
But I assume it only works with the new kind of receipts, right?
Whoa, that’s hardcore. Respect! Do you use a percolator?
Open flame.
No, only the new ones for now. I might be able to add scanning just the lottery part of the old kind in the future. It’s something I’ve thought about.
I think tracking your spending is useful in the beginning stages of financial literacy - especially how it shows you areas you spend on that you weren’t aware of. However, once you have that awareness, it isn’t really that important, especially if you have a consistent salary.
Personally, I find the “pay yourself first” methodology to work best for me long term. I put a certain amount into my investment/retirement accounts first - these are untouchable. Then I put a certain amount per biweekly check into different accounts: travel, house, and car; I can use these as needed. Finally, I have automatic withdrawal on a separate account that has a certain percentage of my check out into it , that has all my regular bills on auto withdrawal. In addition, at the end of the fiscal year (generally tax time), I put extra money into my Emergency fund, and once it hit 3 months expenses, I put the extra onto my mortgage (and some for a small fun fund for my wife and myself)
So where is my spending money??? Whatever is left over. If I don’t have enough for something I want, I just need to wait. Or if I really want it, and the “fun” account is empty, then I take it out of my travel account if necessary. The most important thing is my needs are taken care of first, my wants (spending) come last.
This is my method after 15 years or so of figuring it out, and it really works for us. It is not for everyone though.
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