My friend M was telling me how she tracks her spending in her notebook. By doing this she could analyze where her money was going on a monthly basis. M, what kinds of patterns did you notice in your spending? Did you decide to take any kind of action after tracking your expenses?

This made sense to me. If I’m going to set a financial goal for retirement, I need to know how much to budget for and see if there are any areas I can reduce my expenses. Alongside that I have some personal goals, and I hope my spending aligns with those goals. My goals are to:

• eat healthy (fresh groceries may cost more in Japan)
• broaden my friendship circle (this may mean eating out more, purchasing gifts, cards etc.)
• trying new hobbies (may cost $)
• stop purchasing clothes or shoes this year unless its to replace something – closet is full!

So, for the past few months I have been using the Easy Spending app. This app is easy to use and quite intuitive. You can create your own expense categories and even add your income. It creates weekly or monthly reports (pie charts) on your spending. One of favorite features is its foreign currencies capabilities. So I can track expenses when I’m at home in Canada for a few months and track my Japanese expenses!

My goal in the next 6 months is to see if I can see any patterns in my spending and to see where I can cut unnecessary expenses.