Stuff keeps happening...

Readership

I don't mean to brag, but check out the legions of readers my RSS feed has. That's four whole people who like what they've read enough to follow up on a regular basis. Assuming, of course, that they're not all me (I'm still getting the hang of this Web 2.0 thingy).

Retirement Savings

This morning, I requested the transfer of my final "chunk" of retirement savings into my brokerage account. For those keeping score, I have the following (as of July 31):

• Brokerage self-directed RSP account: $5,752.77
• Employee Savings Plan Group RRSP: $27,135.99
• Employee Group RRSP:$4,740.82

The first group RRSP is where my bi-weekly payroll deductions (and 50% employer match) go into company stock. The second is where I can defer a portion of my year-end bonus. My goal is to consolidate my retirement savings into one account (the brokerage RSP), and today I initiated the transfer of the final piece of the puzzle. My bi-weekly contributions will continue in the ESP, and I will continue to defer part of my annual bonus into the other employee account, but I will periodically move these assets into the brokerage account, to have a consolidated view of my retirement savings (diversified across my selection of index funds).

The Spending Struggle

I've been thinking more and more about my recent issues with a "paycheque-to-paycheque" mindset. Ultimately, I think I'm not planning and tracking my spending adequately. A big problem area for me (and for many others) is grocery spending. I tend to look at this category as a single, contiguous "block" of necessary expense, and I believe that there's plenty of room here for better planning and prioritization. It seems to me that I have a choice: either live paycheque-to-paycheque, or live "purchase-to-purchase". By taking the latter mindset, every expenditure will be evaluated to answer the following questions:

• Is this a necessary expense?


• How much money will this leave available until the next paycheque?


• What will I need to sacrifice to accommodate this expense?

I believe that "purchase-to-purchase" thinking is really the essence of frugality. Let's see how it works for me.