Financially Naked: Trainer Edition with Jenny Harp

As a Trainer, I always ask my clients to track their spending. After all, it's hard to know how much you can save or invest if you don’t know what’s coming in and going out! One pain point we hit on often is that people think it’s not a good time to track spending because something out of the ordinary is happening. Maybe it’s vacation time, a holiday, a houseguest will be visiting, or any number of other little things that come up in life seem to conspire so that it doesn’t seem like the spending we’ll be tracking is “typical” enough.

I stand by the FinGym love of tracking spending, whether or not it’s a “normal week.” First of all, not tracking often gives us permission to keep our heads in the sand about patterns and choices and habits that don’t serve our financial goals. Also, tracking doesn’t have to mean depriving yourself. It means being aware of whether your spending habits are aligning with your goals and values.

In order to put my money where my mouth is, I volunteered to track my spending while I was road tripping across the US with a friend of mine this week as I moved from Florida to Colorado. (I don’t know how I convinced her to do this with me!) There were some interesting times, that’s for sure! This was also going a testament to my will power as I went to parts of America I’ve never been to before and I was afraid I might go a little overboard on the spending (and I knew my own trainer would be reading this!).  

Before I get into the nitty gritty, let me go over the things that won’t appear on my day-to-day spending, but still have an impact on my finances. 

While I am not currently paying rent because I lived with my parents in preparation for my move, I still have fixed expenses. These include Roth IRA contribution, savings for annual expenses, small monthly investments, Netflix, HBO Max, Discovery+ (bought it for my mom for Mother’s Day since she LOVES the HGTV shows, but of course now I’m hooked on watching Deadliest Catch...and yes I know I’m 17 seasons behind. lol). This month includes a transfer to my travel savings (I’ve got some upcoming weddings to pay for), paying off the LAST of my remaining CC debt (yes, trainers can have debt, too!), and then my gym membership and personal training.

Those things all come off the top, and I consider them non-negotiable, so my discretionary spending has to come from the balance after I deduct those things. From there, I decide on a daily basis where I want my money to go.

And without further ado, here is how my road trip went!

Thursday, September 2

I made an appointment to renew my Global Entry before I knew I was leaving for my roadtrip today, so I had to head on down to the airport to get that squared away. Parking unfortunately wasn’t free, so I had to pay $3 for less than 30 minutes of parking. Sigh…

Once that was officially done, I stopped at the gas station to fill up ($32.63) and then headed out on the road! We made it to our first stop, Tallahassee (we both went to FSU), and stopped at the bookstore so we could purchase some FSU gear. I got a pair of Nike FSU workout shorts for $37.63.  We had lunch with my friend’s sister who goes to school there and my friend paid for all of our lunches.

Total for the day = $73.26

Friday, September 3

We stayed overnight at my friend’s house in Panama City, Florida and the next day we drove straight through Alabama to stay overnight in Nashville. We found one of those little country stores on the side of the road, so of course we had to stop. There were So.Many. Different jams, jellies, hot sauces, moonshines… you name it and they probably had it! I treated myself to some various pieces of chocolate for the road trip ($4.33).

It was finally time to stop for gas again, so we filled up somewhere in Alabama (I couldn’t even begin to tell you where we were) and it was $33.89.  Not too long after that we decided we should also grab some lunch, so we stopped at Wendy’s (I LOVE getting Wendy’s on road trips) for $8.57. 

We finally made it to Nashville. We checked into the hotel and the plan was to have dinner, but we had such a late lunch that we ended up skipping and went straight to having a drink at a bar instead. It was nice to be at a bar again — good whiskey, live country music, dancing — and I was one happy camper that evening! And since I like the good whiskey, the two I had cost me $47.29 (with tip but you always tip your bartenders!). Of course since we didn’t have dinner, two drinks was enough for me that evening!

Total for the day = $94.08

Saturday, September 4

We had decided the night before that since we had such a short drive that day (we were only headed to St. Louis) that we would go a little out of the way to Lynchburg, Tennessee to the Jack Daniel’s Distillery. We couldn’t tour the distillery as all the time slots were filled up, but we definitely did some shopping! I picked up a couple of single barrel bottles from the store on site ($74) and then when we were in town there was a shop dedicated solely to Moon Pies. I’d never heard of Moon Pies, so I figured I would try one (especially because it was only $0.80 for one). I can officially say that I’m not a fan.

Before getting back on the road we stopped for gas again ($24.65) and it was also my turn to get the lotto tickets ($7). We decided to purchase lotto tickets in every state we drove through during the trip. Around lunch time, and to keep with tradition, we stopped at Wendy’s again ($10). Right before getting into St. Louis we had to stop for gas, and this time it was expensive!  The tank of gas cost me $40.10. Geez!

We stayed the night in a hotel in St. Louis and this was the hotel I covered (my friend got the one in Nashville). The total for the night, including $40 for valet parking was $252.10. (I normally don’t do valet, but since I had so much stuff in my car for the move/road trip I didn’t want to park it in the street).

Total for the day = $408.65

Sunday, September 5

Back on the road again! This was definitely the earliest morning we had to get up, as we had a very long day of driving. We stopped at McDonald’s for breakfast ($17.32), and I paid for both of us since my friend paid for dinner the night before (and wouldn’t let me give her any money for it!) The total for McDonald’s definitely didn’t compare to what she paid for dinner, but at least it was something!

We made it to Kansas City for a later lunch and immediately went to get some BBQ!  I was told it was the thing to do while in Kansas City, so when in Rome right? We went to Jack Stack Barbeque. My friend and I each did a combo platter so we could taste a variety of different things (including a salad —  I desperately needed some greens! lol) and my half of the bill came to $35.62. We had to stop for gas before leaving the city ($39.46) and I grabbed the lotto tickets for our Kansas stop ($6).

Total for the day = $98.40

Monday, September 6

We stayed overnight in Nebraska in an AirBnB, so when heading out in the morning we had to fill up for gas again (shocker). We went to a local gas station that also had breakfast sandwiches (kinda like a Wawa if you’re familiar with that). The gas was $26 and the breakfast sandwich, lotto tickets, and snacks for the car were $14.99. We hit the road again, this time driving through Nebraska a bit more, back into Kansas, and finally making it Colorado!

We had to stop for gas (I’m sensing a theme to this story…) which was $37.30. The gas was expensive per gallon so I didn’t even bother filling up a whole tank of it. Once we got to our destination, we stopped at a gas station to get the last of our lotto ticket purchases and a car wash for my car, because the amount of bugs squashed on the front was unreal ($17).

After a little rest, we went over to Target so I could get some groceries for the week ($39.08).

Total for the day = $134.37

Tuesday, September 7

Oh thank heaven, I didn’t spend any money that day!

Wednesday, September 8

I didn’t spend any money on Wednesday, either. I was on a roll! Let’s see how long I can make this last.  :)

Total for the trip: $808.76

All in all, I spent about $808 on my cross country road trip. This is more than my usual $150 weekly spend target, but obviously I expected that, given that this wasn’t just any week. Despite the fact that it’s hard to pull this number into an average of my monthly spending, the exercise was valuable for a few reasons. 

One is that it shows that overall, I was pretty intentional about how I spent my money. I chose inexpensive pit stops when possible, which helped me make room for some splurges on things I care about (like good whisky, local delicacies, and safe parking, apparently!). Another is that the process of tracking keeps you honest. When you know you’re writing things down and reporting them back, you think twice before throwing money down the drain. Another is that knowing what I’ve spent helps me keep track of my overall savings rate, which is an important marker of financial wellness. Again, this isn’t an exercise in deprivation, but a way to stay intentional even when you’re outside of your normal routine.

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