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Home > Does our Grocery/Household Budgeted Amount Seem High?

Does our Grocery/Household Budgeted Amount Seem High?

June 10th, 2007 at 05:30 am

OK, I'm opening up a bit here, but I'm wondering if what we spend on groceries and household seems high or pretty good.

We allocate about $700 per month ($350 every two weeks) for all food, diapers, pet food, paper products, toiletries, etc. for a family of 10 (3 teens). Yes, we could eat more rice and beans, but haven't gone that far yet.

I guess I'm just wondering what you all think of the amount. If it seems like a lot, I may work harder at cutting back . . .

Thanks in advance!

Posted in Finances in General | 10 Comments »

10 Responses to “Does our Grocery/Household Budgeted Amount Seem High?”

  1. boomeyers Says:
    June 10th, 2007 at 05:48 am 1181454513
    1181454513

    We are at about $400 a month for a family of 5, 2 dogs and one cat. So I think that less than half of that for double the people (plus diapers!) is pretty good! It is hard these days, because EVERYTHING costs more!

  2. pjmama Says:
    June 10th, 2007 at 05:50 am 1181454631
    1181454631

    It really depends on how big your family is and how many pets you own, I think. And your lifestyle as well! Obviously vegetarians or people with illnesses needing certain kinds of foods, or people who eat healthier (or are attempting to!), etc etc etc spend different amounts of money on groceries and the like. A family of 10 is QUITE big, especially considering a few of them are teenagers. I'm not in the slightest bit surprised. When I lived at home, we were a family of 5 and my parents probably spent the same amount feeding us (2 teens, mind you). If you feel there are more cuts you could make, I'm sure that would be fine, but it doesn't seem too high to me. Of course, I'm now living in a household of 2 Smile

  3. monkeymama Says:
    June 10th, 2007 at 06:29 am 1181456997
    1181456997

    Sounds good to me! We spend around $450 lately for 4. & the cat...

  4. yummy64 Says:
    June 10th, 2007 at 12:23 pm 1181478181
    1181478181

    Doesn't sound bad at all. But if you want to trim more look at the liquids you buy. Milk to my mind is a necessity. Pop (soda, coke) isn't, nor are flavoured drinks - buy koolaid for the kids if they can't drink water.



  5. koppur Says:
    June 10th, 2007 at 01:01 pm 1181480504
    1181480504

    For such a large family, I think you're doing fantastic! When I was a kid, my parents spent about $600 a month and it was 2 adults and 2 kids. Currently, the boy and I spend about $300 a month and it is just us (& 2 cats), which is a super lot. Considering you spend twice that on a family 5 TIMES BIGGER, you're doing fab!

  6. tklahn Says:
    June 10th, 2007 at 07:46 pm 1181504771
    1181504771

    Thanks for all the feedback!

    I should have mentioned a couple of things:

    Specifically, we have 2 adults, 3 teens, 5 smaller children. There is 1 in diapers full-time and 2 bedwetters (that I sometimes splurge on pull-ups for). We have 1 dog and 1 cat.

    Yes, we do try to eat moderately healthy (minimal processing, mostly all meals from scratch). We use only butter (avoid hydrogenated margarines which are cheaper), farm eggs (but sometimes have to resort to store eggs), lots of fruit (fresh, frozen and canned), and there is some produce that I REALLY try to only purchase organic because of higher amounts of pesticides used (potatoes and apples are two of the priorities).

    One HUGE benefit we have is that we get our milk FREE! This also helps (when I have time) so that we make homemade kefir and yogurt (great probiotics!).

    Thanks again for the feedback. It helps me to measure how we're doing compared to other families.

  7. Carolina Bound Says:
    June 10th, 2007 at 11:32 pm 1181518346
    1181518346

    I spend about $100 just for myself. And I really work at it. So I think you're doing great!

  8. baselle Says:
    June 11th, 2007 at 01:23 am 1181525035
    1181525035

    I think it is pretty good. If you suspect that you are leaving money on the table you might want to save your receipts and start a little price book to see if you can shave a few bucks here and there on pet food or household incidentals (the grocery store is usually not the best place for those). I don't think you are going to go too much lower without a radical change, but you don't know until you check. Smile

  9. fern Says:
    June 11th, 2007 at 02:58 pm 1181573910
    1181573910

    It sounded very high to me, that is, until you said you are a family of 10! (I'm single and I average about $200 a month.)

  10. katwoman Says:
    June 11th, 2007 at 06:59 pm 1181588347
    1181588347

    I don't know where you live and if you coupon or not, but I bet you can get the paper products/diapers/toiletries way, way down.

    A good way to do this is to find websites (slickdeals.net) that post upcoming ads of Walgreens/CVS. Follow the comments, deals, rebates and coupon pairings that are posted and plan your shopping accordingly. If you need coupons there are clipping services and ebay where you can buy the coupons in bulk.

    There are also threads devoted to getting diapers/wipes very cheaply. Members are good enough to describe in detail just how they do it. I remember one member who would buy diapers/wipes off of Amazon and Toys R Us. Very creative but doable.

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