Expenses: my expenses for 2022

Kaylee's not-a-blog » Human stuff » Expenses » my expenses for 2022

Category	Total Spent for Year	Monthly Average	Daily Average
all Vehicle expenses (gas, repairs, insurance, etc)	$1200.07	$100.01	$3.29/day ( $1.79/mile )
food	$1038.89	$86.57	$3.27/day
everything else	$719.68	$59.97	$1.97/day
Total Year:	$2958.64	$246.55	$8.11/day

These are my total expenses for all of 2022 (365 days).
Here is a year-by-year summary of my expenses for all my years in my van.

Noteworthy Changes:

Inflation exploded.
My 2022 expenses increased significantly, mainly due to:
- more van repairs
- re-acquiring phone/internet (I went without in 2021)
- rebuilt my food supplies/reserves
I received about 48.0 days of food from food pantries - thanks to all who support such projects! :)
I received all three pandemic "stimulus" payments from the IRS. #phew

Vehicle only Expenditures:

Category	Total Spent for Year	Monthly Average	Cost per Mile
repairs & maintenance	$772.89	$64.41	$1.15
gas	$258.17	$21.51	$0.38
van insurance	$106.08	$8.84	$0.1581
van registration	$62.93	$5.24	$0.0938
Total for Year:	$1200.07	$100.01	$1.79

Van expenses comprised 40.6% of all of my expenditures.

Total miles driven: 671 miles
Of those miles, about 0 miles (0.0%) were "travel"/migration miles between states, the rest were local, mostly relocating and town supply/etc runs.

In mid-2021 I had another major van mechanical issue, the original repairs of which failed, and had to be completely re done in 2022, so I was not able to migrate the winter of 2021-2022.
Several admin issues delayed my migration for winter 2022-2023, and I ended up skipping it again.
Lack of migration dramatically lowered my gas costs for the year.

Food Expenditures:

I spent $1038.89 on food, which was 35.1% of my expenditures.
The daily average was $3.27/day (based on 318 calendar days (i.e. minus 48.0 days of gifted food)).

My estimated food stockpile at the end of 2021 was 42.5 days, vs 188.7 days at the end of 2022.
My cost per calorie day was about $2.24/day based on cost of calories (i.e. I bought about 463.2 days worth of food for the year).

My cost per calorie day again went down for 2022, mainly because:

Inflation invoked my Fear response, albeit in a Competent manner. :)
I gave up some more expensive food items, particularly items that jumped up in price (e.g. no more Walmart mini pies).
I was more focused on stockpiling sales.
I optimized Dollar General (I'll write up details, soon-ish).

Note that in January & February 2022, I did a major food restock, buying 135.5 calorie-days for $338.74, and obtained 14.9 calorie-days from a local food pantry, for a total of 4.9 calorie-months of food.
I felt much less stressed afterwards. :)

Everything Else:

Total cost of all my non van & food expenses was $719.68 (24.3% of my total).

Breakdown by sub-category:

expenses that are roughly equivalent to "sticks & bricks" Utilities
PO box	$86.25
Communications	$353.50
cooking fuel	total: $54.42	butane (1 case of 12 canisters)	37.44
cooking fuel	total: $54.42	propane (3 one pound bottles)	16.98
all other expenses
non-food Personal expenses	total: $160.12	clothing	50.70
		hygiene (laundry, etc)	36.74
		luxuries	50.02
		medical	9.18
		sundry	13.48
Gear/Equipment (mostly one-offs)	total: $65.39	6 medium (12L) latching bins (to improve food organization and mouse proofness)	33.28
		DC charger, small devices	9.62
		handwarmers	8.47
		headlamp	6.39
		velcro cable ties	6.08
		glasses	1.25

Budget Limits:

My budget for all "personal" expenses (food, clothing, hygiene, luxuries, medical, etc) is $1500 per year ($125 per month).
For 2022, I only spent $1199.01 ($1038.89 for food, $160.12 for all other "personal" expenses), and so was $300.99 under budget.

My budget for luxuries is $60 per year ($5 per month).
I spent $50.02, which was $9.98 under my limit for the year.