Six Questions to Get to Know Each Other (Financially)

I first saw this post at Budgets Are Sexy and then also over at Single Guy Money and How I Save Money, but I think the questions originated at Automatic Finances. I thought it would be fun and informative to share my answers with you, sort of like the Facebook 20 questions quiz that was going around last year, minus the TMI (too much information) aspect. I’d love see your responses too. Just post your answers in the comments section and let’s start the discussion.

(1) How do you spend: cash, debit or credit? A mix between credit and debit. I try to use my rewards credit card wherever possible. I rarely carry cash because it seems to disappear so fast when I do. However, I am looking at adopting the envelope budgeting system for groceries as this is an area where I’ve consistently been exceeding my budget.

(2) Do you bank online? How about use a financial aggregator (Mint, Wesabe, Yodlee, etc.)? I do bank online at one of the big banks and I’m very happy with them. I’m also looking at online banks with higher savings interest rates. I don’t use a financial aggregator as I track everything between my Budget and Net Worth spreadsheets. But I’m interested in their functionality so I’ll probably evaluate a couple soon.

(3) What recurring bills do you have set on autopay? Any fixed amount bill is set to autopay. The rest I pay manually so I can review the bills before I make the payment.

(4) How are your finances automated? Our 401K is funded automatically and we use direct deposit. I’m also planning to have a portion of my husbands paycheck directly deposited into our savings account so we’re automatically funding our Emergency Fund.

(5) Do you write checks? If so, how often? Only for birthdays and Christmas.

(6) Where do you stash your short-term savings? It’s currently at Chase but as noted above I’m looking at higher yielding online savings accounts.

That’s it for me, now let’s hear from you.