. My 2025 expenses are pretty scary to look at, given how many line items increased significantly from 2024.
Here are my top 10 expenses.
1. No surprise, but what I paid on my new Toyota Corolla Crossover, between the down payment, regular payments and extra principal-only payments was $19,662. I still have a balance of $9,650 and plan to pay it all off in 2026. Seems like it's taking FOREVER, and I resent the 6.9% when nearly every other car brand out there finances at less than half that. I suppose I could have joined a credit union and gotten a better rate, but oh well.
2. Again no surprise, but property taxes of $7,569, an increase of 5.2% compared to last year. It is what it is. And to think that if I chose to move one town over, because that town is in a different county, I'd save quite a bit in property taxes, among other things. But I like my town.
3. Back stone stair redo, a one-time home improvement so I have nothing to compare it to from last year. $4,600.
4. Food: $4,502, which surprisingly was 4.5% less than last year.
5. Health insurance: OK, here's where it gets really scary. My cost for Medicare and a Medigap plan was $4,473, which is 100% more than what I spent last year!! Last year, for the 1st 7 mths of the year, I was still on Obamacare. While I thank my lucky stars I don't have to deal with the massive rate increase Obamacare folks face now thanks to Rump, my health insurance costs in 2024 were just $2,231. I hadn't realized how much more I was paying this year.
6. Front door replacement (including the storm door) was another one-time home improvement that cost $3,698. I don't regret it but I still need to find a trim carpenter who can fix and replace the trim the door installers used, which doesn't match the trim I have in my LR/DR. It doesn't look good, plus there's a gap they created by removing the old trim.
7. "Household." $3,182. This is probably the only catch-all category I have where things that don't fit in other categories tend to get buried. It's usually stuff for the house. This represented a 41% increase from the year before and included a new Shark vacuum, paying my handyman to build me a platform for my front-loading washer/dryer and my reverse-osmosis water filtration system. I don't regret any of these purchases.
8. Lawn & garden: $1,865, an 85% increase from the year before. This includes bi-weekly lawn mows, which increased in price when I changed mowers. It also included some new plants I bought, a new battery lawn mower and an expensive tuteur for some native honeysuckle a friend gave me.
9. 2 basement walls recoated: $1,850. I had the other 2 walls done in prior years so now finally all 4 walls have been recoated. It needed to be done as the old concrete was crumbling, and if I ever want to sell this place, that could have been a concern for potential buyers.
10. Car insurance for new car: $1,286, the first time it's been a four-figure number. A 59% increase from last year, when I was insuring a 2013 sedan. Geez. Not to mention an increase in my car tax, $405, double what I paid on my old Honda.
I also had an unexpected big expense, replacement of the firebox in my oil furnace which cost me $1,090. The HVAC guy said that if it had been any other brand, he would have just recommended I replace my 30-yr furnace, but with mine, I can get another 20 years out of it, he said.
The majority of my other more routine expenses all saw increases from last year. The exceptions included a 42% drop in what I paid this year in out of pocket medical/dental costs and a 27% drop in entertainment expenses. My internet bill increased by 24%, just because they like to gouge their customers. Even though I have 2 full years of free ToyotaCares maintenance, I still wound up paying $450 out of my own pocket because of that fiasco where I was handed the 2nd, spare key by the dealer salesman and then immediately lost it. Like, I don't know if it ever left the parking lot. I searched high and low for it and in the end, decided I wanted that 2nd key should anything ever happen to the first, so yup, I forked over $400.
A few bright spots in my secondary expenses: my gas costs dropped by 46%. My dining out expenses dropped by 40%, but then I only spend a few hundred on this anyway. My water bill dropped 11%, I think becus in 2024 the end cap on a pipe burst and flooded my basement with more water than I realized at the time.
All in all, total expenses came to about $65,000. But part of that was roughly $11,000 spent on 4 separate home improvements, so my actual living expenses were about $54,000.
Looking at my grocery breakdown, or where I spent my grocery dollars, I spent the most, $1,298, at BJs, which I'm okay with since their prices tie with Aldi's in many cases. In the #2 spot was Whole Foods, at $921, which I think I'm ok with too because I stick to the 365 brand but do probably pay a premium for fresh organic produce there, but I think they have the best and I'm willing to spend on it.
I'm unhappy that I spent $815 at Stop & Shop, which is high priced, but there are certain items I can't find elsewhere cheaper, like the low-fat Cabot cheddar I buy, frozen lima beans and the shredded wheat cereal. I did discover their bok choy is way overpriced at $6.99 for a wrapped package of baby bok choy compared to Whole Foods, so I corrected that oversight sometime ago.
In the #4 spot is Aldi's, where I spent $445. I buy what I can there, but admit to being very particular when it comes to food; I avoid high sodium, high fat and high sugar products, as well as processed foods with lots of additives/preservatives and ingredients I can't pronounce. The remaining places I spent grocery dollars on, in lesser amounts, included Trader Joe's, Vitacost, Big Y, Target, Harney & Sons, Shop Rite, Walmart and 2 local and expensive stores. One is a new, small farm market with produce even more dazzling than Whole Foods, but I don't think their prices are a bargain and I don't like their receipts, which DO NOT itemize what you bought, making it impossible to compare prices later, so I'm sticking with Whole Foods.
January 3rd, 2026 at 02:19 am 1767406791
January 3rd, 2026 at 05:12 am 1767417124
One of the many, many examples why, for the life of me, I can not fathom why people would ever vote for and even defend Trump and the GOP right now. They've never hid the fact that they were not interested in taking care of the people, unless of course you are already super rich and is donating to their coffers.
January 3rd, 2026 at 01:43 pm 1767447800
Dido is right about the car and you said you'll have that paid off this year so your expenses there should decrease once that is paid off.
However, I think we've all seen prices go up on so many things, whether it is groceries, clothing, healthcare...DH and I tease each other and say, "Are we great yet?"
January 3rd, 2026 at 02:49 pm 1767451751
January 3rd, 2026 at 02:50 pm 1767451839
January 3rd, 2026 at 02:52 pm 1767451966
January 3rd, 2026 at 10:32 pm 1767479576
Tabs, I completely agree but I confess that I don't have high expectations of folks in the cult.
January 4th, 2026 at 08:44 pm 1767559459
January 9th, 2026 at 06:24 am 1767939844
January 9th, 2026 at 01:33 pm 1767965632
To answer LAL, I was planning to live on a fairly modest $65,000 a year but ample for me until age 70, when my SS begins. That's still a few years away.