Our March 2026 Budget in Percentages | Family of Four
Here’s what was going on for us in March.
The credit card debacle from February had one last victim (I hope!). I missed the fact that the compromised card was tied to our water bill (which is billed every other month). They sent a very inconspicuous email that looked exactly like our regular payment confirmation with one small line saying, “your card was declined.” We ended up with yet another late payment and associated fee. It wasn’t a huge late fee, but on principle, we called and asked for the fee to be removed, and they agreed. I went through all of our accounts again to make sure nothing else was missed.
We paid our last preschool tuition check ever! I was simultaneously feeling really sad while being super excited to get a few hundred dollars back into our budget starting in April. Mike’s cost of living increase went into effect this month too, so we have a slightly higher income that we’ll adjust for future months. One of the many things I love about using Monarch for budgeting is how easy it is to change budget amounts from month to month (vs. my old spreadsheet where I’d have to change all the remaining months for the year whenever we updated the budget).
March (and early April) typically means spring break for our kids. This was our third year going down to the Outer Banks in North Carolina. We ended up about $100 over budget in food/dining out given our trip (we did also host some meals and overnight guests at our house earlier in the month). However, our flexible spending category had room to spare (about $300) so it evened out nicely. I also pulled funds from our travel savings bucket to cover the cost of our AirBnB in NC.
Other Income for this month includes our tax refund, which went right into savings.
March 2026 Detailed Budget Categories
Highlights
Savings rate: 26% (higher than normal due to our tax refund)
Top spending categories:
Mortgage (18.8%)
Groceries (17.9%)
Travel (10.6%)
Preschool (3.4%)
Irregular bills that hit (pulled from sinking funds):
Pest control (1.6%)
Water (1.6%)
Monarch (1.1%)
Garbage (1%)
Reflections & Looking Ahead
What changed most compared to a “normal” month?
We traveled at the end of the month, and we had a large AirBnB bill so we pulled funds from savings to cover it (didn’t want to wipe out our budget for the month). We filed our taxes at the beginning of the month and got our refund back a few weeks later. We didn’t have any specific plans for our refund so it went into savings.
What felt good this month?
Having savings buckets to pull from when our regular income won’t cover bigger purchases (like AirBnb accommodations).
Is there anything we’d tweak for the future?
Not necessarily a tweak but just a reminder to myself that we set aside money in savings to help us out later on when we make larger purchases. When later on rolls around, it’s perfectly fine to use the money, that’s what it’s there for! I definitely struggle with taking any money out of savings, even if it’s planned.
