Well, here goes (And it's probably gonna be long...)

For starters, I'm 23 years old. I graduated college in May, 2006 and began working at my current job in August 2006 as part of a Graduate Training Program. The salary was good, and it gave me a nice couple of months to relax before beginning life in the "Real World." Since joining the work force, a lot has changed. I moved into my first apartment, "bought" a car, bought a big tv, bought a wii, bought an xbox360, bought a new laptop, bought an iphone (noticing a trend?)

Raise time rolled around this year and I did pretty well for myself. I received a bonus of $7500 (though uncle Sam only handed over $4500) and a salary bump to $68,750. I thought to myself, "This is pretty good!" Then i thought, "Man, why don't I have any savings?"

I spent a day in Barnes and Noble looking over Personal Finance books. I didn't really know where to begin, but it had to be in one of those books, right? I ended up purchasing (on my debit card!) "The Financial Peace Planner" by Dave Ramsey. (It's been a long time since I've written much of anything, so don't be offended if the title of a book is supposed to be underlined and I used quotes. I studied computers, not English.) I liked this book in particular because it was less preachy than most I had skimmed through, including his other books, and it had a lot of math. I finished it in a weekend and assessed my situation. I was living paycheck to paycheck, but I'd never missed a payment, always paid more than the minimums, and felt that anything left at the end of the month was mine to spend. Besides, I had been putting 6% into my 401(k) since day 1, which put me ahead of most people my age. (I justify my actions to myself a lot.) All in all I didn't feel that I was in terrible shape, but I could see that I wasn't exactly getting ahead either.

The first thing I did was to divvy up how I would allocate my bonus.

In rounder numbers, here's what I did-
Finished off Baby Emergency Fund (Dave Ramsey Step 1 Complete!) [$500]
"Safety Net" for my "Bills" Checking Account (ING Electric Orange) [$500]
"Safety Net" for my "Discretionary" Checking Account (WaMu) [$300]
Opened a Roth IRA [$250]
Cleared up my outstanding Credit Card Debt [$500]
Down Payment on an engagement ring [$500]
Began a Wedding Fund [$250]
Booked a Cruise for two (leaves locally, so no additional airfare) [$1400]
Set aside for cruise expenses [$300]



I then took a serious look at my accounts. My raise went into effect March 1, and on the 15th I received my first check with the new amounts. I have tweaked my direct deposits and am using the rest of this month as a dry run for my new budget. I began my new budget on March 1st, and so far, so good. My fiance (I proposed yesterday!) has been very supportive. Supportive, for the most part, translates to eating out less often and trying to do more fun things at home, rather than always go to the movies. Anyway, the accounts. Here's a breakdown of what's in my name-

Checking/Savings
ING Electric Orange Checking: Bills Account [Months End ~$500]
ING Savings 1: Emergency Fund [$1000]
ING Savings 2: Wedding Fund [$250]
WaMu Checking: Discretionary Spending Account [Months End ~$250]
WaMu Online Savings: The "I need to save for something that isn't an emergency or a wedding" Account- Currently the cruise expenses. [~$300]

Retirement
401(k): I put in 6% to get max company match [~$10,000]
Roth: Just opened [$250]

Debt
WaMu Mastercard: Don't use. Just have incase I need a major card. It also reports my FICO (currently 720ish) monthly [$0]
Discover More Card: This was empty after bonus, now carries engagement ring. 0% APR until August [$2500]
Amex Blue: I've never even used this card. 0% APR until 2009. [$0]
Car Loan: 8.9% Everyone's favorite topic of Debate... More on this later [~$16,000]
Student Loan: 4.5% [~$12,600]



As I mentioned earlier, I adjusted my direct deposits in anticipation of the raise. I made myself a budget which could be described as half Dave Ramsey, half "I'm 23 and obviously know better than him." Every month before taxes roughly $345 is being deposited to my 401(k) plus whatever match. After taxes I'm bringing home $3600 a month. That translates to $1800 a paycheck, of which I've allocated $1500 to "bills" and $300 to discretionary.

These amounts were decided after studying my previous spending habits, and making adjustments where I saw fit. I have been doing a dry run of the budget, and am fairly comfortable with it. The budget is sound, I believe, until the end of August. August will be an interesting month for several reasons. 1- My fiance and I will be looking to move in together. Currently I live with a coworker, and all bills are split evenly. 2- I will "graduate" my program at work and will be eligible for another raise. Maybe another bonus. 3- The 0%APR ends on my Discover (ring) card, and I have made it my goal to clear that up before then.

Anyway: Here is the Monthly Budget for April-August.

ING Electric Orange Checking [+$3000]
Rent: My half [$700]
Gas/Electric: My half (high estimate, should go down in Spring/Summer) [$140]
Phone: I pay for me and my fiance [$130]
Cable/Internet: My half [$30]
Car: 2006 Civic. I pay $130 extra [$500]*#
Gas: High Traffic = Low Fuel Efficiency [$250]
Car Insurance: [$120]
Groceries/Supplies: [$250]
Student Loans: [$110]*
Wedding: [$250]*
Ring: This will allow me to pay off before 0%APR ends[$500]*
Variable: E-Z Pass, Water, Oil Change, Dog, etc.

At the end of each month, I'll spend a little above or below the $3000 I put in, and I still have a $500 safety net in the account. I don't mind leaving it there because ING Checking pays interest.

WaMu Checking [+600]
Variable Expenses: Eating Out, Entertainment, Video Games, Clothing, Books, Haircuts, etc.

The basic idea here is I can spend this money how i want, but if I buy a video game, i probably won't be able to go to a fancy dinner. By separating this money from my bills, I shouldn't ever have to worry about spending money that I need to allocate elsewhere. The extra incentive to be frugal is that this is the account linked to my Roth IRA. I know I won't fully fund it this way, but it will be more incentive to eat out less and put that money towards my retirement at the end of the month.

I've also made it my goal not to resort to my credit cards. They're still in my wallet, but hey, that adds to the challenge.



*The four items I marked with the asterisks are what I feel are my debts. The main focus in Ramsey's method is getting out of debt. He says to attack your smallest debts first and snowball up. I agree with the approach, but I'm trying it in a less conventional way. The first one I want to tackle is the ring. There are two reasons. One, I want it paid off more than anything else on the list. Two, I want it taken care of before the 0%APR is up. By paying $500 a month, it will be cleared up right before the statement in August. After that it becomes a little tricky. On the one hand, there's the car, which has a pretty high interest rate. On the other hand is the wedding. While not a debt yet, it would be nice to say that I saved towards it and didn't have to resort to my credit cards. Plus, I'm already paying extra towards the car each month, which, if followed through to the end, will cut 15 months and $1000 off the total. All of this plays into that whole weird time frame of August thing. At that point, I should be moving in with my fiance. That means taking a whole new look at the rest of the bills and how we will afford them together. I also could be making more money, and by that time so could she. (She is working an hourly job close to home and taking a bus, while tackling the last of her credit card debt and saving for a used car. She's found a variety of salaried job positions in her field, but needs a car to commute to them.) There's also a good chance that we will have picked a date for the wedding by then, which will put a whole different spin on how much and when we should save for it. Hopefully as time passes I'll have a clearer picture on what snowball 2 should actually be, but I guess I'll just have to be more patient until then.

#The car. If anyone has read this to this point (And still has any clue what I'm rambling about), I'm sure the obvious answer to help my situation is to SELL THE CAR! Here's the thing. I "bought" the car in 2006 because hey, I was a big shot and deserved it. Having had no prior credit history (My parents talked me out of a credit card in college), I was blessed with a wonderful 11.5% interest rate for 5 years. I was also naive. The initial car payments were $470. I sucked it up and paid them all on time. Then, a year later I applied to refinance it. Since I had paid mostly interest for the first year of the loan, refinancing it at the lower rate for 48 months didn't change the monthly payments all that much. I opted to extend it back out to 5 years to get a $370 a month minimum payment. Quick math told me that I would be spending about the same in the long run, but it wouldn't be such a high payment each month. (And of course, I immediately started paying the minimum instead of trying to pay it off early.) I checked Kelley Blue Book, and right now I'm about $2500 upside down on the loan. If I make the small extra payments I've planned each month, I should be slightly ahead by the end of the year. Here's the (other) thing. If I were to sell it at that point, and buy a "junker", it would probably be a used civic. But... I'm driving a civic. I bought it in the first place to run it into the ground. It has great fuel efficiency and enough room for a small kid or two (we're talking 10 years or so of owning this car). Does that make it worthwhile to keep?


Well, thanks for reading if you did indeed stick around long enough. I'm open to suggestions, comments and the like. If what I'm doing or saying doesn't make sense, please let me know. I started this journal because I know myself, and I'll always be thinking of ways to "change" and "improve" my plan or revise my budget. I think this will help me capture my thoughts as I have them, so that later I can rationally decide if a change is for the best. Plus, it'll be nice to hear what others have to say.

Until Then.

I would keep the car.

It's not my style to go out and a buy a new car (I'm 22, I make 56 grand a year, but I'm still driving the same car I've had since I was 16), just because you'll lose a ton just making the move now. You've got a reliable car that you'll have a long time, is one of the better bets on fuel out there, and it's relatively inexpensive anyway. Just keep making the payments and take the credit boost in the future when you go to buy a house or something.

You make enough to stay afloat, although I don't agree with a lot of your purchases or past spending... but it sounds like you are on the right track. Best of luck.

Thanks for the advice. You could probably classify me as a recovering spendthrift.

It took a while, as I've been spending "willy-nilly" for the past two years, but I'm finally starting to take an interest in getting myself out of debt and making smarter choices on what to do with my money.

I'll admit that I haven't made the best choices so far, and I'm sure the $1400 for a cruise when I'm trying to clear up my debts doesn't exactly scream, "Progress!" The truth is, for all the justifications I could come up with, there's no good reason for it other than "I wanted to."

I know I have a long way to go, and the urge to splurge isn't going to go away overnight, but I'm hopeful that following a budget for the first time in my life and having some short term goals will help to keep me on the right track. Putting everything on paper definitely helps to see the bigger picture. If I were smarter from the beginning, there's no reason I should have a car loan, and my student loans could have been almost completely eliminated. Compare that to the 30k of debt I'm in now, and it's pretty scary.

I know the next couple of months aren't going to be easy. I'm going to be changing a lot of old habits, and will probably be tempted on a number of occasions to buy something that I don't really need. It's going to take patience, a virtue which I'm not exactly overflowing with.

My first big milestone will be at the end of April, when I see if I could really stick to my budget for a whole month. I'll probably post my progress along the way.

Thanks again for the advice, and the well wishes... And if you have any suggestions on changes I could make, let me know. Maybe someone else will think of something that I missed.

First of all, congratulations. You've acknowledged the problem and have put a plan in place.

I'd keep the car. If you're really planning on driving it to the ground, it'll last you quite a while.

A few comments/questions:
- Your gas/month seems pretty high (especially for a Civic!). Any way you can telecommute, carpool, etc?
- Phone/month also seems high, especially if it's just for 2. I'm assuming it's a cell phone plan... any cheaper ones?
- Where does Dog fit in? You never know when pets suddenly fall ill (God forbid, but it happens), and pet medical emergencies can be really expensive.
- I think you should focus a bit more on increasing your emergency fund. Depending on your risk tolerance level, the emergency fund should cover 3-6 months of expenses.
- It's good that you're contributing towards your 401k and saving specifically towards a Wedding.
- One suggestion for your WaMu Checking / Variable Expenses account: split it up into more than 1 category. I know you want to treat it as one big lump sum so you can spend it however you want, but that just makes it easier to blow it all very quickly. If you know you will be eating out, make that a category. If you know you will be going out to the movies, make that another category. Make another category for video games (will you buy 1 a month? 2? 3?) Once you've spent up that category for the month, make yourself wait for the next month before buying that video game, or going to that movie. You can still keep a Miscellaneous category, just keep it low; anything that isn't specifically covered by the other categories goes into this one.

You're on the right track. Keep it up.

I suppose I'll tackle these in the order they came in

-Gas. I know! I wish i could explain it, but I seem to fill it a lot more than I want to. I actually only live about 10 miles from work, but my office is the last exit before the Lincoln tunnel (which leads from NJ into NYC) so much of the gas is wasted sitting in rush-hour traffic. I've ruled out carpooling with my roommate because we work different hours and he drives home every day for lunch. Even though the traffic is lighter mid-day, I'd still have to make an extra round trip on the days I have to drive. The $240 number is a high estimate, based on trips to visit my family, so hopefully it's lower than this on average.

-Phone. This is the result of that splurging. Both of us have iPhones, and the hefty phone bill it takes to keep them up and running. We actually split this bill, but it comes out of my account so I budgeted accordingly. I'll probably just have her contribute her half to the wedding fund going forward to keep it simpler. Out of everything on the list, this is, sadly, the one that I'd fight tooth and nail to hold on to.... I'm a gadget nerd.

-Dog. Learned this one the hard way (not mine... my roommates dog jumped out of his arms and broke his leg) The dog lives with my fiance, she was a gift from my grandmother who breeds them. The expenses I have listed include haircuts (she's a Shih Tzu) and the like. I'm glad you pointed this out though, because it does put more of an emphasis on your next point.

-Emergency. I kind of just took the Dave Ramsey $1000 fund as the definitive answer on this matter. When you mentioned the dog expenses, though, this should probably have more emphasis. Plus, I work for a large financial company, and what with Bear Stearns going belly up in essentially two days time, who knows what might happen. I've tried to make as close to a $0 balance budget as I'm comfortable with, but I'll see where I can make some adjustments to help this along. I think I'll be coming out ahead on groceries this month, so maybe I can sweep anything "left over" into the Emergency fund. I kind of locked myself in with the deadline for paying off the ring, but in a couple of months, that could be partially applied to bumping up the emergency fund.

-Saving. I'm glad I started with the 401(k) from day one, that way I've never missed the money. Having the wedding goal is definitely a big motivator, and it's something that I know my fiance and I will both be vigorously contributing to. Hopefully sooner rather than later we can establish a rough timeframe and budget, and make a target contribution/mo amount. She picked up a book on ways to save money on weddings (a sign that she's at least supportive of getting out of debt!) and I've been reading the long thread about it on this site.

-Variable. This is the area which I'm going to need the most work. Hence the reason I've filtered the money into a completely separate account from the one I pay my bills with. I call this my variable account because based on the past several months, variable is probably the only word that can describe it. I actually have a rudimentary breakdown for this account in my "Master Spreadsheet." I'll be putting around $600 into this account each month. The big expense is eating out, which I'm trying to curb at $300 a month. It's still a lot, but compared to what I was spending (especially before I started bringing lunch to work) it's a start. The other main categories (games, books, movies, clothing) I've given a cap of $200 a month, though I've planned ahead to which months there are games I want coming out and which months I know I'll need to buy clothes... etc. This should leave me with $100 at the end of each month, which i can funnel either into the Roth or the Emergency Fund. Again, I'm not completely comfortable with $0 balance budgets, so having that floating amount keeps me sane (so long as I don't try and assign it to an extra video game).

Thanks again for the input, and the support. It's funny how you can think you've got everything covered, and then all of a sudden someone mentions something so obvious that you go, "Oh no! How could I have overlooked that!"

Side Note: I stopped by wikipedia and learned something:

A man who is engaged to be married is called his partner's fiancé; a woman similarly engaged is called her partner's fiancée. These words are pronounced identically in English; the separate feminine form exists because of the inflectional morphology of grammatical gender in French, where the term originated.

So, instead of correcting my previous posts, I'll try and remember this rule going forward.

Before my wife and I got married, I used to remember the fiance/fiancee difference as she will likely spend more during the wedding planning stage, which coincides with the 2 "E's" instead of one. Seemed helpful for me, but I'm a bit neurotic.

Anyways, good luck with everything. Personal finance has crazy depth. And good luck at your finance job. I work in finance as well and am in a similar age bracket as you (24), so this is all pretty crazy stuff going on!

EDIT: Have you considered trying to zero balance transfer your car loan to a credit card? There are lots of things to think about with that sort of transaction, but my wife and I did it, and we couldn't be happier. If you want more info on what we did and the risks (that I have found) associated with it, let me know!

I mentioned the two "E"s comment to her, and she said, "true... i just figured it was because I get two rings."

As for the job, I'm hoping everything starts to calm down. The problem I face is twofold, however. 1) I work for UBS, which had some of the worst write-downs. 2) I'm in IT, the first suckers to go. According to my manager we are in a hiring freeze, and i think they're banking on people getting scared and quitting instead of having to resort to layoffs.

If you could, let me know about that 0% transfer thing. My best guess on how it would work is this:
Suppose I get a 12 month, 0% APR balance transfer offer. I can afford to pay $500/mo on a car payment that is supposed to be $300/mo.
I transfer $2400 ((500-300)x12) to the card. I then proceed to pay $300 to the loan, and $200 to the card each month.
At that point, I can look for another 0% card, rinse, and repeat.

This is a few days late, but I might as well post where I stand.

For the most part I stuck with my March budget. The only "unexpected" purchase was in helping my fiancée purchase her first car. I didn't have to dip into the Emergency Fund or anything, just cut back on some other things (like the extra payment towards my car loan) and we managed to gather the money needed. This wasn't a planned purchase, but a family friend was going to trade their car in, and it was still in pretty good shape, so we got it for a great price.

I've also decided to keep my checking accounts "padded" just in case something comes up. I know I could earn money on it if I rolled it into savings, but it's a comfort thing. In my ING (bills) account, I want to have at least $500 of padding at the end of the month. All of my bills are budgeted for (a little high, even) as well as extra payments towards my debts. At the end of the month, whatever is in excess of the $500 gets rolled into the wedding account. Some months it may be $300, others $50, but at least I'll always have that safety net. I think my biggest worry is that if I put it into the emergency fund, I'd feel pretty bad if I had to pull out that money just because I didn't expect the heating bill to be so high. The same is true for my WaMu (discretionary) account. Anything in excess of $200 at the end of the month gets rolled into the Roth. I want to be able to fully fund the Roth, but until I clear out some of these debts, I'll just put in what I can. I still have my 401(k) at 6%.

Here's the roundup as of today:

Good Money
ING Checking: $1,343.89 (bills)
ING Emergency: $1,002.63
ING Wedding: $303.25
WaMu Checking: $409.03 (discretionary)
WaMu Savings: $301.29 (budgeted cruise expenses)
401(k): $10,610.26 (-6.2% RoR for the year...)
Roth: $250
Company Stock: ~$400
CarValue: $13,680 (KBB for Dealer Trade-In)

Bad Money
Discover: $2000
Car Loan: $16,459.69
Student Loans: $12,653.69

Net Worth: -$2813.03


If all goes to plan, I should be right-side-up on the Car by Novemberish. Right now, the KBB for a private trade is actually $16,210, so if I factored it that way I would be right about even (on the loan as well as my net worth), but I'm thinking more along the lines of- if I absolutely had to dump the car right now, what could I get for it. I'm still debating what I want to do about the car too. I went to visit my parents last weekend, and took a ride with my dad in the old Subaru Impreza hatchback I used to drive when I lived at home. They bought it used while I was in college and let me drive it while in school. Now they use it all the time as a way to keep miles off my dad's work truck and my stepmothers minivan. It has 190k miles and is still going. I loved that little car, and there are days where I want to ditch my new civic and get a used impreza, but we'll see.

That's it really for now. So far this month, so good. My grandmother sent me a borders gift card so that'll save me some discretionary money, and I redeemed my Discover Rewards of $80 for $90 in Macy*s gift cards, so I shouldn't need to spend anything on clothing either.

Until next time.

You didn't specify what the cruise was for or if you've already taken it. As a suggestion, since you mentioned you sorta regret blowing the money but do want to go, you can probably change the date of the cruise and make it your honeymoon.

If the timing worked out better, I'd be all for that, haha.

The cruise leaves in 3 weeks from today. While I don't regret that I booked it, it always hurts to see that much money disappear all at once. My fiancée and I are really looking forward to going away this year, since last year we spent "vacation" in the hospital- she had a pretty major surgery which kept her in bed for almost a month.

For the trip itself, we've set up a pretty tight budget. We've set aside $300 for on-ship expenses. The ship "includes" tips in that they will charge $10 per person per day (so $10x2x7, or $140). That leaves $160 for drinks (here's hoping). They tie your room key up to a credit card, which means I'll probably be putting it on my Amex. I don't want to use my debit card because they pre-authorize the amount for the week, and the last thing I want is my checking account to be locked up for no reason. Everything else will be in cash. We've set up a vacation jug for loose change, and it has added up pretty quickly (to the tune of $60 or so). Plus I'm holding out on "discretionary" purchases this month so that I have a little extra for the boat, if needed.

The wedding is going to be in the Spring of 2010 (I'm pushing for March or April, since it's "off-season"), which should give us enough time to save for a majority of the expenses. We haven't finalized much of anything at this point, but I've been scouring the internet for ways to save money on a wedding, and she purchased a book on the same topic with a left-over Borders gift card. From what I understand, most of the planning takes place beginning around a year before the actual wedding, so I'll look and see how much we've saved by next March or so and estimate a realistic budget. My mother, my father and stepmother, and her father have said that they will help to contribute, but I don't want to rely on them. Anything they offer will be gladly accepted, but I don't want to overspend just because someone else is helping to foot the bill.

Any suggestions on ways to save for a wedding/keep the costs down? (Besides NOT going on expensive vacations.... )

The Wisebread forums have a wedding expense thread going. I think it all depends upon your personal preference. In my opinion, not inviting kids except for the immediate family will really help cut costs. Meaning your friends' kids, coworkers' kids, etc. are left off the list. I would save by making the centerpieces myself, having a cupcake tree or someone help with the cake (otherwise it will run a few hundred dollars), not throwing lavish showers/ bachelor parties / rehearsal dinner / breakfast morning after - hold at someone's house vs. having everything catered, and pick a place that offers some type of liquor deal OR don't go with an open bar all night. Nobody remembers if they ate filet mignon or chicken once the alcohol starts flowing. I'm glad we splurged on the dress and photographer, because I've got great photos hanging in the hallway that will last forever. I was lucky in that my parents paid for almost everything, but I also didn't want to overspend just because I could.

I think you have a great cruise budget and plenty of time to recover financially before the wedding.

We did not have a low budget wedding, but I do have a couple of money saving suggestions.

(1) Hire a wedding planner, yes said planner costs money but because they have more knowledge and connections they can save you big bucks. My planner paid for her services and saved us a ton of money on top because of all the discounts and inside info she had. It was also super nice on the big day to have someone else handle that process.
(2) Set a budget and stick to it. My planner was very helpful with this process. Its hard to set a budget when you have no idea what a wedding costs.
(3) Figure out what is important to you and your SO. There are no rules that you have to follow despite the wedding industry machine (hint - you don't have to have napikins with your names on them unless you really want to). We wanted live music, good food and good drinks (b/c we treated our wedding as a big party) so we skipped the cake, did not have a sit down dinner (who has a sit down dinner at a big party), and went very light on decor (we also had the wedding at a very pretty location so decor was not necessary), had budget invites (hint - most people throw the invites away so why spend big bucks).

Good luck!

I find your story very close to my own, I am just 8 years further down it.

Some advice I can offer is read smart couples finish rich, and do the steps in there with your fiancee. It has to do with setting goals together that you are both working towards.

I fully appreciate the fact that you are doing a lot NOW and are ahead of others. Keep in mind that you are racing with yourself though. It isn't what you have done compared to "average" since you already make more then the average american family you should be able to do MORE....see what I mean?

I think that you should try racheting up your 401K to the Max in the next 12 month to a year. If you go up by 1% every other month you will get to the max pretty quick and since it is pretax dollars you will only see a reduction of about .7% I think in the long run you will be happy to start getting that max in now in a cheap market and allow it to grow for the next 4 decades.

One thing that I have learned is that not paying attention to the nickles and dimes adds up to LOTS of money lost to me. Saving that extra 100 on a vacation isnt as important as (just an example) selling the iphones and getting a MUCH cheaper cell phone to use and operate...saving you monthly.

I will be interested in your ability to keep your car for the preceding decade, because frankly MOST people can't... I think it is harder then people think to do this a lot of people buy a car with that intention but it doesn't happen. That said I propbably wouldn't do anything on this front as you will probably not "net" any real gains. I would try and pay it off as quickly as possible however.

OH I meant to add...

Wedding ideas that I can offer... but it really comes down to what your SO will accept you know? I know in my marriage my in-laws offered a set amount and we found ways to cut costs so that we can use the balance to make a down payment on a house... having a house made cutting some corners on her dream wedding easier to swallow.

Things like, buffet style food instead of sit down meals, DJ versus band, reception as part of the churches facilities, limited open bar (wine and beer, versus mixed), a simple cake. I would not reccomend getting a video professional done (you can have someone shoot it if you want it but I wouldn't pay for it), etc.

All of the things that are important like you getting married and enjoying and celebrating with your family can be inexpensive... paying 100s and 1000s for a cake for instance I dont understand (it is just food after all), I like the idea of buffet versus sit down because it takes less staff for maintenance and people can mingle and eat and everyone can eat what they like, versus a sit down with people trapped at tables etc...

just my .02