What should your budget
actually look like?
Type your monthly take-home income. See exactly where every dollar goes — based on the order we followed on $1,200/month in Taiwan. In under 10 seconds.
After tax. This is your starting number — everything flows from here.
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The order behind the numbers
Needs first
Rent, utilities, groceries, transport. The non-negotiables. Fund these before anything else. If this bucket runs over, it tells you exactly where to look.
Giving and saving second
Giving comes before wants — it’s a value, not a line item. Emergency fund sits here too. Both are non-negotiable. Both funded before you see a dollar of lifestyle spending.
Other / lifestyle third
A coffee out, a day trip, personal spending. Not waste — the small things that make life enjoyable. Twenty percent sounds tight. On a missionary budget in Taiwan it actually felt generous some months.
Investing last — never skipped
Yes, even on $1,200 a month. Some months it was $30. The amount mattered less than the consistency. A small amount done every month for six years looks very different from a large amount done occasionally.
Small Budget Big Life
I’m Owen Liu. I started investing $30 a month on a missionary salary of $1,200 in Taiwan — the same month my wife and I got married with $200 in our account. Six years later the portfolio crossed $23,000. This blog exists to show that small, consistent financial decisions build something real — regardless of income.
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