Budgeting and resource allocation?


cheis

cheis

New Member
I figured I would budget 20% of my overall railroad modelling budget on rolling stock, that appears to have been flushed. ;)

For the members that must monitor your expenditures, what percentage do you folks allow for which resource and what is a good guideline? How often do you end up going over for the gotta haves?
In example, what percentage do you allow for track work, % for engines, % for cars, % for electronics etc?
 
Putting the responsibility for 20 trillion dollar debt on me? Man that is mean. :eek: lol
I blew my months budget on 5 engines before I knew it, I wound up with most of the engines I have been pining over for a decade now however. Haha
 
Let's see now. About 30% on track, 80% on locos, 43% on rolling stock, 17% on electronics and 51% on misc. The remainder is spent on food, utilities, vehicle maintenance and clothing.
 
I don't really have a budget.

Occasionally I'll look at my money and figure what I can spend. That gets compared with what items are on my mental priority list, what the current going rate is and I try to work something out.

For internet items, things pretty much work backwards from that. If I see something I want, I figure out if I can afford it.

That doesn't give me carte blanch to go buy stuff willy nilley. My BLI locomotives were the result of several months of searching before I found a price that I was willing to pay.

For train shows, I take out cash from the ATM. I again have a mental list of things I am looking for and are willing to pay. If I run out of $$, then I'm done.
 
I spend three dollars on engines for every dollar on rolling stock. My main interest is in the locomotives. I mix up the roads on consists because that's what I see on the real rails. That allows me to have the same consist of between 4-30 items, plus the correct caboose, towed by one or two engines of any one road. That way, I swap out the engines, but keep the same cars on the layout.

When I built my last twinned main layout with a closed loop of 60', I spent approximately $600 on flex track and turnouts, including a costly Walthers/Shinohara #6 double crossover. That is what I spend on two locomotives with sound. However, I have 27 locomotives totalling $11K. If I only ever had those 27, and only ever built the one layout, that gives a ratio of locomotives/track of 18.3/1. Obviously that ratio is highly dependent on the cost/number of locomotives one has and the cost one apportions to track purchases over the average lifetime of those locomotives. My guess is that the heavy majority of those in the hobby have a locomotive/track cost ratio near 5/1, especially by the time they are four or more years into the hobby.

My cost so far for electronics, minus several tens of dollars for wire of various gauges, is about $400 for a Digitrax Super Empire Builder, plus an extra DT400 throttle @ $200-ish. I also have a single PSX-AR auto reverser at about $75, and a 90' indexed turntable from Walthers for $270. That totals to about the cost of three sound locomotives.
 
I'm screwed on this one because the bulk of my locomotive roster is brass steam. 20-30% of the passenger cars as well. Diesels are mostly Athearn Genesis, Walthers Proto, with a few orphans from Atlas and and one each Intermountain cab forward and BLI, Santa Fe 2-10-2. Next largest expense is structure kits. I like working with wood so most of those are Foscale, Bar Mills, Motrak and so forth. I have very few plastic structures.
 
I am one of those guys with out a budget. I want a bunch more box cars but my wife (correctly) reminds me I already have more than I can use. I want more locomotives, but then again, I have more than I can use. Not wanting to be in the "collector" category, I am relegated to purchasing small items to detail the layout.

But...I like to keep an open mind ;)
 
Several years ago I started a small bank savings account at a bank near our cabin. I deposit gift money, loose change that I saved and small dividend checks. (Really small dividend checks.) The account was earmarked for model railroading purchases and mainly if we moved to a new house to finance the start of a new layout. I used this remote bank since I wouldn't have easy access to the money.

Since a move is unlikely in the near future, some of this money will be used for the expansion of my current layout. I'll need mostly bench work, track, turnouts, electrical and select structures. The extension will have mostly wooden structure which is a different approach than the original layout which has mostly plastic, kit bashed structures.

I been using some of this money for locomotives which I really don't need and rolling stock that catches my eye.

Prior to my retirement I collected a nice amount of kits that I plan to finish. guess in the future, my $$$ allocations will be mostly for the new expansion.

I risk making some purchases on the family credit cards. Better to ask for forgiveness than permission.

My 50 cents worth.

Greg
 
cheis said:
I figured I would budget 20% of my overall railroad modelling budget on rolling stock, that appears to have been flushed. ;)

For the members that must monitor your expenditures, what percentage do you folks allow for which resource and what is a good guideline? How often do you end up going over for the gotta haves?
In example, what percentage do you allow for track work, % for engines, % for cars, % for electronics etc?
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I would think that percentages are going to vary greatly depending on the state of the model railroad. For one building a new pike the track / benchwork expenditures would be up. I would not have a separate electronics category because other than the main control the electronics are for a specific caboose, loco, passenger car, or turnout motors and signaling which would be part of track/scenery expenditures.

I am guessing if I broke it down from what I have spent in the past, locos will have the biggest percentage followed by passenger cars. As others, I don't have a budget. Budgets can end up being an excuse to buy something one doesn't really want/need.
 
I pay all my bills, buy food and sundries. Then I use the rest to buy model railroad stuff, guns, sports equipment, whatever I want. I live alone, so my budget is bills first, play with what's left.
 
OldGuyHO said:
I pay all my bills, buy food and sundries. Then I use the rest to buy model railroad stuff, guns, sports equipment, whatever I want. I live alone, so my budget is bills first, play with what's left.
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I'll go a 100% with that as the perfect model RR'ders life style. (and I can always eat less an dress grungy)
 
Being on a fixed income like I am, I have to be careful on what I buy. I have some stuff to sell, fortunately, at an upcoming train show. I have enough locomotives, to supply 2 layouts, and probably enough cars to supply 3-4, depending on size.

The task I have now is to separate the cars I want to keep, from the cars that I need to eliminate.

I also have over 50 structure kits, mostly wood, that I need to see which to use, and which to sell. Beinga steam powered road, I need to make sure I have enough water tanks, and coaling stations. Other than that nothing else, structure wise, is really necessary.
 
Cjcrescent said:
Being on a fixed income like I am, I have to be careful on what I buy. I have some stuff to sell, fortunately, at an upcoming train show. I have enough locomotives, to supply 2 layouts, and probably enough cars to supply 3-4, depending on size.

The task I have now is to separate the cars I want to keep, from the cars that I need to eliminate.

I also have over 50 structure kits, mostly wood, that I need to see which to use, and which to sell. Being a steam powered road, I need to make sure I have enough water tanks, and coaling stations. Other than that nothing else, structure wise, is really necessary.
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I'm not on a fixed income yet, but I have plateaued on buying stuff. I find that there is little that I actually need these days. I did order one of the Athearn Genesis MT-4's in semi Daylight, because I'm too lazy to paint it myself, and because I don't want to cut up a vandy tender for sound, but other than that, I really just need to finish projects, fix things, paint things and build kits.

I've also started to look sideways at the brass shelf. There are so many models and only a fraction of them get much run time. There is a corvette hiding on that brass rack! Not that I would buy one, but at some point you start to look at things differently.
 
Espeefan said:
I'm not on a fixed income yet, but I have plateaued on buying stuff. I find that there is little that I actually need these days. I did order one of the Athearn Genesis MT-4's in semi Daylight, because I'm too lazy to paint it myself, and because I don't want to cut up a vandy tender for sound, but other than that, I really just need to finish projects, fix things, paint things and build kits.
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I know what you mean. I'm in the same boat, except for the income part.

Espeefan said:
I've also started to look sideways at the brass shelf. There are so many models and only a fraction of them get much run time. There is a corvette hiding on that brass rack! Not that I would buy one, but at some point you start to look at things differently.
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I know that I don't have as many as you, but I'm beginning to look at it differently than I did even up to a couple of years ago. I'm asking myself do I really need them all? I know that there are some that I could sell in a heartbeat if needed. I had originally wanted to stay around 20-25 engines, as that would take in the interchanges/staging, locos being serviced in the roundhouse while their counterparts were out on the road.

That 20 is now up to over 45, and I am going to have to get rid of some, sometime. I'm getting older, as are we all, but I want to be able to also maintain my stable without too much trouble as I get older. I don't see how some folks with 100-200 locos will be able to do it.
 
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Hmm a budget ... well I take budgeting very seriously - I budge when I see something I want, then I get it! Therefore; I Budg et :)

Okay, so that didn't work out as well as I would have hoped ... bottom line with me is that I don't have a budget for my model railroading, or anything else really. I make sure all of the bills are paid and there is food on the table first and foremost. After that, and if I have the money and need something, I will buy it. If I don't have the money and need/want something I wait until I do then buy it.

In terms of general priorities - the household and family comes first before anything, including my modelling and wants.

In terms of railroading priority though, I bought my track and power supply first, then my engines/rolling stock then scenery - structures etc. I figured, once I had the track, the foundation of the layout - I could then buy the other things.
 
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My mrr spending is easily less than 1% of our family income, we've got quite a few bills and they have to take priority. Never tried to stay within an "official" budget, I just know when our cash supply is sufficient.

Collection-wise, I'm pretty much in the same boat as Carey: Maxed-out on space, and my layout is as big as I can ever hope to fit in a converted 2-car garage. I have just the right amount of rolling stock + motive power to support various op session scenarioes, all I really need to do now is apply the scenery.

Now my main resource shortages are time and energy. On weekdays I still have a full-time job with a 40-minute commute each way, and once I've finished supper and my regular daily household chores, I'm usually too exhausted to work on the layout. That leaves only weekends, and they are often taken up with yard maintenance and family outings. So any new item that I buy just gets placed on top of the existing stacks of unopened kits under the layout.
 
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