<prompt> Human: personal finance, i need some help! long time lurker here. using a throwaway as im posting honest financial details. bottom line is i am trying to balance monthly expenses, saving for a ring to propose to my longterm gf who i live with and support, saving for retirement, and eventually saving towards a down payment. but i feel like things are a little out of control and i am always coming up short at the end of each month. all my disposable income is gone at the end of every single month, and sometimes i dip back again into my CC. i want to contribute more towards my roth ira, but dont know where to get the money. should i scale back my 401k contributions? hopefully someone out there can provide some perspective on what i am doing wrong... some background info: income is 120kyr pre-tax take home 5150 per month after 401k deduction i contribute 1460 per month, maxing out to 17.5k annual limit monthly expenses: rent - 1900 subway - 115 cell - 65 home bills - 175 gym - 40 credit card - 200 stupid personal loan - 350 total monthly expenses - 2845 monthly put towards savings: emergency fund - 420 other short term savings engagement ring - 420 roth ira - 100 average, as i put in spurts here and there total monthly savings - 940 details on my debt liabilities including loans above: credit card - 2500 owed 14 personal loan - 9000 owed 4.25 monthly left over after expenses and savings - 1365 all gone at the end of every single month personal finance, what can i do to free up more cash get my finances in order? edit: thank you all for great feedbacksuggestions. it sounds like i need to cut back on my 401K contributions and knock out my CC debt. question - should i go ahead and pay off my CC right now with my emergency fund? id still have 1.5k leftover from my emergency fund, which i can start to re-build immediately with money freed from my 401k.Assistant: Id seriously talk to the GF about what she expects for an engagement ring. My SO and I are getting engaged soon and we are aiming for a fairly cheap ring so that we can save up for other things. I think it might be worth floating by her. Human: i think this is valid. i had planned on spending roughly 7-8k on a ring. is that exorbitant? am i being ridiculous?  <response>: Uh, yeah, thats obscene. 