A written spending plan is powerful
How are some people organized with money and others just cannot keep current on their bills?
A spending plan seems to be a good guide to organization.
Before the month begin, I know exactly what I am spending before my paycheck arrives.
It usually looks like this:
Mortgage
Food
Gasoline for the car
Car insurance
Cell phone
those above are my main expenses, expenses that I must pay to operate.
Then are the various bills (no fixed amount, varies month to month)
utilities
Internet
entertainment
Pay your living expenses first! If you have trouble with organization, put it on automatic payments. Or either have your bank automatically deduct it out of your account and put it in a separate account for bills.
Having a good spending plan makes you discipline with your money. You are an adult, not a child; you cannot play and have fun all the time.
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:57 am
We stopped doing this and it has made a difference for the worse for us. Seeing how much we pay for mortgage, insurance and other bills makes it real. We need to do it again and hopefully it will lead to getting us more on track again.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:07 pm
Yeah it sucks at first but I found that after 3 months it gets better. But the the first 3 months is very discouraging. Especially if you never did it before
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:02 pm
I don't budget and I've never had a spending plan, but I don't need to take the time to do this. There's another way called "living way below your means". If you naturally have a sense of limits and self-control, then the mathematical juggling isn't necessary, so you can play and have fun all the time like I do.