The Christmas holidays are difficult for many, especially financially. Add bills, debt, and basic neccessities of human life and you're faced with an absurd amount of stress which can in turn affect other areas of your life. Now, we may not have children of our own, eliminating a certain degree of stress, but it's still equally as difficult when money is tight.
Firstly, we begin putting money aside for Christmas gifts about 6 months prior, eben if it's just small amounts. Every little bit helps! We budget every two weeks when money flows in using The Ultimate Budget Planner (available on Amazon). We prioritize bills that cannot wait until the next payday. For example; some months can be harder than others, so we split our rent payment in half. It's due on the first of every month, allowing us to take half from the first pay and half from the last pay. When we have a little more money for the month, we take the full amount from one cheque, freeing up extra money on the other cheque.
We aim to put a minimum of $200 into savings every two weeks, but always aim for more whenever possible. Once all bills are taken care of in the budget, we then tackle or wants, such as snacks, date nights, little road trips, or mini shopping sprees. This allocates 30% of our budget for the two weeks. Although, there are many times where we sacrifice our wants to add more to the needs if we're short for bills. On the occasion, we move extra money over to savings if we know that we're saving for something in particular, like a house or even just emergency funds.
The last useful tactic we use is calculating the cost of everything. We price things out online first, giving us a rough estimate on the cost. We then add everything up while in the store and calculate the tax before approaching the cash register. If we're over budget, we sift through and put the least important items back, using coupons whenever possible and always shopping where the best deals are.
I know these things don't seem like a lot, but it's worked for us the last few years! Easing our financial stress is always a top priority for us. How do you budget your money?
- B-Raditude
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