You completely forgot your quarterly insurance payment is due this month! $300!!! You already cut up the credit cards so you have no backup!
To avoid this situation you need to set up an account specifically for these types of expenses. Any infrequent expense including gifts, insurance payments, taxes, etc. should be saved for monthly. For example, if you insurance payment is $300 a quarter than you should be budgeting $100 per month to go toward this expense so that you aren't scrambling when it shows up.
This should be done for big yearly expenses such as Christmas, furniture replacement, tires, and so on.
Budget how much you want or need to save for each of these things and work them into your monthly budget.
Then you won't feel one ounce of guilt when you are out there buying your Christmas gifts or much needed sofa to replace the 10 year old one ;-)
Choose the best place to keep this money where you won't be tempted to use it before you are supposed to, but make sure it is easy to get when it's needed. We choose to keep ours in a separate savings account that is linked to our checking account so that we can easily transfer the money (but it is not an overdraft protection account).
It is amazing the peace of mind that planning for this irregular expenses will bring you!! You no longer look at the calendar dreading the Birthday's and Holidays because it means more money... you no longer worry about the oil change or the car repairs that you will inevitably need.
I told you having a budget is freeing :-))
1 comments:
so true! i do this every month. although there still seems to be things like oh, someone needs a new pair of shoes and this one has an unscheduled chess tournament, and the dog needs bloodwork.....keeps things interesting! loving this series!
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