Although we would all ideally love to go through life living within our means and never getting into financial difficulty, the reality of the world means that lots of us end up in debt through one reason or another. For some, debts are easily paid off, but when you only have a low income with which to operate, the situation can be a lot more sticky than you would like. Here is are some pieces of advice for how to pay off debt on a low income.
Don’t adopt the mindset of just winging it and being able to do a little whenever you can; it is too easy to miss and avoid payments this way. Instead, sit down with a sensible helper and come up with a plan that you are going to be able to stick to and be consistent with. Factor in all of your monthly costs and come up with a number that is achievable and will make a dent in your debts without getting you in trouble.
And in the process of taking a look through all of your monthly costs, try to identify areas that you can cut back on in terms of nonessential expenses. When you are out of debt, you will be free to treat yourself in any kind of way you want, but when there is financial responsibility breathing down your neck, you need to bite the bullet and be more frugal with your spending.
Take advantage of that smartphone that you are paying for monthly by picking one of the many financial savings apps in the app store. You can get apps for budgeting, you can get apps that help to make a plan for you, and you can get apps that offer savings and deals that can help towards cutting your expenses. There is a wealth of app-related assistance out there.
The bottom line is that you need to set a budget for yourself, one that takes the debt payments into consideration and still allows you to live comfortably. Having a visual representation of how much you are spending each month, and how much you have left, will help you to be sensible and will stop you from getting in to even more debt than you already are.