It’s hard as a woman to learn the best ways to budget your money. With a love for shopping, lack of time, stress, or low pay, budgeting can be hard, especially if you’re not aware of the best ways to budget your money. To make matters worse, prices go up, pay goes down, and we’re charged fees for everything under the sun. Yet, there truly are some great ways to budget your money better that I’d like to share with you. If you’re not already using these, don’t wait any longer. Start today and you’ll see rewards through your increasing bank account balance in no time.
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1. Make a List of Your Bills and Pay
One of the most important ways to budget your money is to make a list of all your bills and then how much you make each week or bi-weekly. Include all other sources of income your currently have as well. You need to know how much you have going out and coming in each week, instead of just paying bills when they come due with what you have left in the bank. That’s no way to live, and I know this firsthand from past mistakes. By making a list, you can manage your money better, and it puts everything into reality for what you have to spend elsewhere.
2. Space Things out
One thing I typically avoid doing is to try to pay all my bills with one paycheck. While this might work for some people, for me it creates issues. First, for that week of pay (or first two weeks if you’re paid bi-weekly), you’re skimping yourself on money you could need for emergencies, food, or social outings that you might want to do once or twice a week. I find it helps to space my bigger bills out between paychecks for this reason. I also find it helps me from looking forward to those “free checks,” which I’d most likely use to binge shop. If I know I have bills coming out of all my paychecks, it gives me more discipline and more money to budget with each week.
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3. Reduce Social Outings
I hate to tell you, but one of the best ways to budget your money is to start spending less of it. This means less social outings, which can be expensive unless you do free activities. Don’t forget transportation isn’t cheap these days in any form or fashion, except walking or biking, of course. Try taking turns each week having friends over if you like, and get everyone to chip in for dinner by bringing something.
4. Reduce Your Bad Habits
Excessive shopping, drinking, smoking, etc. are all bad habits many people have. The more habits you have that aren’t doing you any favors are only sucking your income dry. Avoid these at all costs, no matter how hard they are to quit. I challenge you to make a list of how much you spend on these habits on a weekly basis and then on a monthly basis. Look at that number and really be honest with yourself. Can you still say you’re broke, and have no idea why?
5. Balance Your Bank Account
At the end of each day, or beginning of each new day, balance your bank account for what you spent that day or the day before. Make it a daily 5-10 minute activity you would do, just like making breakfast. I know it isn’t fun, but it is important. Doing so can help you budget your money much better and give you a glance at how much you’re spending each day. Optimally, you won’t have to do much budgeting if you’re not spending much each day, so take it as a sign that if it takes you over 5 minutes, your spending might need to be reduced.
6. Get an App
Sometimes, it helps to get an app to help you budget your money better. There are so many free apps out there to choose from to help you budget your money. Having these at your disposal each day on your smartphone seems to help many people, and might help you too. For a good list of apps to start with, you can check out this article: apps.allwomenstalk.com.
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Budgeting apps often come with handy features like expense trackers, savings goals, and due date reminders which can keep you on top of your finances. Some apps even categorize your spending automatically, offering insights into where you might be able to cut back. Whether it's setting up a weekly budget or tracking your net worth, these digital tools can be personalized to meet your financial needs. They're especially useful for those who are always on-the-go, turning your smartphone into a portable financial advisor. Give them a try – they could be the stepping stones to achieving your financial goals.
7. Reduce Your Needs
Lastly, one tip that’s hard as a woman is to reduce your needs. For instance, do you really need six kinds of perfume or shades of lipstick? Could you buy a lower cost body wash, or better yet, a bar of soap? Could you start buying more basic food items instead of takeout, restaurant meals, or overpriced name brand food items? Really think about what’s important to you: living on a tight budget, or having more items than you really, truly need. As a woman, it’s a very hard thing to do this, but I’ve found it really is helpful to start being smarter with your money this way. It has also helped save me a lot of money in the long run.
Budgeting is definitely one of my least favorite things to do, but when you can do it on a regular basis the right way, it does become easier. Do you have any budgeting tips you’d like to share that work for you?
Comments
Melanie: How about savings? Pay your savings account as if it is a bill. The only way out of debt is to have emergency money, even if it's only a little each check.
Georgina: After years of living pay to pay, being in credit card debt ($10k) and believing that I would never be able to buy a house of my own I finally realised that I could afford the repayments but saving a deposit was the biggest hurdle. I used a lot of tips suggested in this article. I set myself a budget which was as simple as writing down income vs expenses and I stuck to it (mostly). I review it every week to see how I'm tracking. I cut down my spending, particularly socialising and still only do the things I really want to do and I feel much happier for it. I paid down debt and became debt free. I have one low interest credit card with a $1,000 limit (but still need to be more disciplined). Then I saved the deposit in a high interest internet savings account, separate to my operating account and treated saving like a bill like Melanie S-G suggested. I still do my own 'bill smoothing' whereby a portion of my pay goes straight to bills so when they are due I am often in credit and I receive some discounts for early payment. I bought a block of land in April 2013 and I am currently renting and paying back an interest only construction loan while I wait for my new home to be finished in June 2014. It takes planning and being organised but anyone can do it!
Keri: This will surely be useful!
ytt89: I enjoyed this article! I'm trying to learn how to put myself on a budget. My addiction is shopping, I'm trying to learn how to stop myself from wasting on so much unnecessary things. I'm learning!
Liliana: Thanks for the tips!
Fluorescent_Biege: Good read with tips that can be easily initiated! Thanks
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