OK so recently I was hanging out with a good friend of mine named Seth.
The reason I am telling this to you is because Seth recently showed me the true value of creating a budget. Even though I knew what a budget was, I never really looked at it from Seth’s perspective.
I have known Seth for quite some time now and have always wondered why he drove such an old car and lived so frugally. He was not a cheap guy but I knew he made enough money to have a nicer car. I mean come on, the guy had a 1906 Honda. It wasn’t really that old but you get the picture.
Well after meeting him for our quarterly goal setting meeting, he started to go over the reasons he set up his budget and how it was helping him.
First off let me give kudos to Seth; the guy is doing waaayyy better than I am.
So here is what I found out.
1.) You should have a budget for every month, for every bill.
2.) You should even budget an amount for “Oh Crap” situations. These can be car repairs, home repairs, and whatever else you say “Oh Crap” for.
3.) NEVER steer away from your budget.
Now following these three rules I have made several different changes in my life.
The main thing I have done recently was to eliminate my debt. I got rid of my NEW car and bought a used car. I now have my house (that was just sitting there empty) rented and producing profit. And have got rid of various other bills that I didn’t need.
Basically I was slashing debt left and right. I know this might sound to hard for you to do, but if you really try you can figure it out. Just sit down and get creative.
Now my friend Seth has a very nice chunk of money saved up and even thought his is personal info, I know he wont mind me bragging about him…he deserves it.
Now that I have been following my budget I went from $0 in the bank to almost $400.00.
Now most bloggers would try to hype up their story by telling you they went from $20,000 in the bank to $1,000,000.
I am not here to impress you with all of that hyperbole. I am telling you the truth because I don’t want to sugar coat anything.
That is all the money I have saved in the bank and it will only get bigger.
So the point of this post is for you to know that you can start your savings plan today. All you have to do is start yourself a budget and stick to it. You will be really surprised at how much money you are able to save once you start working on it.
So there you have it. I kind of went off on a tangent but I know you get the picture. If you have any questions please make sure you leave them in the comment section below.
Thank you and happy saving.
Not to be pessimistic, but I want to offer another idea for those of us that are having financial difficulities. I know of places where I yes can begin to save money, but we all don’t have an empty house to rent to generate income.
My suggestion, would be to choose one area, just one area to focus on to improve upon. For instance, instead of buying a Large Starbuck coffee everyday, perhaps a smaller size and putting the difference aside. It may seem like this is dumb, but bad habits are hard to break, and for most people going cold turkey is a sure fire way to fail. Gradual is best for some.
If you have the will power to go cold turkey, go for it. After a month of the smaller size, seeing how some money is being saved, then try for the next size down for another month, buy the third month, the need may or may not be there. Drink coffee at the office, or by travel instants and now all the money that had been spent is now being saved.
Like you said on the home page, this is going take work. A lot of work, and I myself have to bear down too and make some serious changes in my life. But I already now some of my limitations and know what causes me to fail. Cold turkey is not for me, I have to do it gradually. Yeah it may take longer but in the end, its not how fast you run the marathon, its whether or not you finish the marathon.