Budgeting Lesson 1

Let’s get started!

If you are like most people, you do not want to spend your life carefully tracking every expense, keeping receipts, and entering data into careful graphs, so you can categorize the expenses, and put all of the information into pretty charts and graphs.  You probably want a financial plan that is going to take only a few minutes a month and will practically run itself after that.  In this segment, we will discuss how to spend the time right now so that in future months your finances will take only a few moments a week to keep on track so you can get on to more pleasant things.

Budgeting Lesson 2

The Budget: Getting down and dirty

After you have a list of all of the money you have spent for a month, try to come up with very general categories for your expenses.  I find that general categories work much better than very specific categories because they allow for more flexibility and require less time to work with later on.  Some of these categories will be really simple because they are fixed expenses that often come in the form of a single bill every month. Variable expenses, on the other hand, will be a little trickier because you will have to create a category for them.

Budgeting Lesson 3

Budget: Begin Putting it Together

Now that you have gathered all of your information and categorized it, it is time to begin creating a spending plan (budget) that works for your family.  You will need the information from both of the previous sessions.  What we are going to be doing is making sure that your spending every month matches the goals that you have set for yourself for your finances.

Budgeting Lesson 4

Reducing Fixed Expenses

Working and planning to reduce expenses is my favorite part of budgeting.  You can really be creative when you do this and any money you save gets to be put to a use that better fits your overall goal for what you want your finances, and ultimately your life, to look like.   Because there are so many different ways to trim expenses, we are going to be focusing on them in two different parts:  fixed, and variable.  In this session we will look at a few fixed items that will be in almost everyone’s budget, and a few that I will use primarily for example purposes that will be in some budgets but not in others.

Budgeting Lesson 5

Reducing Variable Expenses

Now that you have trimmed a little off of your fixed expenses, let’s look at how to reduce the expenses that are not the same every month.  Like your fixed expenses, there will be areas that you can easily cut and areas that will be more difficult.  This list is by no means exhaustive; you will have to be creative as you look at your own list of variable expenses to think of ways to trim here and there.

Budgeting Lesson 6

Putting All That You Have Learned Together

Now that you have looked carefully at your income and your expenses, it is time to use those numbers by putting pencil to paper and writing down exactly how you plan to spend each paycheck.  I find that assigning expenses to each paycheck is the simplest way to do a budget.  Balancing your budget this way takes only a few minutes a week and you can balance your checking account at the same time.

Thrifty Living Lesson 1

How to Stay UP in a Down Economy: Putting Money in its Proper Perspective

In today’s crazy economy where everyone is struggling to make sense of it all, we need to look at money differently.  I recently attended a lecture where the speaker asked the audience to raise their hands if they considered themselves to be world class rich.  Most everyone in the room laughed and curiously looked around at each other to see if anyone was really that rich…

Thrifty Living Lesson 2

Keeping More Money in Your Piggy Bank

Last time we talked about keeping money in its proper perspective.  Here’s an interesting observation about money:  A businessman earns it, an economist learns it, a banker turns it, a politician burns it, and a wise man spurns it.

There is almost nothing that gives me a bigger natural high than getting something for free!   Well, maybe dessert.    Or a massage.  No wait…a FREE dessert and a FREE massage!  Today we’re going to talk about how to get more stuff for free so we can keep more money in our piggy banks!

Thrifty Living Lesson 3

How to Save More and Spend Less

Ok, let’s dive right into today’s lesson and talk about how to save more money and spend less on things we’re buying already.

First of all, never pay full price!  Whether you’re buying something online or in an actual “brick and mortar” store, there are always ways to spend less.

Thrifty Living Lesson 4

How to get tons of free stuff!

So, are you having fun yet?  Loving all these freebies more than life itself?   Let’s keep going!  There’s lots more!

Each year consumers spend more than $80 billion shopping on the Internet.  It’s fast.  It’s easy.  No crowds.  No searching for parking spaces.  And who doesn’t love shopping in their pajamas?

Thrifty Living Lesson 5

How to find more money in places other than between your sofa cushions

Ok, during our last 2 lessons we’re going to talk about creative ways you can bring in extra money to pay those bills.  Stay-at-home moms are always torn between wanting to stay home with the kids and helping out financially to stretch the budget.  You can do both!

The fact is, nobody is going to just hand you money; you have to do something.  No, wait a minute….they just might!

Thrifty Living Lesson 6

Earning extra money in your spare time: You’re worth more than you think!

Are you sad that this is the last lesson in this series?  Yeah, me too.  There is still so much more we could talk about!  Today’s final lesson includes another quick brainstorm on how to get more money into your life to stretch your budget without selling your first-born son.  Consider some of these ideas…