Hospital Duty

I've been sleeping in the hospital and taking care of my mom for a couple of days now... and it has been affecting my mood lately. Apparently, staying in the hospital, albeit with free wifi, 24/7 aircon and 3 meals, is quite depressing.

Sigh.

I know I should be strong for my mom, but maybe I'm not that strong enough yet. I need to have Christian songs playing non-stop on my laptop to keep my mood from dropping.

May God help me and give me strength.

Five Common Budget Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

So far, i'm on the right track.. just need to consistently apply what I'm doing now :)

Five Common Budget Mistakes and How to Avoid Them | Money Estate - Personal Finance Blog

Posted by Money Advisor in Budgeting, Financial PlanningMar 21st, 2009 | 7 responses

Budgeting is something that most of us learn about in grade school and don't recall it comes to crunch time and we realize that unless we take the reins and take control over the finances it could quite simply cause our personal finances to come crashing down. When making a budget, many people make mistakes but constantly tweak the budget until they find the right combination of savings, expenses and debts which must be repaid.

Avoid these mistakes in order to make your financial plan easy to follow:

Mistake No. 1: Not writing down and Defining Your Budget

A budget may sound great while you calculate the options for your income in your head, but until you write it on paper – it can be difficult to make these ideas come to life and begin to increase your personal financial health. Take the time to write your budget down on paper, or simply create a spreadsheet which can easily be accessed, changed and updated with the available funds or changes that you have made to make the budget easier to follow.

Mistake No. 2: Not Planning for Surprise and One-time Expenses

Planning for the unexpected is an essential way to ensure that you are prepared for whatever it is that life throws at you. Whether you have a pet that needs an unexpected trip the vet or medication to purchase for your child, these expenses can be confusing when you have not allocated for these expenses that can change from month to month.

Mistake No.3: Not Budgeting for Contributions to an Emergency Fund

An emergency fund is an essential part of creating a healthy financial plan that allows you to maintain comfort in the time of a job loss or illness within the family. There are many situations that can cause the unexpected expenses to wreak havoc on the finances – having an emergency fund allows the consumer to prepare for these situations and therefore allow the consumer to have an alternative to expensive interest rates when choosing to finance the expenses with a credit card.

Mistake No.4: Not Changing the Budget

Each month the budget should be reevaluated and changes should be created if you find that you are spending more in one part of the budget, or less in one part of the budget. If you are unable to make the budget balance and have your income get into line with your expenses than it may be time to consider taking on additional hours or finding a way to up your income.

Mistake No. 5: Leaving Income for Spending without Budgeting

Every part of the budget should be accounted for, just like every dollar of the income should be accounted for. Any excess over the expenses should not be spent as a little something extra for the consumer it should be used towards savings and investments and establishing the emergency fund. Tweak the budget to accommodate the influx of income and determine where the money should be allocated.

Image by linusb4.

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Grace

"Failure is not defeat unless you stop trying"

life lesson # 678 - do no always give a child everything she wants because she will have a problem adapting to change later on in life ... spoken from experience!