Thursday 6 March 2014

Constantly improving your budget

My budget is constantly improving, is yours?
 
A budget is like a human being in many ways, constantly growing, learning, improving, making mistakes, refining and changing. Today after discussion with a workmate I have decided that instead of using my leftover money after savings and bills to do "whatever I want with" I am creating 5 new online saver accounts! This is separating out my life goals, and making things easier if something does go wrong. The new account names are: 1-Second car savings fund 2-New York City trip fund 3-Car repairs buffer 4-House repairs buffer 5-Germany/Italy trip savings fund. The added bonus is that because they are online savers, there is a small amount of interest paid!
 
Furthermore, I have decided to give myself a "Personal allowance" of £10 per week to spend on whatever I want. For me, this is the perfect solution to the guilt I feel when spending needlessly, and the sadness I feel when I am too strict with my money, as I have talked about before, you have to budget in fun! Its just that I was previously budgeting in more fun than I was financially comfortable with. And at the end of the month if there is anything left the money will be split equally between all 5 of those savings accounts.
 
I do a lot of "side hustling" and any of the money I get will be split equally between "extra treats" to make the extra work worth it, and the other half will be distributed between the 5 accounts to make it do something worthwhile for me!
 
The last of my new guidelines is that I am going to use my nectar points to pay towards my second car when the time comes! Just dont tell my wife though ;) now that nectar points can be earned on ebay, AND used on it too, there is theoretically nothing stopping me buying a car with points earned on my grocery shopping!
 
I feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders, I am much happier about my situation!
 
Can you take a long hard look at your budget and try to improve? Let us all know any tips!

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