Budget and impulse buying — ADD Tip o the day 255

I was asked to comment on budget and impulse buying.   I might not be the best person for this, but – will offer a few thoughts:

We were never able to keep a budget and spent a lot of time and energy fretting and fighting about it, until we got some help.  The big trick was to write down everything we spent for a month, every cent.  Hard to do.  And to write down all the expectable and repeatable expenses, like mortgage, insurance, taxes, etc.

It became clear that in our case, the big issue was travel.  If we skimped and saved on every other category, it wouldn’t really make much difference at the end of the year, but travel – wow!

With that clear, we had a lot less friction and worry, and just had to struggle over the travel budget.  That’s still hard to deal with, but at least it’s only one thing, and things are much better.

I highly recommend that strategy, find out where your discretionary money is really going.  

More later.  In the meantime, I suggest asking  yourself if you’re really serious about doing something about this.

doug

interesting book review and discussion clik here

(relates to reading, see previous Tips 254 and 158 )