Thursday, July 14, 2011

A Plan For Sticking To Your Budget

So you have made your budget & it looks lovely on paper. Great! Now it is time to implement it. But are you prepared to follow the budget you have developed? Here are some helpful tips to keep you on track along with your budget.

one. Choose why you made a budget. There is a reason you have put time in to developing your budget, now you need to put in to writing what your goals are. Would you like to be debt free, live on income, or save for retirement? Make this in to your personal or relatives financial mission statement. Write it down or type it up nicely & then have it laminated & display it in a prominent place where you can see it often. Plenty of times they need a reminder to ourselves for why they are doing a specific thing, & that can be incentive when things get hard.

two. Set small range goals so you can see progress. It can be impossible to keep up the discipline necessary to stay on budget in the event you cannot see any measurable progress. Create some short term goals that you can celebrate meeting. If your aim has been to reduce your grocery spending by $100 per month, then your every week aim would be to cut grocery costs by $25. Likewise, if your aim is to pay off debt, make a chart to show how much you have paid off. Reward charts are not for babies! Use a kind of chart where you can color in a bar to show your progress, & then color it in every time you make a payment so you can see the progress you are making. Put it up on your refrigerator or bathroom mirror as a reminder that your hard work is paying off

three. Identify your weak spots & create a plan to battle them. In sticking to your budget, you need a clear idea of where you may be tempted to break the budget. In the event you are liable to impulse spending, then you must remove that temptation from yourself. In the event you go window shopping, leave your credit cards & check book at home! in the early days of sticking to your budget, it is important to re-train yourself to curb spending.

Making a budget is the simple part in financial management. It is sticking to the budget & making your spending match your plan that is the difficult method. By disciplining yourself & retraining your spending habits, you can accomplish your budget goals.

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