Have you ever wondered how to make a budget for home expenses? Do you want to understand an easy way to make a budget at home and stick to it? Well if you are a housewife and are looking for an efficient way to make and manage a detailed daily budget this blog might be just for you. Keeping track of your expenses and managing them can be a herculean task but with a good plan it might just not be that difficult. So let us try to learn how to make a budget and save money.
Understand what you spend on
You can’t manage what you can’t measure. In order to control your expenses it is important to keep track of them. In fact it is the first step towards making a budget. Using an app like ‘Chat with Nerd’ might help you do it easily. It just requires you to enter your expense like a text message and automatically adds it to the relevant category. It is a must have for any housewife struggling with keeping track of their expenses.
Separate the essentials from the wants
Once we understand where we are spending our money it is good to get an idea of how much we are spending on our needs and how much on our wants. Some people follow a 50:30:20 formula where 50% of their income is spent on needs, 30% on wants and 20% goes to savings. It is perfectly okay to make your own formula as per your wishes.
Make a budget for different categories
Now that we have a clear idea of our expenses we can go ahead and decide certain amounts that we would be comfortable spending on different categories like food, rent, dinner outings, fuel and transport etc. This will help you stay safe from impulse buying and will let you know exactly where you overshot your budget by the end of the month. The idea is to be conscious of it and improve constantly. Do remember that this is not a restriction plan but a self improvement exercise. You can read a blog on how to start budgeting easily for more detailed ways of creating a budget
Plan your shopping list
Making a grocery list at home before visiting the store can do wonders for your budgeting plans. Departmental stores are designed to persuade customers to make impulsive purchases. A clear list of things you need to buy is a good way to stay safe from that. Also buying in bulk can help you get better deals and discounts. This concept applies to clothes shopping as well. Checking out your wardrobe to understand exactly what you need could help you make better decisions at the mall.
Revisit regularly
As we noted above making a budget and sticking to it is like a self improvement exercise and relies heavily on consistency. It is important to look back at our budgeting plans and see where you need to make improvements. In order to achieve your goals you might need to change some habits while in some cases you might have to readjust your budgets in order to suit your needs. All in all it is a learning exercise that will help you understand your financial goals and the actions that you will need to take in order to achieve them.
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