Budget: Boost Your Income
So, you’ve done your budget. There’s only one problem. You’re finding there is always too much month and not enough cash. How do you fix that problem? For some it’s a process of paying off debt to improve their monthly cash flow and for others it’s a case of boosting their income on a more permanent basis. In any case, here are some great suggestions.
Sell Items on Ebay and Craigslist
Everybody has things that aren’t being used, but are just accumulating in their house. Put your old baby items, and dusty CDs up for sale on Ebay or Craigslist. These sites are very easy to use, and will usually give you more income that if you sell them at a garage sale. Be very careful to always include shipping and handling, or you will see your profits get eaten up.
Take on a second job
It is true, that you could take on a second hourly job, but the best ones to boost your income are a little more flexible.
These can include:
a) Pizza Delivery: There is a lot of room for tips, and many places don’t even require you to be there unless there is a pizza to deliver
b) Elance: If you have a skill like writing, graphic design, etc. you can make more by freelancing out your skills at your leisure
c) Saturday and Evening Jobs: If you do have to do a hourly job, look for one that gives tips, and hours that will fit into your schedule. These places will be used to working around second jobs, babysitters, and more complex schedules.
Fill out Surveys
This may seem like an obscure thing to do, but there are many places that you can fill out surveys for extra money and get paid for your opinion. Do a search on the internet and you’ll be sure to find what your looking for.
Add a Roommate
Whether you rent or own your home, a roommate can really reduce your monthly expenses. Consider moving your kids to one room, or converting a downstairs rec. room into a room. Doing this can reduce your house or rent expenses by 25% to 50%. Offer your room furnished and with utilities and you’ll be able to command a premium without seeing much increase to your monthly overhead. If you don’t want anyone else in your house, you can also consider renting a garage to a tradesperson or a band looking to make it big.
Start a Home-Based Business
This can include all the typical Tupperware and Mary Kay Products. If you are able to keep your overhead down, you can increase your income quickly as there are limited requirements to keep inventory and no storefront costs.
Build Your Education
If you find that you are in a more permanent income crunch, you should consider increasing your education, so you can look for a higher-paying job. You also should consider increasing your financial education, so that you can discover more creative income making methods in businesses or investments.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Friday, May 28, 2010
Self Help Debt Settlement - Steps to Help You Negotiate Your Own Debt (Part 1)
This article is part of a series of articles dedicated to helping consumers get out and stay out of debt. This article is about budgeting: The real way to avoid debt problems.
Budgeting:
The real way to avoid debt problems
It’s a simple formula. What you make, must line up with what you spend. If you need to spend more, you have to make more. Mastering this simple formula will save you from getting behind on payments and being unable to pay off mounting debt. The easiest way to get this under control is a written budget. A written budget requires you to spend on paper, what you intend to spend during the month. So, where do you start, what do you include, and how do you make a budget? Here are some good guidelines.
Income
This is as simple as it gets. What do you make very month? Be sure to include all job income, expected bonuses, and child benefit money. Also, don’t round this number up, or you will find yourself dealing with as shortfall. Be realistic. Take into account anticipated day-offs or shortage of income. If you find, that your expenses don’t match up with the amount of money you are making, you need to take action. The first step you’ll need to consider is reducing your expenses. The other step you can consider is increasing your income. You can do this temporarily by selling items on Ebay, taking on a second job, or adding a roommate. If these things, don’t appeal to you you’ll need to look at a more permanent income boost like changing careers or creating some investments.
Expenses
Here are the things that should be considered in a budget.
Food:
First and foremost, you should plan to eat. This part of your budget involves going to the grocery store, and not out to restaurants. Grocery shop with a shopping list, as you will find it easier to not spend money on things that are unnecessary.
Heat, Electric and Water
This is also an essential that you should consider first. Make sure to keep on top of this, as well as look for energy-saving tips that will make this an easier pill to swallow every month.
Rent/Mortgage:
You need a roof over your head. If you find that you have the potential to get behind on this talk to your bank or landlord, and they may be able to be flexible with you. As a rule, combined with heat, electric, water, and property taxes this should account for no more than 30% of your income.
Transportation:
Some forms of these expenses are essentials and others are luxuries. You will need to account for transportation that will enable you to fulfill your regular life duties. Try to avoid costly car payments or leases. Buy a car with cash, and hold off from buying a more expensive car until you can pay with cash. You can also consider using public transportation. You will also need to account for gas costs, insurance costs, and car upkeep cost.
Phone and Internet
This is perhaps an expense that has been rising over the last decade. Most people in your house will have a cell phone, consider a family plan with restrictions on texting and long-distance phone calls. If you have a landline, try to reduce the features, as to not have it coincide with cell phone features. An example being if you have a good long-distance plan on your cell phone, don’t put one on your landline and make all long-distance phone calls from your cell phone. Nearly every home has internet access, try to get in included with your phone bill for the most aggressive pricing package.
Medical Insurance:
Whether, you have some coverage from work or your own plan, be sure to keep on your premiums, you never know when there needed. Also, if you know of big medical expenses are coming up, start to save as early as possible, so you need to put aside less per month.
Television:
This can also be paired with your phone and internet package on occasion. Only pay for channels and order channels that are watched to avoid unnecessary costs.
Health/Beauty:
This includes soap, shampoo, cleaning supplies, etc. Buying in bulk is always cheaper as items rarely expire. You also will need to budget in biweekly or monthly haircuts.
Charitable Donations:
This will include all gifts give to charities or churches. Be sure to track these as they are usually tax deductible and will increase your income tax refund.
House Expenses:
It’s a good idea to have a slush fund of a couple hundred dollars per month to pay for unexpected house problems. This will avoid unneeded stress if the toilet overflows. You should also make sure you are covering your yearly property taxes and insurance. Many times, these items are included in your mortgage, but if not set aside money on a monthly basis.
Entertainment:
Although, it should be a final priority, it is healthy to spend time and money on fun. This will make for a healthy home environment.
Other Yearly Expenses:
Some bills won’t be monthly, but will be need to be paid on a yearly basis. To anticipate this, take the payment and divide it by 12 and you have your monthly payment. These expenses include vacations, new clothes, new furnishings, education cost, etc.
Savings and Investments
Develop a plan to save three months of expenses in case of jobless or unexpected expenses. Also, consider how you will prepare for your children’s education and retirement, by developing savings plans that fit your goals and comfort levels.
Budgeting:
The real way to avoid debt problems
It’s a simple formula. What you make, must line up with what you spend. If you need to spend more, you have to make more. Mastering this simple formula will save you from getting behind on payments and being unable to pay off mounting debt. The easiest way to get this under control is a written budget. A written budget requires you to spend on paper, what you intend to spend during the month. So, where do you start, what do you include, and how do you make a budget? Here are some good guidelines.
Income
This is as simple as it gets. What do you make very month? Be sure to include all job income, expected bonuses, and child benefit money. Also, don’t round this number up, or you will find yourself dealing with as shortfall. Be realistic. Take into account anticipated day-offs or shortage of income. If you find, that your expenses don’t match up with the amount of money you are making, you need to take action. The first step you’ll need to consider is reducing your expenses. The other step you can consider is increasing your income. You can do this temporarily by selling items on Ebay, taking on a second job, or adding a roommate. If these things, don’t appeal to you you’ll need to look at a more permanent income boost like changing careers or creating some investments.
Expenses
Here are the things that should be considered in a budget.
Food:
First and foremost, you should plan to eat. This part of your budget involves going to the grocery store, and not out to restaurants. Grocery shop with a shopping list, as you will find it easier to not spend money on things that are unnecessary.
Heat, Electric and Water
This is also an essential that you should consider first. Make sure to keep on top of this, as well as look for energy-saving tips that will make this an easier pill to swallow every month.
Rent/Mortgage:
You need a roof over your head. If you find that you have the potential to get behind on this talk to your bank or landlord, and they may be able to be flexible with you. As a rule, combined with heat, electric, water, and property taxes this should account for no more than 30% of your income.
Transportation:
Some forms of these expenses are essentials and others are luxuries. You will need to account for transportation that will enable you to fulfill your regular life duties. Try to avoid costly car payments or leases. Buy a car with cash, and hold off from buying a more expensive car until you can pay with cash. You can also consider using public transportation. You will also need to account for gas costs, insurance costs, and car upkeep cost.
Phone and Internet
This is perhaps an expense that has been rising over the last decade. Most people in your house will have a cell phone, consider a family plan with restrictions on texting and long-distance phone calls. If you have a landline, try to reduce the features, as to not have it coincide with cell phone features. An example being if you have a good long-distance plan on your cell phone, don’t put one on your landline and make all long-distance phone calls from your cell phone. Nearly every home has internet access, try to get in included with your phone bill for the most aggressive pricing package.
Medical Insurance:
Whether, you have some coverage from work or your own plan, be sure to keep on your premiums, you never know when there needed. Also, if you know of big medical expenses are coming up, start to save as early as possible, so you need to put aside less per month.
Television:
This can also be paired with your phone and internet package on occasion. Only pay for channels and order channels that are watched to avoid unnecessary costs.
Health/Beauty:
This includes soap, shampoo, cleaning supplies, etc. Buying in bulk is always cheaper as items rarely expire. You also will need to budget in biweekly or monthly haircuts.
Charitable Donations:
This will include all gifts give to charities or churches. Be sure to track these as they are usually tax deductible and will increase your income tax refund.
House Expenses:
It’s a good idea to have a slush fund of a couple hundred dollars per month to pay for unexpected house problems. This will avoid unneeded stress if the toilet overflows. You should also make sure you are covering your yearly property taxes and insurance. Many times, these items are included in your mortgage, but if not set aside money on a monthly basis.
Entertainment:
Although, it should be a final priority, it is healthy to spend time and money on fun. This will make for a healthy home environment.
Other Yearly Expenses:
Some bills won’t be monthly, but will be need to be paid on a yearly basis. To anticipate this, take the payment and divide it by 12 and you have your monthly payment. These expenses include vacations, new clothes, new furnishings, education cost, etc.
Savings and Investments
Develop a plan to save three months of expenses in case of jobless or unexpected expenses. Also, consider how you will prepare for your children’s education and retirement, by developing savings plans that fit your goals and comfort levels.
Monday, May 10, 2010
B-EZ Enterprises Celebrates One Year of Helping Consumers Negotiate Directly with their Creditors Utilizing a “Work with your Creditors” Approach
B-EZ Enterprises operates the website www.2SettleMyDebt.com and now celebrates the websites one year milestone. The website utilizes a patent pending method of internet debt settlement. This Self Help website employs a patent pending method that allows consumers to enter creditors, make offers to creditors, generates letters and allows these creditors to accept, reject or make counter offers via the internet.
Self Help Debt Negotiation website, www.2SettleMyDebt.com was created by a Credit and Collections insider to assist consumers in negotiating directly with their creditors utilizing a “Work with your Creditors” approach. This website was created to combat Debt Settlement Companies and their sometimes unscrupulous tactics. Consumers who are seriously considering debt settlement should be aware that there are alternatives.
2SettleMyDebt.com provides their users with secure internet access to “user specific databases” and preformatted letters that assist individuals in negotiating directly with their creditors. Their website also provides the users to choose either debt reduction or debt settlement programs. Both programs are fully explained and facilitated by their Patent Pending method of debt negotiation.
Once a consumer signs up for this Self Help debt negotiation web based program, they have secure individual access to the databases, video tutorials, explanations of both the debt settlement and debt reduction methods. The website also provides the users a complimentary copy of “The Debt Settlement” eBook written by a debt collector to assist consumers in their negotiations with creditors.
DIY Debt settlement is not that difficult if consumers have the knowledge and the tools they need. 2SettleMyDeb.com provides their subscribers with the knowledge and tools, as well as a step by step method to successfully negotiate directly with their creditors. To see a video demonstration of the process utilized visit http://www.2SettleMydebt.com for more information on their Patent Pending Method of debt reduction.
Visit our website http://www.2SettleMyDebt.com for more information about our services!
Self Help Debt Negotiation website, www.2SettleMyDebt.com was created by a Credit and Collections insider to assist consumers in negotiating directly with their creditors utilizing a “Work with your Creditors” approach. This website was created to combat Debt Settlement Companies and their sometimes unscrupulous tactics. Consumers who are seriously considering debt settlement should be aware that there are alternatives.
2SettleMyDebt.com provides their users with secure internet access to “user specific databases” and preformatted letters that assist individuals in negotiating directly with their creditors. Their website also provides the users to choose either debt reduction or debt settlement programs. Both programs are fully explained and facilitated by their Patent Pending method of debt negotiation.
Once a consumer signs up for this Self Help debt negotiation web based program, they have secure individual access to the databases, video tutorials, explanations of both the debt settlement and debt reduction methods. The website also provides the users a complimentary copy of “The Debt Settlement” eBook written by a debt collector to assist consumers in their negotiations with creditors.
DIY Debt settlement is not that difficult if consumers have the knowledge and the tools they need. 2SettleMyDeb.com provides their subscribers with the knowledge and tools, as well as a step by step method to successfully negotiate directly with their creditors. To see a video demonstration of the process utilized visit http://www.2SettleMydebt.com for more information on their Patent Pending Method of debt reduction.
Visit our website http://www.2SettleMyDebt.com for more information about our services!
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