Saving Money As A Single Mom
Saving money as a single mom is less about saving and more about you and your relationship with money. Stay with me while I’ll explain.
Most people don’t treat money as a resource. To them, it’s easy come easy go, and that’s not a plan.
A plan sometimes called a budget should be written down on paper and should direct your money. And saving money should be as important to you as grocery shopping. You need to be faithful to this plan.
Making a budget is essential. You need to make a budget and live by the budget.
Note: When you first start making a budget you will make mistakes and it’s okay to change your budget until you have it right. Budgets also change as your living circumstances change. Maybe you have a baby or someone goes off to college. You should make appropriate changes to your budget.
Saving Money As A Single Mom
Saving money is so important because you will have cash on hand for emergencies.
If you can save money, that means you are living within your means. and living within your means is a necessity. To stay financially strong and to provide for yourself and your family.
Let’s get started. To know how much you can save you need to know how much you spend and where it goes. Look for waste.
Track your spending
To track your spending you will need a spending journal. As you spend money whether it’s cash, debit card, or credit card. You need to know where every cent goes and for what. Most spending journals are set in a format that shows the item, amount, method of payment, and category the money came from. Tracking your spending is important. It will make saving money as a single mom much easier.
Make Emergency Savings A Priority
The first savings you should have is emergency savings. We never know what emergency will be next nor do we know how much it will cost. but being more prepared is better than not being prepared at all.
The experts recommend six to twelve months of living expenses as a good emergency fund.
You don’t need to have it fully funded to start saving for other things. but you do need something set aside for when you have an emergency.
I recommend saving one thousand dollars for the proverbial rainy day. I would save it as fast as possible until my goal of one thousand dollars was reached.
After the goal was reached I would slow down but not stop adding to my emergency fund.
It’s time to start working on other things.
Debt Free
There are two kinds of debt: good debt and bad debt. I am not going to go into details about which is which but I will say debt increases your cost of living making it more difficult to pay bills and save money. Saving money as a single mom is hard enough as it is, you don’t need more complications.
The debt snowball concentrates on paying off your lowest balance of debt than taking the amount you were paying to the lowest debt and applying it to the next lowest debt until you are debt free.
If during this time you have an emergency use the funds that are in your emergency funds to avoid any more debt.
Go back to making minimum payments on your debt and sending the surplus to your emergency fund until you have it built back up to where it was.
After your emergency fund is back to where it was: go back to apply the amount you were applying to your debt before the emergency.
Prioritize Your Expenses For You And Your Children
Not including housing, food, electricity, and other living needs, everyone has individual needs. Some of you moms need to have your hair and nails done because you are a professional. Professional people need to be well-groomed.
Your children also have individual needs. Maybe a new book bag, newer clothes, pens, pencils, or other school supplies are needed.
List each item in order of importance and make adjustments to your spending and living to have these things.
It’s important to prioritize your expenses for you and your children. Everyone has different needs.
Free Entertainment For You And Your Children
It’s not reasonable to think you’ll be able to live without some kind of entertainment. But going to the movies or theme parks is expensive. You need to find free entertainment for you and your children.
Most cities have free entertainment in the evenings with live bands in public parks. You can check with your local park department to find a full listing of all events.
Libraries are a good place to go for entertainment. Most libraries have books for reading, and movies you can borrow. Some libraries also offer story time and a few other things.
Check out your local library to see what they have to offer.
Don’t Forget Your Long-Term Goals
Long-term goals can be almost anything that’s more than a year away. Long-term goals can include things like buying a home, sending your children to college, sending yourself to college, retirement, and many other things.
I know it may seem like you’ll never have another dream come true but you will if you concentrate on your goals and look for ways to make them come to be.
I know saving money as a single mom can be a real pain and sometimes you’ll take two steps forward to take one step back. But if you keep working on the saving money side you’ll eventually begin to see the results you want to see. Financial freedom.
Automate Your Finances
In today’s world, we already have too much to do. Why should we do something that’s already automated and ready for you to use for free?
Most banks have a form of bill pay set up to be used. I’ve used bill pay to pay fixed amounts (the amount is always the same). Usually, we are talking about car payments, rent/mortgage, savings, etc.
Things you should automate are fixed-amount bills, savings, and retirement savings.
I save for everything. Think about it. Everything you own will need to be replaced or repaired. If you’re living below your means and saving money you can avoid going into debt for replacement and repairs.
I use a system of sinking funds to save for things and events. I use the bill-pay to move money from my checking account to the appropriate savings account.
I’m able to save for everything.
Saving for things and staying debt free is an easy way to keep your cost of living down.
Increase Your Income
I know you have children to raise and probably a full-time job. But you need to find a way to earn more money. It only makes sense. Before you are living within your means you need the extra money to pay off bills and get your money under control to include savings.
After you are living within your means you need more money to accelerate your emergency fund retirement and long-term goals.
There are plenty of ways to earn extra money teaching English as a second language, copy editing, babysitting in your home, or house sitting are a few.
Saving money as a single mom isn’t difficult but it does require you to spend time with your money and change your attitude about money and realize it’s a resource for you to manage so you can have a better life.
Conclusion
Saving money as a single mom is no different than anyone else saving money. you need to live below your means and have a budget, track your money, and decide to save money.