Family Time Friday- Budgeting Help

I want to share with you a tool that I found!  I want to preface this post by saying that I have not been given anything to tell you about this tool, I simply found it and want to share it with you ;)

My husband recently took a MAJOR pay cut, and we are so close to the finalization of the adoptions that we are also no longer receiving foster money, so our budget has taken a HUGE hit.  In an attempt to figure out a way through these waters I found a tool that I have found to be very helpful.  If you have read any of Dave Ramsey's stuff or been through Financial Peace University, you're familiar with the idea of budgeting through envelopes.  If you've read Larry Burkett, he talks also about an envelope syle budgeting, but rather than the actual cash in envelopes he has a check register style paper envelope.  This concept has worked very well for me in the past with one drawback:  I didn't have the whole notebook with me everywhere I went.  So, things fell through the cracks and I eventually abandoned the concept.

Well, with the cut in our budget I knew I had to go back to this style of budgeting for us to survive.  I honestly don't know why I don't continue to do it when we have plenty of money.  That is a change that I will make when my husband's paycheck is restored- I will continue to use this budgeting system.  It is called Easy Envelope Budgeting Aid.  This program has an app for your Android phone that keeps track of your envelopes, and you can utilitze it online.  It really makes communication between my husband and I easier too, because he can easily pull the information up on his phone and know if there is money in that envelope or not as well.  You can create as many at 10 envelopes on the free plan, and sinc it on your phones and the web.  If you do not have an android phone use of just the web application would be very helpful for couples as well.  If you opt for the paid plan you can also track your bank information.  I am personally using only the free version at this time and it is really helping us stay on top of our money.

Dave Ramsey says we need to "Tell our money where to go"...  This Aid helps you to do just that, and helps you to keep a little money set aside each month categorized for unexpected or irregular expenses.  I hope you will take a look at this, because I really think this is a great tool, especially for those of us who don't like carrying around a lot of cash.  It is true for most people that you spend less with cash, but I personally do not.  I spend every last cent if it's in my wallet.

Hope that helps your family a little bit today!