Home budget planning always seems a drag, considering the amount of effort that needs to be put in to create a budget and stick to it. Most people abandon budget plans midway after realizing that they need to devote a lot of time for planning. Here are some basic principles to follow to make the home budget planning process simple for you. 1. Always remember that there are three components in a budget – fixed, variable and discretionary. Fixed components include mortgage payments, vehicle finance, insurance policy payments, tax payments, other monthly payments and educational fees etc. The funds allocated to them will not change often and so a fixed amount from the monthly salary can easily Blue Loop be allocated to this component. 2. Variable components include telephone, electricity, clothing and house hold costs. This component keeps changing depending upon usage of household items and the total number of family members. Funds for this component need to be allocated based on experiences and intuition. 3. The last component is the discretionary budgeting, where expenses are inevitable, due to health problems, annual holidays etc. Remember, that at no point of time, discretionary spending should borrow from funds allocated for the fixed and variable components. It is advisable to plan for this kind of spending by allocating a small amount of the salary to a separate savings account. 4. It is not possible to include all components of the budget in the first phase. So it is advisable to use an expense management tool to help sort out the monthly spending. Generally these tools are accompanied by bill tracking and funds management features that can also help in effective finance management. Remember that budget or expense management should be kept as simple as possible to include new spending components. And finally, budget management is possible only when fund flow is optimal; this necessitates wise spending and active saving on a consistent basis..
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