Sometimes, it does not matter whether you have plenty of income or you have a tiny one, a small bill sneaks up on you. Sometimes, it is your cell phone bill. It happens. You might forget when it comes due. You might have a surprise expense that keeps you from having the money to pay it. Regardless of why you can keep shortages from happening.

Making a Simple Budget

Okay, I’ll be honest. The first time you make a budget, it will suck. It takes a ton of time. They’re easy to make though. You can set up a simple and reasonable budget within a few hours. Use tools like those on Budgetry.com to get started. The real challenge comes from sticking to the budget. You have to spend time making your budget a habit. How do you do that? Adulting.

Advantages To Budgeting

Many advantages exist in budgeting. It is more than just having money for all the things you want like budgeting for your cell phone.

• You develop a good Debt-to-Income Ratio (DTI)

• You develop your personal responsibility

• You can attain your budget goals like a cute apartment

• You give yourself control and power over your finances

As long as you are willing to save money, you can afford anything. It may take you a long time to save up for it, but if you do not touch the savings, you will get there. Opening a savings account is a great way to start saving. We suggest taking a look at the options below:

A budget gives you a place for everything and keeps everything in its place. You figure out how much you regularly spend and where you can reduce that amount.

Get out of Debt

You create a plan for getting yourself out of debt. That provides you a certain measure of freedom. When you know where you stand, you can take a stand. If you’re in the working class, you probably have a higher consumer debt level than wealthier workers.

How to Create a Budget

So, an obvious advantage to budgeting and sticking to it is getting out of debt and getting ahead in life. Let’s look at how to do that while budgeting for your cell phone and a dinner out now and then.

Gather Information

Step one to creating a budget is gathering information. Budgeting for your cell phone is only a small part of it. Calculate your monthly income.That may come to more than you realize if you work a side gig, complete surveys, do odd jobs, etc. Use hard numbers. Do not fudge. Use logical numbers that you have experience earning. If last month was super busy, do not assume this month will be, too. Unless you recently earned a raise, budgeting on an average of your income over twelve months works well.

Calculate Your Monthly Expenses

Start with your rent or mortgage payment. Add your utilities — electric, gas, water, trash, — car payment, car insurance, gas, groceries, motor oil, fitness center membership, cable or satellite, cell phone, dining out, credit cards, loans and savings. Definitely do not forget budgeting for your cell phone, otherwise, how will work get ahold of you to tell you they have extra shifts for you. Oh, more money.

Also, do not skip savings. You need to put savings in your budget. That should be about ten percent of what you get every month. You might think that sounds like a lot, but it really isn’t. It is an important part of budgeting to put aside money for a rainy day, as my Daddy used to say.

Coming up with your expenses list should not be something you ballpark or just put down off the top of your head. Get out your checkbook, credit card statements and bank statements so you're budgeting for your cell phone the right way.

Look at Where You Spent Your Money

Look back for a full year. Because most people have at least one or two semi-annual or annual expenses that otherwise sneak up on them. For example, you pay your mortgage every month, but your property taxes once per year. This you have to budget for, too, my friend.

You’ll find you have more expenses to include depending on your personal situation. These might include:

• clothes,

• school supplies,

• household sundries like light bulbs and cleaning materials,

• pet supplies and pet care,

• home or car repairs and maintenance,

• medical and dental bills,

• online purchases/shopping,

• entertainment,

• online subscriptions,

• child support and alimony,

• your children’s allowances,

• gifts for birthdays, holidays and weddings,

• church tithes and charity donations.

Divide Your Expenses into Categories

You might eye a legal pad if you’re old school, but a spreadsheet will actually work much better.

Prioritize Your Expenses

You need to organize and prioritize your expenses. You can make your own priority system, but one Budgetry writer suggests these:

• “Non-Negotiables” for rent and car payments;

• “Credit Cards & Utilities” as a second non-negotiable;

• “Important” for groceries, gas, clothing, savings;

• “Optional but Nice” for cable, Internet, cell phone;

• “Fun Stuff” for entertainment and shopping;

• and “Unpredictables” for medical expenses and car or home repair.

You might not realize that credit cards qualify as non-negotiable. They do. You need to make at least the minimum payments each month. More than that when possible. You might think of your cell as a non-negotiable which explains why you are here learning budgeting for your cell phone 101.

Reduce Your Expenses

You need to prioritize pretty seriously if you have found yourself already in the hole. That may mean cutting out things that you currently purchase. If you just can’t imagine doing without, try cutting down on the item or replacing it with another method. Here are a few ideas:

Budgeting For Your Cell Phone and More

Your budget should be guided by a couple of percentages.

First, your rent or house payment should not exceed 30 percent of your total income.

Second, you should save at least ten percent of your income each month.

If that sounds impossible, you need to cut back and make more money.

Earn More Money To Make Budgeting for Your Cell Phone Easier

Earning more money can be as simple as picking up a part-time job. No whining that you do not want to work more. It is the simplest solution. You are not earning more to spend more. You need to earn enough so that you can easily pay every expense in the top four categories of priorities

• Non-Negotiables,

• Credit Cards & Utilities,

• Important,

• Optional but Nice

That is a basic of budgeting for your cell phone. So, either get a part-time job, start a side gig or land a higher paying main job. You can easily drive for Uber or Lyft. Rent out an extra room of your home as an Airbnb. For one-time, short-term cash, you can clean out your attic, closets, and garage and sell it off.

Having Enough For Budgeting For Your Cell Phone

You may need to do more than just budget and reduce expenses.

Negotiate Your Bills

Sometimes, you need to negotiate your bills with credit card companies or medical institutions. You can also threaten to leave your cable company, cell phone provider, etc. Cable and cell phone providers will often reduce your cost or offer you extras for free. Nix the extras. You do not need an extra movie channel. You need $10 or $20 off of your bill every month.

Use Public Internet

Use the Internet at the library. Scale down to only the adults in the household having a cell phone.

Consolidate Debt

You can also consolidate your debt. Okay, you probably do not see how this helps budgeting for your cell phone. It will because it lowers your monthly outlay of money for other bills.

Debt consolidation saves you money in two ways. It often comes with a lower interest rate than individual credit cards and loans. It provides only one payment to track each month. This can help you if it is the credit cards and loans that cause you problems every month. Taking out a consolidation loan can provide you with the funds to completely pay them off. You make one small payment per month makes it simpler to follow the budget.

When Budgeting For Your Cell Phone Hurts

You would probably like it, if budgeting just took a day. It does not. Not even a week. It becomes a lifetime process. You have to learn to upkeep your checkbook. You need to add items to the budget when you want something new that does not impact your housing payment nor your monthly required bills nor your savings.

You may end up watching more movies at home for a little while. You may need to buy a different brand of peanut butter or shop at a different grocery store. You might also need to leave yourself notes on the bathroom mirror or phone alarms or set up a cloud app to send you reminder emails when something comes due.

How Informed Choices Help

An informed choice refers to a choice that we know all consequences of making. When we make uninformed or unplanned decisions, we miss out on the consequences until it is too late.

Don’t Pull Cash out of a Different Bank’s ATM

One simple example of this is pulling cash out of an ATM that does not belong to your bank. Machines owned by other banks charge you more money. Your bank also charges you money when you use an ATM that does not belong to it. You might not realize it, but those $5 to $7 hits to your account make a difference at the end of the month.

Can you really account for the cash you withdrew and spent? Do you know where every dollar went? Even with a budget, things can get away from you if you start taking a few dollars out here and there. When you run late and pick up dinner, you break your budget. When you buy coffee out instead of bringing it from home, you break your budget. When you buy that soft, fuzzy sweater just because, you break your budget. Those things add up.

Cut out Cigarettes and Alcohol

Okay, here, I am going to become unpopular. I will just pretend there is no way any of my readers are doing drugs, so I do not need to mention cutting that out. I am being serious though. Add up the money you currently spend on those “entertainment” items. The average cost of a pack of cigarettes in the US is about $6.28. If you smoke two packs a day, an average “habit” then you are smoking $12.56 per day out of your budget. That equals $87,92 a week and a huge $380 per month.

Walk over to your wet bar. Tally up the cost of each bottle of alcohol. You just don’t realize how much you drink in more ways than one. Bushmills or Johnny Walker — it doesn’t come cheap. Neither does that Bombay Sapphire or my former favorite Guinness Extra Stout. Yes. I was a beer girl before I quit drinking five years ago. You’d be shocked how much money you will save, not to mention your health and welfare. If you want a fancier way of doing this, go hi-tech with the National Institutes of Health’s Alcohol Spending Calculator.

You might hit awe level when you tally up your monthly purchases. Let’s say you’re a man or woman who is considered a heavy drinker. For a man that is four drinks per occasion or for a woman, it is three drinks per occasion. Maybe you just have one at the end of the day — every day. You are like 30 percent of the US. Your one drink a day costs about $3.50. Let’s say you have two. That’s $7 per day. At the end of the month, the one drink per day person has consumed $105 while the one who had two a day consumed $210.

Now, imagine that you smoke and you drink. Holy cow! You are spending $485 to $590 a month on ruining your own health, creating blood pressure and cardiac issues for yourself. No offense, but you probably smell bad, too, because no smoker or alcoholic smells good.

Let a Doctor Help You Quit

Hey, quit smoking and drinking and you can also cut down on all the Febreeze you have to buy. Let me turn back to the serious stuff for a moment again. You may or may not need help quitting. First, talk to your doctor. Your doctor can prescribe medicines like Chantix that can help you quit smoking more easily. By obtaining a prescription for it, you can more easily get it covered by your health insurance. That makes it cost less, which helps you save money even faster.

Your doctor can also help you stop drinking. You might need to go to rehab, but many people can stop drinking by attending meetings like those offered by Alcoholic Anonymous and avoiding the consumption of alcohol. No need to pour it all down the toilet. You can simply give it to a friend who rarely drinks, but keeps some on hand to serve to visitors. If you do require a rehab stay, your doctor may write a prescription for this. Your insurance may or may not cover all of the cost. Each state offers its own rehab services and these can cost little to nothing. Many use a sliding scale.

A Budget For Life: It’s About More Than Budgeting For Your Cell Phone

Money matters. There is no denying it. You might not realize it today, but sitting down and creating a budget can give you more than just a little more money each month. It can help you create a better life. The process of budgeting can help you identify where you spend money. That can lead to some serious self-discoveries.

You might not have realized what you spend your money on or how often. Maybe you thought you spent less, drank less, ate out less. The process of sitting down to create a budget and honestly listing out every expenditure you make can help you reach your fiscal goals.

You Can Change Things

It can also help you reach personal and health goals though. It makes it easier when you see everything about your life in front of your eyes in a spreadsheet.

Conclusion

You might ride your bike to work more often instead of driving. Replace cigarettes with celery sticks and baby carrots. Drink flavored sparkling water instead of alcohol. Because of those little big changes, you would see $500 to $700 more in your bank account every month. You would see unwanted pounds drop off your body. You would see muscle tone return.

And that money you did not think you had for putting into savings? You would have $500 to $700 a month to sock away for a rainy day. Imagine what you could do with even an extra $100 per month. Forget just imagining it. Write it down. Make it real to you. Define your goals. Where would like to be one year from now? Budget it for it. Stick to it. Get there.