四口之家的预算建议: 理财方式发生了巨变
Victoria Sully, 33, is a full-time blogger who writes about money and lifestyle at lyliarose.com. She lives in Brockworth, Gloucestershire, with her husband Ben, an IT service manager, and their two children, six-year-old Bella and three-year-old Reuben. My approach to money has drastically changed over the past few years. I used to be a spender, but having children has made me more responsible and I'm becoming a saver. Being in my 30s has also been a wake-up call, as I realise I need to save for retirement. My New Year's resolution this year is to save for an emergency fund, and I've also recently started putting money away towards a pension. I'm starting to think about the future by budgeting and putting money aside. One way we've simplified taking care of our finances is by having a joint "master" bank account, where all our income goes into and all our bills are debited from. Previously, all the bills came out of Ben's account, and at the time I worked less or was on maternity leave, so we relied solely on Ben's income. I had no access to his account and had to constantly ask Ben to tell me what had gone out, how much money we had left and get him to transfer me money whenever I needed it. Our finances were all over the place and Ben wasn't the best at keeping track of it all. When we got a joint account, I took over the finances by tracking our income, bill payments and budgeting for our spending. Budgeting also ensures we stick to our monthly income and save money, too. I use a spreadsheet to list our income and monthly outgoings so we can see what's left once all our direct debits have gone out. Our outgoings list will also include a payment to our savings account to ensure we save some money each month. |