Stretching Your Dollar: How to Avoid Monthly Financial Stress

<div class="block">With millions of Americans living paycheck to paycheck, the end of the month can be a stressful time as funds stretch thin. Kristin Myers, personal finance expert, joined &#39;Stretching Your Dollar&#39; to provide a few money management tips so people can avoid financial stress as a new month is set to begin.</div>

Stretching Your Dollar

End of the month can be incredibly stressful for millions of Americans, millions who live paycheck to paycheck. Next month's rent or mortgage payments are coming due. And after covering all of your monthly expenses from groceries to bills, you may find yourself short on cash for advice on how to break that cycle and start strong on the first of every month. I'm joined by personal finance expert, Kristen Myers, Chris. Welcome. Hi, Hannah, how are you? Thanks for having me. Great to see you again. So most of us don't get paid every single week. What's the best way to make sure those paychecks are going through to last through the whole month? Yeah, and this is going to be particularly relevant for those folks that are only getting paid once a month, right? They're not getting that regular infusion of cash into their bank account either weekly or even bimonthly. And this is really where I would say Hannah, a budget is going to be really, really key for you. You really need to make sure that every single dollar I like to say has a job if that one of those dollars is to pay for example, your rent or one of those dollars is for entertainment. You need to make sure, you know exactly how much money you have coming in. You need to know exactly how much money has to go out every single month to cover all of your bills and expenses. And a budget is going to be the best way to make sure that by the end of the month, especially if you're only getting paid once a month, that you still have some money left over and can cover all of those necessary expenses. Do you suggest any strategies to help people keep track of when all their different bills are due within the month? Yeah, so that's a really great question and honestly, it really depends on you. You can either go high tech or low tech. So starting on the low tech side of things, it could be as simple as having a calendar and noting on that calendar every single time that you have an expense coming up, whether that's the first of the month and you might have rent or the 15th, you maybe have a credit card payment due. You can simply track that for yourself on your calendar, on your phone or a calendar, even on your fridge. Then you also have a little bit of those high tech options. If you, you can probably believe that there's definitely an app for that. There are several different apps that are out there that will actually, and many of them are free. I should know that will actually keep track of every single bill that you have coming due. And when and then my last piece of advice is and a lot of not a lot of people know this, you can actually change the due date for some of your bills. For example, your credit card bill, you can actually change that to be either due the first, for example, or the 15th. So you can better sync up some of these bills to better align with when you actually get paid. And there are so many Americans that have trouble covering all their bills should some be a higher priority than others. You know, that's a really great question. Um because unfortunately, some folks are not able to cover every bill and expense. It's very easy for us to say you should be paying every single bill that you have every single month. And of course, that is the prevailing wisdom. However, if you are having to kind of rank and prioritize some of these bills, I would say first really address some of those key needs that you have. So thinking your rent or your mortgage, things like shelter, things like clothing, things like food, those are the three things that you absolutely need to survive. And so that should be your top priority when it comes to paying your bills. Then next up, I would say anything that impacts your credit Um So that could be your credit card bill. For example, if you do not pay it, you're going to see your credit score, really start to get a ding and you're gonna start to see that drop over time and that's something that you definitely don't want. And then after that, I would say would fall the rest of those expenses but anything to do with, you know, your heat, your, your utilities, your housing, food, your shelter. I would say those need to be your top priorities. Kristen, how often should you be checking in with your budget if you are concerned about running out of money throughout the month? Yeah. So typically I like to say that your budget shouldn't be something that you really are stressing over regularly, especially if you, if you've made it correctly. So if you have taken an accurate accounting of how much money that you're receiving every single month and you've done an accurate accounting of how much you actually have to spend every single month in terms of your expenses. I would actually say that the only time you really need to check in with your budget is really if you are finding that you're overspending in discretionary categories, let's say you find that you're going out with your friends a little bit too much, then you maybe need to go back to your budget and tweak it a little bit so that you're not constantly dipping into your savings or constantly unable to cover your bills. Now, if you have any change in any of those expenses or any change in your income, that's when you're also going to want to go back to that budget, whether you get a pay raise or a pay cut if you lose your job or if you perhaps add on some extra bills or expenses or even take away some bills and expenses. That's when you're definitely going to want to check in with that budget. So any change to your financial picture, go back to that budget and make changes as necessary. You mentioned dipping into your savings, but is it risky to put the expenses you can't cover in cash or savings on a credit card? It definitely is. And we are seeing a lot more Americans, um actually turning to their credit cards, I mean, credit card balances hit about a trillion dollars not too long ago, according to some of the latest studies from the, from the Federal Reserve. So I would say it is absolutely a big risk. If you can't cover something in cash or with the money that you have on hand, it is absolutely a risk to start putting these things on your credit card. It is a habit that you do not necessarily want because the more that your credit card gets used, the more debt that you go into and it becomes a bigger and bigger hole for you to have to try to get out of. So if you can make sure you cover as many of your expenses as possible, with the money that you have, that credit card should really be if you have to cover some of those expenses, really a last case scenario, if people are struggling and decide they really, really need to cut back on spending, is there a good first step that they can take? Absolutely. So again, go back to that budget if you have to make any sort of changes when it comes to your spending and really start to look at those discretionary items, those things that you do not need to survive going out with your friends, for example, would be one taking Ubers or lifts instead of using public transport. These are all areas that you can really look to first to really start making cuts. Um and then really making sure that you try to cut back on spending anywhere that you possibly can. Perhaps it's making some changes to that grocery list as we all know, um food items are still one of those persistently sticky items every single month when it comes to inflation. So you might need to start making some changes there, making some adjustments in the type of food that you're purchasing. So you really need to go again, back to that budget. Figure out what are the necessary expenses for your survival if you're in this kind of scenario? And what do you absolutely not need every single month. Always great advice, personal finance expert, Kristen Myers. Thank you as always Kristen.