How to Save When You’re A Single Income Family

Our family is what you would call a “single income family”. Why? Because back in July my husband quit his full-time job to come and work from home with me. While it took several months of planning in advance, it also took time afterwards to get used to living on one income versus two. So today I want to discuss How to Save When You’re A Single Income Family because I think saving is a huge part of life that most think they can go without. To me, saving is everything your future needs and everything your credit card doesn’t.

How to Save When You’re A Single Income Family

“Credit card” are two of the scariest words you can ever say.

Why?

Because a credit card is a form of a loan and if you are not careful, you can have far more money loaned to you than you can afford. That is exactly why for our family, we have an emergency credit card that is in a lock box and meant to be used for emergencies only. Anything that is a want is never an emergency so therefore, it never gets touched. But before you get ahead of yourself, you should know we have a good amount of savings too!

You see, credit cards can also be the road block to getting you to the point where you are saving. If you have a credit card with a nice limit on it, you may think that you will never need savings as long as that credit card is your buffer. If that is your mentality, you should rethink your financial plan.

So let’s take a moment and forget you have that plastic card with magical money on it and let’s think of a realistic way you can plan for your future… It starts with saving!

Getting you on the right track to saving

There are many  ways you can adjust to living on a single income so you can have enough room in your budget in order to save. I am talking about the type of savings that is not meant to be touched unless something unexpected happens to you in life. We all know this isn’t a matter of “if” but “when” something unexpected will happen.

The car breaks down, a major medical situation gets thrown at you, or even if your spouse that is supporting family, happens to get sick and needs to take off work for any amount of time. You want to be prepared which is truly why I believe saving is such an important aspect in life. So how do you get there?

You can cut out things from your budget (like all of those Starbucks drinks each week) and you can even utilize sales and coupons. But sometimes there is a better and easier way to jumpstart your savings. It’s something we did personally and I am going to share our secret with you…

Are you ready?

We got help!

By “help”, I mean, we got help creating a plan that fit perfectly into our life so we could save for our future and the future of our children. That all started with a company called SUM180.

SUM180 guides you through several things that analyze your life including income made, spending habits, debt, etc. Then they will help create a plan that is perfectly molded to your financial situation. Even if your goal isn’t to save but rather just to pay off existing debt, they can help!

After I completed the online interview I received my personalized SUM180 Plan. It truly was amazing to see all of our finances in one place. It helped me determine where we were spending too much and even showed me the accomplishments we have made financially. For example, I have surpassed the amount of saving that is recommended in case of an emergency. It is recommended to save about 10% of our income and we have saved about 15%. 

But, if you think it stops there, it doesn’t!

Just like many other Americans, my husband and I have student loans and a small amount of debt. So even though our savings are on track, everything else isn’t. I now see that we can use some of the money we have saved to pay down those debts making our financial future better overall. Once our Next Steps are tackled, we can re-adjust the plan as needed and high-tail our savings even more.

How you can become in charge of your finances too

Take my word for it, having financial help and having a second pair of eyes looking at your budget is amazing. It will be the best financial decision you make all year!

You can learn more about SUM180 by visiting their website and even visit the SUM180 Community to hear testimonials, see commonly asked financial questions, and much more from people just like you and I. Plus, as a special introductory offer, Simplistically Living readers will receive 50% off a SUM180 subscription when they use the exclusive promo code SIMPLE50. This offer is good through December 2016.

That offer helps you get on track with your expenses and get ahold of your savings especially if you are a one income family like we are. Your future can be brighter all you need to do is get some professional financial help!

This post has been sponsored by SUM180. I was provided with product at no charge to sample in exchange for my review. The options expressed in this post are my own. I am in no way affiliated with SUM180 and do not earn a commission or percent of sales.