Budgeting

I've had a few clients ask for assistance creating budgets lately. While I'm certainly not an accountant, CPA or really anything even close to that, I am able to provide some ideas about the basics of creating a budget.

The first thing to do is figure out what your expense will be that you have to pay - mortgage/rent, utilities, insurance. Make a list of all the types of costs you know you'll have monthly. Go through your files and wallet to help jog your memory of what you might have. If you pay something semi-annually, like car insurance, break it down into what the monthly cost would be (divide it by six).

Next, list out expenses that you anticipate to some degree. This includes public transit, prescriptions, gas, groceries, memberships and subscriptions. Do your best to estimate what the monthly break down of these items currently is. Take a look at a couple bank statements to get a better idea of what you're spending.

Third, list out anything you'd love to be able to afford - vacation, retirement savings, gifts. Don't fill in a cost of these items yet.

At the bottom you'll total the expenses you do have (from the first two parts of the list). Now, you'll also need to know how much money you have coming in each month. What's the difference between the total of costs so far and the income? If you're already over, it's time to reassess some of the costs from the second part of your list. If there's still some money leftover, divide it however it suits your goals best between the items in the third part. For example, there's a $1,500 difference between regular expenses and income each month. Decide how much of that $1,500 should be deposited into your retirement account, how much should go into savings for vacation and how much you can spend on going to the movies and getting birthday gifts.

Now, the hard part is to put it in to practice and actually follow the plan!

Little Tips for Little Places

Sometimes all we need is to shift or change in the slightest way to make our stuff fit! Here's some ideas to get you started:

1) Linen Closet: Try folding your linens into a different shape to make them better fit your shelves. Maybe you need them in halves or thirds. Or, try rolling them.

2) Book Shelves: Try laying sets of books of the same size on their sides instead of right side up. Depending on the amount of books in the stack, this can sometimes increase the amount you can store.

3) Shoes: Instead of storing them with the toes and heels lined up, try storing each pair toe-to-heel. This decreases the space needed from left to right.

4) Hanging Clothes: Try switching from bulky wood and plastic hangers to space saving thin hangers. They really do create room to hang more!

5) Kitchen Cabinets and Drawers: Store the lids of pots and storage containers with the bottoms. If you have the room, keep the top and bottom together and stacked. No searching for the matching piece and inevitably losing a lid at some point.

6) Toy Room: Use larger bins, even for the little pieces. Most kids aren't going to take the time sort all the Barbie shoes from Barbie's kitchen accessories. Or, the Lego men from the rest of the blocks. Having one place for all things Barbie and one for all things Lego is sufficient.

7) Crafts: Bust out the plastic baggies! Bag up small items like cotton balls or googley eyes. Bag up anything that could leak: glue, paint, ink. These baggies can be easily stashed in a drawer or bin. It's easier to squish a baggie into a space than a small box or bin.

8) Beauty Products: As you buy more, store the new items to the back of your cabinet. This way, you'll use what's in front, and oldest, first.

9) Entryway: This time of year, there are probably scarves and gloves all over the place! Have one place for everyone to drop these items. It can be a basket, a hook or a shelf. In the summer, switch to baseball caps, umbrellas and sunglasses.

10) Basement/Storage: More often than you'd imagine, the quickest solution to all those boxes and bins piling up is to get them onto shelves! Being able to grab the single item you're looking for instead of moving box after box off a small mountain to get to the one at the bottom can make a world of difference.

In Someone Else's Words

Over the years, I've collected quotes from movies, books, friends, posters, you name it. Thoughts that are verbalized better than I could say it at the time. Or, funnier. Or, truer. Even though I started writing them down years before I even knew organizing was a profession, it turns out I've got a few that apply. (It must have been in my bones already!)


"If it weren't for the last minute, a lot of things wouldn't get done." - Michael S. Taylor


"Everything happens to everybody sooner or later if there is time enough." - George Bernard Shaw
*You are not the only person struggling with disorganization!


"In order to seek one's own direction, one must simplify the mechanics of ordinary, everyday life." - Plato

"We cannot change anything unless we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses." - Carl Gustav Jung, Psychological Reflections

 "Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful." - William Morris

 "Don't confuse the love of an item with the love of a person." - Sue DeRoos


"Chaos is always an accessory to order and belongs to our world..." - Michael, Ajvaz, The Other City

Well, that last one was for me.


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