[Music] well hey you guys so what if I told you it only takes me 5 minutes to budget every month mhm now that might sound too good to be true but actually it is true now obviously a few other things have to be true as well I still look at my every dollar budget every single day and yes I make changes to my budget throughout the month yes Winston my husband and I we are on the same page when it comes to our spending we're checking in a lot but but also it does only take about 5 minutes now we've been doing it for about 15 years since we've been married but again the idea is that when you create a habit something even like budgeting it just becomes a part of your Rhythm and you get better at it so I know some of you guys are in the trenches right now when it comes to budgeting like you're like oh my God this is so hard and maybe you've been working towards a really big Financial goal for a while or maybe you're stuck on a certain baby step but whatever it looks like for you it's always helpful to re-evaluate your process every now and then so today I want to share three ways you can simplify your budget so first let me explain where this all started for me I saw my friend Don who is minimum mom you guys know may know her Channel or listen to her but she was giving her take on a recent home organization Trend called house hushing which is very interesting and this was kind of really founded by the Nester uh who I've had on this show as well which is so great but if you're not familiar with this house hushing is where you take everything out of a room in your house except for just like the large furniture and rugs curtains that kind of thing but you take everything out and the idea is you start with a clean slate only to bring back in items that truly spark Joy if you know what I mean and that you only are really going to use regularly in that space and sometimes the clutter in your house can just feel like noise in a way it's so noisy when you walk in so that's where the hushing comes in it's kind of like a ha we're cleaning it and it's just a quiet room now with less clutter so I thought well that could be really true with your budget too I mean like your living room or your kitchen your budget is something that you're used to seeing every single day and so it's easy to become blind a little bit to the chaos or the Clutter of your budget so here's how I recommend doing a little budget hushing if you're due for a financial reset step one eliminate every category of your budget except for your four walls so four walls are food shelter utilities Transportation so again these things could include that you take out like subscriptions and look we are all human and sometimes we forget about subscription fees until they finally start adding up you're like oh my gosh and so it may be worth it to wipe the Slate clean and then figure out hey which ones do we actually use also cable I know this for the cruises we pay you guys like $200 a month and listen and I need to do this I've been saying this for like a year now we need to cut it we don't use it like we don't use it and I don't know why I have this like need to be like oh my gosh but the Real Housewives like are on my DVR and I know I can watch some other places but there's just something about when you're in the Rhythm and this is what you know it's hard to change and for me it's cable which I know is so stupid but I'm like if I just cut it out of the budget and out of my life I'm probably not going to miss it but I need to do that so I'm saying that for me also things like the YMCA or any other activity related memberships so Caroline our middle she plays soccer 3 months out of the year and Winston used to go work out at the Y but now we like kind of put some stuff in our garage so that's where we work out so we don't use that membership for the nine other months and guess what we get charged cuz we don't cancel it after soccer season so again that's a little bit of that clutter that's in there also Amazon spending so this continues to be one of these places that man you can just spend so much and the majority of what I buy on Amazon I probably could technically live without and so there's a little bit of that cleansing that can go on of like taking away the instant gratification purchases and if you actually needed something actually going into the store to buy it and again it's just to help re-evaluate what's going on all right step two is adjust your savings category and see how much progress that you can make while you're budget hushing so with all the Clutter and the noise gone from your monthly expenses you may have some extra cash to throw towards savings or investing for a bit and once you start making progress in these bigger more important Financial areas you suddenly stop missing all those Rand random subscriptions that you never really use so again there's something powerful about seeing that extra margin and for those of you that may have debt maybe you throw it towards that but there's something about seeing your savings pile up a little bit that just kind of gets you motivated all right step three do all of this on paper so what I mean by that is you visually want to see your numbers out in front of you so don't try to keep all your those details in your head cuz again you're not going to budget well when you do that and mapping out everything is such a game Cher and if you need a way to do this easily you don't have to go back and actually use paper like we did back in the day you can actually just use a great app and every dollar is my favorite budgeting app out there it really is it simplifies everything you can actually have it attached to your bank account and so all of your transactions come in you drag and drop them keep up with your budget in the present and it is fantastic so you can go to every.com Rachel create your first budget for free and do that you guys because this is so huge so once you reach the stage take as long as you need I recommend about a month and then slowly start incorporating your high priority expenses back in and the beauty of this budget hushing is that it's going to be unique to your situation and you have the power to eliminate whatever spending you want you can add things back in it is up to you your budget is never meant just to be fixed permanent hard and fast it is going to be evolving month-to month even throughout the month itself and again this all comes back to intentionality and simplicity you guys so listen if you want to here from me and Don chat about other ways to simplify your life and your home be sure to check out our episode on the top 10 money wasters in our houses and that is with minimal Mom all right you guys remember to take control of your money and create a life you love
