@Anonymous wrote:
I think one of the first steps to rebuilding (as well as maintaining a good fico score) is a good budget, but I don't see anyplace to really post questions about a budgets. How do we go about making suggestions or even polling to see if this would be beneficial as either a forum or one of the threads that is at the top of one of the other forums?
Actually, there are many other sources of budgeting advice and discussion, what is unique about this forum is its specific focus on and expertise with FICO scores and credit histories -- and ETHICAL ways to clean up credit. Many other sources give incorrect or misleading credit advice even if they offer sensible advice in other aspects of personal finance.
Also, I don't think there is any one-size-fits-all approach to budgeting. Fundamentaly, budgeting is about thinking through your resources, your values, and your goals so as to make sure you are spending your money on what you really want. For some people this means recording every purchase, but my wife and I would go crazy if we tried to keep such close track of details. Our approach is to maximize our financial flexibility by keeping those expenses we couldn't change on short notice under 50% of our after-tax income. So we have a relatively modest residence, I buy used cars and keep them till they fall apart, etc., but we eat out a LOT and we spend a LOT on entertainment. Our basic idea is, should our situation suddenly change we could instantly cut back on discretionary spending, but somebody who has too much house or too much car might get into serious trouble. We also save a fair chunk of our income. Finally, there is something I personally consider a vastly-underappreciated aspect of budgeting: each time our household income has increased, we dedicate part of that increase to an increase in our charitable giving; not only does such giving help to align our money with our values, but also devoting a significant chunk of our income to charitable giving helps increase our financial flexibility because it means we are accustomed to living on less than our income.
Message Edited by MattH on 11-07-2008 07:41 PM
TU 791 02/11/2013, EQ 800 1/29/2011 , EX Plus FAKO 812, EX Vantage Score 955 3/19/2010 wife's EQ 9/23/2009 803
EX always was my highest when we could pull all three
Always remember: big print giveth, small print taketh away
If you dunno what tanstaafl means you must Google it
