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Letters: How can I budget when I'm self-employed?

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We're still fresh off of our love hangover from Valentine's Day here at Money this week, so we've invited a couple of personal finance experts to answer your questions about money and relationships. Bob and Kristy Walker have been married for 22 years and for the last four of them, they've written the blog "Frugal Fun and Financial Fitness."

Nina from Bolton, Mass., has a question about keeping a budget. She works part-time as an accountant while her husband is self-employed. She says some months are good while others aren't. She wonders how to better manage that fluctuating income.

Bob has experience being a self-employed contractor.

"I made more money in one month than ever before and then some months were really lean. A couple of things that we did. First is that we wrote down where we spent every penny. That really showed us little leaks that we could stop and not change our lifestyle dramatically, but make changes," says Bob.

By logging where they spent money, Bob and Kristy found that they spent $600 a month eating out. By cooking a few more meals at home, the Walkers were able to set up a college savings account for their kids.

"This might be a family exercise as far as what do you as a family really value. Get the kids involved, teach them a little bit about money management. The goal for you guys is to really set up a big emergency fund where you can smooth out those months and then ease the envelope system," says Bob.

Bob also has a novel way to avoid racking up additional credit card charges.

"With credit cards, they're really tempting to use. It's hard to really cut up credit cards, but what you can do is put your credit cards in a little plastic bowl, fill that bowl full of water and stick it in your freezer so you're literally putting your credit cards on ice."

"Since your income is so variable, stop using those credit cards if at all possible and for every month, making a payment to one of the credit cards, focus on getting that balance to zero as well as paying into your savings account at the same time. Eventually, that's what you're going to be tapping instead of turning to those credit cards," adds Kristy.

For more advice on how to make ends meet when an unexpected tax bill comes your way, and how to build an emergency fund even with unsteady employment, click play on the audio player above.

About the author

In more than 20 years in public radio, Barbara Bogaev has served as the longtime guest host of NPR’s flagship program Fresh Air with Terry Gross, as well as host of APM’s news and culture magazine, Weekend America and the weekly national documentary series, Soundprint.
laura.g.mitchell's picture
laura.g.mitchell - Feb 22, 2013

I was interested in this story, but didn't hear a great tip I heard once from a realtor. After a sale, she would pay her utilities and mortgage or rent ahead for 4-6 months. Isn't that a good way to smooth out the bumps?

facts by jack's picture
facts by jack - Feb 18, 2013

1. why do you not always have a comment section for the letters segment? there seems to be more screw-ups there than in other segments, so let us help the poor slobs who get bad and/or incomplete advice.
2. to wit: particularly since this woman is an accountant, the much better response would be for her to stop the cash (and credit card) basis "accounting" she has been using, substituting accrual. so she figures their est annual income, divide by 12 for monthly budget, then know whenever income is short it must be made up soon or budget adjusted. their budget should also include repayment of credit cards ASAP.

pfletch's picture
pfletch - Feb 16, 2013

Thank you so very much for the 1099 information. As a senior on SS only, i was deliriously happy to get my re-fi after 18+ months of seemingly endless paperwork requests. The principal and rate reductions, to what i thought it should've been when i bought the house, were a godsend. Then came the 1099 showing $107K. I was in panic mode until i heard your program today. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! OXO

facts by jack's picture
facts by jack - Feb 18, 2013

to qualify for tax-free forgiveness, the house must be your principal residence and all of the loan must have gone into its purchase/improvement