A Different Take on using the “Envelope System” (I like it!)
I’ve been hearing about this idea quite a bit lately… The idea of paying for as many of your budgeted items as possible with cash. This means putting away those credit cards (or even cutting them up) unless they are absolutely necessary.
I completely understand the concept of why this sytem would work to help keep a person on track budget-wise (once the envelope has no more cash in it, there is no more money to spend). And I have respect for those who are able to successfully use this system!
But, I have to say that I’m really not convinced that it’s the way for our family to go right now (and I have hubby’s backing on this, too). For whatever reason, I feel overwhelmed at switching over to the envelope system. And, for whatever other reason, this has actually been discouraging to me…
Until today! What changed? I read Using Cash for Your Budget Problem Areas over at Our Simple Life. And I really like Leslie’s idea… Use the cash system for those areas in your budget that you particularly struggle to stay on track in!
For us, this would be our “eating out” fund. If we were to take out, in cash, the money for the month that we have set aside to eat out, it would be so much easier to track how much we have left to spend as the month goes along!
Well, good for you! This is how we started with the envelope system. I wanted to get a better handle on groceries, so I started using cash for groceries. After a couple of months, we added in Gas. AND we allowed ourselves some Fun money, just because! Our cash system only has a few categories, so I totally agree that you should start small and with your problem areas!!
We now do groceries, gas, fun, date night, haircuts and gifts. It works great! Baby steps!
Thanks for the encouragement, Kelleigh! I absolutely love the wallet insert you designed to help keep your cash system organized! So pretty and so creative! I almost wanted to switch to the cash system right then and there when I saw your idea.
Wow – thanks so much for reading my blog and I’m glad the idea might be of helps to someone. I think the all or nothing cash envelope idea really overwhelmed me years ago when I first heard about it. At that point someone just telling me to try it for a couple of categories would have been such a help. Anyway, I’m actually going on 2 months now of being successful in my problem areas because of the cash way. And I find I’m still doing just fine using my debit card in other non-problem categories. Good luck to you. Keep us posted.
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