{"id":2999,"date":"2019-02-14T17:39:53","date_gmt":"2019-02-14T17:39:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/money\/?p=2999"},"modified":"2019-02-14T17:39:53","modified_gmt":"2019-02-14T17:39:53","slug":"budgeting-essentials-for-college-students","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/smmo-blog\/budgeting-essentials-for-college-students\/","title":{"rendered":"Budgeting Essentials For College Students"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">As Americans, we have normalized the idea of living paycheck to paycheck. The origin of this problem may be arguable, but the current state is what we have to work with. The truth is that we have been consumed by consumerism. We\u2019re marketed to 24\/7 to spend money. We\u2019re led to believe that we won\u2019t be happy without the luxury cars, expensive houses, brunches with friends, and late nights on 6th street. This is a short-sighted view of reality. Fact is, 78% of us live paycheck to paycheck. Many of us fail to think about possible long-term repercussions of living in a false reality and the \u201cturn up\u201d lifestyle.<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u201cSO YOU\u2019RE SAYING I CAN\u2019T DO ANYTHING FUN?!\u201d Not at all! The trick is to find a balance between your financial reality and having fun with a simple tool the personal finance professionals like to call\u2026 <\/span><b><i>a budget!<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">With\u2026 \u00a0<\/span><b><i>a budget<\/i><\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, you have a clearer picture of how much money you have and, exactly where it\u2019s going. Budgeting is not about living on a Top Ramen diet. It allows you to create a spending plan for your money and it ensures that you have enough money for the things you need and those things that are important to you. When you have a plan, you don\u2019t have to guess whether or not you\u2019ll have enough money to pay your bills, and make it to the end of the semester. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The very first step in creating a budget is knowing all of your <\/span><b>income<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and all of your <\/span><b>expenses<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Now, let\u2019s focus on income.<\/span><b> Income<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> isn\u2019t just money from a paycheck, it\u2019s ALL the money that COMES IN to your possession as a college student, including the possibilities listed below:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Grants\/Scholarships<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tax returns<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Money from family<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Change that you found in the parking lot at HEB <\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Maybe don\u2019t count on that last one, but you know what we mean. <\/span><b>Expenses<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> should be broken up into three subcategories:<\/span><b> fixed<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, <\/span><b>periodic<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and <\/span><b>flexible<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Here\u2019s how they work:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><b>Fixed expenses<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> are always the same every month. Rent and car payments fall under this category. <\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><b>Periodic expenses <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">are similar, but come up once maybe twice per year. Think tuition and holiday spending. Car insurance may fall under this category if you choose to pay it all at once.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400\"><b>Flexible expenses <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">vary month to month. This category includes gas, food, entertainment, and whatever else you spend your money on, including vices (let\u2019s be honest). Flexible expenses can be cut or modified.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">After everything\u2019s gathered up and labeled, you can see clearly. And as we learned last week during our Peer Money Mentor meeting, when you&#8217;re honest about your expenses and account for ALL income, your budget will not lie to you.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now that you understand how to handle your income and expenses, let&#8217;s put everything together. There are many budgeting tools out there.\u00a0If you\u2019re not a fan of the good old fashioned pen and paper, or excel spreadsheets, you might try apps like <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mint.com\/\">Mint<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youneedabudget.com\/?ar_clx=yes&amp;ar_channel=sem&amp;ar_campaign=36195583&amp;ar_adgroup=1420857373&amp;ar_ad=256856340712&amp;gclid=EAIaIQobChMI5tTHxty74AIVmNdkCh09_gjSEAAYASAAEgKU0PD_BwE\">YNAB<\/a>. These apps\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">allow you to track and categorize all of your purchases. Mint is free! The downside for college students is that most of these apps work on a monthly budget. A smarter idea while in school is to budget for an entire semester. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">With the help of the Student Money Management Office and its <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/money\/semester-budgeting\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">semester-budgeting tool<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, you can get assistance with creating a budget that covers the entire semester. Schoolwork might keep you up late at night, but worrying about finances shouldn\u2019t. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Monitoring and reevaluating are huge components to budgeting. Don\u2019t just create your budget and stick it in a drawer to collect dust. Your budget should be looked at as this living and breathing thing. So, evaluate all purchases; the necessities and the nonessentials. And if you&#8217;re over your budget, figure out what caused it.\u00a0 Then, make your modifications. Let\u2019s say you still have funds allocated in the flexible expenses category for entertainment or eating out. If not, what about your groceries? Which area has the most potential for finding a good amount of money? Welp if it\u2019s groceries, this time, you can\u2019t get those delicious Chocolate Milano cookies or any other guilty pleasure items on your list. Think <\/span><strong><i>essentials only <\/i><\/strong><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">when shopping for your groceries<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">. <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Finally, when you\u2019re in a tough financial spot, side hustles like Uber and Lyft or getting paid to test apps are great ways to boost your income. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"><strong>BE WARNED:<\/strong> budgeting takes practice like anything in life that you want to master! So, don\u2019t be discouraged. If you\u2019re an ACC student and need help with creating a budget, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/money\/financial-coaching\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">schedule an appointmen<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">t with ACC\u2019s Student Money Management Office. <\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As Americans, we have normalized the idea of living paycheck to paycheck. The origin of this problem may be arguable, but the current state is what we have to work with. The truth is that &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/smmo-blog\/budgeting-essentials-for-college-students\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88,"featured_media":3000,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[12,27],"class_list":["post-2999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-smmo-blog","tag-amber-rodriguez","tag-corbin-walters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/88"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/money\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}