You may have heard the old saying “there is no time like the present to start”; well that goes double for getting your finances under control after an accident. Your injury may have caused you to lose income while you recover and even introduced new expenses related to your injury such as medical expenses. If you take the time to make a good evaluation of what you are currently spending, there are many ways you can find room to budget and here are some tips to help you start reducing debt during crisis.
Set the Family Budget
It is always the little expenses that add to the overall picture of how much you really spend in a month. These expenses seem small and are in the range of $2.00 to $10.00. These could be things like ATM fees, take-out lunches, extra items at the grocery store etc.
Write down everything you spend in a month and ask your other family members to do the same. At the end of the month, look at the places you can eliminate expense. The savings can be significant.
Check Your Credit Score
Many times you will find discrepancies that can be corrected. If anything you see has high interest rates, you may be able to have the interest rate adjusted by calling the creditors and explaining your circumstances from the accident.
Call Your Creditors to Adjust Payment Schedules
Most of your creditors would rather have you be able to pay your obligations rather than fall behind. Call them and explain your circumstances and you may find them helpful in restructuring your payments
Pay Attention to Your Savings
Now that you have identified where your extra money is going, try to put that money in a safe place to use for the important bills. Pay with cash and keep the change and small bills in a jar. Declare an amount of money; even if it is small, to set aside to help with keeping enough on hand to get through the difficult time you are going through.
Increase Your Payments
That might sound crazy while you are a compromised situation, but the fastest way out of the debt, is to get the debt paid down. Now that you have reviewed and reduced your interest rates, saved money from the extra places and restructured your payment plans, if you pay a little more, even $20 to $50 dollars more each month on your bills, they will start to go down. This is especially true if you tackle the bills with the highest interest rates.
Little by little you can reduce your overall debts and be able to survive the period of time it takes for you to recover from your injury.
