Four Walls
Dave Ramsey says it’s very important to make sure you have your four walls. If you are worried about money,mounting student loan debt, not knowing how you are going to prioritize your money when you have competing money needs. You should write on a piece of paper your four walls: food, shelter, utilities and transportation. That’s it! If your money is tight only do these four walls.
A tight budget could look like this you make $1,200 a month, your single, You eat $200 in food, you pay $600 in rent, you pay $100 in utilities and you pay $120 for your gas. That’s $1,020 you have $180.00 left for clothes, oil changes, debts or savings.
Wall one food. You need to eat so you can concentrate at school or work. The food you are eating is nourishing and not a number 7 with a Diet Coke. Make your own food, try to keep your monthly food budget around one or two hundred per person a month.
Wall two shelter, You need to relax when your done working. Whether you already own a house or you rent make sure you pay for your shelter, Dave Ramsey suggests it should be about a 1/4 (0.25)of your take home pay. I live in a high rent / mortgage payment area so I do (0.32) Dave Ramsey does not have dogmatic percentages as some would like to blog about. If you listen to his radio show for fifteen minutes you will see that his approach is right but there is flexibility in the percentages he lays out. He wants you to win with money so the more money that is going to housing the less you have going to debt or investments.
Wall three utilities, to live a comfortable life and not worry if you can cook food on the range, microwave or turn on the lights pay for your utilities before you pay for your credit cards or student loans, if you live in cold Minnesota like I do heat is so vital! Don’t worry about making your debt collectors angry because you can’t pay them if you have to choose between the four walls or paying them. Just block them and call them when you can pay them. I was not born in MN so I don’t care about #MinnesotaNice.
Wall four transportation, whether you have a car or take public transport make sure you can get to work so you keep your four walls up.
Thanks for reading, peace.
(Note: I am not a financial professional nor claim to be please seek out professional advice about your unique situation. This is my opinion and freedom of speech.)
