Budget mania

Q & A

Budget Mania

Is it possible to be over-budgeted? I love a budget - my husband and family tease me about my budgeted ways. Anyway, the reason I ask is that my husband and I would like to start a family but we've put it off for a year or so to save enough in the baby fund to cover baby needs and our expenses for when I go on mat leave. The reason we decided to do this is because my husband started a new business a little over a year ago and although he makes a profit, our combined income is about $25,000 less than what he made working for a company. (We currently make about $70,000, have no debt other than mortgage but struggle to put money into long term savings every month). I wanted to make sure we had enough to cover expenses in the event he has a lean patch while I'm on mat leave. I don't think I'd be concerned about over-budgeting except I'm moving into my late 30's now and the clock is seriously ticking in my ears these days. I'm just concerned that I may miss my chance for a baby making sure that all my financial ducks are perfectly in a row. What do you think?

Name Withheld

I think that if you want to find a way to work a baby into your life, then putting the baby in your budget makes good sense. If you’re planning on taking the full year (or even six months) for mat leave, you should do two things right now:

a) find out what your mat leave income will be, and
b) start living on that budget right now, which will mean trimming expenses.

The money you save can go toward building up your emergency fund, buying the stuff you’ll need when baby gets here, or just putting some room into your budget later on.

Once you go back to work full time, you’ll be used to living on less, so finding the money for longer-term savings should be a breeze. Good luck.