So my rent went up, Im now paying 750 a month for rent and utilities. I pay 50 bucks a month for a phone. 100 in medical. 60 for a train pass. 325 in student loans. I try to put an additional 150 towards debt, amongst other mandatory monthly expenses. I make crap cuz i work in publishing and my financial situation feels HOPELESS. Im also 65k in debt from college expenses and medical bills because I didnt have insurance until 2 years ago. My credit sucks.


ANY SUGGESTIONS?!

Sorry to hear that,and now you have to deal with rising food prices and gas.
Are we allowed to sue the government for unneeded stress?

Rethink your approach.

You can try to spend less or earn more - or both. Whatever route you pick - success will not come overnight.

On the spending side - keep track of ALL your expenses and analyze them periodically - chances are you find some surprising numbers over there.

On the earning side - since you are writing on Hubpages, consider ghost writing or starting your very own Internet business. Just stay away from get-rich-quick things, they NEVER work.

That's pretty much all what I can say to almost a total stranger...

Good advice from Misha there: can you get a room mate or move to a cheaper flat? Can you get a 2nd job? I wrote a hub on the topic a little while ago http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-get-out- … save-money hope it gives you some ideas!

There's not much you can do with the 'hard' debts like loan repayments and rent. Lots of other stuff is up for grabs though.

Can you cut down on the mobile phone usage? Maybe end the contract and get a pay-as-you-go plan? Do you need to use the train? Can you walk or cycle? How about the food bill - do you eat out lots? Can you make your own lunch and take it to work, rather than buying it each day? Buy cheaper by buying in bulk, cook larger meals, and freeze half of it to have another day.

How much of your spending do you track? Keep a 'debt diary' for a month - record everything on it, even down to 20cents for a paper. At the end of the month you'll have a full picture of your outgoings - compare that to the budget you drew up, and you'll be surprised how different they are. They always are, at first ;-)

But then you have a really accurate picture of where your money is going, and you can focus on areas where you can cut back. If you have debt on credit cards, use the snowball method to focus payments on one credit card debt, and when it's payed off, take all that spare cash and add it to the minimum payment on the next card.

As Misha says, if you're writing, then capitalise on that - you can bring in some extra income, and it might even open up another career choice for you.

Even when it looks hopeless, there's a lot you can do. There is no easy fix, though, and it does take a long time to clear everything down.

Good luck!

Thanks everyone!!

1. Get another job that pay well.
2. Look for something extra you can do like part time work
3. Look for a partner whom you can share on house.
4. Re-structure your loans so that you pay less amount for a longer period.

Lady Luck--FinancePortal gave you some very good advice.  Keeping a money journal is hard--been there and done that--but it is the best way to know where the money is going.

Hope everything turns around for you soon.  Keep plugging away!!

RUTHIE17 

I want to live where Finance Portal lives - a newspaper for just 20 cents?

Mark Bennett wrote:

I want to live where Finance Portal lives - a newspaper for just 20 cents?

Where I am in the UK we've got several popular local weekly papers for 10p. Some of the free ones are pretty good, and mostly carry the same news.

Websites are best of all though ;-)

True - and usually totally free.

I liked Misha's suggestion about getting something else on the side that works with your publishing (and i'm assuming a little writing?) experience.  There are great part-time, telecommuting options for freelance writers on places like freelancewritinggigs.com or problogger.com.  Those are two sites I've had lots of success with and are great communities as well (very supportive).  You could try that as a way to bring a little extra during the month and work at home, aka not incur anymore travel costs?  Hope this helps - I am a freelancer myself, so please feel free to ping me if you have more questions!!!!  Good Luck!

Unfortunately, with the central banks creating currency like crazy to bail out just about every fat cat on the planet, the value of money will continue to fall. It's not that prices are going up, it's that the value of the money is being diluted and going down. Look for much more of this to continue.

First Home Buyer,

I have to disagree with you here.

There are real reasons why fuel and food prices are going up in real terms.

If it was pure inflation, earnings would be going up at the same rate as prices. They are not.

We are approaching the fuel crisis that we all knew had to come.

Those who figure out how to live as much as possible self-sustainably without using too much fossil fuel will be the financial winners.

Those who carry on with unsustainable habits and complain that nobody is protecting their unsustainable lifestyles will crash horribly at some point.

Manipulation can only fend that off for a little while.

The truth is that all our energy comes from the sun. When we burn wood, we are releasing the sun's energy trapped by photosynthesis. Fossil fuels - coal and oil - come from wood that is millions of years old.

We are using sunlight which hit this planet over millions of years to boost up our ability to consume stuff - and we are using it faster and faster. It won't last indefinitely.

Eventually, we will use all the "savings" of sun energy from the past, and then we will have to live on one year's worth of sunshine per year after that.