Family Budgeting – How to Set Up an Emergency Fund

In a family budget, emergency fund is necessary because it provides you and your family with a financial resource which you can depend on whenever an emergency arises. In your budget it is very important to allocate an amount of money for the emergency fund.

Ideally, an emergency fund is about three months of your living expenses. Every month commit an amount of money into the fund. Since family budgeting is a process of setting aside money for savings or for an unanticipated future use, the money saved from trimming the expenses can either go into the saving goals or the emergency fund.

One final point to remember is that once you have started the emergency fund, it is important to remember that this fund should only be used for actual emergencies only. It should not be used as your stash fund or to fund an “emergency ” purchase of things like that state of the art large screen plasma television.

Family Funds – Is Having Children Going Out of Fashion?

In results from a RollerCoaster.ie survey published in September, 78 percent of parents said they would hesitate to expand their families because of the increased costs involved. The survey comes before child benefit payments are set to be either cut, taxed or means tested in the near future as part of the upcoming Budget.

In a survey by WorkingMums.co.uk, a 79 percent majority of mums pointed out that flexibility in work was the top priority during the recession – while more than half (54 percent) admitted that they would take a lower paid job for more flexible hours.

One thing that is consistent in both sets of research, however, is that as the economy looks to improve more parents are eager to spend more time at home with their children – and employers are certain to need to adapt to this.

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Family Investment

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