WHAT TO DO?
Your budget is a plan to follow. Your budget can be off in either direction. If you are doing better, it is probably due to being disciplined (repaying debt, etc.) or you’ve increased your income. If so, you can reallocate your resources within the 70-20-10 model.

You could modify your allocations using what financial planners call the 50-30-20 budget. Here’s how that works.

• 50% for Needs – Housing, food, transportation, insurance premiums and minimum payments
• 30% for Wants – Entertainment, travel and subscriptions (streaming services, Internet, etc.)
• 20% for Savings – Emergency funds, retirement savings and extra debt payments

In this scenario, you’ve proven you can stay on budget. So, rearranging your budget should not be a problem. If you are not keeping within your budget, either you were unrealistic setting your budget goals, you have not maintained discipline, you’ve had an unexpected event or some other factor.

The number one reason people get into trouble with their budget (regardless of the mitigating factor) is they don’t analyze their spending often enough and take corrective action soon enough. If you are going off your budget, the sooner you know about it, the sooner you can take actions to get back on budget. In most cases, that means forgoing “wants” for a period of time.

WHAT TO DO?
If your budget circumstances are improving, stay the course and look for ways to pay off your most expensive debt, build your rainy-day fund (savings) or increase your investments, particularly if you have not maxed out your 403b or 401k.

If you’re not keeping up with your budget, review it, change it and recommit to the new budget. If you are behind on your budget take swift action to fix it. Many factors play into why we don’t adhere to our budget and it’s different for different people; unforeseen events (external), mindset (psychological), poor planning/execution, lifestyle/external changes, reckless behavior (alcohol abuse, gambling, etc.) or methodology (budget too complex).

Wealth creation and wealth building take a realistic plan, time and discipline. The best plan is where we develop good savings habits, careful debt management and respond to our changing financial circumstances.

OUR ADVICE
Most of us do not have unlimited financial resources. We need to be purposeful about them to build wealth that leads to financial freedom

Whatever your financial need, we're here to help.