Use a Summer Budget to Find Your Fun Money

Ah, Summer… the sun is out, everything is in full bloom, and the kids are home from school. It’s a magical time of year, but when you’re on a tight budget, it can come with additional financial stressors as your spending changes and often increases. So ask yourself, how are you budgeting specifically for Summer? 

People often think of budgets in terms of monthly averages, eg: “I make this much per month, so I can spend this much per month.” And that makes sense! Thinking this way can help you budget predictably and effectively. But when you get down into the nitty gritty of your budgeting, you quickly realize that your spending and even your income can change month-to-month, and it can help to adapt your budget as the seasons change. So with another Summer right around the corner, here’s how you can update your budget to accommodate those high-temp expenses.

1. Calculate your Summer income

It’s true that for many people, their income is fairly stable regardless of the time of year. For salaried employees, for example, their yearly salary is divided into monthly or bi-weekly payments and they can expect to see the same deposit into their account every single paycheck. 

But for many others–particularly hourly or service industry workers–the change in seasons can mean a change in income. Maybe Summer is the slow season at the store you work for and you can expect your hours to be cut back, and you need to take that into consideration. Or maybe you work at a restaurant with a hoppin’ patio business and you’re counting on a Summer boost in tips to carry you through. Either way, the basis of any strong budget is calculating an accurate income (or at least a reasonably accurate prediction), so before you start plotting your Summer fun, make sure you have a solid baseline for how much you’re bringing in.

2. Identify changes in your spending

Just like how your income may change during the warmer months, so can your spending–often even moreso. With kids home from school, you now have to calculate increased childcare costs, which can encompass everything from summer camps to daycare to even increased grocery bills if you can’t rely on school lunches to feed your child 5 days out of the week.

It’s not just childcare expenses, either: with warmer weather can come other shifts in your otherwise-stable budget. For example, running an air conditioner can cause your electric bill to skyrocket, but not running a heater may mean your gas bill goes down to compensate. If you’re an avid cyclist or walker, you may even find yourself driving less and saving on fuel and transportation costs.

Whether your overall expenses are going up during the Summer or down, you’ll want your budget to accurately reflect your spending so you can calculate just how much you have left over to really start to have fun and enjoy the season while it lasts.

3. Set financial goals for fun Summer adventures

Budgeting isn’t just about weighing your expenses vs. your income; it’s also about identifying how you can save money and start setting goals to achieve financial stability and/or treat yourself and your family to something really exciting.

This “fun money” can be thought of in terms of both short-term and long-term budgeting strategies. Once you’ve taken care of your necessities each month (and hopefully set aside a bit into emergency savings), you’ll want to see what you have left over in your budget and start to allocate that towards things that make you happy. 

For example, a short-term budgeting category might be setting aside $20 a week to take your kids out for ice cream in the park, while a long-term budgeting category might be setting aside $20 a week so that at the end of the season, you can treat the family to a trip to that theme park you all love.

Spotloan: A Smarter Way to Borrow

During the Summer months, the last thing you want to do is to look your kids in the eyes and say “no, we just can’t afford it” to a small request that every child deserves. Budgeting isn’t always a fun or exciting task, but if you start building your Summer budget now, you can do your best to ensure you have enough in your back pocket to take advantage of this season of excitement.

Sometimes, even with the best budget, you need a little help with an emergency or just making ends meet. At Spotloan, our simple online application process can help you qualify for the money you need, even if you have bad credit or need a loan quickly. All you have to do is go fill out our application to see if you qualify, and you could receive a decision within minutes. Fill out our application now!