Finding Child Care

There are camps for nearly every child’s interests but, according to the American Camp Association (ACA), most day camps cost between $200 and $800 per week and overnight camps average $630 – $2000 per week. The good news is that there are much cheaper options available.

• The YMCA offers quality, affordable overnight camps. Use their search tool to find the right one for your child.
• By using public facilities, local Parks and Recreation agencies are able to provide inexpensive summer programming. Better, they often give financial aid and discounts for multiple children.
• Churches, synagogues and other places of worship provide free or very low cost faith-based camps, such as Vacation Bible Schools, and many churches in a community will intentionally schedule their programs for different weeks so that the same children can attend multiple camps. You do not need to be a member of any congregation to enroll your child.
• The Salvation Army has totally free, summer camp programs nationwide— featuring activities like sports, swimming lessons, music and art — for low-income families. Check out the Salvation Army for locations near you.

Having Fun

Hopefully your summer won’t only be about working and juggling childcare. With any luck, you’ll have some time — and money! — for fun. But how can you afford fun when money is always tight and now you’re paying for summer childcare expenses?

1. Keep your side hustle, but adjust your hours. Try getting up a little earlier, before anyone else in your house is awake, and devoting that time to making some extra money. Or, if you’re a night owl, use those late night hours after everyone else is asleep for extra work.
2. Three Fs — festivals, free events and family (or friends) — will help you stretch your entertainment and travel budgets. Summer is full of festivals and most of them are free. See if you can visit family members or friends who live out of town to scratch your travel itch, and take advantage of free events in their cities while you’re there.

With a little research, some extra hustle and a dash of creativity, you can get your work done, control your spending, and give yourself and your children a great summer, no matter how tiny your budget.

If you’d like more individualized help getting control of your finances, Ronald J. Drescher has been assisting clients with their legal and financial troubles for more than three decades.

The post The Single Mom’s Guide to Surviving Summer (Without Wrecking Your Budget) appeared first on Baltimore Bankruptcy Lawyer.

Know what you owe. Add up all your debt–student loans, mortgage, car loans, credit card balances and any other debt. You need to know how much you owe, to whom, how you’re paying it off, how long it will take to pay it off, and the interest rate you’re being charged.

Know how much you make. For a lot of people, their salary is their main income. But you may also have other income sources, such as income from a side job, tips, alimony, child support, and tax refunds. Knowing how much money is coming in to your bank account will help you understand your entire financial picture for budgeting purposes, and it will help you make sure you aren’t overpaying or underpaying on your taxes.

Know how much you spend. Just as you need to know how much is coming in, you definitely need to know how much is going out. This doesn’t mean you have to account for every penny – unless you want to! It’s enough for you to just have a broad sense of how much you’re spending in the major budget categories, such as housing, food, childcare and transportation. Once you know what you have to spend, you can create a budget so that you know how much you have left, then you can look for ways to slash your expenses and start saving!

Manage your own money. This is important for all women, and especially important for single moms. You may have had a man in your life in the past who took control of the finances – and you may have a man in your future who wants to do that, too. The truth is that women tend to live longer than men, so even in the happiest of relationships, the woman may find herself trying to make sense of a financial system she didn’t create after the man in her life is gone. And, of course, not all relationships stay in the “happy” category. You earned your money. Devise a system that makes sense to you, and then manage that system yourself.

Talk to your children about money. There is no shame in explaining your financial situation to your kids once they’re old enough to understand. Choose your words wisely because you don’t want to frighten them, but do explain your reality. When your children understand the need to be frugal, they can help you live within your means. And, learning these finance fundamentals now will set them up for their own healthy financial future.
Want some help putting together a financial plan? Ronald J. Drescher has been assisting clients with their legal and financial troubles for more than three decades.

The post Personal Finance Concepts Every Single Mom Should Know appeared first on Baltimore Bankruptcy Lawyer.

But, with more than half a million active podcasts with nearly 20 million episodes available online, finding podcasts that are active, useful, engaging and well-produced can be difficult. To save you the hassle—because who has time for that?—here are three great podcasts for single mothers who want to take control of their finances.

Like a Mother
Veteran money writer, single mom and blogger Emma Johnson takes her popular Wealthy Single Mommy blog and puts it into audio form on her Like A Mother podcast. A former Associated Press Financial Wire reporter and MSN Money columnist, Johnson’s blog and podcast explore issues pertinent to single moms, like investing, entrepreneurship, how to get dads to pay child support, getting out of debt, overcoming a spending addiction, affordable travel with kids, and topics related to business and career, sex, relationships and parenting.

Money Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for a Richer Life
Host Laura Adams provides short and friendly personal finance advice inspired by current events, social media, listener feedback and everyday interactions. Though her content isn’t exclusively geared to single moms, her female forward perspective and universally helpful advice is useful to women whether they’re raising kids alone, with a partner, or not at all. Each episode is under 15 minutes long, and jam-packed with actionable advice listeners can use right away.

Martinis and Your Money
This award-winning personal finance podcast presents advice on a variety of financial topics, with an emphasis on the issues that tend to really hit home for women. Host Shannon McLay is an entrepreneur, author and personal finance expert and she brings her lighthearted, fun approach to every episode.

Want some more help climbing out of your financial hole? Ronald J. Drescher has been assisting clients with their legal and financial troubles for more than three decades.

The post Three Great Podcasts for Single Moms Who Want to Save Money appeared first on Baltimore Bankruptcy Lawyer.

Many of the wealthiest people in the world weren’t born that way—they built their empires and saved their cash through making smart choices. Read this wealth building advice from titans like Warren Buffet, Oprah Winfrey, Mark Cuban and Tony Robbins.

How working a job you love, delaying gratification, and spending your money on experiences rather than things and other advice people can use to set themselves up for wealth later in life.

It’s hard to get ahead when there’s no cushion in your bank account. Here’s how to save money, even when your paycheck barely covers your expenses.

Speaking of, seeing that $0 balance in your checking account at the end of each pay period is depressing and stressful. What if you were able to have a little left over to save, even without your income increasing? Follow these suggestions and say goodbye to living paycheck to paycheck.

How opting for a little less convenience, designating days to spend no money at all, and filling your grocery cart—and then removing five items before paying—will leave you with a much fatter wallet.

Should you establish a healthy emergency fund or pay of your debts first? Which is more important? Though experts tend to be evenly divided on which is the wisest course, these experts say that the best approach is to divide your money in half and do both simultaneously.

There have never been more resources available to help you manage your money, but with so much information out there, assessing those resources can be like drinking from a fire hose. How do you know which ones are really worth your time and trust? Here are seven of the best resources available for a free personal finance education.

No matter what your financial goals are, achieving them starts with education. Until you know how to get to your destination, you’re unlikely to get there. By knowing where you stand, knowing where your money is going, and knowing where you want to be, you can start on the road to financial recovery.

Now is a great time to revisit the smart lessons from the past year so they’re fresh on your mind for the new year. Need some help climbing out of your financial hole? Ronald J. Drescher has been assisting clients with their legal and financial troubles for more than three decades.

The post The Most Insightful Pieces of Financial Wisdom of 2018 for People Struggling with Debt appeared first on Baltimore Bankruptcy Lawyer.

That means, if there’s something you want to know more about, odds are great that there are a few hundred (or thousand) YouTube videos already posted on the topic—those related to personal finance and money saving.

However, with that many videos available, it’s easy to fall down a YouTube rabbit hole, wasting hours of precious time watching videos with useless—or worse, inaccurate—information. Here are some suggestions of a few videos featuring subject matter experts who dispense solid, proven tips for getting a handle on your finances.

• This Bank of America created short video offers helpful tips well beyond the oft-cited “make your own coffee.” The video goes into the bigger habits and thought patterns you can change to keep from falling into overspending traps.
• Dave Ramsey has been a personal finance guru for decades because he dispenses plainspoken, easy to understand advice for real people in real life situations. In this, one of his all-time top viewed videos, he explains the core concepts of his winning system.
• Funny and very relatable, Lydia Seen offers her “7 Daily Habits of Frugal People” in this video, in a straightforward style. Her tips are the sort that anyone can easily adopt.
• In this TEDX talk at London Business School, Adam Carroll explains an experiment he conducted with fake money to demonstrate why people spend more when they don’t pay with cash.
• In “15 Things Poor People Do That The Rich Don’t,” the host doles out a list of 15 habits that differentiate the poor from the rich. We suggest that you take the video with a grain of salt, because some of her descriptions are overly harsh and beyond the control of many people. However, we still think it’s worth checking out, because the habits she lists will nonetheless challenge you to think about how you spend your time and money.

The post Surprisingly Useful YouTube Videos About Saving Money appeared first on Baltimore Bankruptcy Lawyer.