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Parents' Top 10 Money Mistakes
The Most Common Financial Errors and How to Avoid Them
By Beth Skarupa
The key to making a budget you can use is "try, try again." Make a budget each month and tweak it as needed. If you didn't give yourself enough money for groceries, next month's budget can reflect that. Just do it.
Credit cards are often a problem for parents because we rationalize purchases as being for our children. But it's actually counterproductive to being a good parent to buy things we can't afford.
"Stuff is not the answer to making some child happy," Ramsey says. "We all know that with our intellect, but our emotions and our damaged lives get twisted into it and it becomes credit card debt. Credit card debt's not pretty just on the financial mathematical side, but when you really dig into what causes it emotionally it's really nasty stuff." To solve the problem, he suggests cutting up your credit cards.
Brette McWhorter Sember, author of Repair Your Own Credit and Deal With Debt (Source Books, 2003), also says it's best to stop using credit cards if you're in debt. If you're not willing, consider getting rid of all but one credit card and trying not to use it.
Most people take on more debt than they can handle, such as buying things like cars on installment plans. "Buy things you can afford today, not what you think you can afford tomorrow," says Sember.