The 50/30/20 rule never worked for my lumpy income so I tried something different

After two years of feast-or-famine months freelancing in Austin, I started splitting each big payment into four weekly chunks in a separate checking account. Has anyone else found a budgeting method that actually handles irregular paychecks without driving you crazy?

3 comments

3 Comments

joseph_green1319d ago

Wait do you just let the money sit there or actually pay bills from that account?

rosepark19d ago

Joseph's question is the key part - definitely let the money sit there until its designated week rolls around. Treating each weekly chunk like its own little paycheck helps stop me from blowing through the whole lump sum on tacos and concert tickets. Keeps the stress way down compared to my old method of just crossing my fingers and hoping I'd budget right.

stella11119d ago

This weekly chunk method sounds interesting but I wonder how you handle the weeks where unexpected expenses pop up, like a car repair or a sudden medical bill. Do you dip into future weekly chunks for those or do you keep a separate emergency fund? It seems like you would need to have some buffer money set aside anyway for the lumps to work right. Otherwise you might end up short when a big expense hits and have to borrow from next month's chunks.