Met a retired accountant in a Chiang Mai coworking space who changed my budget approach

I was at Punspace in Chiang Mai last Tuesday, struggling to track my freelance income in a messy spreadsheet. This older guy next to me saw my screen and just laughed, then showed me a simple envelope system he used for 30 years. Have any of you picked up strange advice from strangers in coworking spaces that actually worked?

2 comments

2 Comments

felix_hayes6415d ago

The envelope system is interesting but I have to ask - did he explain how he handled uneven cash flow? Because that's where I keep getting stuck. Some months I get three payments, other months I get one big check that has to cover everything for six weeks. The envelope method sounds great for steady income but I wonder how it adapts to the feast or famine pattern most freelancers deal with.

kim.zara15d ago

@felix_hayes64 have you tried setting up a separate "buffer" envelope just for those gaps? I feel your pain though, feast or famine is the worst part of freelancing. What helped me was taking any big check and immediately splitting it into smaller weekly amounts for my envelopes. So if I get a $2000 check that has to last 4 weeks, I put $500 in each week's envelope right away. Then I treat the empty envelopes as reminders not to touch the money until that week. The guy who taught me said you gotta build a buffer envelope first before you even start the real system. Like a "rainy day" envelope that smooths out those irregular payments. It took me a few months to get it going but once that buffer was there, the envelopes actually worked pretty well. Maybe try starting with just your fixed bills in envelopes first and see how that feels? That's what I did and it made the cash flow problem a little less crazy.