Defining the Types of Pay-Ahead Bills

The Way Bills Were Meant to Be Paid – Part 6

If I want to begin using the Rent-To-Own method of bill pay, with which bills do I begin?  Do I just start with them all? Or is there an order to where I begin?

Beginning any new initiative is the hardest part.  Because what you’re attempting has never been done before (at least by you), getting started seems a little daunting.  Don’t allow this process to become overwhelming and keep you from getting started.

Below, I have listed a few key considerations to get you going.

Focusing on Mandatory Bills

With any new process, you want to ease into it.  If you plunge right in, more harm than good can be done.  We understand that your money may be tight so every dollar is important.  Plunging into the pool may be good when swimming, but with your finances the shock may be more than you can bear when it comes to your money.  We suggest you start with the mandatory bills. Only start with the absolute essential items.  When you get some traction going with these, you will feel more confident when moving to the non-mandatory items, which we call the “luxury” bills.

Examining Luxury Bills

Now that you’ve mastered the “rent-to-own” method of bill pay with your essential bills, you’re ready to move to the non-essentials; the “luxury” items.

With the non-essentials, you may wish to examine them one by one.  What we mean by this is, tackle them one at a time. They may require a customized approach.  Pay the way you’ve been paying except apply the rent-to-own method on just one for now and add others as you become more comfortable.

Note: each time you apply the “rent-to-own” method, you’re adding just to a few dollars to your monthly expenses.  If you try all your bills at once this could be a significant increase that you’re not prepared for and will (as stated earlier) produce more harm than good.  Don’t be in any hurry with these non-essential items; place your focus on the bills that matter most first.

Assessing the Non-pay-ahead Items

Just like every household, you will have a few bills that you can’t apply this method towards as smoothly as the mandatory and non-essential bills.  These are items such as loans, the mortgage, autopay items such as auto-insurance, and large bills like daycare.  Loans, mortgages, rent and car payments are tough because they are usually large monthly payments. To get those ahead using a 12 month pay-ahead method will add more than you could possibly be prepared for to your monthly expenses.  Auto insurance and any other payments that are processed with autopay can be a little complicated because you don’t control the payments that are taken. Daycare and school tuition can be as large as rent and mortgage payments. For these special cases we will need to apply a different approach.  You should save these until you’ve put yourself in a better financial position to handle. In other words, you’ll be ready to tackle the special cases when you’ve mastered the mandatory and non-essential expenses and have them paying in advance 3-6 months.

Today is Friday!
You now have a starting point and can begin your journey to controlling how you pay your bills.  The most impacting benefit is you won’t ever again be afraid to check your mailbox. We assure you that once you see progress, you’ll wonder why no one ever shared this with you years ago.  This process, brings relief and excitement to what seemed like an unchangeable process.

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