By Leslie R.
One of the most difficult things for me to do was build up my emergency fund. It seemed that I lived every two weeks paycheck to paycheck and there was no buffer when emergencies did happen. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t seem to build up an emergency fund.
Another problem that I was facing at the time was a too small apartment cluttered with things I no longer used. I was tired of not having enough space and I finally decided that it was time to get rid of a lot of stuff.
I knew that my junk wasn’t worth a lot of money, but I decided that I would try to sell it instead of throwing it out or giving it away. I also made the decision that any money that I made from doing this I would use as my emergency fund. I even went so far as to open a new account specifically to deposit any money that I made.
I sold my stuff in a variety of ways. I used Craigslist.org a lot. If I thought something had a bit of value, I would place it on eBay. I even had a garage sale to get rid of all those little things that I didn’t think would sell online.
The results were outstanding, at least for me. Over the last nine months of cleaning out my closets and other storage places, I’ve been able to put $1300 aside for a true emergency fund while not missing anything that I have sold. As a bonus, my apartment is a lot less cluttered and I actually have room again.
I really thought that I would never be able to build an emergency fund. Imagine my surprise when I found out that it was sitting in my closet.
Do you have a story about saving money that you’d like to share? We’d love to hear about it.
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