I had a few car expenses come up this month that put me over the budget for the month. I had the money to pay for everything because I have a Car Fund as part of my zero based budget. I put in a set amount of money into a sub account every single month and that amount builds up in a little emergency fund until I should ever need to use it.

Unfortunately this month that time came and I had to use a good chunk of money from the car emergency fund to pay for car repairs and maintenance.

Lexus1

While the amount for the car budget is over the total for the month I do have a one year running budget which spreads out the cost of all expenses and all income over a twelve month period. This means that the money spent this month will simply be averaged out and hopefully I should be under the amount allocated for the year.

I  must say that in the past I would have been extremely stressed out over having car repairs but due to having a budget I can breathe a little easier.

I will still have to rebuild the car emergency fund on a monthly basis but it is better than having to go into debt to repair the car because I did not have the cash to pay up front.

By the way that is NOT my car in the image….but it is my dream car so I just thought I would throw it out to the universe!