Why you need an emergency fund.

Back to personal finance.
I seem to talk a lot about an efund but it makes sense since it's really important. A while back, I decided to cut back on my contribution to my student loans and divert some of that money to my savings account. I decided this for a couple of reasons. The number one being my realization that if I got laid off, I wouldn't even have enough to pay the next months rent. I was truly living paycheck to paycheck. Number 2 was that when big emergencies came up (or big events), I didn't have the money on hand to pay for them and then I'd have to rely on my credit card and take 2 steps back in debt reduction (i.e. $500 gas bill, $350 down to renew my car insurance). I'm proud to say that my savings account now has $40.

That won't completely cover my rent but here's why I'm proud. I had actually saved about $800. Then I had to pay for my car insurance and I was reminded I had about $300 to pay on 2 parking tickets (nyc for you) and on top of that I had to start making payments on my gas bill. All these could have sent me running for my VISA but this time around, I had the cash sitting in an account. These are precisely the reasons, I tripled my efforts towards growing my efund.

I'm not perfect, I used some of that money to by some divine shoes but at least it was a cash splurge. I'm going to keep contributing although I'll won't be able to contribute as much since I have to pay my loans again. All my outside income - ehow, surveys - are going to go to my savings account till i reach my $2000 goal.

If you don't think you could survive a month after being laid off or losing your job, you should think about building up your emergency fund even if you have a mountain load of debt.