Needs, as the name suggests, are things you cannot live without. Clean drinking water is a need. Healthy food is a need. If the location you live in has no reliable public transport, your car is a need. The thing that trips up most people is that wants embed themselves within needs.
For example, you need to eat healthy food but do you really need to be purchasing organic, grass feed beef from New Zealand? Don’t think of this as singling out organic food, that frozen pizza you chuck into your oven is as much of a want as the grass fed beef is.
Distinguishing between needs and wants comes down to evaluating your priorities. While it would be great to be able to afford all of your wants, how crucial is it to your well being at the end of the day? You shouldn’t eliminate all of your wants from your life but you can do without the majority of them.
I am one of those people who would rather earn more than save on foods and drinks. However, this doesn’t help me to avoid debt. Having read the info above I need to find another article on how to get out of debt and then start saving money. I once bought a used computer instead of buying a new one. I would like to think that it is a good financial habit. So far, according to the pie chart, half of my income goes to needs and a half to want. I do want to save some to go to Cabo this summer. Is there any way you could advise on the budgeting apps?