Good luck!

the way to start with this system when you’re living paycheck to paycheck is to first add up all the nonnegotiable monthly expenses like your rent, car insurance,(leave groceries out of this; you’ll see why in a second), and divide that figure by 4.3 (the number of paychecks in a month).

Every week, leave the figure you came up with in your checking account, and take out enough cash to buy groceries and pay for your transportation for both you and your husband, children or family members. Put that cash in the physical envelopes. One for grocery, one for transportation… you get the idea.

Now you only spend out of those envelopes. (you may need to give an envelope to other family members for their weekly spending needs too).

Do this every week and at the end of the month, the money for your rent will have accumulated in your checking account, since you didn’t spend anything except what’s in the envelopes and left the right amount for your nonnegotiable expenses from your paycheck every week.

Actually, that’s how you would use YNAB too, it’s not true that you need a huge chunk of cash to start out with. But really, a few envelopes for weekly spending (groceries, transportation, maybe clothing and entertainment) combined with leaving enough money from your paychecks in your checking account so that at the end of the month you can meet rent and car insurance and whatever, and you should be good to go. It’s simple and it works, assuming you actually are taking in enough money to pay for all the stuff you need.

Good luck.

As far as how to stop living paycheck to paycheck, you’ll have to make some sacrifices. I can see your situation is tough. However, the only way to do it is to earn more and spend less.

* Are you paying for anything that you can “live” without?
* Are you paying for something that has a less expensive alternative?

You’ll have to look hard and dig deep, but that’s how it’s done. There’s no magic bullet.