Protection during financial crises.

[moneysense]

Protecting yourself in times of financial crisis is a very important thing to accomplish.

Below are several things you can do to keep yourself on good financial footing.

First of all, dont use a home equity loan as your emergency fund. The reasoning in this theory is that getting into further debt will only make things worse in the long run.

Do keep an emergency fund though, and in that fund, you should have from 3 to 6 months of living expenses, IE: house payment, utility payments etc.

Keep that 401K. Keep investing in the 401 K for your future.

Pay off as much debt as you can, now. Especially credit cards. These cards can end up being what can break you financially. Especially if you are only making minimum payments each month. Late charges and finance charges can really add up quickly. So pay them off completely, or make the most payment on them monthly that you can afford.

Perhaps a part time job will help. You could apply the wages from this job to things such as credit card payments in order to pay them off much quicker. But dont forget to keep adding to your Emergency Fund, thus making yourself even better protected against any and all emergencies.