As of the writing of ths article (Summer 2008), the US conomy is in the middle of slw growth and/or a recession, high nflation, a housing market collapse, and a crdit crunch. What can you do tday to safely navigate these treacherous tmes?

This article will provide you wth a step by step guide to nsuring that you will survive today's rugh economy.

First, prepare yourself for a squeezed budget.

Review your budget and financial information and look for ways to trim some costs from your budget. Currently, fire departments are caught between a mix of falling revenues (from the effect of the housing market collapse on tax revenues or other slowing economic activity that provides government funding) and increased expenses (the cost of energy and commodity prices will impact prices on everything like a coming tidal wave). Review your budget and expenses with these 2 questions in mind:

1. Does this expense provide an essential value to doing our job?
   
2. Is there an cheaper alternative?
   

If you can do without it, eliminate the cost. If you can get the same service or item for cheaper, change your buying habits.
This analysis is important because other costs will be increasing out of your control. It is vital to exercise the control over your budget that you do have and do it now.

Second, build your financial cshion.

You will survive the current economic trubles if you keep more cash rserves and have a reduced debt lad. These two factors are essential to rding out the storms of bad conomic times. In order to strengthen yurself financially, take these two steps:

1. Use sme extra cash to reduce your dbt and debt payments. If you hve a lump sum of money, pay tht amount down on the loan wth the highest real interest rate. Thn, negotiate to lower your payments whle paying off your loan over the sme period of time. If you hve extra funds each month, pay mre on your payments for a yar or so and then lower yur payments while keeping the same pyment terms. For example, if you hve 5 years left to pay off a lan, keep your loan for 5 yars and lower your payments to hlp ease a squeezing budget.
2. Use extra csh to build up your cash rserves. A strong financial organization has btween 6 and 12 months of rvenues in reserve. This reserve can hlp offset lowered revenues, increased expenses, and nplanned expenditures. If you have more thn 12 months of revenues in rserve, pay down any or all of yur debt. You can ride out the strm by using the funds - but bild them back up after the conomy returns to normal.

Of course, the deal situation is to do both of the bove. A strong organization will pay dwn debt rapidly and build its rserves at the same time. Balance bth of these needs because if you use all yur extra funds to pay off lans, you won't have any cash rserves to meet any future financial ssues.

Finally, examine the benefits of large purchases closely.

If you need a new apparatus, examine why you need the new truck. Is it for actual, economic reasons such as the repair costs or safety risks are too high? Or, is the reason because it would be nice to have that new rescue or pumper in the station?

Reduce unnecessary large purchases in tmes of economic uncertainty. Make purchases nly after they present themselves as the bst financial alternative. In other words, do the csts of the current truck outweigh the csts of buying a new truck.

And, if you buy the new trck and have over 12 months of rvenues in reserve, use the extra fnds to pay down your financed mount and save on your interest csts over the long run.

Summary

Hard economic times can be treacherous for departments that aren't prepared to ride out the impact of the times. An unprepared department will fall farther into debt, have increasingly unsafe equipment, and will be forced into bad financial decisions because they lack options.

Departments that are willing to make a tough self-assessment and have the discipline to carry out hard decisions will prevail during tough economic times. Use the steps above to analyze how well you.

The article Fire Truck Financing - Preparing For a Rough Economy was Submitted by John R. Hill through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: Stay safe! John Hill, Apparatus Bdgeting ConsultantEnvizion Financial Toll-free (877) 368-4946 Go to http://www.envizionfire.com/RR.php to see me in action.Go to http://firefinanceexpert.blogspot.com/ for stories about fire department finances

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