A minimum survival budget is not your normal budget cut back slightly. It is a deliberately stripped-down figure showing the least amount of money needed to keep yourself and the business running for a period, used for planning rather than everyday spending.
Building the personal side
- Housing, utilities and food
- Insurance and essential transport
- Minimum debt repayments
- Nothing discretionary — no subscriptions, dining out or non-essential purchases
Building the business side
- Software you cannot operate without
- Any essential subscriptions tied to delivering client work
- Insurance required to keep trading
- Minimum marketing needed to avoid losing all future work
Using the figure
If your minimum survival budget comes to £1,900 a month, that figure becomes the base for your emergency fund target and the threshold you watch for in a cash-flow forecast. Knowing this number in advance removes a lot of the guesswork during an actual difficult period.
Take these three things away
- Strip the budget down to true essentials only
- Separate personal and business minimums
- Use the total as your emergency fund benchmark
Frequently asked questions
Written for the Hayley Duster editorial project as general information for people running businesses alone. It is not medical, legal, financial or tax advice, and it is not a substitute for guidance from a qualified professional who knows your circumstances.
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