Budgeting for Emergency Preparedness

Unsplash / Charlie Foster

If you’re in the midst of an emergency, your kit of supplies will seem like the most important thing in the world. You’ll be beyond grateful for the time you took to prepare. And not just the time, but also the money you were willing to spend.

Putting together a comprehensive emergency supply kit can be costly.

If you’re still trying to decide how much you’re willing to spend, and how important being prepared really is to you — your hesitancy is understandable. Even with natural and unnatural disasters happening regularly around the world, it seems that humans have a built-in tendency to think, “Yes, but that would never happen to me!” Whether it’s a perceived good or bad thing — getting famous, winning the lottery, getting in car accident, getting caught in a bad storm — it’s difficult to imagine that we, out of anyone, would be the one.

We don’t really know what the chances are of these things happening to us, but the reality is, they could.

If it’s difficult to swallow the idea of buying a full kit, it may be time to write a list of everything you’d eventually like to include, and gradually accumulate them. This way, you are being responsible, both financially and in preparing for the safety of yourself and your family.

Of course, it’s best not to leave unchecked items on the list for too long. One suggestion we give is that you add one item to your grocery list, each week. This way, the cost is spread out over time, but in a consistent manner so that nothing gets left out for too long — possibly until it’s too late.

Something else to consider is that you may have items around the house already that could be added to your supply kit.

If you’d rather leave the responsibility in the hands and care of experts, you can still start with a basic survival kit, such as our optimal 2 Person Earthquake Kit and then build on that foundation, adding as you are able.

Whichever route you choose, once you have your list written out and scheduled responsibly, you can rest knowing that you have made a plan.

For other related tips on emergency preparedness, have a look at some of our other articles: