The title of this post may seem weird for a site that almost purposely wants (needs) you to buy consumer good to keep the site going, but I want you to just take a minute to think about something first. If you make that next purchase, will you have enough money for an emergency, should one arise? I read an article today at The Consumerist which stated that a whopping 64% of the people they polled would not have enough cash available should a $1,000 emergency occur in their life.

Now we all know that emergencies, while infrequent, do happen, and so should be expected. And at today's prices for major car repairs, insurance deductibles, or major medical events, $1,000 is almost the norm. If you wrap a car accident around those three items, you will almost assuredly need to have $1,000 (or much more) available to get through the emergency.

So if you haven't saved up $1,000 or heck even $500 in an emergency fund, then you need to do it today! I'm not perfect, and have certainly been in positions in my past where I did not follow this advice. And guess what happened? Some serious life event occurred, and my "plan" to take care of my emergency by using the credit card quickly escalated out of control. Instead of using an emergency fund to help bridge the gap in an emergency, the credit card stepped in. But it didn't just step in for the emergency. No...it stepped in all the way to where it was being used all the time, quickly racking up debt far above that $1,000 mark.

And that's what will happen to you if you do what 18% of that 64% said they would do when faced with an emergency. Those said they would either take out a new loan to pay the $1,000 emergency or get a cash advance from their credit cards (for the record the others said they would borrow from family or neglect other bills; neither of which are great either). You won't get just a loan or cash advance of $1,000. You'll go way over "just in case". Nope, much better to save up that emergency fund.

Saving up a $1,000 emergency fund is not new material nor new advice. It's been around for who knows how many years, and is most recently used by all of the financial gurus in some form or fashion. Dave Ramsey is famous for having it as "Baby Step #1" in his plan. Others like Ramit Sethi, David Bach or Suze Orman (blech) want you to get to three, six, or twelve months of emergency funding, but all have you start out small and build the fund up eventually.

The problem seems for most people in how to start or why should they even bother. $1,000 sounds like a lot for a lot of people, those living paycheck to paycheck. I have to agree, having lived through it before. Then others, $1,000 doesn't sound like much at all. That's the high income earning people who will are getting $2,000-$5,000 paychecks every two weeks and don't think it's a problem to get $1,000 if they need it. But both groups need to save for emergencies.

Starting to save can be accomplished a few ways: stop spending money on things you don't need, skip a lunches out, or just stop doing stupid stuff. My favorite post that I found tonight regarding ways to save an emergency fund comes from a favorite minimalism blog: zenhabits. The author, Leo Babauta, posted 21 Strategies for Creating an Emergency Fund and Why It's Critical back in 2007 but they are still great strategies even today.

Take a look at the blog post at zenhabits if you are having trouble finding ways to begin savings your own emergency fund and I bet that you will find something that will work for you. If you have a job and a fairly steady paycheck, you should be able to save something. I don't care if it's just a $1 a paycheck, do it! Life has a way of helping us reach our goals once we have a plan, so by starting on a plan of saving, you may just find your life start turning around for the better (at least financially).

And of course, come back to our site to find some great deals once you have that emergency fund in place!

B. Daniels is the lead review expert with Find Cheap Bargains. B. was more than likely the person responsible for the hands-on review of every product on the site. He also spends time searching for sale bargains when not conducting and writing the reviews.