Survey: Most Americans fail the emergency-fund test
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Other findings of Bankrate.com's emergency-funds poll include:

• Men are doing better than women when it comes to having three months' living expenses set aside. Just over 42 percent of men say they have at least the minimum set aside, while just under 36 percent of women have saved that much. • Not surprisingly, people with higher incomes are more likely to have a funded emergency account. More than 63 percent of those making $75,000 or more answered "yes" to having adequate emergency savings, while only 19.5 percent of those making less than $20,000 had enough to get through three months. • Likewise, older survey participants were more apt to have money on hand. More than half of those surveyed age 65 or older could get through a three-month emergency, while only 22 percent of those age 18 to 24 could. • How much money do people have in their emergency fund? Slightly more than 8 percent have a whopping $50,000 or more. Nearly 12 percent say they have between $20,000 and $49,999; 11.2 percent have between $10,000 and $19,999; almost 11 percent have $5,000 to $9,999; 6 percent have $2,500 to $4,999, and 8.5 percent have less than $2,500 saved. • Geographically, folks in the Northeast are best at building emergency funds. Nearly 45 percent of those surveyed who said they had three months' living expenses set aside hail from that section of the country. In the rest of the country, between 36 percent and 39 percent had three months of expenses saved.

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If you don't have an emergency fund, get one started immediately.

Many financial planners advise having a fully funded emergency fund in place before making contributions to retirement accounts. This can help prevent borrowing against a retirement account in times of need.

"It always surprises me when people first receive some excess cash," Tobias says. "Their priority should be to fund their emergency fund, but the first thing they want to do is invest it."

Obviously, funding such an account isn't easy or everyone would do it. The main thing is to get started. Once you begin a steady pattern of setting aside money, you'll be surprised at how quickly it grows. Be sure to open a high-yield account so you get the best return.

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Bankrate commissioned the Roper Public Affairs & Media, a part of GfK NOP, poll of 1,000 Americans age 18 and older from across the country. The margin of error for the results based on the total sample is plus or minus 3 percent.