[While the site launch was a bit delayed, exploring this particular topic is useful at any point in the year, especially when one has life changes to adjust for …]
Who says you have to sit down and plan out your entire year before January 1st? If you’re ready to make changes for your financial future, it’s time to start thinking about what you want to achieve financially in the months ahead if you haven’t already …
Here are the steps my husband and I have been working on checking off our list:
Set some achievable money goals.
Savings goals. Investing goals. Earning goals. Budgeting goals.
Remember, make them achievable. If you know that you don’t have the time or energy to side hustle and bank the money needed to hit a goal, then figure out and set a goal with what’s doable with your current income.
We have several savings goals as well as some debt payoff and investing goals for the year ahead that will require us to make some tweaks to our budget. On the other hand, we honestly do not have any major earning ‘goals’ for the year; at least as of now, as I’ve learned to value my downtime and health over the stress of working extra hours at another job. We both work in the public sector and pay raises only happen if one is due for them salary scale-wise + if the budget approvers are in a position to allow for raises and cost of living increases [read: the revenue brought in by sales taxes/property taxes/misc fees are enough to increase a department budget]. While I have off & on decluttered and sold things around the house to fund home projects in the past and am in the process of developing this site into a stream of income over the course of 2024, I do not have any set goals for what I want to bring in on that front at this time.
Money ignorance is not bliss.
Figure out — if you haven’t already — what is coming in and going out.
Also, pay attention to your bills as they come in or as you receive email notices for them.
I can say that in the past, I’ve had a couple of bills that never put a notice in with billing statements regarding fee increases that ended up happening. One of those resulted in an email to my insurance agent over an increase in service fees if paid out monthly [+ me switching to paying my car insurance lump sum every six months soon after while I was still single; I made adjustments to my budget to afford to do so in quick order]. Then there was the time my cell carrier increased the unlimited data fee on those of us grandfathered in by almost double. I wasn’t notified about that one either but found out ahead of time thanks to a news article.
Budgets are your best friend.
How else will you know if you can afford to splurge on a want every once in a while, be able to make a snowflake payment on debt, or if your retail therapy spending has resulted in barely affording next week’s groceries?
Figure out what works best for you: a journal/notebook, a spreadsheet [like I use], or a budgeting app such as YNAB or CoPilot.
Kick money weaknesses to the curb.
Figure out what they are and strategize on a plan to avoid falling prey to them. Get rid of these ‘bad boys’ 😉
Some weaknesses are easy to overcome but others involve a mindset change [a topic on the agenda for multiple posts throughout 2024] …
Some of my money weaknesses [past and present] include hoodies, books, and carbonated beverage drink stops. How did I put a stop to that? Unsubscribing/unfollowing my favorite hoodie brand, initially getting a Kindle Unlimited account and only reading what I could get within my $11/mo subscription before switching over to in-person and online (via Overdrive and Libby) library borrowing if I don’t already own it, and stop going through the dang drive-thru so often! That last one sometimes means taking a different route or being in the ‘wrong’ lane of traffic!
I have a few others that are occasionally as tempting, but to greatly oversimplify it, the easiest thing for me to do to avoid spending money when I don’t have it or when I’m trying to meet a savings goal is to avoid websites and brick and mortar places I know I’ll be tempted to buy something I don’t need. Thus, during no-splurge periods I set, the only businesses I will set foot in are the grocery store, the gas station, and the pharmacy as necessary.
Pay yourself first.
If you want to become financially independent one of these years, how else do you expect it to happen? Inheritances and lottery winning aren’t a likely option for 99% of us. Thus — pad that savings + retirement NOW. Not when you’re 40. Besides, we shouldn’t trust living on what Uncle Sam MIGHT have for us one of these years and we don’t want to burden someone else in having to help us out financially or doing without needed things in our golden years.
If I could manage/not miss the money my employer pulled for a mandatory retirement contribution from my paychecks back when I made just over $15,000 a year in my first full-time job, you can find a way to save something too. My hourly wage then was right at today’s current federal minimum wage, so no excuses! Even if you can only spare $5.00 a pay period or a month, that still will add up to more than many people have on hand when an emergency strikes.
Take advantage of employer pension/retirement options if available, especially if they match as mine currently does. 401k, 403b, and 457b plans are another way to contribute to retirement savings [if available to you] and lower your income tax bill. Also, if your check is auto-deposited to your bank account, set up a deposit to a savings account so that your employer sends that money directly into the savings for you before you see or have the opportunity to spend it.
Check your credit report and your credit score.
Especially if there’s a chance you’ll borrow money in the next year, make sure everything is in order and that no one has stolen your identity/opened lines of credit in your name.
If you live in the US, you’re entitled to three free credit reports a year [one from each of the major credit reporting agencies]. You’ll have to pay extra to get a credit score [usually less than $10], but if you’re a Discover cardholder or a customer of many other financial institutions, you can get your credit score free through them at any time. I prefer them over Credit Karma and Capital One’s Credit Wise for scores as they only factor in accounts that you are the direct account holder of [whereas many others factor in accounts that you are an authorized user on that you possibly haven’t had access to in years and may not be able to easily get the account holder to remove you from].
