Please don’t hate me. I’m very proud that you’ve been following my advice (and the advice of my PF blog constituents) to start saving for retirement, etc. But now we’re going to talk about something that may require you to dig just a little deeper into those pockets of yours: • College “I Don’t Even Have Kids Yet!” Why Do I Care? I know some of you are pretty young and just graduating college yourself, while others of you may have recently got married and just had children. These are all great positions to be because, like most savings strategies, “more time” is our friend. However, this post is going to assume that someday when or if you already DO have kids, that you’ll want to send your little Princess or Jedi (… there’s a Star … [Read more...] about Adding Your Children’s College Savings to the Budget
Savings & Budgeting
Another Expense Reduced – Refinancing Your Auto Loan
It wasn’t one week after we closed on our mortgage refinance that my wife and I got our next “big break” on our expenses. As I’ve spoken about before, part of my annual budget is to pick a handful of expenses each year and see what I can do to reduce them. Sometimes this takes a fair amount of work and research as was the case with the mortgage refinance. But ironically, this next one came from an unlikely source: Junk mail. … [Read more...] about Another Expense Reduced – Refinancing Your Auto Loan
Ways to Squeeze Extra Cash – Sorta …
It’s important to know that you don’t have to agree with every single piece of financial advice you’re given. I know I don’t. I was reminded of this fact recently when I read an article on Daily Finance by Molly McCluskey from “The Motley Fool” entitled “5 Unconventional Ways to Squeeze Extra Cash Out of Your Budget”. I’m all for fresh ideas on ways to save money, especially if it can be shown to produce results. But although this article may have had its heart in the right place, some of the advice may be a little misleading. Let’s review each one and I’ll tell you why I felt this way. McCluskey’s Tips: 1. Rent, don't buy. Where to begin. Everyone knows you should never do a rent to own program for things that rapidly lose … [Read more...] about Ways to Squeeze Extra Cash – Sorta …
How to Budget – Download My Excel Budget Template
In the preceding chapters, we've covered quite a few strategies for successfully creating a budget that will work for you. Now enough talk! Let's put the pen to paper and get down to business! As promised, here is the last post in the series containing my free Excel budget template. If you've got Microsoft Excel installed on your computer, then you should be in good shape. The file was created in an older version of Excel so it should open with no trouble. … [Read more...] about How to Budget – Download My Excel Budget Template
How to Budget – Making It Easy with Mint
At many times throughout this series and especially in Part 2, I told you not to worry just yet about your individual credit card purchases and to treat them all as one “big category”. The reason I did this is because I didn’t want our lesson to get hung up on analyzing credit card purchases to death. You have a lot of other bills besides a credit card, and most of them are fixed each month. As we’ve already shown, knowing what you’re going to spend each month versus what you’re going to take in is extremely helpful in creating a budget. But in no way does this mean that we should ignore your credit card purchases. In fact, hitting the credit card category is the first place I usually look to cut my spending and re-direct the money … [Read more...] about How to Budget – Making It Easy with Mint
How to Budget – Step 7 – Sticking to the Plan!
Time to test the gold in fire. Earlier I told you that a well designed budget would be the key to money management and staying within your means. This is still true. If you’ve created something that is tailored for you, meets your goals, and is comfortable enough for you to live with, then you should do well. All of this would be great if “you” were the only person this budget was for. The problem is that it’s not just “you”. A budget is usually for you, your spouse, and your family. Although that doesn’t sound like a lot, there’s a lot going on inside that group. Just like how a company sets a budget, each department will likely have competing goals and agendas. Similarly, sometimes each person in the family feels differently about … [Read more...] about How to Budget – Step 7 – Sticking to the Plan!
How to Budget – Step 6 – Adding In Your Investment Goals
So after Step 5, does your budget meet our goals? Did you make adjustments and sacrifices? Do you have a positive balance for each month throughout the year? Is less money going out than is coming in? If so, then you are ready to move on to adding in your investment goals. Notice we didn’t do this in any of the previous steps. This is because you have get your business in order before you can start getting advanced with your budget - You have to walk before you can run. After we’re meeting our basic set of goals, let’s start digging a little deeper and adding in our investment goals. … [Read more...] about How to Budget – Step 6 – Adding In Your Investment Goals
How to Budget – Step 5 – Apply the Formula for Success
Every great budget follows one simple formula: • [ Money In > Money Out ] = Good Or in other words … • [ Money In – Money Out > $0 ] = Good Basically you’ve got to have more money “coming in” than “going out”. Any other way is just a recipe for disaster! Don’t under-estimate how incredibly powerful this equation is. Everyday, people make the mistake of buying things on credit that they can’t afford or taking on payments when their income simply can’t sustain it. It’s simple physics that you can never have more going out than coming in. … [Read more...] about How to Budget – Step 5 – Apply the Formula for Success
