I was enthusiastically reminded this morning that it is 4-weeks to Christmas. I suppressed the urge to harm my co-worker and smiled politely. Don’t get me wrong, I love Christmas. It’s just that Christmas...
It seems that everything has a price. Everything you want to do costs more. There is this constant battle to either justify spending the extra money or justify doing without. Take eating healthy for...
What if you are faced with a hard decision. You have to decide what to pay and what not to pay. How do you decide? And how do you handle this stressful decision? Now...
This question comes up often, but usually too late, after the Bank has taken money out of your account and left you short on your mortgage, car payment or any number of things scheduled...
I was recently reflecting on the reasons that people walk through my door. Of course, they come to me because they are experiencing some type of financial hardship and they need advice. But I...
Payday comes, the money goes into your bank account, you leave some in to cover the automatic withdrawals, pay some bills online, head to the grocery store, fill up the gas tank on the way and start your next pay cycle. Often with little or no thought to how well it is working. Sometimes you just need to pause…take a few deep breaths…and look at things from a different angle. Then ask yourself, “what can I do to make this better?”. You might be surprised at the answers that present themselves.
I know we live in a world of credit, but sometimes I feel like I am on a seedy corner, with a drug pusher who is saying all of the right things to get me to make the “purchase”. I resist because I see the perils everyday, because I know how much credit I now have and how much I am unwilling to let myself be lured into that false sense of security that comes with credit.
Is it an Emergency? Or a planned expense? Do you use credit versus savings? This is the heart of what I see everyday and what I personally struggled with as I attempted to set up a spending plan for our household. By not planning for things like car maintenance, we are left with a roller coaster plan. We allocate our money to all of other expenses, spend the rest, and then feel the setback when we have a large ‘anticipated’ expense.
If you were to ask me, “what is the single most important thing a person can do to change their financial future?” I would answer “Track their spending”! Oh and I would add “And look at it!”. Let me tell you a quick story about a relative who learned this lesson just a tad too late.
There’s an epidemic in today’s society. We are borrowing on our lives. And payment day is coming earlier and earlier. Is it sad, that at age 40-something :), I look forward to retirement. That in the same breath I fear it, simply because I have little (translated into none) savings at this point because every day, every week, every month, the cash flow that I do have pays for our basic living needs and ensuring that our kids get to have some opportunities in their lives?
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