moneyFYI
Financial Freedom Is Merely Organized Common Sense
The Satisfaction of Winning With Every-Day Money Management
People put off and some never do much money management. It looks harder than it is.
It has to do with shifting from an event or transaction based method to a system.
Step #1 Know your obligations.
You must choose a lifestyle that fits with your resources. Lifestyle includes
Accomodation
- Mortgage or rent payable each month
- Taxes, heat, hydro, water, insurance, maintenance, fees
- Furniture, appliances and maintenance
Transportation
- Car payments or lease
- Fuel, maintenance, insurance, parking
History
- Student or other loans
- Old credit card balances
Childcare
Personal maintenance
- Food
- Health care and health insurance
- Other insurance
- Physical fitness
- Recreation and Entertainment
- Clothing
All other.
- Grooming, cigarettes, alcohol, telephone, cable and internet, subscriptions, memberships,
Most of these will be visible and big enough to know about, The other ctegory will take some tending in the beginning because it will include many small expenditures. It is very difficult to manage spending that is nearly invisible. A coffee at Starbucks on the way to work is not material by itself but one per working day for a year is more than $500.
Step #2 Savings and money directed from the present
- Money going to the future will be invested for retirement or education. Maybe for a downpayment on a house.
- Money going to the past could be accelerated debt payments.
- Some would argue step 2 shuld come before step one but that is only possible before your make lifestyle commitments. Think about it though.
Step #3 The resources to fund the spending
For most people it will be money from working. They don’t get to keep all it though. Before they see any, the government takes a slice and there may be other things like union dues, government retirement and insurance plans, company pension plans, group benefits and maybe an investment plan.
Work with take home pay. If you are short what is there in step 1 you can amend.
Step 4 Automate the processes
Everything you can automate you should. Many of your household bills can be made automatic payment. Same thing with savings for the future, for debt reduction, for planned purchases, and for emergencies.
You could allocate a certain amount of cash each week or month for those “little” expenses. When you run out of cash, they stop. Paying with plastic does not seem like paying with money. People are more careful when they see the money going out.
Step #5 Compare to the spending need.
Almost everyone finds they have intuitively built a model that cannot work. That is why they need this exercise. Matching the income and outgo reality is necesary once in a while. Finding ways to reduce consumption or to organize debt better, or to invest better so savings could be smaller for a while, all are possible.
After Action Report
It could take 15 hours to gather the data so you can work at making it better. It might take another 15 hours to work out the improvements. So 30 hours. Maybe even 50.
Then what.
Most of what happens requires no daily management. Pretty much just count the cash in your pocket and divide by the number of days left in the week.
Everything else is planned for and anticipated. Every quarter or so maybe check the actual automatic expenditures agaisnt your original assumptions and adjust again.
You can do that. Your should do that, right?
I help business owners, and professionals understand and manage risk and other financial issues. To help them achieve their goals, I use tax efficiencies and design advantages to acquire more efficient income and larger, more liquid estates.
Please be in touch if I can help you. don@moneyfyi.com 705-927-4770
moneyFYI 
Thanks for share this post. its very helpful and useful for MONEY MANAGEMENT….