Reading time : 4m 46s
1.Make RIGHT DECISIONS as much as possible. This is the first cause of effect. Not making smart decisions will create a negative ripple effect. Research, ask and find out. Don’t be lazy. Don’t do the obvious mistakes like making purchases that will make you broke in the following months to come. That’s just (what better word can I use ….?)… umm stupid. Yup, there’s no better word unfortunately.
2. Have 3 bank accounts named: Loans & Bills , Pay-Yourself and Daily Spending.
3. Create and an R & O system.
In a journal or planner, write these down.
Split your finances into Two Categories : “Responsibilities & Others”.
For illustration purposes only. Method copyright by LM.
Responsibilities, is the category you put all the money you need to pay for Loans and Bills.
Set aside $2,400 (for illustration purposes only) every month for all the Responsibilities you need to actually pay for. Don’t touch this money cos it’s what you need every month to survive.
Then split “Others” into two sub categories: Daily Spending – place a cap for the amount you spend, for eg. $200-$500 on groceries, anything miscellaneous, impromptu and leisure. I personally cap my groceries at $150-$200 per month. And the miscellaneous is capped at $400. So my Daily Spending category is $600.
Your Pay-Yourself is everything else that’s left after you’ve set aside Loans & Bills and Daily Spending. The key is to limit your expenditure and not your savings. Even if the balance of your funds happened to be $1,000 that month, then great! Push all of it into your Pay-Yourself bank account and don’t look back.
4. Be smart with your money. Don’t over commit when you don’t have to or aren’t capable enough. Set your ego aside and use basic logic. It’ll save you thousands.
5.Use your skill set to earn a side hustle. Find out what talents, skills or niches you have to offer. Be it pet sitting, house sitting, washing cars at condos, baking, delivery services, movers, driving Uber on the side, anything at all that can bring in income. Put your side hustle income into your loans account. Set aside that money to accumulate to pay off your lowest debt fast. Keep earning and setting aside for this purpose only.
6.Don’t spend unnecessarily. You have too much stuff at home, stop over- buying Tupperwares and long maxi dresses or that expensive hobby you keep spending unnecessarily on. You have enough. Trust me. Focus on what’s more important.
7. Prioritize your finances. Arrange your current loans from the smallest to the largest loan. Pay off the smallest loan first. Or pay off the highest interest first. It all depends on your capability and what financial arrangements you have.
8.SLAM DUNK your bonuses and extra earnings into all your existing loans or savings.
9.Roll your payments to the next loan on the list, even after you’ve finished paying off the smallest loan.
10.Discipline when buying groceries. Don’t just buy what you feel. Plan your meals. Base your purchases on the ingredients you need . If your style of cooking is quite standardized, you have no problem mixing and matching ingredients and flavors.
11.Use leftovers in your cooking, to stretch out the weekly spending. We waste too much food already as it is. That could be a $5 meal just by using leftovers.
12.Consolidate all your expenses and limit your spending to $2,000-$2,500 of expenditure per month total household income (base it according to your monthly commitments and income). Go back to the R&O illustration above. This is just a reminder of what you’ve learned above.
13.DON’T SPEND MORE THAN YOU EARN.
You might think this requires basic common sense, like who would do that right ? But yes, there are a lot of people who don’t utilize the brain as how God intended for us to use it.
Fun fact : common sense isn’t that common
14. Smart shopper. Sell away your stuff to earn back what you spent. If you can’t earn it back in two months, you shouldn’t even buy it.
15.If no.14 was to earn back what you bought, this is to sell everything that you don’t need. Till there’s nothing left to sell. Till your best friend is eBay and till your children think they’re next. Haha. This is to declutter all unnecessary things and earn you money from stuff that you don’t use or need anymore. This is a treasure chest. I earned a couple hundred dollars from stuff that was just lying around collecting dust.
16.Put all loose change in a jar at the end of the day. Not that it makes a huge difference, but you’ll be surprised with the end of month result. Send that coin jar to the bank. I had $300 worth of lose change and notes stuffed in a jar once. Money falling out of the sky basically.
17. Eat at home as much as you can. Do yourself a great favor and learn how to cook. It’s an essential life skill.
18.Spend date night by doing activities that don’t use much money or that are free! Spend for a movie ticket if it’s a movie that really requires it to be best enjoyed on a large screen. If not, HBO or Netflix it. Or rent a dvd on iTunes for 3-5 bucks.
19. Delete all unnecessary subscriptions. We spend a lot on gym memberships, club memberships, online courses , sports channels and movie channels that you don’t even watch that often anyway. This will reduce your responsibilities in your R & O and maximize your earnings and savings.
20.Listen to the Right people. Always ask how successful friends do it. Look out for good financial advice but be aware of what’s good and bad. Always discuss with your spouse or a wise, professional and reliable friend who can guide you to the right path of financial intelligence.
So there you have it. 20 everyday tips that you can do to move forward to attaining financial competency and maximizing your money.
It took a really good friend to sit me down and jolt me to realizing my relationship with money. And I’m grateful to her for it till this day. Though she didn’t teach me any particular method or anything like that, it was her interest to see me succeed that really touched my heart. That pep talk really changed my life around.
I bid you adieu and have an awesome midweek bambinos!!!
-LM
Simplelifedaily 