Getting Started With a Budget
Using a budget is one of the smartest money management moves you could make. For guidance on using a paper & pencil system, read the Budget Quick Start Guide and make use of the Cash Flow Plan, Cash Flow Tracker, and Recommended Spending Guidelines, all found in the Resources section. For help using the online tool Mint.com, watch my tutorials here, here, and here. And for help with the Envelope system, read this article.
Remember, “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty.” – Proverbs 21:5
There’s a new report out that says very few Americans are financially healthy. Working with researchers at the University of Southern California, the Center for Financial Services Innovation (CFSI) developed an eight-question survey that was taken by a representative sample of U.S. adults, leading to what it calls the U.S. Financial Health Pulse. Its results […]
If you’re really paying attention, life can be a very odd experience. Especially when it comes to money. For example, in troubled economic times, front-page newspaper stories regularly quote economists expressing concern that the personal savings rate is going up. I still vividly remember reading one such story during a previous recession. I had to […]
Those of us who write about money for a living can get a little carried away by some of the nitty-gritty details. That seemed to be the case in a surprisingly impassioned debate that sprang up recently over what a person’s higher priority should be—controlling spending or controlling saving. At first, it seemed kind of […]
I just signed up to do something I really don’t want to do, and I’d like to encourage you to do the same. Not the exact same thing I signed up for, just something you may not necessarily want to do. Let me explain. You see, there are plenty of things I want, and I’m […]
How in-synch are you and your spouse when it comes to money? On a scale of 1-10, with 1 meaning you’re living on separate financial planets and 10 meaning you complete each other’s financial sentences, where on the scale would you put your marriage? Now do quick reality-check by asking your spouse the same question. […]
What if there were a single step you could take to greatly increase your sense of financial control and confidence, decrease your financial stress, make your marriage work better, free up money for generosity, increase your savings, and speed the process of getting out of debt? What if this single step were available to you […]
A weekly roundup of some of the best personal finance articles from around the web. Is your brain wired for wealth? (Jason Zweig). A long read, but worth the effort for anyone who wants to invest better. 6 ways to lower the cost of college (The White Coat Investor). That ACT/SAT test prep course may be well […]
Would you like to achieve uncommon financial success? As I read the business classic, “Good to Great,” I couldn’t help but think that the principles used by the unusually successful businesses profiled in the book are directly applicable to how we manage money. In the book, author Jim Collins takes a close look at a […]
A weekly roundup of some of the best personal finance articles from around the web. 1 million kids suffer ID theft, so parents beware (CBS Money Watch). Checking to see if your children even have credit reports isn’t easy, but it’s important. Peer-to-peer payments carry risks (Chicago Tribune). With P2P apps, the rules are different, and so […]
Sheila has long been an expert at living beneath her means. Even when she was making a relatively low salary and living in an expensive city, she never worried about not having enough. She always had money in the bank. Because she grew up as one of five kids with a stay-at-home mom and schoolteacher […]
