Commit. Plan. Take action.
These past couple of weeks, we’ve been talking about saving money to help you reach your financial goals. I shared 48 ideas to help you cut expenses and trim your spending.
Today, let’s dive in to brainstorming ways to boost your income.
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At the beginning of 2017, just one year ago, I resolved to better myself physically and financially. My credit score was around 420, I was living in a motel, and I was seriously overweight (around 280 pounds). I was spinning my wheels and needed to make a change.
By February, I’d paid off the biggest piece of debt keeping me from being able to move and in April we leased an apartment. Then I started focusing on my health and continuing on my current financial path. I continued to pay off debt and started to save money. In June, I had to use all my newfound savings for a medical emergency (doesn’t that always happen?). No matter what happened, I continued to push forward.
Skip to December 31, 2017, and my credit score is sitting at 650 (much better than earlier in the year). I’m also down 106 total from two years ago, 74 of which was lost in 2017. I also managed to establish some savings and established some credit for myself.
When entering 2018 I was kind of flabbergasted. What do you do when you come off a good year? How do you maintain momentum?
Keeping up momentum is something I’ve always associated with sports, running more specifically. I knew how to maintain and push through that way. A huge portion of that is the mentality, of course, so how do you maintain momentum when you’ve had a great year? Here are a few things I am doing to ensure my 2018 is just as successful as my 2017:
Each of these steps is something to consider when you are trying to maintain momentum in your personal life. Whether it is bettering your finances, doing better at work, or losing weight, you can keep climbing and reach your goals.
Have you had to find an innovative way to maintain momentum? Share it with us in the comments.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has transcended its role as a futuristic concept to become an integral part of our daily lives. Beyond its applications in various industries, AI has proven a powerful tool in personal finance, offering innovative ways to save money and make more informed financial decisions.
Unknown to many, there are 10 impactful ways AI can revolutionize your finances and contribute to significant cost savings.
Traditional budgeting methods can be time-consuming and prone to human error. AI-powered budgeting tools like Mint and PocketGuard offer a more thoughtful and efficient approach.
These tools use machine learning algorithms to analyze your spending patterns, categorize transactions automatically, provide real-time updates on your financial status, and even find you the best loans like NetCredit. By automating budgeting and expense tracking, you gain a comprehensive understanding of your financial habits, allowing you to identify areas where you can cut unnecessary expenses.
Investing can be complex and intimidating for many individuals. AI-driven robo-advisors simplify the investment process by using algorithms to create and manage a diversified portfolio tailored to your financial goals and risk tolerance.
Platforms like Betterment and Wealthfront leverage AI to optimize your investments continually, ensuring that your portfolio aligns with market trends and adapts to changing conditions.
Using AI isn’t just about growing wealth. It’s also about managing debts intelligently. AI-powered debt management tools analyze your financial situation, identify high-interest debts, and create personalized repayment plans.
These plans may include strategies for debt consolidation and negotiation with creditors. By leveraging AI in debt management, individuals can make informed decisions to pay off debts strategically, saving money on interest payments and achieving financial freedom sooner.
Retailers and service providers increasingly use AI to offer personalized recommendations based on consumer behavior and preferences. Apps and platforms employ AI algorithms to analyze your spending habits and present tailored suggestions for discounts, promotions, and cashback offers. By taking advantage of these personalized recommendations, you can save money on everyday purchases without compromising your preferences or lifestyle.
AI significantly promotes energy efficiency in smart homes, leading to tangible cost savings. Smart home devices with AI algorithms can learn your behavior patterns and optimize energy consumption accordingly.
For example, smart thermostats adjust heating and cooling schedules based on your usage patterns, reducing energy bills. Investing in AI-powered smart home solutions enhances your lifestyle and reduces utility costs, leading to long-term savings.
Many individuals subscribe to various services, from streaming platforms to magazines, and it’s easy to lose track of these subscriptions. AI-powered subscription management tools like Truebill and Trim analyze your bank statements to identify and cancel unused or unnecessary subscriptions. By eliminating redundant subscriptions, you can free up funds previously spent on services you no longer need, contributing to significant savings over time.
Understanding financial concepts and making informed decisions is crucial for saving money. AI-driven financial education platforms, like Albert and Cleo, use machine learning to provide personalized financial advice and insights.
These platforms assess your financial situation, offer tips for saving money, and even provide guidance on investments and debt management. Incorporating AI-driven financial education into your routine gives you the knowledge to make sound financial decisions, ultimately leading to long-term savings.
AI excels at predictive analytics, and this capability can be harnessed for effective expense planning. By analyzing historical spending patterns and external factors, AI algorithms can predict future expenses with a high degree of accuracy.
This foresight allows individuals to plan and budget more effectively, avoiding last-minute financial stressors and enabling better control over their finances. Whether it’s planning for upcoming bills or setting aside funds for irregular expenses, predictive analytics can be a valuable tool for saving money.
Financial security is a top priority, and AI is crucial in safeguarding your assets. AI algorithms analyze transaction data to detect unusual patterns and flag potentially fraudulent activities in real-time. This proactive approach helps prevent unauthorized access to accounts, protecting individuals from financial losses and the hassle of resolving fraudulent incidents.
Tax season can be stressful for many individuals, but AI can simplify the process and potentially lead to significant savings. AI-powered tax optimization tools, like TurboTax and TaxJar, use advanced algorithms to identify eligible deductions and credits, ensuring that you maximize your tax savings. These tools stay up-to-date with the latest tax regulations, reducing the risk of errors and helping you navigate the complexities of the tax code more efficiently.
From automated budgeting and intelligent debt management to personalized recommendations and tax optimization, AI empowers users to make informed decisions that contribute to long-term financial well-being. With AI technology advancements, managing finances has become more accessible and less daunting. Using these tools and using them to their full potential, individuals can take control of their finances and achieve financial stability.
Saving is a huge part of becoming (and remaining) debt free. If you don’t have an emergency fund things can pop up and cause you to rack up some serious debt. Similarly, you can go into debt buying things if you don’t save money for big events like birthdays and Christmas. But, saving money is hard. Really hard.
Thankfully, the internet has come up with fun, catchy challenges to make you more financially aware and help you save money. After looking at some of the different challenges, I’ve decided to create my own 12-week challenge for savings.
About five years ago savings challenges began popping up on the internet. First, it started with the 365-Day Money Challenge. This challenge lasts throughout the year, as the name suggests, and helps you put aside small sums of money each day. The first day starts out with you saving just $0.01.
Next, is the 52-Week Money Challenge. Like the 365-day challenge, it lasts the entire year. However, this challenge ends with a larger amount in savings and focuses on putting money away weekly. The first week, people participating in the challenge put $1 into savings and work their way up to $52 by the end of the year.
Both of these are easy and help people who aren’t so great at managing their money or saving get some cash put away (even if it is only a penny at a time). Many people have been wildly successful at saving this way. So much so that they’ve put other twists on it, like the Bi-Weekly Money Challenge, Reverse 52-Week Money Challenge, and the Mega Money Challenge.
For the most part, each of these challenges takes an entire year. If you’re also actively trying to pay off debt it can be overwhelming trying to put money into savings while effectively snowballing what you owe. That’s what got me thinking about a savings challenge with a shorter timeframe: 3 months.
Here is what I got figured out for a 12-week challenge…
For the first week, we will start by putting $100 into savings. Then, the second week, we will increase our contribution to $150 (making our total savings $250). Throughout the 12 weeks, we will alternate between putting $100 and $150 into savings. The fluctuation will account for the weeks we have “additional” expenses like health/beauty supplies or cleaning items around the house.
As I’ve been talking about for a few weeks, we are looking at moving… again. If you have been following the blog for a while, you know we started our financial journey while living in a motel (that is just a step above being homeless). We got moved into our apartment after that, then shortly after got the offer to move down to Atlanta. Since being in Atlanta, we’ve moved twice, and now we are just ready to move away from Georgia altogether. So, we started looking for cheaper housing to start saving more but questioned if it was the right decision.
The first thing you really need to decide is how much of your quality of living you’re willing to give up for cheaper housing. Cheaper is almost always going to mean giving up something. You may find it means shared laundry space, small living quarters, or heavily used appliances.
Consider how much money you would be able to save and how that would help the progress of your financial goals. Would that be worth giving up your quality of living for a short period of time? As a family, we’ve done this. We have been in a studio apartment for going on two years now and it wasn’t worth the discomfort we saved moving here. It has sent us running away from apartment living altogether. Giving up space was not the right decision on our part.
Which brings me to my next point, what are your limits when it comes to pursuing cheaper housing? Is it space, is it amenities, is it location? For us, being able to stay the next place we land for a while is important. We want to have a yard for our dog, extra room for expanding our family, and a home office. This way, we can stay put until we are either debt-free or ready to buy a home.
Another thing people often think of doing to help them financially is relocating. Especially now, when many people are working from home, relocating may be a good option. For instance, if you are self-employed, you may consider moving to a state with a lower income tax or if you are starting a family you may want to move somewhere with good schools and low property tax.
You may also find some rural areas have cheaper rent prices and even cheaper real estate. Those moves seem enticing when you look at the large savings, but you should also consider how it will impact your day-to-day life. How far will you have to drive to the store? Will you have to pay more for an internet connection?
There is more to making decisions about your life than how much money you’ll save making that move. You should consider your entire life, happiness, and long-term goals when you are making any big decision in your life, even if it is something as small as seeking cheaper housing.
When it comes down to it, making decisions about your everyday life should take more thought and consideration. For us, our next step will be to find reasonably priced housing that our family can grow into and stay in for a while. Somewhere we can reach debt freedom and start saving for our first home. To me, this will be the perfect find over saving (insert amount here) each month.
Readers, what things do you place more importance on when making decisions in your life? Have you ever made a similar choice about housing?
Upon entering the debt-free (or rather the debt freedom-seeking) community, I realized there are a lot more people who struggle with paying off debt than you may realize. There are thousands of personal finance influencers online and Instagram profiles documenting financial success. Seeing all of this success made me start thinking, do people really have a hard time paying the debt off, or are we each struggling to find the right path for our own family?
First and foremost, there is no doubt paying off debt is a struggle. There are so many things that stand in your way of being debt-free in this consumer-driven society. However, if you are paying off your credit card in full each month, but still holding on to auto loan debt, your focus may be misinformed. What most people are struggling with isn’t making the payments themselves but lacking a plan.
So, the thing to ask yourself is do you struggle with paying off debt or do you struggle with one of the following?
It seems that oftentimes before people face their debt they need to face the above issues. Really, people don’t struggle to pay off their debt. They struggle with rehabilitating the behavior that got them there in the first place.
So, that is really where you start if you want to get off on the right foot on your debt freedom journey. You take a look at your actions, bad habits, and a sincere look at your finances. Consider some of the following tips to help you get started.
When it comes down to it, there are families with a single income paying off six-figure amounts of debt on Instagram, Reddit, Facebook, and just about any other social site out there. How? They have made the decision to really do it. They made a plan, resolved to stick to it and work through any issues along the way.
So, readers, do you really struggle with paying off debt, or are you struggling with something else?
Enzo has brought so much joy into our lives that his presence is truly priceless but the cost of a puppy is real. First you have to pay for the dog, and if you are seeking a pure-bred dog they can be expensive. Once you’ve gotten a puppy you’ll have to pay for shots, dog toys, dog food, dog bed, vet checkups, training classes, treats and even puppy bath supplies. The cost of a puppy can get pretty high, especially within the first year.
Saving for a puppy is a good idea, especially if you’ll only be able to afford the regular month-to-month expenses of having a dog. To prepare for your first year of having a dog you should probably save (or be able to afford) the following:
If you want to try and save for the costs of your puppy’s first year of life you’ll want to save anywhere from a couple hundred to a couple thousand dollars. The good (and bad) news is is that they won’t stay puppies forever. Eventually he cost of having a dog will be spread out across the year.
A dog costs you about $695 per year. The various vet checkups, insurance and food costs are what really impact the overall cost. Here is the average annual cost of a dog broken down:
Budgeting for a dog can be difficult. You should always have some money saved in case of a vet emergency but, other than that, you only have to spend about $70 per month on your dog. If you are able to make your vet appointments during the last or first month of the year you’ll be able to save for exams as well!
In addition to the financial cost of having a puppy there are also other costs. You will have to spend a lot of time with a puppy training them and caring for them. There is also a possibility of losing sleep (if they have a hard time adjusting). Any way you look at it, a puppy or dog is a huge responsibility and they deserve all the love you can give them. Be sure you are able to afford and care for your pup before bringing him home.
Have you gotten a puppy and realized it was more responsibility than you could take on? What did you do?
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Social media has changed the world in so many ways (some good, some bad). One thing it has certainly done (for me) is provided me with new, interesting ways to think about things and approach projects. Recently, I have seen people choose a word to represent the year to come. Many people have chosen words like “hustle” or “positivity.” My word for 2023 is “productivity.”
Of course, everyone wants to be productive, but I chose this word this year because last year was really busy. Even though I was running around and felt exhausted and busy constantly, I didn’t get as much done as I wanted to. Then I came across this inspirational post on Facebook and it really spoke to me. It said…
Be productive, not busy.
When I read that I was like, “that’s it! That’s what I need to focus on.” It is kind of like that old adage “Work smart, not hard.” I want to focus on improving my everyday processes to reach my goals (both short-term and long-term). Before starting projects, I’ll analyze what the best approach is to protect my time (and money).
A lot of my productivity goals for 2023 will require a bit of planning. To start, I’ve begun waking up just a bit earlier every day and jotting down a brief schedule of what I have planned. If you saw my last post, I talked about my main goals for the year and I plan to achieve each of these by being productive and planning out my day.
For instance, to achieve my goal of learning German, I will carve out 10 to 20 minutes every day for a quick lesson. To be able to read a book a week, I am scheduling about an hour a day devoted to that alone. My goal of practicing self-care every day will be achieved by waking up just a little earlier and taking care of my skin and practicing yoga.
Our main finance goal of paying off at least half of our debt will also be helped along by being productive instead of busy. Last year, we were a bit frantic with our financial plans. This year, we will track every penny and have a set plan for paying off our accounts.
All in all, I am hoping that setting a goal to be more productive (and less busy) this year will free me up to do more of the things I enjoy, like spending time with my husband, hiking, reading, doing makeup, and crafts. As I’ve stated in the past, a huge part of me being successful in life, and in my finances, is being able to achieve a balance. That’s why I’m choosing to be productive and NOT busy this year.
Readers, do you choose a word to describe your year? What is yours?
This article is about the perception of different price action trading. It also includes various trading strategies and the way of reading the charts. It can assist in reading commodities, futures, and chart movements and creating personal process and its action. Some strategies are depended on the technical analysis and individual opinions. It is such a type of trading that incorporates both fundamental and technical analysis. It is needed to make the right decision at the right time. [Read more…]
The purpose of this blog is to take you through the exact process that my husband and I have used to pay off more than $65,000 of debt in 11 months on a single middle class income.
To get you started on your journey, there are a number of things you need to do get your house in order.
1. Make a promise and get your spouse on board
2. Calculate your net worth
3. Review the checklist for a strong financial plan
4. Set your goals
5. Track your spending.
This posting is about a key part of the process in your debt payoff journey – developing a debt payoff plan using the debt snowball.
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This step is where you determine which debt you will pay off first, assuming you have more than one debt. We need to prioritize your debts so that you will focus on paying off one debt at a time.
If you make extra payments at one time toward all of your debts or even just a few, it will take much longer to realize significant results. This may lead to feelings of discouragement and frustration with the debt elimination process.
By focusing your energy on eliminating one debt at a time, you will see quicker results and earn a greater sense of accomplishment for all your hard work.
You will work on paying off the smallest balance first and make the minimum payments on each of the other debts.
Put as much money as you can each month toward the smallest debt.
Once that debt is paid off, you will cross it off (and celebrate!) and move on to the next debt on the list. Add the amount you have been paying on your first debt to the minimum payment for your second debt on your list and that becomes your new payment amount for your second debt.
This is called the debt snowball method. As you pay off the smaller debts, the amount of money you have available to pay off your bigger debts increases.
You will gain momentum as you rapidly cross the smaller items off your list. Paying off the smaller debts quickly gives you a series of “small wins.”
In his book “The Power of Habit
By the way, Duhigg’s book is great, I recommend you pick up a copy
Let’s say your debt snowball looks like this:
Paying off your total debt of $31,850 probably feels overwhelming. Perhaps it is almost as much as your annual salary from your job. You might be thinking that it would be YEARS before you would be able to pay it all off.
And that might be true. It might be years but probably not as many as you think if you are intentional and focused on your goal.
Let’s say you work really hard in finding room in your budget (we’ll discuss strategies for this in a future post), and you are able to pay $500 toward Credit Card 1 each month while making the minimum payments on each of your other debts.
After two-and-a-half months, you have paid off Credit Card 1!
The following month you add $500 to the minimum payment for Credit Card 2. We’ll say that amount is $95. So in month four, you pay $595 toward Credit Card 2.
At that rate, it will take you about four months to pay off Credit Card 2.
After eight months, you have paid off two credit cards totaling $3,550!
Achieving those quick, small wins makes paying off your auto loan feel much more attainable. Your enthusiasm for paying off your debt has increased, and now you are even more motivated to pay off your auto loan as quickly as possible so that you can move on to paying off your last debt!
In month nine, your excitement spurs you to find an additional $100 in your budget so instead of adding $595 to your auto payment, you are adding $695 to your minimum payment of $250.
How long do you think it will take you to pay off your auto loan when you are making payments of $945?
Possibly only five months because your balance has decreased while you have been working your debt snowball even though you have only been making the minimum payment up until this point.
After thirteen months you have paid off three debts totaling $9,050, and you are able to add $945 to your minimum payment for your student loan!
Even though your student loan balance may still be over $20,000, you realize that in thirteen months, you have been able to pay off almost a third of your original debt total. And as your income increases over time, you will be able to pay even more toward your student loan each month.
In this scenario, I anticipate that it might take you another year-and-a-half to pay off the student loan. As a result, it has taken you two-and-a-half years to pay off your total debt balance of $31,850!
Exciting, right?
This is the method my husband and I have used to whittle away more than $87,000 of debt in 20 months on a single income, but our numbers were much larger.
If we can do it, you can do it too!
If you’re making good progress on your debt payoff and your credit is good, you might consider refinancing. If you’re going to do this you might consider going with a company like SoFi. They’ve been making waves with their low priced loans.