top money tips for 2016 Archives - Pennsylvania Debt Consolidation Quote

Continued from Top Money Tips for 2016: Part I

7. Educate yourself financially

If you can get a realistic idea of how finance works, and how it’s not always icing on the cake, you will understand that it’s essential to strive and hold onto your goals if you believe in them strong enough that it can lead you to success.

Even if it’s time-consuming, it is time well spent when you dig for financial information whether it’s in magazines, books, podcasts or a TV show, try to educate yourself because sources like these, they not only give the top money tips for 2016 but have various success stories and even stories of businesses and entrepreneurs who failed several times before launching their dreams and becoming wealthy.

8. Design the lifestyle you imagine for yourself

If you want to feel secure moneywise and also be able to call yourself wealthy, you need to stop spending money that doesn’t exist or spending money that exists but not for the things that you’re buying.

When you really commit to something and work hard, you can create a lifestyle where you might want to ditch the societal norms that you’ve been following daily, such as the 40-50 hours you work per week from morning to afternoon, following the same regimens over and over again, not having enough time for yourself.

Realistically you should create a lifestyle you feel comfortable with and which can stabilise your future finances. Having a lifestyle that allows you to do a happy job and make time for yourself at the same time can greatly improve your mood and add balance to your life.

Try something new if you’re able to, maybe it’s time that you don’t sweep away your ideas and start your own business.

9. Think about how to bring in more money

Whether you cut your spendings and boost your earnings by saving up or doing side jobs, it is possible to bring more money into your life.

24-year-old Brooke Saward, the creator of successful travel blog called World of Wanderlust shares some great money saving tips in one of her posts. She highlights that reducing things like phone bills, Internet subscriptions, switching to home-cooking rather than ordering take-out or skipping the expensive takeaway coffee can save a lot of money which can be an extra reserve for something else later on.

Additionally, there are many side job opportunities that you can do in your spare time or if you get time next to your other job, to bring in those extra dollars.

Anything from selling your old stuff online, pet-sitting, garage sales, cleaning or freelancing can help you to bring some extra cash to your life.

10. Operate Your Savings

If you successfully save money every other week or month, you should perhaps start thinking about trying automatic savings in your bank accounts. You can do this for example when you receive your paychecks. The earnings don’t just happen to go and get “saved” every now and then as one single payment, instead, they automatically get transferred from each paycheck to your savings account even if you only increase the amounts by a small percentage, it still makes a great difference.

11. Prosperity is not only about having money

Being wealthy is not solely determined by how much money you have. Yes, it can lead to comfort and joy but according to the famous blogger, Tim Ferriss, the value of money lies in the lifestyle you created for yourself by sacrificing every dollar to time and mobility.

Ferris himself is not only wealthy by doing a job he loves, but also because he devised his time and flexibility in a way that leaves time for other things, such as writing great books like the famous “4-Hour Work Week”, and also doing public speaking, interviewing several people and many other activities. You can learn from this that wealth highly depends on how much time and flexibility you put into planning a lifestyle that would make you happy and rich both emotionally and materialistically.

12. Don’t lose your money.

You don’t know everything that’s going to happen in the future and therefore, you may not be prepared for a possible financial crisis or certain financial factors that may positively or negatively affect your life. However, whether you want to keep the money, manage it or invest it, do it wisely because there is no worse thing than losing money superfluously without knowing the problems it may cause in your way of living.

Looking at the top money tips for 2016 may not be the shortest process and it might be difficult to go forth with a decision in terms of your personal finances.

However, if you put valuable time and energy into it and acquire the knowledge needed for managing your finances and set the necessary goals, it will put you on the right track to make smart financial decisions this year.

Learning how to manage your personal finances efficiently can be time-consuming because in order to get an overview of the top money tips for 2016 you might have to gather thorough research, do a lot of reading and filtering between certain strategies and categories which can be quite daunting.

Before you make any major decisions about managing your money or setting goals, try to mentally prepare first and know your situation with your money.

You need to ask yourself certain questions before heading onto any major decisions and setting goals in order to progress with your money managing.

Do you have credits to pay back? Are you in debt? Do you owe other people? Have you clearly thought through your incoming earnings relative to your outgoing costs? Are you a spender or a saver?

You must come up with a realistic conclusion as to what type of financial situation you are currently in and what you’re expecting to happen in the future.

How your money affects your life not only reflects a lot about your personality but it can seriously define your days, weeks, months and technically the rest of your life.

That’s why it’s a good idea to consider your personal finances wisely and take the time to plan and adopt the following money tips for this year if you wish to control your finances better.

1. Schedule an appointment with a financial advisor

It’s never too late to see an expert in the financial field. Don’t be shy to ask for help and turn to an advisor, because they really know their job. And even if it takes time and not all of the options work for you, the time spent on considering the following options will be worth your while.

Financial advisors can help you to start off with the money managing by looking at the following:

Your credit rating
Insurances such as health or home insurance
Debt repayments
Checking out deals for your mortgage
Personal assets, wages and earnings
Considering interest rates
Pension and retirement savings

2. Get into budgeting

Having an idea of where your money is regularly going, controlling it and building up a necessary plan are all vital to filter through anything that you don’t actually need in your life. This can be simply achieved by keeping a constant budget, because by doing so you can see where you’re money is going and where you’re money should be going such as:

Debt payments
Savings accounts
Future investments

The financial expert Whitney Johnson who co-funded the investment company called Rose Park Advisors thinks that smart proactive money making is important because it teaches you to work properly, to earn the money you deserve for the work and to save up from it because you’ve learned to value it.

3. Make a living out of doing a job you love

At times, you will get into the situation when the job you do will not satisfy you nor earn you a good deal of money. It might not be the dream job and believe it or not, most people start with jobs where they don’t necessary feel happy, but because of simple survival and needs, you always have to be humble and work hard in order to earn your living.

However, the point often arrives at which you question yourself whether you’re happy with what you’re doing, how you’re earning your living and how it is affecting your life. Are you going to keep chasing your dreams forever or be brave and give a shot to a job that would make you satisfied in your life? There is no better feeling than earning money with a job that makes you truly happy in life.

4. Start saving for your retirement

Pension savings should be a financial priority because it’s going to cost you a lot of money sooner or later if you ignore thinking about it. Having a comfortable and secure life in your elderly years is going to make your future finances much easier for you and allow for greater financial independence. Besides, every cent you plan to save is a good cause that you’re making for your future self.

5. It’s all about perspective

If you want to be independent with your money you need to shift your mindset first. Being mindful and calm is highly important because at harder times finance can be difficult and may dispirit you. However, remaining positive and having an optimistic take on life can always help to keep a good and realistic perspective and weigh between the positive and negative things that affect your financial situation.

6. Have a plan

Creating a certain “emergency plan” for your finances by putting cash aside, is a smart way to manage your money because it allows you to reach for your reserves in the future.

Additionally, you should always keep your financial goals in your mind and make steps to reach your goals. If it helps, write them down and make a long-term plan and devise it in a way so that you will surely know how you will achieve those goals.

Continue reading in Part II of this article.