Jul
22
Saving From An Early Age
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One thing I stress to all the young ones I know is the importance of saving in your youth. Unfortunately, the younger a person is, the less they seem to think about the future. There are so many good options for young people trying to plan for the future. Besides normal savings accounts you could consider opening a Roth IRA account or a traditional IRA that comes with additional tax benefits. Remember that your investments are really worth a lot more the earlier you start.
One important aspect of saving that young people often neglect is budgeting. It is very important to budget so that you don’t look at your end of month bank statement and wonder where your money went. When you manage an organized budget, you can tell where every cent goes and thus can cut back where needed. For example, young people tend to spend a ton of money on going out to eat, but usually they don’t realize how much it really costs them until they see it on paper. If you eat out 3 times a week and spend $20 each time, you’re already spending $240 every month. And if you dine in you’re probably looking at a lot more. The most powerful budgeting tool in my opinion is on most of your computers right now. Excel has all you need to budget wisely.
After you have a set budget on paper, you can start allocating a portion to savings. Now that you can see exactly where your money is going, you can pick an amount you are comfortable with to be directly deposited into a savings account every month on the day you get paid. It is important to include the savings in your budget and treat it like a house or a car note. It must be paid every month. If at all possible make it a direct deposit so that you have no choice. Also I mentioned to do it on the same day you get paid. This will help you see that this amount is not really yours for spending. If it leaves your checking account on the same day your check comes in, you don’t have any time to accidentally spend it or time to justify spending it on something that YOU REALLY DON’T NEED! LOL.
By budgeting and saving from an early age, you can insure that you will have a safe financial future. But who knows I might lose a bunch of it in the stock market. Lately I have been learning how to trade options in the market, and have been doing pretty well for the time being, but even that is not too stable.
Jul
5
Resisting the Computer Temptation
Filed Under Spending | Leave a Comment
Well the other day I went to Best Buy, and decided to browse. My laptop battery is gone and so it requires me to keep things plugged in all the time. Not too fun, but not anything that will kill me.
So I start getting the idea in my head that I want to get one of those little mobile internet PC’s that are good for mainly browsing.
Could I justify that I should get one since after all my laptop wasn’t so mobile anymore? I stopped to ask myself some serious questions.
Why do I need this? Can I live without it? Will it really be of great benefit or is it just a novelty that will wear off like everything else? (Thats a long one) Will I really just be blowing money I don’t have to spend?
I am proud to say that after looking over the sleek and cool small PC’s, that I have resisted the temptation to buy one. In all honesty, I really don’t need one, and when do I actually not have a plug when I take my laptop with me to a friends house or stay at a motel occasionally?
If you don’t need it, resist the temptation to spend money that you can’t recoup in some valuable way. That makes me think of all the other gadgets which we could forgo. Hmm…… I may have to talk about that next time.