One of my birthday resolutions was to be more careful with my spending. and to do so I had to sit down with: myself, my paycheck stub, checking and savings online accounts, my credit scores. I had to face MY FINANCIAL REALITY. I’m 31, have been in the full time workforce for almost 8 years. I have very little in my 401K, not enough in my own savings account, and I have two kids with no saving plan for either (HORRIBLE BUT TURE). I like many others, practically live paycheck to paycheck, have horrible emotional and impulsive spending habits.
Now I am obviously no financial expert but I’ve been reading and learning a lot from financial experts (DAVID BACH and Dave Ramsey to name a few) and gathered a few tips that have been working for me for the last few months:
- Face your financial reality—Know your income and know where your money is going. Pile up any medical bills, past due bills, bills in COLLECTIONS and start paying them off; smallest to largest using what is called the SNOWBALL method by David Ramsey
- Have daily MONEY DATES—Check your bank account daily. I used to do this on a weekly sometimes even every 2-3 weeks (NO BUENO) and I would lose track of my spending. Doing this 2 times a day helps me with my impulsive spending habits. Knowing how much I have, reminds me if I have the extra cash for that coffee splurge or that 5.99 lipstick. I also sit down every Friday (I call it my FINANCIAL FRIDAY) and look at my transactions in detail to make sure they match with the budget I made for the week/month. I also check for any unexpected transactions. For example I recently saw two child care tuition checks that were cashed on the same day. Mind you I had given these paycheck almost 3 months ago.
- Fix any money leaks—Subscriptions you might have forgotten about! You might have magazine or iTunes subscriptions you totally forgot about but still have automatic payments deducted. Amazon prime but you don’t really use it? Even if you do want to keep them make sure you know the date that the amount is being deducted to keep track of that spending budget.
- Look out and eliminate bad money habits—STARBUCKS! I know I’m not alone on this one. It is so easy to just buy a 6-dollar coffee on your way to work because your early anyway right! . Helpful tip: BUY A STARBUCKS cup and pour your own coffee in it from home or from work, the IG pictures will be the same I promise (LOL)
- Have a grocery budget and stick to it: Try to plan your meals for the week and grocery shop according to your meals and snacks, it gets a little hard and pricey with kids (and a husband) lol but it isdoable. Get on the same page with your partner so they know why you have to stop buying 5 different types of fruits when in reality we only eat 2 types and the rest end up going bad. Just buy what you know you are going to eat. Lastly
- Spend every single dollar. Know your income, make a budget and spend every dollar, the trick here is spending a lot of it in savings and giving yourself an allowance, but every dollar should be assigned.
If you feel like you need a little more control on your finances, try these tips, and I hope they kick start your way to financial freedom as they have for me.
(previously published 1/29/18)
xoxo
Celeste Corona
Celeste Corona 
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