Joy Olivia Miller

Archive for the ‘Financial Tips’ Category

Finances troubling you? Are on the edge of financial ruin? Thinking of bankruptcy? Here are some ideas to help you get back on track.

Get serious. We all have tough times, but you can’t ignore or hide from your finances. Unfortunately, this problem won’t disappear, but the money will.

Make some changes in your finances. Look at your budget and alter your spending. Stop eating out as much, get rid of things that cost you extra each month and adjust your thermostat.

If the credit card ills seem too high, give them a call and ask for a reprieve. Usually they’ll give you a lower interest rate for 6-12 months. That’s just free money while you are paying off the debt.

Some experts think you should have a cash cushion for emergencies. They say keep three months of living expenses in a savings account. But let’s get real. If you had that much money, you probably wouldn’t be in this mess. Start modestly at $50 a month and let it build. Changes are, you’ll need the money before the 3 months of earnings is accumulated, but who cares? At least you had a stash to go to.

Set goals and write them down. You must write them down on paper, stick them to the fridge or wall, and make plans on how you can reach these goals. It can be a simple palm, $1000 in savings by the end of the year. Then calculate how much from each paycheck you contribute. Or you can say – I’ll pay off this visa in one year – and stick to your goals. You’ll feel better and so will your wallet.

I hope these ideas can set you on the right path. The bankruptcy path isn’t always the best way out. Take charge of your life, not charging your life.

With a complicated and confusing economy, many people are looking for Christian financial advice that will help bring security in these insecure times. Whether you are just beginning your journey, wanting to rebuild after a crisis, or simply seeking advice for achieving a stronger financial future, there are basic principles that will always apply and, if followed, will bring success. Too often we want quick remedies when lasting prosperity comes from a strong and properly built foundation. True financial freedom is reached one step at a time and involves hard work, careful planning, and personal discipline.

“Good planning and hard work lead to prosperity, but hasty shortcuts lead to poverty.” Proverbs 15:22

By following simple advice and smart money management tips, financial freedom is still possible, even in the most difficult and uncertain economies.

1.Build on Biblical Principles.

“My God shall supply all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” Philipians 4:19

It is easy to place confidence in our own wisdom and success during times of prosperity, but when we face a crisis or encounter a threat to our future security, we begin to realize the true weakness of our financial foundation.

It often seems as if we live in a world where financial success is simply an illusion – the proverbial house on the sand that creates temporary feelings of grandeur but is unable to withstand the storms of life, so it is washed away with the tides of economic change. We believe we have done all the right things so we are devastated when we find ourselves sitting amidst the rubble of poorly devised financial plans.

The only way to true financial security is to build on Biblical Principles. We need to “cease from our own wisdom” (Proverbs 23:4) and rely on the wisdom of the One who promises to guide our steps and supply our needs.

Changing the way you view your finances by committing to follow Biblical instruction is the first step in achieving the financial success you have always dreamed about.

2.Be a Wise Steward.

“Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy.” 1 Corinthians 4:2

The road to financial ruin is usually paved with bad decisions, unwise spending habits, and poor budgeting. To enjoy financial success you must take care of your money and develop a plan that will allow you to track your expenditures and achieve your goals. To be a wise steward you must:

a. Develop a Budget – A detailed budget is crucial in helping to maintain a clear picture of your financial situation. Knowing where your money is going will help reduce irresponsible spending, prevent unnecessary debt, and allow you to stay in control of your finances.

b. Eliminate Debt – Debt is never a good thing, and too much debt will create stress that can affect every area of your life. Proverbs 22:7 tells us that the “borrower is servant to the lender” and true financial freedom comes when you take the steps necessary to simplify your budget and eliminate debt. And, a lack of debt will inevitably result in more available funds for wise investments, putting your money to work for your future. If your budget has become completely overwhelming, you may find it helpful to consider one of the many available debt relief options.

c. Develop Wise Spending Habits – Good habits usually bring good results and wise spending is a key to smart money management. Excessive credit card use, committing to deferred payment plans, leasing a vehicle, or borrowing against your home may sound like appealing ways to make desired purchases, but high interest rates and depreciating values could leave you with a mountain of debt and a heavy financial burden. Carefully considering purchases and avoiding impulse buying will help you avoid difficult situations.

d. Prepare For the Unexpected – Unexpected expenditures can shatter your neat and tidy budget and cause significant stress. If you are able to set aside a little money each month in an emergency fund, you will be better equipped and prepared to deal with problems when they arise.

3.Seek Wise Counsel.

“Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed.” Proverbs 15:22

Developing or writing a financial plan is an important aspect of future financial security. Consulting an expert in financial planning will help you set goals, maintain focus, and make wise decisions. Choosing the right investments can be confusing, and a golden opportunity can quickly become a devastating mistake so, too often, we avoid it altogether. Seeking the advice of financial planners who understand Biblical principles will allow you to make smart investment choices that align with your goals and provide future security.

Biblically based Christian financial advice will help you get your finances in order so you can enjoy true financial freedom.

Almost everyone dreams of being able to become financially free one day. Being in a good financial position will allow us to experience a greater quality. The better your quality of life is, the more time and freedom you will have. Time, stability and wealth all lead to less stress and more happiness. One of the biggest killers in the US and Canada is heart attacks that are caused by excessive stress. One of the biggest causes of stress is financial strain.

So how do we get there from here? Here are 5 tips to get you there:

1- Conserve:

No matter how big or small your income is you must learn how to conserve your income by budgeting. If you are truly serious about becoming free, then take this step very seriously. Millionaires and even billionaires are very conservative with their money and that is why they always have it. Poor and middle class people tend to be more wasteful. Cut down on all excessive spending.

2- Debt Elimination:

Financing and credit cards are the biggest ball and chain. These two financial killers will keep you in slavery for the rest of your life. Most people purchase oversized houses and expensive cars. There is a time for living extravagantly but that is only after you have become financially stable and free.

Most people will get married and then save for a few years to scrape up a small down payment for a home. Then they go out and borrow even more money for an over priced car. Then they struggle against the constant rising inflation. Then they end up getting chained to their jobs for the rest of their lives. Do yourself a huge favour and sell that overpriced car if you have one. Buy something more affordable. If your house is eating away at you too, sell it as well. It is time to clean house and eliminate all outstanding debt.

3- Elbow Grease:

Now it’s time to role up your sleeves and put in a little elbow grease. Put in some overtime each week or get yourself an additional part time job to boost your income power. Most people are not willing to do this step because they are so preoccupied with their spare time. Sure having time off for rest and leisure is important but working only 40 hours per week isn’t going to make you financially free.

4- Financial Education:

Go to the library or bookstore and find wealth building books that will assist you to increase your financial IQ. Have you ever heard the expression to think and act like an entrepreneur or successful person? Well these books will assist you to do just that. They will assist you to change your financial blue print. For some people this blue print may be set at thousands and for others it’s set at millions.

5- Investing:

Investing will allow you to build passive income. Passive income will keep on growing without your constant supervision and effort. This is what the wealthy used as leverage to take themselves out of mediocrity. There are only 24 hours in a day and only so much that you can do all by yourselves. Passive income can have your money working hard for you. Forms of passive income opportunities include: Stocks, bonds, annuities, network marketing residual income, Laundromats and real estate.

6- Plan:

In order to become successful using the steps above, see a financial planner and get a professional plan of action set up. The planner will take your personal financial situation and set up a realistic budget and debt elimination strategy. Once you have a plan written down on paper, sign and date it. Keep this plan in a place where you can see it daily to keep you disciplined and focused on your financial goals.

To get your financial goals in check it’s important to understand your unique circumstance. First, you need to understand how you accumulated the debt. Was the debt accumulated due to car repairs? Shopping? Education (student loans)? Vacationing? Once you identify the reasons, then you can plan accordingly. Decide whether the debt is good debt (potential for increase in value, such as education) or bad debt (no potential for increase in value). Next, prioritize your debt with the highest interest rate because the card with the highest interest rate is more expensive.

Example: ABC Credit Card 24.99% APY

XYZ Credit Card 12.99%APY

Department Store Credit Card 7.99%APY

Student Loans 4.00% APY

Typically, student loans have the lesser rate. You shouldn’t get too overwhelmed about student loans. Understand that it further provided you an education you may otherwise have not been able to afford. You also may be eligible to deduct up to $2500 of your student loan interest, while the other debts you can’t.

Payoff Debt – Next you need to set a plan to payoff debt. The card with the highest interest rate is paid off first or pay off the card with the smallest balance first. By paying off the smallest balance first, it will provide a psychological payoff. Remember, the Generation Y crowd needs immediate gratification. I mean we are the “iPod” Generation. Using the latter approach you will stay motivated because you will see one of your debts erased.

Decide on an affordable payment to pay the card that carries the highest rate (say $50 over the minimum), and pay the minimum on the other credit cards.

Once you finish paying off the first card, you can use the same payment schedule to pay off the next card. While the first approach may take a little longer, it will save you more money on interest. I recommend either approach. The most important aspect is you stick with the plan you choose.

Once you paid off all the bad debt (such as the credit cards in my example) then you can put more towards your student loan(s).

Reduce your Spending: The easiest way to do this is to literally write down everything from how much money you bring home to what you spend your money on. Write down EVERYTHING you spend your money on a month, including manicures/pedicures, gym membership, etc. Next, assess where you spend the most money. Is it rent/mortgage? Dining out? Entertainment? Shopping? Etc? If it’s shopping, then reduce the shopping. If it’s eating out, then reduce eating out. You will better monitor your spending when you see how much you spend your money and on what areas.

Stay motivated when paying down debt. Have a vision to be debt free. Remember, there’s lots of freedom to being debt free.

Take an initiative in understanding YOUR personal finance. I’m sure there are applications for iPhones and other cell phone devices that provide quick information from the swipe of a finger roll. Read books and blogs about personal finance. Applications such as Mint are free websites to help manage your finances.

Set goals and reward yourself. For example, if you paid off a credit card then go out and buy yourself something you can afford with cash.

Purchase items that will benefit you in the long run - Deciding between wanting to purchase and needing to purchase. If you need to purchase, then it’s for the long term. If you want to purchase, then it’s only beneficial for the short term. When looking at a purchase, don’t buy it right then. Walk away and come back to it in a few months. If you still want the same item at that time, then purchase it.

Additional Tips to Organize your Finances:

Use Billpay to pay your bills. It’s so much easier and takes less than 1 minute to pay all your bills.

Keep records for your income tax. It will help with itemized deductions.

Use Mobile banking, if applicable.

To make managing your money easier use a free program, such as Mint or ClearCheckbook, which is another free website.

Automatically contribute to your retirement savings and emergency fund.

If possible, begin investing in an investment account even if it’s only $50 a month. That’s $1.67 a day! It’s that easy to get out of debt. Start now and see how quickly it can happen for you.

Young adults in their 20s and early 30s face bigger challenges than ever before in gaining financial security.

In the UAE young expats have more disposable income than their ‘back home’ counterparts, there are a plethora of tempting pleasure goodies you can waste your money on – eating out, clubbing, fast cars etc.

So before you go wild here are three top financial tips to help you manage your money and plan for your future:

1) Start an emergency fund. The uncertainty of work overseas without safety nets of employment law and redundancy rights could mean that your working life may see a number of job and career changes. Building up an emergency fund (while fully employed) to cover three to six months of living expenses can help you through a difficult or job changing period.

2) Start saving immediately for retirement. Saving for retirement is a responsibility that everyone starting out in the workplace today should take very seriously. It is difficult to predict what kind of pension benefits will still be available 30 – 40 years from now but it is almost certainly going to be less than today and that is not enough for today’s pensioners! While age 65 may seem a long time away, the key is to use the time and the power of compound interest to build your pension pot – you will need about 70% of your last year’s income to have anywhere near decent retirement.

The earlier you begin the less money you will have to put aside each month to reach your savings goal.

3) Use credit cards wisely. Young expats are good targets for Banks credit card departments. It is now virtually impossible to conduct some transactions, such as making airline ticket reservations online, without one, and thus they have become an absolute necessity. They also have the potential to create debt problems. Paying off the full balance each month is the best way to control your use of credit.

People in immense amount of personal debt are looking for ways to come out of there financial troubles and hence, they are looking for some personal finance tips. There are a number of methods which can help the consumers to get out of their debt. These methods are bankruptcy, debt management, debt settlement and debt consolidation. Though bankruptcy is one of the traditional methods of debt relief, one should always try to avoid it unless there is no other hope. But till then, it is better to explore the alternatives.

Debt settlement and consolidation are the two major relief programs which work well for the consumers. Debt management on other hand is a kind do-it-yourself method where the consumers need to manage their debts and finances and then repay the debts in full. These question of legitimacy is reduced to two known methods of debt settlement and debt consolidation. Consumers need to remember that these programs will work only when they are legit. If not, the consumers will be fooled by fake and fraud companies and there will be no positive end result in terms of debt elimination.

A legit settlement program works well. It is capable of eliminating at least 50% of the dues that the debtors have. In a settlement program the negotiator from the settlement firm contacts the creditor on behalf of the consumer and intimates the creditor that the consumer will not be able to repay the debt in full. A formal letter is sent to the creditor and then when the creditor sells off the debt to a collection agency for recovery, the negotiator contacts the creditor and offers a repayment of 30-50% of the total dues in lump sum. The creditor also faces an implicit threat that the consumer will file for bankruptcy in the event of the creditor declining the offer. The creditor agrees to the deal and eliminates at least 50% of the whole due and then the consumer need to give the remaining amount of money to the creditor within the time given.

A legit consolidation program is a bit different. Here the debt is not eliminated. The consolidator from the consolidation firm hired by the consumer contacts the creditors and ask them to reduce the rate of interest and eliminate some of the fees and costs of debt such as late fee, over limit charges etc. Here also the threat of bankruptcy is used to force the creditors to agree to what the consumer wants. Once the creditors remove these charges and reduce the interest rates, the loans are re-amortized and new repayment schedules are made. The consumer then need to pay the consolidator every month who will then distribute the money among the creditors.