5 Easy Money Management Tips You Can Do NOW

I want to talk about money management today, and I know what you're thinking. Whoa, money management is probably like the number one stressor in your life right now. I want to talk about five easy money management tips that you can start implementing today. Starting now, it's so easy and it'll help you get back on track with your finances so you can bust through this year with money confidence. Hey guys, it's Justine with Debt Free Millennials. I talk about all things related to getting out of debt, budgeting, traveling debt-free, and living a debt-free life. So if you're interested in learning more about that, please be sure to hit subscribe and like the video. All right, the first easy money management tip that I have for you is spend no more than one hour preparing your monthly budget. So that means taking an account of all of your past month's spending and income and tracking that in a written budget. Now, you can use the exact budget toolkit template that I use to track my monthly income and expenses using the budget toolkit. I'll link to that below. But otherwise, you need to have it written down in some place and spend no more than one hour doing this, guys. It doesn't take that long, and it's a very easy way to see exactly what categories you're spending on the most and where you can prioritize your money for the next upcoming month. Tip number two, set a spend limit with your boo. So I have a $100 spend limit with Kyle. That means if I'm considering making a purchase that's over $100, first, I'm going to check in with my accountability partner, with my husband. And I'm going to say, hey, this is something I want to buy, but it's over $100. Likewise, he's going to do the same thing for me. So we talk about that purchase before we actually go out and buy the thing. So this helps you avoid impulse purchases, and then really kind of checks in to see, okay, is this big item, whatever the cost threshold might be for you, you can set a spend limit for $50. And if you're considering a purchase over $50, and you check in with your accountability partner first before you make the purchase. So it helps avoid impulse spending, and it helps you stay within your budget. Tip number three, keep your spending where you can see it. So I mentioned the budget toolkit, but you can also use a simple sheet of paper and pencil, use a journal. I even had worked with a couple through my budget bootcamp program, where they used a whiteboard and they stuck it to their fridge. And every single day when they came home from work or going out, they would mentally note, what did they spend money on? And then they would track it on a whiteboard and update the totals throughout the month. And then they could easily see where their money was going and keep track of it on a weekly and daily basis. So keep your spending where you can see it. If you aren't going to check an app, and you're not going to log on to your computer, I highly recommend doing the whiteboard method or having some sort of journal that's always out on your counter. Tip number four, automate your transfers. I love set it and forget it methods. And that's no different with how I handle my money. So if I'm saving for a particular fund, or I have my retirement accounts that I want to automate, literally you can set this up, ask it to do monthly transfers, weekly transfers, whatever it may be. There's a really good online savings account. You've probably heard of it, Ally, anyone? So Ally, you can set up automatic transfers to go into your savings accounts, online savings accounts with Ally. And you can set it up for specific days, months, weeks. You can even set up a yearly contribution into your online savings account. It's awesome. And I highly recommend it for those of you who forget to save on a monthly basis, or you want to get into the habit of saving and you don't want to manually do it. It's perfect. Automate your transfers. That's something you could do today, literally today, right now. And tip number five is to take no more than 45 minutes a week to learn something new about personal finance. Now, this is something that I did back in 2011, 2012, when I was just starting my debt-free journey. I was reading books, blogs, articles, anything I could get my hands on to help me with my debt-free journey. I'm guessing that's why you watch these videos. But what if there was an online course where you could get that private one-on-one learning through a tool from a millennial who's been there, done that? Yeah, that's right. Debt-Free Millennials has an online course called The Freedom Project. And it takes no more than 45 minutes a week to get through the videos. So I have snack-sized videos that you can watch whenever. It's through a platform called Teachable. So it's a really easy learning tool for you to dig in, watch the videos, or you can just listen to the audio on your phone. And I give you action items at the end of each lesson. I've broken it down into four main topics. So I talk about debt-free mindset, budgeting, saving for an OSHIP fund, and ditching debt, especially when it comes to student loans and credit card debt. Those are the two biggies that I talk on. And I give you the actual strategies and step-by-step show you how to make it happen. Plus, you get access to a whole bunch of other money resources and freebies. So if you are making money a priority this year and you really want to change your behavior and your attitude towards money, I would definitely consider checking out The Freedom Project. I will link to that in the description below. It's a course that has come out of my personal experience of paying off $35,000 in student loan debt. And I was making an average of $37,000 at that time. And I paid it off in two and a half years. So it's all of my experiences broken down into one course, one place where you can access everything. Make this year your year to get better with your money. Even if it's just one thing that you can take away from this video, you can implement it right now. So go ahead, get going. I can't wait to see you crush it.