A Penny Saved is a Penny Earned​

Are you too struggling with paying your monthly bills or zero balance in account in last week of every month? or paying credit card / personal loan EMIs every month?

Your 1 & 1/2 years old mobile phone isn’t turning on. You have been trying to turn it on since last night when it got turned off despite having full charge. It’s the last week of month and you have used up all your salary. You don’t have any money to get the phone repaired, let alone buying a replacement… What to do now? Well, you’ll have to either borrow money from a friend/ credit card or wait till end of the month to get this month’s salary.

Are you also living like this?

Does your life run Paycheck to Paycheck every month?

It’s so thrilling, isn’t it?

Yes, thrilling and tormenting as well when any such accidental breakdown happens. Or worse when any other emergency happens – like Global Financial Crisis, a pandemic, natural calamity – leading to salary cut or job loss.

When you are living Paycheck to Paycheck (sometimes even borrowing to pay monthly bills) you don’t even have a possibility to think about saving for emergencies let alone planning for future financial needs like retirement. Most of you would say, “I want to enjoy life to the fullest and I will change after marriage or with more responsibilities”.

Yes, a lot changes when you have responsibilities but not the way you live your life and spend your money – unless you don’t have any money anymore.

The Golden opportunity to establish your money habits is when you start earning money. You have to be careful with how you spend every penny of what you earn. First goal is being able to keep your expenses below your income. Also, don’t worry, if you are already stuck in the vicious cycle of paying credit card/ persona loan EMIs ,there is still hope. You can start working now, at this Moment towards balancing your cashflows and bringing your expenses below your income.

Below are a few steps that can help you take charge of your money:

1. Reducing vehicle related expenses– carpool opportunities to work, using public transport, keep it properly maintained (servicing and tyre inflation regularly), shift to smaller less maintenance cost vehicle

2. High interest debt reduction – payoff high interest debts even if you have to do it with 90% of your emergency fund, check if there is an option to refinance your car, student, credit card debt for a lower interest rate

3. Luxury items for pets – optimise what you spend on your pets

4. Curtail your spend on eating out – whether you realise or not eating out costs you more than twice of eating at home, limit those trips to coffee shop

5. Memberships/ Subscriptions – review your club/ gym memberships and discontinue the ones you used less than three days a week, asses your TV/ magazine subscriptions and keep only the ones you can’t find cheaper alternates for

6. Quit Smoking – good for your expenses as well as your health

7. Travel / Holidays – use Travel Credit cards to get Airmiles as reward points, find inexpensive entertainment options closer to home, be on a lookout for holiday package/ flight / hotel offers for the destination you want to visit

8. Get rid of addictions – Whether you get a high by shopping or by going to a high end saloon for haircut/ styling very frequently – both cost a lot and drain your salary

   
   

Start with above and see how and how much it impacts your cashflows. Also, do share whether it did or did not help you.

For customised solutions for your situation you can message me directly!

Do share your experience on how you balanced your cash-flow in comments.