Fiscal Fallacies

I’ve always been in love with money. Since the days of Monopoly money and checking every public phone and newspaper machine coin return for change as a kid. The picture to your right is entitled “my hand on my nuts and a fist full of money… it all started here; that sums it up.

It’s not a greedy love, nor is it materialistic. It’s a love of being smart about the money you earn and making it work for you.

I can easily say that most people have no idea how to handle their money and end up wasting most of their lives working for waste. So, I thought I would take a minute and list a few simple tokens of advice in regards to personal finances.

Tip Number One – Use Financial Management Software: Since 1985 (I was just 10 years old), I’ve been using spreadsheets I created on my 386SX personal computer to track finances related to my businesses. Since 1994 when I started another one of my many small business ventures, I also started using Quicken and Quickbooks to keep track of personal and business finances. It’s the best thing anyone can do for themselves. Sure, nowadays your online bank statements are fresh and well designed, even including categories for expense items, but that’s not enough. You need a long term picture to really see what’s going on in your life, your budget and your future retirement. By combining all your accounts into Quicken and tracking every expense, income event, and investment you can see long term analysis of how you are making,, spending and investing money. Without this information you are consistently running blind and leaving your “should I buy it” decisions to the bottom line on your ATM receipt.

Tip Number Two – Create a Personal Budget and Stick to It: Once you have mapped out at least 3 months in software like Quicken or MS Money you can easily create an income and expense report that shows exactly where all your money went. From here you can start creating your budget based on the trends you see and those trends you would like to see changed. Analyze your expenses and see where you could cut back or consolidate, it can save you thousands.

Then, create a new spreadsheet in Excel and break up your expenses into categories such as Home (mortgage, utilities, phone, Internet, cable TV, etc.), Living (daily food, dining, and a misc category for entertainment, etc.), Auto (loan, insurance, gasoline), Loans and Credit Cards (any debts go here).

Below expenses, create a region entitled Investments to track IRA’s, 401k’s, College Funds, etc. Then, create a Personal Savings category to track emergency savings, vacation savings, new car savings, etc.

Finally, create an Income and Cash Flow area. Here you can track your monthly income from salary, contracts, allowance… whatever you receive on a recurring basis.

Import the data from your financial management software into the appropriate categories. When complete you should see a good picture of what you are doing with your money and be able to make adjustments that you can stick to. Remember, this is a living budget estimate and it will change as you see fit so you may be making adjustments to it often until you find that right mix of fiscal responsibility and reality.

Tip Number Three – Always Save for Emergencies: A portion of your income every month needs to go towards an interest bearing savings account (eTrade has 5% savings accounts) to be used in case of emergencies. This amount should be equal to what it would theoretically cost you to find another job. That might be 3 months or 9 months depending on what you do for a living. Keep in mind that you may spend $3/mo. on expenses now, but it may only be $2k/mo. when unemployed due to cutbacks. Figure out this number and start saving until you reach it. You can thank me later.

Tip Number Four – Keep Everything Separate: If you are married or co joined in some fashion, NEVER COMBINE ACCOUNTS! This is a fatal mistake that leads to divorce frequently. If you keep your money separate and simply split expenses based on the percentage of derived income, you never argue about money. I make a bit more than my wife so we split everything 60/40. We look at our budgets often and make adjustments as necessary to keep it fair. Our 14 years together is a testament to keeping finances separate.

Tip Number Five – Save Early, Often, and Use Your Tax Benefits: Start saving as soon as possible. This is common sense and the basis of compounding interest but we all know that times can be tough and you often need every penny. Sure, I didn’t save much in my twenties either, I needed every last cent to survive. But as soon as I landed a decent job and consolidated my credit card debt into my house I started saving early. I saved primarily through my company 401k programs. Do not forget this benefit… max it out every year if you can. It reduces your gross income and thus reduces the amount of income taxes paid while saving for your retirement. In 2007 the annual maximum contribution is $15,500/yr. and it goes up about $500 per year. Why there is a maximum I have no idea, but use it all if you can. If you have even more money left over send $3k to your IRA to adjust you gross income even more.

Tip Number Six – Never Carry A Credit Card Balance: I work in the credit card industry. I see what people do to themselves and its a shame. Sure, the banks should be ashamed that they are charging 30% interest, but it the consumer who should be most ashamed for accepting such rates and falling for scams. Don’t get me wrong, everyone should have credit cards to help their credit score, but do not carry a balance. Instead, get mileage cards, cash back cards, or affinity cards and make retailers pay you to use them! I average an income of over $500 a year by using my credit cards! For example, Discover gives you 1% cash back on all transactions. Use it for everything and pay it off every 20 days or less. It’s better than a second job delivering newspapers at 2am!

Tip Number Seven – You Credit Score matters… A Lot: This matters more than anything in our society and not just for getting a loan but it now also applies to getting a job too. Most employers now check your criminal history and your credit. ALWAYS 1. pay your bills on time, 2. check your 3 bureau credit report 2-4 times a year., 3. maintain available credit lines(e.g. unused credit cards and loans) NEVER 1. have > 70% of your available credit in use on a single credit card., 2. do not share your credit card with a wife, child or anyone. If they screw up it’s your life, not theirs.

Know your score, fix errors immediately, use credit wisely, pay all bills on time.

Tip Number Eight – It’s Easy to Make Money When You Have Money: This is what the rich won’t tell you. You may think your savings are paltry but it’s not how much you have but what you are doing with it. Never let money just sit in a savings account with little to no interest. Invest it in easily liquid able items like stocks, mutual funds, your education, your home, and anything that gains value. The rich let their money work for them and you should to. Use your new budget to save and put that money somewhere smart. I recently took a few thousand dollars of emergency savings and invested it in oil stock… I’m over 23% gain in just 6 weeks. That’s free money baby!