Personal Finance Series: No 13 – Why Vacations Are Sacred Spending

Some personal finance experts are popular all over the world because of their principles, concepts and ideas. They have shared their expertise on money management and saving techniques through their books and lectures. These authors have helped people live financially comfortable life by providing easy to follow techniques. We will have a glimpse of some personal finance gurus, who have been providing the right financial advice to their followers. Dave Ramsey: Dave Ramsey, popularly known as “Debt Free Dollar Man”, is an expert in personal money management. He offers financial advice to people about how to get control of their money and lives. Noted for his preaches on ‘How to get out of debt and stay out of debt’, Ramsey often talks to his clients in a nationally syndicated radio talk show in U.S. 1 best-selling book, “The Total Money Makeover”, which furnishes excellent advice on financial fitness. The book demolishes popular myths on personal finance. Robert Kiyosaki: Robert Kiyosaki is a well-known investor, educator and entrepreneur.

As these types of budgeting offers calculators you can calculate the loan amount without depending on others. It offers a tabular representation which makes it easy to process and calculate future payments. Your day to day financial activities are recorded for future references. A Personal finance manager alone can guide you through this imbroglio. This will help you to stay off from indulging in unwanted expenses. Its effective personal debt management keeps track of your expenses and guards you against falling into debt trap. It will also introduce you to many insurance policies and funds that will enable you to save for a rainy day. A personal finance software is a reliable tool and is like a good friend who will warn you of lurking danger. Your life will be secured if you give the reins to the personal finance manager. Expenses are numerous and it needs the ingenuity of a useful tool to track down. Expenses like house help, grocery, medical help, laundry, basic amenities, phone, mobile, transportation that contribute to the household expenses and the Lifestyle expenses include expenses on newspaper, clothing, entertainment books, personal care, eating out, travel, holiday, and club or gym membership all get incorporated in personal finance.

If you do clear your card monthly, the APR will not be as important as it is to those who do not clear their cards each month. Each month your card supplier will send you a bill stating the full amount you owe them and the minimum payment you must pay by the due date. If you do not meet this date you will be charged a late fee and perhaps other penalties depending on the terms and conditions of your supplier. So you can pay the minimum amount specified, or the whole amount, or any amount in between. The important thing to understand is you will NOT be charged any interest if you make full payment. But, if you do not pay off the whole amount, you will pay interest charges on the amount left. This interest will be added to your next bill. The interest you will be charged is that you agreed to when you signed up for your card. And compared to, say, a bank loan, the interest, or APR, is very high. So it is possible to start a spiral of debt in this way if you do not know how these things work. Always borrowing on your card without paying it off each month will accrue high interest charges which you will have to pay eventually. Do not misunderstand me here. I am not saying you should never use your card if you cannot pay it off in full at the end on the month. I am saying your personal finance basics should be good enough to inform you when you can do this and when you should look for another source of funds.

Let’s face the facts; one of the hardest things to manage is, of course, your personal finances. However, a lot of people do not know what it means to manage their personal finances. The good thing about this is that you can ask yourself four main questions that will be able to answer this for you. These are questions that can help you see if you have managed your personal finances the right way. Learning to do this is one of the hardest things that you can do. However, if you get to the point where you can do it, then you will live a very happy life. The first question that you have to ask when looking at how to manage your personal finances is, can you meet your living means without using a credit card? This means, can you get by month after month without having to have a lot of credit card debt?

As long as you have earned income, an individual can contribute to a Roth IRA up to the amount of his/her earned income or $4,000 (increases to $5,000 in 2008), whichever is less. For a married couple, both spouses can each contribute up to $4,000 for a total of $8,000 (increases to $10,000 in 2008). Think of it this way, some part-time workers don’t even pay income tax, due to their low income coupled with qualifying deductions. In such a case you could actually make Roth IRA contributions which would not be taxed, and the account would never be taxed. Some people make the mistake after graduating from college of buying a really expensive car, I guess as a reward to themselves for all of the hard work they put forth to earn their diploma. This is absolutely one of the worst, albeit most common, mistakes young adults make. Why? Because after buying a BMW at 22 years old, do you think we’ll buy a Honda or a Mercedes at 25? Of course, we’ll buy the Mercedes because we don’t want to go backwards on the “perceived” quality scale.

ERTC

Tell me what you liked about the post!

Powered by WordPress.com.

Up ↑

%d bloggers like this: