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July 17th, 2008 — Personal Finance
Children are such precious little beings. They add that special something to our lives. But when they start to complain about wanting everything under the sun, we can’t imagine what that ’something’ is. Here are some tips for parents who are dealing with, or want to avoid, this classic syndrome that can affect children.
Don’t think of it as cute behavior.Continue reading the rest of this post - click here
July 2nd, 2008 — Personal Finance
A budget is a spending plan. It is your single best tool for knowing where your money is going and how much you have to work with. Of course, just the mention of the word budget can send even the most structured and organized person running for the hills. A budget, however, has several tremendous benefits. Among them are:
#1: A budget makes it easy to save and have extra money.
By tracking your expenses and income and controlling how much you spend on variable expenses, you will quite likely find that you have more money than you thought you needed.
What are you going to do with that extra money?
June 17th, 2008 — Budgeting, Personal Finance
Do you equate family finance with tax law? Does it seem like an overwhelming concept to develop a budget you can live with? If this applies to you, take heart - budgeting doesn’t have to be rocket science! Here are five tips to make creating a realistic budget easy:
Tip #1: Think positively about your money.
Money, and budgets, are not bad things. In fact money is wonderful!
June 2nd, 2008 — Budgeting
Sit amongst a group of friends and associates and mention the word budget, and suddenly everyone has somewhere else they need to be. Usually no one wants to talk about budgets, no one wants to think about budgets, and no one wants to follow a budget. However, when looked at with open eyes a budget is actually a fantastic thing. Here are three reasons why budget may become your favorite word):
Reason #1: A budget puts you in control of your money instead of your money controlling you.
April 17th, 2008 — Budgeting, Personal Finance
It’s really quite simple to create a personal budget with these simple steps.
There’s no question, a budget is the best way to gain control over your finances and live a life free of financial stress. Here are the simple steps to achieve this:
Step 1: Collect your financial information together.
This will include every credit card statement, bank statement and your receipts. Anything that documents your expenses for the last three months needs to be collected.
April 2nd, 2008 — Budgeting
Creating a business budget is very similar to creating a personal budget. However there are some differences.
When you own a business, taxes are not directly taken out of your income, which makes your income and any quarterly tax payments extra important to track.
Having an accurate and realistic budget will help you make accurate spending decisions and make it easier to predict profits. Which means the more frequently you track you costs, the better.
Here are the recommended steps for creating your business budget…
March 17th, 2008 — Personal Finance, Personal Finance Help
Do I need an accountant to create a business budget?
I’m a big fan of accountants, but that’s mostly because I don’t like taking the time to figure things out. When it comes to money, I’d much rather listen and follow the advice of an expert than to try to learn it on my own.
However, when you’re creating a business budget, you may not need an accountant. Here’s how to decide whether or not you want to go it alone.
#1: Do you have a solid understanding about what expenses your business is likely to encounter?
March 2nd, 2008 — Personal Finance
Living within your means is a liberating way to live your life. It means no debt - debt is one of the most common causes of relationship stress. Living within your means gives you the freedom to save money for special things rather than always scrimping to pay your bills.
Unfortunately, many people don’t live within their means. They live above it, way above it. This happens for many reasons. Maybe they just don’t track their expenses, and purchases are made without thinking. Maybe they’re trying to keep up with their friends and family. Maybe shopping is a misguided form of therapy. Whatever the reason, the end result isn’t a happy one.
If you feel that you could do more to live within your means, here are a few tips to help keep your life on track and your financial status right where it belongs…
February 17th, 2008 — Budgeting, Personal Finance
When developing a budget or financial goals it can be tricky to figure out how far in advance you should plan. If you’re too short-sighted you could wind up with savings that don’t meet your needs. Conversely if you think too far out, you could be putting some of that money you’re tucking away for your savings to better use.
Here’s how to figure it all out:
What are your financial goals? List your financial goals on a piece of paper.
February 2nd, 2008 — Budgeting, Budgeting Software, Personal Finance
Want to create a monthly budget but don’t know where to start? By using a simple spreadsheet program like Microsoft Excel you can create a budget in a few minutes.
Here’s how to get it done!
Step 1: Open Excel or your favorite spreadsheet program, open a new spreadsheet and give it a name. If you want to lighten up the budgeting process, give it a positive name like ‘The Best Life Budget’
Step 2: Create four columns and name them: Category, Monthly Budget Amount, Actual Amount and Difference. If you want to really track your budget on a closer basis, add a column for each week of the month. It will look like this:
Category | Monthly Budget Amount | Week 1 Spending | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Monthly Total Spending
