Improve your financial life in 15 minutes or less

15 Mins PDF

We can often over-complicate improving our financial life because we might believe that improving our situation requires big changes. In fact, the opposite is almost always true. Improving your financial situation can often be accomplished by several little moves that mostly take less than 15 minutes to complete. You might be surprised at how quickly all these little moves add up and affect real improvements in your situation.

What are a couple of quick moves to improve your savings efforts?
If you already have savings, then take the time to ensure you are receiving the best dividend possible. It might require that you transfer to the best option with your financial institution instead of keeping it in the same account you always have. Next, make it automatic, set up a transfer each month or week, so that your savings deposit is on autopilot.

How can we quickly change our debt reduction efforts?
This is a two-step process. First increase your payments to an amount that you can comfortably reach and then set up the payments on auto pay. The auto pay feature will ensure that you don’t have to decide each month how much extra to pay. The automatic payment will force you to make the necessary adjustments in other areas of your spending and your debt reduction goals will be much easier to achieve. You’ll make the decision once, instead of every 30 days.

Are there any moves to improve your retirement efforts that are quick?
Most 401k plans or retirement savings options through your employer have two features that are very helpful. The first is the automatic increase in the contribution amount. Each year the amount goes up by 1%. This means that you don’t have to remember to increase it. The second feature is the automatic rebalancing option. Rebalancing is extremely important to keep your portfolio within your desired investment allocation. This feature will automatically rebalance your investments any time the balances are outside the tolerance level that you set for investments.

What are other quick moves to make your financial life less complicated?
Start by receiving all your statements electronically. You are likely not looking at statements that come in the mail and then have to deal with the clutter. Next, sign up for account alerts on all your accounts. Spending alerts can often change your behavior so that you begin to spend less. Next, put all your credit and debit cards into your FIs card control system so that you manage cards. Finally, get the app for all your favorite places so that you can get rewards and more easily manage your purchases and history.