We don’t typically associate money with parties but I’m telling you, it’s a worthwhile association to make.
One of the reasons we don’t make the progress we want in our financial lives is because our financial to-do list continues to get put on the back burner. We have busy lives so when we don’t create the time for something (like dealing with our finances), the calendar fills up and we continue to not have time. It’s a vicious cycle.
Dating and early relationships can be stressful. Then add in money and it gets even more complicated.
Not only is dating expensive (hello inflation!), it can also be confusing. I always had questions like… Who should pay? Do we split? When should we talk about money? How do we split expenses? Is that a financial red flag? What are my financial green flags?
For many of us, money is a taboo topic that we don’t even talk about with our closest friends and family. This might not seem like a big deal, but it has some major repercussions. One is that it makes it a lot more difficult to reach our goals.
When the people who love us the most don’t know about our goals, they can’t support us. They might even unknowingly sabotage us!
And we’re back with part #2 of the results from the Fiscal Femme Anonymous Money Survey. If you missed it, here’s part #1. This time we’re talking about your systems and accounts.
While many of you shared your favorite apps (I’ll give you a rundown below), a great deal of you were also looking for recommendations. Stay tuned!
Secondhand Shopping 101: How I Saved $4,500 Buying Secondhand Furniture
Shopping secondhand can be a tremendous win-win and way to align our spending with our values. We save money because buying secondhand is often much cheaper, it’s better for the planet, and we’re not supporting companies and industries that exploit women. For some, the process can also be really exciting when you search and find something great.
Over the past nine years (the Fiscal Femme had it’s 9th birthday on March 2nd!), I’ve been creating resources to help you succeed in your financial life and reach your goals. And we provide many of them for free.
Here’s a roundup of my favorite free resources. Whether you are new to the Fiscal Femme or you just missed a few of these golden nuggets, I’ve compiled them for you here in one place.
How we traditionally set up spending plans doesn’t work because we aren’t accounting for the big infrequent expenses in our lives. Yes, there are things we can’t plan for (and that’s why we have our rainy day fund) but most of these expenses are things we know about or even things that happen every single year.
Why is this a problem? Not only does this way of spending keep us from planning and saving the way we want, it also makes our financial lives much more stressful. If I have to make a big expense in any given month, cash will be really tight and I’ll have to put the expenses on a credit card or pull money from savings. I have to spend the next month recovering (until another expense comes up!).
The good news is, I am excited to share a tried and true system to stop this spending and saving rollercoaster. Once you take the time to set it up, it will do the work for you and take the stress out of these larger more irregular expenses.
Okay, yes. For any of us who have purchased something and experienced a quick high, we know that retail therapy can work in the short-term. It can be a distraction or even a nice chance to imagine ourselves wearing or using the item we just purchased. That feels good.
What happens next provokes a vicious cycle. We may experience buyer’s remorse, stress about our new higher credit card balance, or feel deflated and guilty for failing to curb our impulses. We may already be looking for that next thing we want to buy.
We often make things harder than they need to be, especially when it comes to our finances. I’m guilty of this myself! I used to have a million bank accounts with a handful of bills coming out of each. I had a big blob of savings that was used for a variety of things. Very little was automated outside of my 401(k), and that even had some room for improvement.
To make our lives easier and less stressful, we can use automation to our advantage. Here are five ways you can automate your finances to reach your financial goals more quickly and easily.
