Financial bad habits are scarily enough not the most obvious. It’s not the occasional bet, though that can be a problem. Not alcohol, unless it is addiction. Bottom line, most people can spot where there money goes because it is what, traditionally, people have called ‘vices.’ And that means most folks can control them, or choose to indulge. But what happens when you have all those things under control, where does the rest of the money go?
Many of us are information junkies.
Now you could think that it’s just the internet, or the TV. But seriously, how many magazines and books do you actively buy? And they have their own excuses: you need them to keep up with your field of expertise. You have a long journey. I was surprised when I worked out that every time I took a train journey I bought a new puzzle magazine or something related to an interest I had. That worked out at my whole Christmas budget for the kids toys over the year! Terrible, and I could curb it. I now take a book with me that I have borrowed from the library.
Buying top brand products
You don’t need to buy top to get the best look. Have you considered how quickly a look’ goes out? Instead, get something that is fairly basic and simple but dress it up with some additional accessories. Scarves, ties, bags, belts, shoes, even bling. Save money by buying supermarket basics and then spend some of that on the accessories. Overall you save money, and you will have a wider choice of mix and match.
Driving the car everywhere
I live on a road where there are two primary schools – that’s those kids who are under 11 so generally most of them need mum or dad to bring them to school. But because of the area that they come from, most could walk. (I admit here that we drive my kid to school, but then it is 2 miles away!). Do they? No. The car is the thing. It is considered a time saver but the reality is it saves just minutes a day. However with the soaring cost of fuel it is costing near enough 30p a mile (in the UK). Now say the furthest distance from school is a walkable half mile, that’s a round trip of 10 miles a week (0.5 x 2 – there and back – x2 trips a day x 5 trips a week) £3. And do that 40 weeks of the year and you are talking best part of the Christmas budget, again! And that’s just the school run. Share that across all the other wasted journey time…
Perhaps the biggest bad habit of all though is not knowing where your money is actually going. You really should consider getting some simple home accounting software. The amazing thing about money is it’s like kids: if you aren’t watching it then it will disappear and get up to some mischief somewhere that you aren’t aware of, and probably don’t approve of.
Keeping a log of where your money goes, and on what, will mean that you are able to far better control your money and make the decisions of where and what you are going to stop doing. So do yourself a favour, read some good reviews of home accounting software, make some decisions, and then get a package (even a free one) that will help you to control your outgoings and break some of those bad habits.
Article Word Count: 582
You must log in to post a comment.