If you are anything like me or most Americans, it is highly likely that you have some hopes and dreams of striking it rich and not getting up to go to the office the next day. I think we all would love the opportunity to spend our time doing anything besides our normal day job. We all have passions, hobbies, and obligations that we would rather be doing.
In reality, many people are able to spend their days doing all those other activities that they would rather be doing. The difference is that they got there through hard work and discipline rather than having some large inheritance or winnings. It was with a goal and a plan that they were able to live the life that they really wanted. The life of Financial Independence. The plan that they used to get there is called their BUDGET.
Anyone who has ever read any personal finance book, blog, website, or article knows that there are a million different "experts" on the subject of personal finance and budgeting.With each of those experts comes their own version of the simple method of understanding and planning your income and spending. Most follow the same rough path to get to the same place with your money. That place is to spend less than you earn each week, month, and year.
You may think that I will try to provide some new ideas on how to budget and get you where you need to be, which is to have a surplus of cash. I am not going to do that. I want to try to simplify the principles of budgeting to make it a less daunting task. I will also share some of the difficulties that I run into that I am sure others can relate to.
Step 1: Understand The Income Flow
The first step in planning how you will spend your money for a set period of time is to fully understand how much and how often you will have money coming in. It is important to focus on the Net Income for the purposes of budgeting. Net income is the amount you actually bring home to spend. Gross income includes all the money taken out for taxes, insurance, 401k deductions, etc. If you work a regular number hours per week you should be able to expect to receive almost exactly the same pay every pay period. This allows us to understand how much money is available to live on.
Personal Application:
For me this is the easiest aspect. While there are two incomes in our household, we primarily live off my income and my wife's is saved and invested. If that was not the case and we used her money for monthly expenses, being able to understand our income could be very difficult. That is because my wife is in sales and her income can vary by several thousand dollars per month, depending on her success.
Step 2: Understanding Spending Habits
Once we know how much money we have available to live on, we need to study where we normally spend it. There are several online tools available that allow you to see where you have been spending your money. This can also be done by reviewing your bank statements.
The most important part of this is to identify the unavoidable expenses, that typically are pretty consistent. Items such as mortgage, car payment, gas, groceries, child care are all categories we should know what we spend each month. Other categories such as vacations, dining out, and entertainment are things that if not planned, can fluctuate drastically.
Personal Application:
In our house this is probably one of the more difficult tasks. We fully understand our regular monthly expenses such as mortgage and car payments, etc. The confusion for us comes with our real estate investing business. Occasionally we will need to put some of our personal money towards a project for our business, and this can skew our spending.
Step 3: Plan your spending for each category
Once you fully understand where your money is going, you need to allot that portion of your income to each category. One category that most people forget, but is probably the most important, would be savings. Most personal finance experts follow the rule that you need 3-6 months of expenses in savings and readily available. I think the higher end would be perfect to avoid any big emergencies.
There are many methods of generating your savings but the best ideas in my opinion are the idea to pay yourself first and make it automated. If you make yourself and your savings the top priority when it comes to allocating your cash, you will be in good shape. The ability to automate savings also makes it so much easier simply because of the fact that if you do not see it, then you will forget you even have it until the day comes that you need it. This really allows you to build your account quickly.
Once you have your 3-6 months of savings accumulated, I would suggest making an automated investment account to help realize the positive effect of investing in mutual funds. That is a topic for a later date.
Personal Application:
For our family we allocate our spending in a pretty simple fashion. All monthly payments come out of a joint account. All personal spending comes from our own separate accounts. We pay our utilities and insurance bills each monthly automatically using 1 credit card which gets paid in full automatically. We also have a credit card used for our groceries and other household expenses. These are all paid from the joint account.
Step 4: Stick to the Plan
At this point you should be living by your written budget. Over the first few months you will probably have to tweak and adjust your budget as you learn more about your spending. That is just fine tuning. Unless you have an increase in income or a change in your expenses, there should not be any large changes.
Part of sticking to the plan is being disciplined to not blow the budget. Do not splurge if you do not have the money. Learn to say NO. It is the best way to stick to your budget. A couple other methods I like to apply to spending would be to evaluate if the purchase is a want vs. a need. I also like to analyze a purchase by thinking of how many hours I spend working to make that purchase.
Personal Application:
Our plan seems to constantly be evolving and changing due to new ideas and opportunities that we decide to take advantage of. The budget should be looked at as a living document that is always tweaking.
Step 5: Enjoy Life
If you can follow these steps to create and follow a monthly budget, I think you will 100% enjoy life more. Knowing where your money goes and how much is available to you will absolutely simplify your life and decrease your stress. You should no longer have to worry about money.
In addition to enjoying life, you should be able to accumulate wealth pretty quickly which will allow you added benefits later in life.
Personal Application:
We definitely enjoy our life, but its always work before play. The plan is to work hard now so we can both retire around 40.
A few added topics that can be considered in a budgeting discussion are:
Cash vs. Credit Card spending: This is a highly debatable topic that everyone seems to see differently. I think the most important thing is that if you use credit, pay it all off every month. I believe that the answer to this topic is based on each individuals income and maturity level. If you can successfully manage your budget using cash for 6 months or longer, then I would say you should incorporate a rewards credit card that is used to auto pay regular utilities and gas bills. As long as its all paid off each month. Do not use credit as your emergency fund.
Reducing Expenses: I personally feel that once you have your budget in place and are working hard to stick to it, it is a good idea to look for areas we can reduce spending. This is a good chance to find things that we can analyze as a want vs. need. I personally have set a goal for 2016 to reduce our household monthly spending by 20%. To this point I have gotten rid of a storage unit and changed my cell phone service and have saved $150 per month. This is roughly 8% reduction, but I still have time this year to find more savings.
That will be all for now. I hope any readers will enjoy this quick article on budgeting and hopefully it will help you get where you want to go financially.
Book Review - Bigger Leaner Stronger by Michael Matthews
If you could not tell by the title, this book is all about fitness. In the introduction the author Michael Matthews gives a good bit of background into is journey to becoming a successful fitness trainer, writer, and blogger. In many ways I feel like I had a very similar journey, though the fitness journey is never complete. In the book he details his many years of working out moving from the new popular program or new fad diet, only to see minimal results. After years on that path he decided to ditch what was popular and find out the science behind fitness.
Exercise
Most people believe that exercising is the way to get fit. After reading the book I have learned that it is merely a part of getting fit, and possibly a smaller part than we may think. The plan that is laid out in this book is to teach you how to burn fat and build lean muscle. This is the key to achieving the "Spartan Warrior" physique that most men strive for. In terms of exercising to achieve that goal, Mr. Matthews presents a plan that is rather simplistic yet effective. The main goal of the program is to progressively overload your muscles by lifting at a lower rep count while using roughly 85% of your max for each particular lift, after you have properly warmed up. In terms of what lifts to be done the focus should be on 4 compound lifts. Squat, Bench Press, Deadlift, and Overhead Press. These should be done in the 4-6 rep range and if 6 reps are achieved, weight is added for the next set.
The book goes into detail on training frequency and rest periods as well. It teaches you how to lay out a program for yourself that you feel may be most appropriate and also gives a few templates based on a 3, 4, or 5 day training schedule. One aspect that I know I will be using is the rest periods that are explained. When lifting at such a high ratio of your max, more rest is required. In the book he explains that many studies have shown that rest periods of 3-4 minutes are optimal for weight lifting programs.
Diet
As I mentioned that exercise is a part of the fitness equation, diet is a much larger piece of the equation. There is a great deal of detail on the science of how food effects your body and fitness levels included in the book. The science behind weight loss breaks down to a simple equation of energy in - energy out. If you bring in more energy(food) than you expend in a given period of time, you will gain weight. To fully understand how to manipulate this equation you must understand how much energy you expend in a day, or your Basal Metabolic Rate. He explains how to figure this out along with many other aspects of healthy eating to lose, gain, or maintain your weight.
A huge portion of the fitness calculation is the macro nutrients that you get through food and supplementation. The macro nutrients are Fats, Carbohydrates, and Protein. There is great info in the book on how you should plan your macro nutrient intake in order to achieve your goals.
Science
To me the thing that makes this book different from many other books and articles that I have written is that Mr. Matthews makes it a goal of the book to be sure that the reader understands exactly how anything you put into your body works and effects your body as it relates to eating for fitness. The amount of detail is extremely helpful to change the way a reader may think about foods or supplements. I think this is the most interesting aspect of the book.
Final Opinion
I think this book is an extremely informative guide to how to modify your life and fitness routine to achieve a healthier lifestyle or fitness goal. I would highly recommend it to anyone who feels they have hit a wall in their training or are just beginning their journey.
I personally will be implementing the lifting methods and routines that were laid out in the book as that is how I worked out years ago when I was in my best shape. In recent years I have gotten away from that and I do not feel or see any progress. I think with using these methods and putting a big effort into increasing my protein intake to approximately 200g per day will help me to achieve my fitness goals of 300lb bench press, 350lb squat, and 400lb deadlift.
You can visit www.muscleforlife.com to learn more about the author and his writings.
I hope you enjoyed my feedback on the book. I tried to keep it brief but detailed enough to provide some background. I appreciate any feedback.
Thanks,
Travis
Exercise
Most people believe that exercising is the way to get fit. After reading the book I have learned that it is merely a part of getting fit, and possibly a smaller part than we may think. The plan that is laid out in this book is to teach you how to burn fat and build lean muscle. This is the key to achieving the "Spartan Warrior" physique that most men strive for. In terms of exercising to achieve that goal, Mr. Matthews presents a plan that is rather simplistic yet effective. The main goal of the program is to progressively overload your muscles by lifting at a lower rep count while using roughly 85% of your max for each particular lift, after you have properly warmed up. In terms of what lifts to be done the focus should be on 4 compound lifts. Squat, Bench Press, Deadlift, and Overhead Press. These should be done in the 4-6 rep range and if 6 reps are achieved, weight is added for the next set.
The book goes into detail on training frequency and rest periods as well. It teaches you how to lay out a program for yourself that you feel may be most appropriate and also gives a few templates based on a 3, 4, or 5 day training schedule. One aspect that I know I will be using is the rest periods that are explained. When lifting at such a high ratio of your max, more rest is required. In the book he explains that many studies have shown that rest periods of 3-4 minutes are optimal for weight lifting programs.
Diet
As I mentioned that exercise is a part of the fitness equation, diet is a much larger piece of the equation. There is a great deal of detail on the science of how food effects your body and fitness levels included in the book. The science behind weight loss breaks down to a simple equation of energy in - energy out. If you bring in more energy(food) than you expend in a given period of time, you will gain weight. To fully understand how to manipulate this equation you must understand how much energy you expend in a day, or your Basal Metabolic Rate. He explains how to figure this out along with many other aspects of healthy eating to lose, gain, or maintain your weight.
A huge portion of the fitness calculation is the macro nutrients that you get through food and supplementation. The macro nutrients are Fats, Carbohydrates, and Protein. There is great info in the book on how you should plan your macro nutrient intake in order to achieve your goals.
Science
To me the thing that makes this book different from many other books and articles that I have written is that Mr. Matthews makes it a goal of the book to be sure that the reader understands exactly how anything you put into your body works and effects your body as it relates to eating for fitness. The amount of detail is extremely helpful to change the way a reader may think about foods or supplements. I think this is the most interesting aspect of the book.
Final Opinion
I think this book is an extremely informative guide to how to modify your life and fitness routine to achieve a healthier lifestyle or fitness goal. I would highly recommend it to anyone who feels they have hit a wall in their training or are just beginning their journey.
I personally will be implementing the lifting methods and routines that were laid out in the book as that is how I worked out years ago when I was in my best shape. In recent years I have gotten away from that and I do not feel or see any progress. I think with using these methods and putting a big effort into increasing my protein intake to approximately 200g per day will help me to achieve my fitness goals of 300lb bench press, 350lb squat, and 400lb deadlift.
You can visit www.muscleforlife.com to learn more about the author and his writings.
I hope you enjoyed my feedback on the book. I tried to keep it brief but detailed enough to provide some background. I appreciate any feedback.
Thanks,
Travis
Life advice - Chapter 1- Goals
Id like to begin a series of posts that I would aim toward a target audience of young people. I think most of these pieces of advice that I will write about are generated from my thoughts of things I wish I knew as a teen or young adult. This info covers a wide variety of topics that I think would be helpful to most young people, or even people who are getting a late start on the path to success. These will all apply to anyone, but my goal is for young people to learn from my experiences and get a bit of a jump start to their future dreams.
The first topic of advice I want to dive into is setting Goals. In my opinion, goal setting is the beginning of all of our successes and failures. If we do not have a target, then we are just wandering aimlessly through life.
The Goal
The goal can be anything. Most people should and do have many goals. Perhaps that is an inaccurate statement. Most people have many Dreams. A dream only becomes a goal when you put a plan in place to achieve it. The goals can cover any variety of topics. I personally have a significant list. My list of goals cover financial goals, fitness goals, relationship goals and several other areas as well.
Goals can be big or small. In most instances starting with a small goal is a good thing. This allows you to feel the emotion of success and often will drive you to bigger and better goals. I think a good goal is one that you view as challenging yet still attainable.
The goal should be quantifiable and have a timeline for achievement. For example, saying you want to lose 15 lbs can be a goal. But when you say I want to lose 15 lbs in 8 weeks you change the goal to have an expected result by a deadline. You have a point in time that dictates your success or failure. This also adds to the goal by making it more challenging. It places pressure on you to focus on how to achieve the goal.
The Plan
As I said earlier, many people have dreams but it only becomes a goal when you have a plan. Planning is the key to success in just about anything. I believe the saying goes "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail." That is very true. If you have not put any effort into visualizing how you will reach your goal, then you will be wandering aimlessly. Maybe not totally, because you have an idea of what you would like to achieve, but you may wander off the correct path at some point.
The plan can also help to make the goal more attainable by setting milestones along the way to the ultimate goal. As I said before, a smaller goal is more attainable and can help you build momentum toward the final destination.
Adversity
Along the way you are bound to run into some sort of adversity. The key to overcoming that is to realize and accept what adversity is. In most cases, it is something that is beyond our control. Sometimes that fact can make it even more difficult to accept because it feels like outside forces are working against us. The truth is, they are. Life is always throwing us curve balls. We must learn to accept those difficulties and focus on a solution that will minimize the impact on your end goal.
Achievement
Achievement is when you finally reach the end of the plan with success. If you followed the plan with discipline there is a high probability of success. At this point you will have spent a good amount of time planning your goal out, tracking your progress, dealing with adversity, and enjoying the small victories along the way. The process will often feel like a roller coaster in that there are many ups and downs on the path to success. The progress and achievement of your milestone goals will help keep you committed and driven to reach the final result.
Keys to Success
1. Discipline. You must be disciplined to follow your plan. This means you will have to sacrifice some things in order to achieve your goal. Often it is a good time, friends, family, or many other opportunities that we must forgo in order to achieve our goals.
2. Focus. This goes right along with discipline. You must maintain focus on your goal in order to reach it. If you have too many other distractions going on, then you need to analyze what is important and realign your priorities.
3. Patience. Too often people fail at goals because they aren't willing or able to be patient to get there. I personally fall into this trap. I often find myself altering a good plan in ways that I think will expedite my achievement of the goal. Often, this will set you back in some form or fashion. Part of this goes to trusting that your original plan is a good plan to reach success. One thing to remember is that success is a marathon, not a sprint.
Additional tips to help reach goals
1. Write your goals down. Physically writing it will help it become more real to you.
2. Tell close friends and family what your goals are. They can help encourage you as well as the fact that you will be motivated by not wanting to be seen as a failure.
3. Set aside time each week or month to evaluate your progress. Maintain a progress sheet to detail how you are as a "plan vs. actual" tracker.
4. Milestones. Break the goal down into milestones to help make it more attainable. As I said before these small victories will motivate you for the long haul.
Thanks for reading and I hope this can help you achieve success in all aspects of your life.
I appreciate feedback.
The first topic of advice I want to dive into is setting Goals. In my opinion, goal setting is the beginning of all of our successes and failures. If we do not have a target, then we are just wandering aimlessly through life.
The Goal
The goal can be anything. Most people should and do have many goals. Perhaps that is an inaccurate statement. Most people have many Dreams. A dream only becomes a goal when you put a plan in place to achieve it. The goals can cover any variety of topics. I personally have a significant list. My list of goals cover financial goals, fitness goals, relationship goals and several other areas as well.
Goals can be big or small. In most instances starting with a small goal is a good thing. This allows you to feel the emotion of success and often will drive you to bigger and better goals. I think a good goal is one that you view as challenging yet still attainable.
The goal should be quantifiable and have a timeline for achievement. For example, saying you want to lose 15 lbs can be a goal. But when you say I want to lose 15 lbs in 8 weeks you change the goal to have an expected result by a deadline. You have a point in time that dictates your success or failure. This also adds to the goal by making it more challenging. It places pressure on you to focus on how to achieve the goal.
The Plan
As I said earlier, many people have dreams but it only becomes a goal when you have a plan. Planning is the key to success in just about anything. I believe the saying goes "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail." That is very true. If you have not put any effort into visualizing how you will reach your goal, then you will be wandering aimlessly. Maybe not totally, because you have an idea of what you would like to achieve, but you may wander off the correct path at some point.
The plan can also help to make the goal more attainable by setting milestones along the way to the ultimate goal. As I said before, a smaller goal is more attainable and can help you build momentum toward the final destination.
Adversity
Along the way you are bound to run into some sort of adversity. The key to overcoming that is to realize and accept what adversity is. In most cases, it is something that is beyond our control. Sometimes that fact can make it even more difficult to accept because it feels like outside forces are working against us. The truth is, they are. Life is always throwing us curve balls. We must learn to accept those difficulties and focus on a solution that will minimize the impact on your end goal.
Achievement
Achievement is when you finally reach the end of the plan with success. If you followed the plan with discipline there is a high probability of success. At this point you will have spent a good amount of time planning your goal out, tracking your progress, dealing with adversity, and enjoying the small victories along the way. The process will often feel like a roller coaster in that there are many ups and downs on the path to success. The progress and achievement of your milestone goals will help keep you committed and driven to reach the final result.
Keys to Success
1. Discipline. You must be disciplined to follow your plan. This means you will have to sacrifice some things in order to achieve your goal. Often it is a good time, friends, family, or many other opportunities that we must forgo in order to achieve our goals.
2. Focus. This goes right along with discipline. You must maintain focus on your goal in order to reach it. If you have too many other distractions going on, then you need to analyze what is important and realign your priorities.
3. Patience. Too often people fail at goals because they aren't willing or able to be patient to get there. I personally fall into this trap. I often find myself altering a good plan in ways that I think will expedite my achievement of the goal. Often, this will set you back in some form or fashion. Part of this goes to trusting that your original plan is a good plan to reach success. One thing to remember is that success is a marathon, not a sprint.
Additional tips to help reach goals
1. Write your goals down. Physically writing it will help it become more real to you.
2. Tell close friends and family what your goals are. They can help encourage you as well as the fact that you will be motivated by not wanting to be seen as a failure.
3. Set aside time each week or month to evaluate your progress. Maintain a progress sheet to detail how you are as a "plan vs. actual" tracker.
4. Milestones. Break the goal down into milestones to help make it more attainable. As I said before these small victories will motivate you for the long haul.
Thanks for reading and I hope this can help you achieve success in all aspects of your life.
I appreciate feedback.
My return
So it has been a long time since I have written anything here. I really want to get back to it and make it a regular habit. I think my idea when I originally started this blog of posting my thoughts on how individuals can improve their situation in life is a good one. Sure there are plenty of others like this out there, but if someone reads what I have posted and it helps impact their life, then I have achieved my goal.
Speaking of goals, that is one of the topics I plan to delve into in a later post. While I have not been posting anything here for about 5 months, I have been keeping a list of ideas for topics to write about. Goal Setting is high on my list. I think it is a critical part of life and anyone successful would tell you the same.
One of my goals that I have written down is related to this site. As I said before I want posting here to become a regular habit. So, my goal in relation to that would be to post at least 1 time per week. I think that is frequently enough to keep me active, but also allows me a decent amount of time to develop some of my ideas and write them out.
So if anyone actually reads this, welcome. I hope you enjoy reading what I have to say and can apply it to some aspect of your life.
Speaking of goals, that is one of the topics I plan to delve into in a later post. While I have not been posting anything here for about 5 months, I have been keeping a list of ideas for topics to write about. Goal Setting is high on my list. I think it is a critical part of life and anyone successful would tell you the same.
One of my goals that I have written down is related to this site. As I said before I want posting here to become a regular habit. So, my goal in relation to that would be to post at least 1 time per week. I think that is frequently enough to keep me active, but also allows me a decent amount of time to develop some of my ideas and write them out.
So if anyone actually reads this, welcome. I hope you enjoy reading what I have to say and can apply it to some aspect of your life.
Taking advantage of high interest savings
Earlier this week I was reading my regular financial blogs and websites and thinking about the different ways that those articles can be applied to my life. One topic that was touched on was the interest rate on savings. This is probably an often overlooked area for many people because, lets face it, most banks basically give you nothing. Add to the fact there is such a low national rate of savings and the interest rate is probably not a big factor for most people. However, I am trying to find whatever means necessary to grow my net-worth, even on my emergency fund and general savings that just sits there.
I admit that we do have more cash on hand than most investment advisers would say we need, but I would like to move in the next year or so, so I am saving a lot. So this money that we have is our emergency fund and a general savings which would total probably close to 10 months of must have expenses. I should really know exactly what our expenses are, but I have not calculated the total lately since some significant life and financial changes.
So, once I got the idea that there was a better option out there, I had to begin my research. We all know where that leads. After a good old Google search for high interest savings, there was a multitude of good information. Low and behold, one of the top suggestions was an article on one of my regularly read sites, The Simple Dollar had an article about their best savings accounts of 2015. I thought it was a well written article that gave pretty solid info about the various providers. It included info regarding the interest rate offered, minimum balances, fees, and any other aspects that set the provider apart from the pack. Often times I see the interest rate fluctuates slightly based on the added options that they offer. Less options usually means higher rate. Translation, the more options means it costs the provider more.
After reviewing the article I decided to visit a few of the individual sites and see for myself what I liked about it.
Capital One 360: This was the first site I visited. They offered a rate of .75% which was the lowest of the options I looked into. They also offered a tiered reward based on the amount of your initial deposit. The bonus started with deposits of $5000 and reached the highest tier at $50,000. The actual bonus was from $50 to $500. All in all, nice to offer the bonus, but over the long haul it would not take me long to get more than that bonus with a higher rate. The best feature about Capital One 360 is the ability to have separate "mini accounts" I will call them within your main account. This is a great option to divide your money among the various savings goals you have.
Ally: The Simple Dollar actually rated Ally as the best overall savings. This was in part due to the high savings rate they offer of .99%. Well above the Capital One option. Another big aspect of Ally getting the highest rating was the online offering. The site is very user friendly and also offers mobile options. There was no minimum deposit or monthly fee. Interest is compounded daily to help you grow faster.
Others: I also looked at the Synchrony option as well as Discover and American Express. These all offered rates close to the 1% with various combinations of minimum balances and monthly fees. Overall they were very similar in offerings.
In the end I decided to go with the Ally financial savings account. I am a big fan of ease of use and do not like a very busy website to navigate. They also have the option to deposit checks using a mobile device, which I like to do.
As I mentioned in the beginning this decision to get this account was in an effort to grow my money more quickly. That being said, a savings account growing at .99% is not going to do a lot to create log term wealth for me. That means I now need to look into other options to create long term growth. I have heard various things about brokerage accounts and ETFs, but I am not knowledgeable enough on those to make that move yet. Look for that post in the future.
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