Some purchases make sense to continue with when it comes to your finances, but there also needs to be some sacrifices made in order to free up extra money, not to mention the easy cuts like my adt experience that I will gladly say goodbye to. While it’s always important to seek professional help, or at least sound advice from a family member or friend that you trust, there are also money moves that you can make starting right now that will immediately improve your financial standing.
Check Your Credit Report
These days you never know who has your credit information so it’s a good idea to pull your report to verify accounts are up to date and accurate. The three major credit bureaus offer a free copy of your credit report once a year, so that’s a good place to start, although the score will not be provided. The good thing is though that credit card statements are now including a copy of your credit score so you can make sure that your score is heading in the right direction even month and take action if you notice a dip out of your control.
Build Up a Cushion
You can be plugging along down the right financial path and then all of a sudden you get hit with a huge vet bill, you need to take your car in for repair, or even worse, you lose your job and need to cover expenses until you find your next endeavor, it’s a good idea to have a cushion. If you can keep a few months’ worth of expenses in an account, you can avoid using a credit card to cover expenses when something comes out, and save your budget from going out of whack in the process.
Increase Retirement Contributions
Although it may be decades before you finally walk away from work and head into retirement, that doesn’t mean that you can wait to start saving. If you think about how long you’ve been in your current job, or even more, how long it’s been since you’ve been out of school, it puts it that much more in perspective about how quickly time goes by fast. Take a look at work to see if there are any employer-matched contributions, as otherwise that would be leaving free money on the table. Then going forward, even increasing a percent a year will help increase funds without feeling too much of a burden missing that money each check.
Use a Rewards Credit Card
I understand that for some, using a credit can be scary on the fact that it takes discipline to stay within a spending limit that you can pay off without having to carryover a balance and pay interest, but if you can handle it, using a credit card with a good rewards system can earn you plenty of free money. Just by making the purchases that you were going to make anyways, you can earn points or cashback, which can go to fund dinners out or even pay for a vacation.