It’s About the Money, Honey

It’s the first day of December, and a good time to start thinking about our finances, and our goals for next year. I was inspired to do so by the folks over at Cash Money Life , who have set up a Carnival to encourage people to share their Financial Resolutions for 2008. Horefully we can learn something in the sharing.

We’re in pretty good shape financially. Even though we’ve been a single income household for the past three years we have no debt, besides our mortgage. We have credit cards, but we pay them off every month. We have a nice amount in savings. It’s not easy to live on one moderate income without accruing debt, but we feel blessed and grateful that we’ve been able to do it.

Still, we should be saving more money than we are, and we want to change that in 2008.

Here’s the plan.

1. Draw up an actual budget by January 5, 2008. This is something I have always resisted. I have a vague budget in my head, but nothing drawn up on paper. I’m not promising to use it for the whole year, but I do promise to try living by a budget for six months and see how it fits.

2. Install the Peachtree Accounting program (bought for $120 and then got a $140 rebate, thank you very much) by January 5, 2008. And start using it for budgeting and to keep track of receipts and expenses and such. My taxes will be soooo much easier to do next year!

3. Review all of our IRAs and other retirement and savings accounts by March 31, 2008. Consolidate and eliminate as needed to reduce fees and maximize profitability. Our biggest issue with this is not knowing who to trust with our money. Everyone seems to have an agenda. We may have to bite the bullet and just consult a financial planner – the kind that charges you an hourly rate but isn’t tied to any company, so hopefully they’ve no agenda of their own). Again, though – who to trust?

4. Pay ourselves first. Find at least $100 per month to put into our non-401k savings, and $20 per month to put into our son’s savings account per month. We haven’t been putting much into savings since I stopped working – we’ve just been maintaining the status quo. Note: These numbers may be adjusted once the budget is set.

5. Learn about the stock market. Read at least one book per quarter, and at least one online article per week.

6. Enter the stock market by the end of the year. Do the research, set a budget and jump in. Again – who to trust?

We also hope to sell our house and move out of state in 2008. I’m going to cry if that doesn’t happen. Cry a lot.

By reaching these goals our financial picture will be much more focused than it is the way it stands now. That’s a good thing.

See how I’m doing on my goals! Check out Called on the Carpet: January 30th Financial Goals Checkup!