FINANCIALLY FIT; FINANCIAL HABITS WE ARE LEAVING IN JANUARY.
January has just ended. What differentiates achievers from everyone else by next year is their financial habits. A new month brings forth a promise of new beginnings, a clean slate, and a new chapter to write and track goals.
Given this, what financial story do you intend to write in your new chapter? To avoid a repeat of the mistakes you have made in January, it is important to understand what made you make the mistakes.
Identifying the financial mistakes you made in January.
These are some of the questions that will give you clarity in identifying the habits you want to leave behind this new year;
- What did you spend most on?
- Biggest achievement in 1 month?
- What was your yearly financial goal and how does it tie to your monthly ones?
- How did you sidetrack from your goal?
- How did you track your expenses?
- What would you love to change about your financially fit journey this February?
Financial habits we are leaving behind in this month.
1. Having no goals
If you don’t know where you are going, you will probably end up somewhere else.” –Lawrence J. Peter
2022 iid your opportunity to set clear financial goals and ensure you stay on track.
Goal setting launches you towards your true vision. Set the pace for your wealth creation journey by setting;
- Specific goals: Narrow down to what you want to achieve in every facet of your life. For example, do you want to further your education? What financial plans do you have in place that will ensure you achieve this?
- Measurable: How do you track your progress? Progress motivates you into doing more.
- Achievable: Your goals should be challenging but achievable. Set goals that will motivate you but let them be as realistic as possible.
- Realistic: Imagine writing down that you want to be a billionaire yet you have not made your first million? Your financial goals should be very realistic.
- Time-bound: A timeline will help you achieve your financial goal. For example, in 5 months you should have saved 300,000.
2. Living beyond your means.
January is often the month most Kenyans (and people across the globe) go broke. Paying for expenses of the festive season and back to school shopping and fee payments keep reminding us how we spend more than budget for. Some borrow money and get into a cycle of debt through the month. If you have to go into debt to meet your living expenses;
- You may have failed to plan or budget your spending
or,
- You are living beyond your means.
Evaluating your monthly expenditure, helps you track what triggers your spending.
The new M-pesa application is a good example of a digital tool that allows you to track your monthly spending. Sit down and thoroughly analyze where you may have cut on costs and any spending that is a financial leak for you.
3. Financial Comparison.
So, you log into Instagram, scroll through your feed and view stories. All you see is your friends out partying, your former schoolmate just bought a new Mercedes and your other friend Shadrack flew to South Africa for holiday.
What first hits you is that they are doing much better than you financially.
Last month, you may have paid for your brother’s fee, your nephews needed to travel back to town and being the only financially stable person in the family all bills fall on you. African families have different complexities in handling money. Different people have different responsibilities.
It is important to treat yourself with grace and learn how best money can work for you despite your income.
4. Not having emergency funds
Recently on Twitter, a frustrated employee ranted how a company she had been working for, relocated without informing employees. They got to the office on Monday morning and found the office doors locked. Their manager then sent them an e-mail at noon informing them the company had gone bankrupt. It was then that she and her colleagues realized that they had lost their primary income source.
This can happen to anyone.
The importance of having emergency savings is when push comes to shove, your finances will work for you as you figure out what next?
Emergency savings are not personal savings.
