Part One…
It’s important to prepare for your financial future, in an age where the government takes Social Security without the security of the return to us in our future, we cannot go through life with a blindfold on and expect to live comfortably in our declining years relying on the governments’ Social Security. Ask anyone recieving these “benefits” today and you’ll find it’s already not enough to survive on. I’ll be bringing you a series of tips to aid in your road to success in planning your future, so that you might live omfortably instead of desperately.

First things first, make what you’re worth and spend less than you make i.e. live beneath your means. This is A LOT easier said than done. Most of the time we find that without the right motivation, saving is nearly impossible.

However, there are many options to making saving painless, and sometimes even beneficial. ING Savings accounts offer an interest bearing savings account that is better than your combination Savings/Checking account. You can go as low as $25 a month as an automatic draft from your checking account. Bank of America offers a rounding up option on every debit purchase where they put the difference to the nearest dollar in a savings account. You’ve heard that it’s important to pay yourself first, and that’s no lie, no one else is going to do it for you. There are several options which can be explored to make your money work for you, many of which we’ll cover here. As far as making as much as you’re worth, it’s time to evaluate your skills in the marketplace today. Do you have what it takes to stand up and be counted? If you can type well, google “typing test” and see how good you are. Can you lead projects at work, can you help your coworkers when they have questions? There are lots of free resources on the internet available to test your skills, or to match your job description with a certain salary expectation, like Salary.com.
It’s okay to be confident in your skills and expect for people to respect that you have those skills, you need to be able to articulate your needs to your bosses as well as them articulate their expectations of you.

If there’s room for improvement, be able to admit that, because once you do, it’ll be easier to gain the knowledge you need to be more successful. Life is hard, but it’s harder without the skills to survive.

Second, and this is harder than it sounds….. Budgeting. No matter how you slice it, or how much money you make, you need to budget so you know how much is coming in and going out. How can you ever save for your future, plan for your future, if you don’t know what’s possible within your means? And it’s never too late, you know that old saying, “better late than never”, well it’s better to be responsible financially later, than to never prepare at all.
If you lack the software to use to have a good budget that you can use over and over again, Google now has programs that are available from the internet, that you can use with the same format as Excel and put together a budget. If you’re in Excel, you can use a template, just alter each item on the budget as it pertains to your own household.

These are two very important keys to being prepared for your retirement years, whenever those years should come, hopefully at a younger age for all of us.

Click Here for Part Two.
Click Here for Part Three.
Click here for Part Four.