Latest / Stacked Intent: Your Guide to Authentic, Intentional Living / How to Get Started Understanding and Managing Your Personal Finances

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How to Get Started Understanding and Managing Your Personal Finances · Stacked Intent: Your Guide to Authentic, Intentional Living

• 0:14
  Speaker: Hello, I am Becca Stackhouse Morson, and I am so excited that you are joining me for Becoming Authentically You.
• 0:22
  Speaker: And no matter what stage you are in life, you can always look for more ways to be authentically you.
• 0:28
  Speaker: We're really gonna dig into how you can do this through relationships, finance, and nutrition.
• 0:36
  Speaker: I look forward to having you come along with me on this journey of becoming authentically.
• 0:41
  Speaker: This is the Stacked Intent Podcast, and it's going to challenge you, bring you tips, and provide some resources all along while you're cozy, riding along, and joining in and listening.
• 0:57
  Speaker: Welcome to the Stacked Intent Podcast.
• 1:01
  Speaker: We are on episode three, and today it's gonna be all about money.
• 1:07
  Speaker: Our topic is getting to know your finances.
• 1:13
  Speaker: I am Becca Stackhouse Morson, the owner of Stacked Intent, and your host today.
• 1:21
  Speaker: Let's get started with talking about your objectives that I hope you come out with from today's episode.
• 1:29
  Speaker: I hope that you get clear on what your financial goals might be, where you can get started, helping you to launch or even reevaluate what your spending plan looks like, helping your financial goals, and help think in advance to recover from some of that holiday spending.
• 1:54
  Speaker: Whew! It's gonna be an episode loaded with different topics, but the whole thing I would like you to not get overwhelmed with, not turn off or skip this episode, but really think about some of the advantages of really getting to know your finances can help.
• 2:14
  Speaker: Topic one of today's discussion is gonna be get clear on your finances.
• 2:21
  Speaker: Are you a little confused of where to start on your finances?
• 2:27
  Speaker: Because there's a lot that comes into it, right?
• 2:31
  Speaker: But getting started can always be one of the toughest steps for us to take.
• 2:38
  Speaker: One place that you can start is to look at your money and how it played out and worked for you in 2022.
• 2:50
  Speaker: Look at your bank statements, grab them, really evaluate them, look at your credit card statements, and look at how your credit or your in and your out affected your year?
• 3:08
  Speaker: Because what this is gonna do is help us plan for 2023.
• 3:14
  Speaker: Where can we make adjustments?
• 3:17
  Speaker: How can we be more intentional with our finances in the next year?
• 3:24
  Speaker: Do you have a clear pathway of how you want your finances to be?
• 3:31
  Speaker: So whether you are single or you're in a relationship where you share your finances, it is important to know where you would like to take your financial path.
• 3:43
  Speaker: So, such as what do you want in a savings account?
• 3:50
  Speaker: How do you want to make sure your bills are paid?
• 3:54
  Speaker: Do you use a credit card?
• 3:57
  Speaker: And how do you plan your finances?
• 4:01
  Speaker: Do you want to find any of subscriptions that you didn't remember you had in 2022 that you don't want to continue in 2023?
• 4:16
  Speaker: Taking note of these can really help with that spending plan creation.
• 4:21
  Speaker: I prefer to have a travel account savings that is ready at the drop of a hat for almost any trip that I could plan.
• 4:35
  Speaker: About five and a half years ago, when my best friend told me that her and her husband would be moving to California, which I'm located in Alabama, or at the time I was in Georgia.
• 4:50
  Speaker: So she was moving across the country from me.
• 4:54
  Speaker: I decided at that moment that I needed to have a travel budget line so that when I wanted to buy a plane ticket, I was able to buy a plane ticket.
• 5:07
  Speaker: Taking that step for me and creating knowing what my budget looks like for getting clear on that particular financial goal for me, allowed me the opportunity to when I found out she was pregnant in December and January, I was able to fly out there and go spend some time and take some maternity pictures.
• 5:37
  Speaker: But that was only possible because every single month, whether I was going somewhere or not, there was a portion, a category in my paycheck that went to travel funds.
• 5:52
  Speaker: Now that travel line still exists today, but it increased a little bit because now there's two of us to be able to travel.
• 6:03
  Speaker: And so it's important to me still today to have that travel line in that travel budget.
• 6:09
  Speaker: At the same time, having money put away for unexpected charges is also something that's so important for me.
• 6:19
  Speaker: And having it laid out is important.
• 6:23
  Speaker: So my challenge here to you on making sure that you're clear on your finances is really understand where you put money out and where you bring money in.
• 6:39
  Speaker: Where you may be able to save a little bit here so that you can go over here.
• 6:45
  Speaker: Those are all really important tasks, and really important that you are clear on what you want.
• 6:53
  Speaker: If travel isn't something that's important to you, what line is important there for you?
• 6:59
  Speaker: Do you have a hobby that you may need some money here and there for?
• 7:03
  Speaker: What can you put on that line that's important?
• 7:08
  Speaker: So getting clear on your finances is so, so important to be that starting block to even get a spending plan, to even know the trajectory of where you want to go and what you want to do.
• 7:26
  Speaker: You first have to look at the habits and the patterns that you've had.
• 7:31
  Speaker: You can look at two to three months to kind of create what that looks like, but really, really looking at a whole year and your patterns from January to December when you've got birthdays, holidays, travel, get togethers, really looking at all of that is gonna be helpful.
• 7:54
  Speaker: Now, do look.
• 7:56
  Speaker: Did you have anything that was big changes?
• 7:58
  Speaker: Did you move?
• 8:00
  Speaker: Did you have a wedding?
• 8:01
  Speaker: Did you totally change jobs, careers?
• 8:06
  Speaker: All those things can play into what it may look like is a little bit different.
• 8:11
  Speaker: And our topic two, we're gonna hop into creating a spending plan.
• 8:19
  Speaker: So this is a spending plan, a budget, however helps you to look at it, look at it that way.
• 8:28
  Speaker: A spending plan, it is a plan, but it is flexible if it has to ebb and flow and change with some of what you've got going on that month.
• 8:39
  Speaker: Have you ever looked at your paycheck stub?
• 8:45
  Speaker: I did a financial class a couple of years ago with um juniors and seniors in high school, and it's all about being savvy with your finances.
• 8:58
  Speaker: But these kids, for the most part, some of them have worked jobs, but none of them had ever looked at what their paycheck stub looks like.
• 9:08
  Speaker: If you have, then great.
• 9:12
  Speaker: But if you haven't, now might be the time that you want to open up that portal and grab that paycheck stub and peek at what your gross looks like, what your net looks like, what comes out once your gross hits, and what comes, what do you actually see in that net?
• 9:34
  Speaker: We're not gonna dive any deeper into your paycheck stub per se, but there will be some blog posts up on stackedintent.com if you want to check that out once they get posted.
• 9:52
  Speaker: But that first step in creating that spending plan that you're working on is determine what your income is.
• 10:02
  Speaker: Where does your net income sit?
• 10:05
  Speaker: And your net income is your check or the money that's deposited into your account after taxes has come out, medical insurance, or whatever is being automated and withdrawn from your paycheck, which some may be your choice that's automated and withdrawn, some is that taxes, social security, those things that have to come out of our paychecks.
• 10:32
  Speaker: Once you've decided and determined what your income is, whether it's just from that one job or whether it's from multiple jobs, or a side hustle plus your main income, next is listing all of your expenses.
• 10:54
  Speaker: So starting with some of those fixed variables.
• 11:00
  Speaker: And so, or fixed expenses, your fixed variables, maybe your bills, like your utilities that are gonna change month to month, but it's still a fixed expense.
• 11:16
  Speaker: So starting with your rent, your mortgage payment, your any loans that you've got, your automotive insurance, maybe even your homeowner or renter insurance, your utilities, phones, internet, cable, all streaming subscriptions that you're paying for, your groceries, transportation, so even keeping a category for car maintenance, gym memberships, if travel's important, dining, and anything else that you may need to use money for month to month.
• 11:58
  Speaker: That's listing all your expenses.
• 12:01
  Speaker: And I like to keep up with all of this in an Excel spreadsheet, but I know that Excel spreadsheets are not meant and made for everybody, they can be an overwhelming thing to look at or keep track in or anything.
• 12:24
  Speaker: Find the way, whether it's written paper, an app, find the way that best works for you.
• 12:32
  Speaker: Once you're making this plan, you've looked back at 2022 and evaluating and creating a relationship with your finances.
• 12:44
  Speaker: Now, maybe track a little bit of your expenses and how you spend some of your money.
• 12:52
  Speaker: This may be like, have you ever felt like you had a $10 bill in your wallet and it just went poof, it just vanished?
• 13:01
  Speaker: Yeah, even tracking those expenses.
• 13:05
  Speaker: So tracking those expenses is important.
• 13:07
  Speaker: That stop at the convenience store, that stop at the coffee shop, those can add up to be a hundred dollars or more over the course of a month.
• 13:17
  Speaker: Now, if that's where you plan to spend that money, go you.
• 13:23
  Speaker: But if it's just poof vanishing, maybe you need to evaluate and look at is that important?
• 13:31
  Speaker: Let me give you an example here.
• 13:34
  Speaker: I recently got married, but my husband, before we were dating, I helped him kind of create his budget and what it was gonna look like in ways that he could save for general savings, but also save for some other goals that he had.
• 13:53
  Speaker: Well, one place that I noticed a lot of money was getting spent was at convenience stores.
• 14:00
  Speaker: And what I realized was most days he was stopping, grabbing a bang energy drink, and then going on his day.
• 14:15
  Speaker: Well, as I noticed this added up, I was at the store with my mom one day and saw a 30-pack of bangs, so I bought them for him.
• 14:27
  Speaker: Instead of going to the convenience store every day, he then just started taking it from home.
• 14:35
  Speaker: Well, what we noticed was over the course of a month, he was having a hundred dollar positive balance in his budget simply by still consuming the bangs every day, but shifting it from going to a convenience store and making that stop to taking it from home because he bought it at a better price per unit than buying it at a higher cost per unit every day.
• 15:08
  Speaker: Now, if you follow along, I'll break some of that down.
• 15:12
  Speaker: Whether it's on my social media and a blog post or in a future episode, we'll break down price units and cost and how you can see about saving some yourself some money.
• 15:27
  Speaker: But that's just an example of poof, he went from having a hundred dollars vanish to it existing in his account to be able to go in another category.
• 15:41
  Speaker: It's important to label your expenses.
• 15:47
  Speaker: So either labeling them is a fixed expense or a variable expense.
• 15:53
  Speaker: When we talk about a fixed expense, these are going to be the things that you must pay monthly, and we can't avoid.
• 16:02
  Speaker: So that may be your rent, your mortgage, a loan, your insurance, your utilities, bills that may be optional or may not be, but they're only not optional if we decide to unsubscribe from them, right?
• 16:18
  Speaker: Variable, these may be some that are more flexible, like our coffee shop stops, or our dining out or our travel.
• 16:33
  Speaker: We also have that category of fixed variable, so it's fixed expenses that we have monthly, but they may vary a little bit up by a little bit on how much it actually cost us each month.
• 16:52
  Speaker: Like, for example, my energy bill was nowhere near as high in the winter as it is in the summer because I like to run my ear, but I don't necessarily run my heat.
• 17:06
  Speaker: Making sure that you account for payments that are gonna be made automatically is always so important.
• 17:16
  Speaker: So, do you have those automated out of an account, or how are some payments that are monthly payments, annual payments being made?
• 17:27
  Speaker: And creating that budget spending plan and sticking to it as your guide is so important, and the more that you exercise that part of you, the more that you create the discipline, the better you'll do it.
• 17:48
  Speaker: Our third topic in looking at this spending plan for you and how you really begin to be you and your money is setting those financial goals.
• 18:01
  Speaker: So, one way you can do this is write your financial goals down.
• 18:05
  Speaker: Something that happens when we put a pen to paper and write it down, that goal that we have.
• 18:14
  Speaker: I mean, it means you can put it somewhere you see, write it on your mirror so you see it every morning while you're getting ready.
• 18:21
  Speaker: When you're setting your financial goals, if you are an individual person, it's important to maybe set up a monthly financial date with yourself.
• 18:35
  Speaker: Take yourself out to a coffee shop, make your coffee at home, tea at home, and have a financial date with yourself.
• 18:42
  Speaker: Look at that month's spending, look at how you've saved, where you've spent money, anything that you can change in the projection of the next month.
• 18:53
  Speaker: Make sure that your goals are specific and measurable.
• 18:58
  Speaker: So creating what we call a SMART goal can be really helpful here.
• 19:06
  Speaker: A SMART goal is a goal that we make clear, we make it reachable, and it's something that is smart.
• 19:19
  Speaker: So you are specific.
• 19:21
  Speaker: It is simple, sensible, and significant.
• 19:24
  Speaker: It's measurable, so it is meaningful and motivating, it's achievable.
• 19:33
  Speaker: So you are able to obtain or agree or achieve that financial goal that you're putting in place.
• 19:40
  Speaker: It is relevant, so you are reasonable, relatable, you have resources or results based.
• 19:50
  Speaker: It's also something that's time bound.
• 19:54
  Speaker: So the time is based, you put a time limit, time cost, timely, make it time sensitive.
• 20:04
  Speaker: So when you make your smart goal, you want to have your goal, but that date with yourself or that date with you and your partner makes it to where you can evaluate and review that goal as well.
• 20:18
  Speaker: When you're making it specific, your goal is that clear.
• 20:26
  Speaker: You're asking those W questions of what do I want to accomplish?
• 20:32
  Speaker: Why do you want these financial goals?
• 20:36
  Speaker: Who else might be involved?
• 20:40
  Speaker: Where is this goal located?
• 20:44
  Speaker: So, this goal is your financial goals.
• 20:46
  Speaker: And are there limits to my financial goals?
• 20:52
  Speaker: Is this the first time you've created a budget?
• 20:54
  Speaker: Because you have to remember to give yourself grace if it is, or are you re-evaluating and relaunching it?
• 21:02
  Speaker: When you measure it, you are looking at how to stay motivated in your goal.
• 21:10
  Speaker: How you're gonna accomplish it.
• 21:14
  Speaker: What have you done once you know you've accomplished it?
• 21:18
  Speaker: You're achieving it.
• 21:21
  Speaker: How do I accomplish this goal?
• 21:24
  Speaker: How do you accomplish shaving for your first emergency fund or your first couple of months of creating a spending habit?
• 21:34
  Speaker: How do you relate this goal and how are you able to stay consistent here?
• 21:42
  Speaker: Is it relative?
• 21:44
  Speaker: So, how relative is your financial goal?
• 21:47
  Speaker: Is it something that's worthwhile?
• 21:49
  Speaker: Is it the right time for you?
• 21:51
  Speaker: Is it effective?
• 21:53
  Speaker: Time bound?
• 21:54
  Speaker: When?
• 21:55
  Speaker: What can I do six months from now?
• 21:59
  Speaker: I create this financial guide for myself.
• 22:03
  Speaker: What am I gonna be able to do in six months?
• 22:07
  Speaker: So, where can I start today in creating that smart goal for myself?
• 22:14
  Speaker: Setting those deadlines for yourself, creating those goals, it's gonna help.
• 22:19
  Speaker: Your goals need to be your goals.
• 22:23
  Speaker: When you share your finances, it need if you're sharing them, make them your goals and your partner's goals.
• 22:32
  Speaker: And creating my spending plan and setting up our financial goals, my husband and I have sat down and had several financial dates.
• 22:46
  Speaker: And we sit down, he drinks coffee, I drink tea, and we have this date and we talk about our goals, what we've done.
• 22:58
  Speaker: We came together, and as we went from our separate incomes to creating a one overall budget, we set out with what are some categories that are important for us.
• 23:11
  Speaker: And like I mentioned before, I keep up with this on an Excel spreadsheet.
• 23:16
  Speaker: And so my method to this is I start with I've got what our gross income is, and then the taxes, the Medicare, the Social Security that's all taken out.
• 23:32
  Speaker: And then I've got our health care, our health savings account, our dental vision, all those expenses that come out.
• 23:44
  Speaker: And then we've got our net.
• 23:47
  Speaker: Next, I've got what's important for our groceries and our gas.
• 23:58
  Speaker: So what we anticipate we're gonna spend in that paycheck on groceries and gas.
• 24:04
  Speaker: Then savings is next.
• 24:07
  Speaker: And savings is that next category because it's not an option for us.
• 24:14
  Speaker: Every single month, we put a percentage away of what the net check is.
• 24:22
  Speaker: So I challenge you, decide what percentage you think you can afford every paycheck, and put that away.
• 24:30
  Speaker: You'd be amazed at even the little by little how it builds up.
• 24:35
  Speaker: We then have our charity and then another savings because we've got savings that have different categories.
• 24:47
  Speaker: Our bills are the next thing that comes on our Excel spreadsheet, and then things that we're saving for in the future.
• 24:56
  Speaker: So my husband's a mechanic, he needs tools, and tools that are good working tools cost money.
• 25:04
  Speaker: So we've got a line for that.
• 25:06
  Speaker: We've got a line for car and motorcycle maintenance, and then we've got a line for clothes so that when we're ready to go buy some clothes, we're ready to kind of spend what we need to spend to get the clothes for that season.
• 25:24
  Speaker: Setting those financial goals and those categories is important, and doing it in a way that makes sense for you, whether that's an Excel spreadsheet or a pen and paper or an app, it's important to find what works for you and your spending.
• 25:43
  Speaker: Now, I know everyone doesn't love an Excel spreadsheet, like I might.
• 25:49
  Speaker: And so I, over the years in helping different friends, my sister and my husband have found other ways, I've broken it down in my brain to be able to explain it in a different way than the way I see an Expel spreadsheet.
• 26:06
  Speaker: And one of those ways that yeah, you might laugh a little here is think of a waffle.
• 26:14
  Speaker: Waffles may seem totally off topic, but I've grown up a lot of my life getting waffles on a regular basis.
• 26:22
  Speaker: So I think of it here.
• 26:24
  Speaker: Think of a waffle.
• 26:26
  Speaker: You have a big waffle, but each waffle has little squares inside of it.
• 26:33
  Speaker: And if it's a well-pored waffle and cooked waffle, each of the squares, when you pour your syrup in, is gonna hold its own little cups of syrup.
• 26:44
  Speaker: Now let me tie that back to finances for you.
• 26:49
  Speaker: Those little cups of syrup are your categories, and if that waffle breaks down, it all becomes one giant puddle of syrup.
• 27:00
  Speaker: But if you're able to keep those categories separated, you're able to keep your money in an ebb and flow of I have that travel budget, that money's there, I can do that.
• 27:15
  Speaker: Oh, I would really like to go out to eat tonight, but I'm going out to eat with my friends tomorrow.
• 27:23
  Speaker: I can eat at home tonight.
• 27:25
  Speaker: Those are just some ideas of how you can keep your waffle and your waffle squares, having their own puddles of syrup.
• 27:34
  Speaker: Just one way to think about keeping that financial goal, keeping your financial plan, and getting to really know your finances set.
• 27:43
  Speaker: Our fourth topic really is just coming because we're right here around the holidays.
• 27:49
  Speaker: You probably had some Black Friday cyber spending, you're getting ready for your holiday spending, so we're gonna look at creating a plan of how you may have to recover from all of this holiday spending.
• 28:04
  Speaker: The National Retail Federation says that Americans may expect to spend an average of $998 between their holiday shopping, food, and decoration.
• 28:21
  Speaker: It is way too easy sometimes to swipe that card without having any kind of plan.
• 28:28
  Speaker: I would challenge you this season to think about what your financial goals are and your spending plan that you know you just created as you're doing your holiday spending.
• 28:44
  Speaker: A couple ways to do this is shop those deals, find them, find the things you really want to give people on those those deals.
• 28:56
  Speaker: Another way is create a gift spending limit on your gifts.
• 29:03
  Speaker: So this year I only have X number of dollars to spend on X person.
• 29:12
  Speaker: Creating those limits sometimes can be so freeing.
• 29:20
  Speaker: It can be creating a limit between you and a friend or a family member, deciding that you no longer can be a part of a gift exchange, it's okay too.
• 29:34
  Speaker: Or simply just limiting how much you're spending on each person that you may be gifting something to this year.
• 29:43
  Speaker: This is a tip that's not gonna help you for this December, but it'll definitely help you next go around.
• 29:54
  Speaker: One of the things that I love to do and I have done forever, so much so that my siblings don't even try in November or October to tell me what they may want this Christmas if I hadn't already figured it out.
• 30:08
  Speaker: They may start telling me in December for next December, but it's purchasing your gifts throughout the whole year.
• 30:17
  Speaker: This way it kind of spreads that spending out throughout the whole year and your spending plan in your budget, and you may be able to find those things at better discounts and deals along the way.
• 30:31
  Speaker: As a recap on getting to really know yourself on today's finances, I hope that you can find a way to be a little clearer on where you're starting and where your financial goals are headed.
• 30:48
  Speaker: Looking at how you're going to launch or reevaluate what your spending plan looks like, setting up those financial goals so that your spending plan is successful, and a few tips in advance on how to recover from some of your holiday spending.
• 31:11
  Speaker: I dare you this week to set a tea date or a coffee date with yourself and spend at least two hours really evaluating your financial goals and where you would like to see yourself in the next year.
• 31:29
  Speaker: We would love to see where you decide to have your tea or your coffee date with yourself or yourself and your partner.
• 31:37
  Speaker: Tag us on Instagram or in TikTok or on whatever social media platform at Stacked Intent.
• 31:46
  Speaker: Join my conversations along the way, budgets, finances, spending plans.
• 31:54
  Speaker: You can also share your steps that you're taking at stackedintent at outlook.com.
• 32:02
  Speaker: I look forward to seeing where you take your spending journey.