Financial Resolutions

One very common resolution in any new year is to get better when it comes to saving more money and spending less of it. If you need help setting and/or sticking to financial-related goals such as this one, don’t worry. You’re in the right place.  

Tip #1: Make Sure Your Goals are Realistic
To start off with, before you start chasing financial goals, make sure that they are actually realistic. Making a goal to put $10,000 in savings when you only make a few hundred dollars a month, for example, is probably not the most realistic goal.

When you set these “out there” or incredibly difficult goals, you greatly increase the chances that you won’t reach them, which can leave you upset and deciding to just throw in the towel and not save or have goals at all.

Keep this from happening by only setting goals you can actually, realistically reach.

Tip #2: Make an Actionable Plan
 Another thing that can really help you is making an actionable plan to achieve your goal. If you made a plan to save $1000 by the end of the year, for example, you could break down how much you would need to save per week or per month to achieve your goal. Then, you could develop a plan for how you will save the money.

It may sound simple, but having a real, actionable plan with clearly-outlined steps makes it so much easier to put your plan into action instead of just putting it off!

Tip #3: Remind and Reward
As a final, helpful tip, make sure to regularly remind yourself of your goals. Have them physically written down and take a look at them at least once a week or so. Just visibly reminding yourself of these goals can help to keep them in the forefront of your mind and ensure that you reach them.
Another nice thing you can do to help yourself stay on track and to make reaching your goals a whole lot more fun is to reward yourself when you hit certain “milestones” on your way to your goal. Decide what these will be ahead of time and then enjoy the fruits of your labor!

If you can keep these helpful tips in mind, you should do a much better job of reaching your financial goals this year than you ever have before.