5
Ways to Organize Your Finances
by
Maria Gracia
If
you haven't balanced your checkbook in awhile, or you lose
your incoming bills before they're paid or you put off filing
your tax returns because it's just too difficult to get
everything together, than it's probably time to organize
your finances. Here are 5 quick ideas:
Consolidate your credit cards. Rather than having
a bunch of different credit cards, consolidate all of your
expenses on one single credit card, preferably one that
has a low finance rate, and perhaps one that offers cashback
or airline mileage on every dollar you spend. This can result
in less confusion over which card to use, it can give you
a better idea of how much debt you're accumulating, it may
give you more back for your dollar, and you'll only have
to write out one payment check per month.
Use a bill paying system. As soon as you get bills
in the mail, they should immediately be placed into a bill
paying system. All of your pending bills are then ready
to be paid once a week, or once every 2 weeks, etc. Use
that same bill paying system to store paid bill summaries,
being sure that each category is in its own folder or envelope.
Doing this makes it very simple to look something up when
necessary.
Organize your expenses, as you spend. Want to know how
much you spend each month, so you can determine your monthly
spending budget? As you spend, just record that expense.
This can be called your Expense Summary. A computer program
like Quicken or a simple spreadsheet is great for this purpose,
or you can certainly do this with paper and pen.
Balance your checkbook monthly. In order for you
to have a good idea of how much money is sitting in your
checking account, what checks have cleared, and any errors
that you, or your bank, may have made, you must balance
your checking account. It really doesn't take that long
if you balance your checkbook the same day your statement
and cancelled checks arrive back from the bank each month.
In fact, if you use a computer program like Quicken, you
can do this task even quicker.
Keep your tax-related stuff together. Before tax season,
you'll start to receive tax related information from your
job, your bank, etc. Keep all of these tax-related papers
in a labeled file folder. This way, when you're ready to
do your taxes, you won't have to search for the papers you
need.
by
Maria Gracia - Get Organized Now!
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