We all plan for the future, whether it be marriage, children, building a home or even what you are having for dinner but what do you to to keep those plans on track? Something like planning for dinner is simple, you look up the recipe, grab the ingredients and take the meat out of the freezer to defrost. But if you have plans for a good financial future it takes a lot more care and work to make it happen. How do you make it happen?
For my husband and I, we have a lot of goals both in our near future and in the distant. We want to build our home, have savings, I plan on going to school to become a registered nurse (RN), have another child and have savings for our children's future. Unfortunately we are late in the game on getting this started because of the cards we have been dealt but we are jumping in and never looking back!
So here is our little story on how we plan on getting where we want to be including our time line. Sure things may change, we may come across some bumps and have to leap over some hurdles but we are confident that we can reach our goals if we work together and remain focused.
We plan on building our home. Now this one is a tough decision because all of our other goals rely heavily on making this happen. If we can't build savings, we can't build a home, if I don't finish school, we can't build a home. Everything goes hand in hand so this one pretty much depends on all of our other goals but we will sock away every little extra that we have to get to this point in our lives. Our first goal was to clear our outstanding debt so we can begin building credit which we successfully did in May of this year. Now we begin building credit so we can bloom from here.
I am currently in the process of doing everything I can to begin and complete the registered nurse program (RN) In order to do this spending the least amount of money possible we have decided that I would focus on all of my upgrading for the remainder of this summer and fall through the Independent Learning Center. My decision to do this was a financial one. I had three choices when considering how I would find myself in the RN program. Decision one was to go to night school classes being offered in the city at least 30 minutes from my home. Now add in the factor that I do not drive and come September I will have four children in school this would mean two trips to this city twice daily for my husband and my children staying up late four nights a week. This was not a smart parenting or financial decision for us. My second decision was to skip the upgrading and apply to the college for the pre health sciences nursing program which would give me all of my pre-requisites for the program. This would save me time and would ensure I had all of the credits that I would need but this also brought up two obstacles. One being I again do not drive and the college is in the city so lots of travel and gas spent and secondly being that I would have to pay for this program to the tun of over $3000. This made little financial sense to us so I choose to skip this option. My last option was the Independent Learning Center which would allow me to do all of the upgrading in my free time at home online. This would be the cheapest option and still give me the flexibility to be home with my children and husband. This made the most financial sense to us and is the decision that I have committed to. Once this is completed I can then apply directly to the RN program, complete it as quickly as I can and hopefully be within my career of choice and making great income in no time.
Now another financial decision that have had to make was savings for both ourselves and our children's futures. For our own savings the best way for us to be able to accomplish this was to first get more income whether it be through surveys, or to save money on other expenses such as groceries. This is where my couponing really comes into play as well as freebies. This allows us to spend less than our budgeted amount every week and sock away that extra into savings. For our children's savings right now we aren't able to contribute much at this time but we ensure that we put all birthday, Christmas and other holiday monies in there. Although it may not be much it all adds up and helps build something for their futures. We also put in $50 per child each month and rather than spending outrageous amounts on holiday gifts for our children we instead have chosen to give them a larger sum of money to put into their accounts rather than a lot of toys that they will forget or will be broken months later.
Overall we have made some very small changes like couponing and having a very detailed budget but those have made a very big impact in our futures. We only spend cash, never credit cards and we never spend more than we need to for anything. We look for rock bottom prices and always wait on larger ticket purchases to see if we really need the items or if we can find it cheaper else where. Entertainment for us is almost always free or next to nothing as we will spend the day at the beach, swimming at a friends house or movies which we go to with free or buy one get it free movie tickets from cereal boxes and other offers.
What I would like to know from all of my readers is how you plan for your financial future? What steps do you take and how often do you revisit your financial plan? Do you talk to a financial adviser? I'd love to hear what you do to invest in your future! I look forward to all of your tips and will be sharing a sample budget with all of my readers for those of you who are interested in budgeting! I hope my financial plan has inspired you or has given you some ideas on how to invest in yourself and your future!
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