Category: Blog

Student loan debt causes major problems for today’s young singles and couples with college degrees. According to the Wall Street Journal, the average student carries a debt of a little more than $35,000. That’s a lot of money to pay back. Even when people find jobs right out of college, it is tough to learn how to adjust spending habits to pay back loans while living within their means.

What’s more, it can be nearly impossible for couples to save money for marriage between the monthly student loan payments, car payments and rent, and any other accumulating debt. As a result, if there isn’t enough money to get married, there won’t be enough money to buy a house and eventually start a family. Student loan debt leaves individuals and couples stranded on an island with little hope of rescue.

You are not alone in your student loan woes. In an article with Business Insider, Matthew Burr dealt with over $60,000 in debt, and shared the secrets to his success in paying off his student loan debt. He and thousands of other students around the country have found ways to make their debt payments work for their budgets, and you can too.

Changing your spending habits to budget for student loan payments can be a challenge. But instead of seeing your loans as an insurmountable mountain, here are a few ways you can challenge yourself to turn your spending habits into saving habits to help ease the loan debt.

Start making loan payments early.

When you graduate college, you have that six month grace period to find a job and make some money before the student loan payments begin. It’s tempting to leave those loans alone during that time, but even with the grace period, the interest on the loans continues to accumulate. Pay down some of the interest during the grace period to help decrease the amount of interest and the ultimate costs of your loans.

Pay more than once a month if you can.

If your monthly income allows for a little extra money to spare, you can make more than one monthly payment on your student loans. Another way to accomplish this is to pay more than the minimum on your monthly payments. Either option allows you to pay down your debt faster than by just paying the minimum payment every month.

Don’t run up debt on credit cards.

Having debt in more than one place can be stressful. Just like there is interest on student loans, there is interest on credit card debt. If you can avoid spending more than you can pay for on your credit card, you’ll save yourself the worries over the debt.

Live within your means.

Living within your means can be tough when there are so many tempting things out there. While you might want a new car, buying a used car is a great way to save money for loans and other debts that you would have spent on payments for a new car. Saving money where you can allows you to pay back more money on the loans. The more you pay, the sooner you can start living student loan debt free.

Set a monthly budget.

One thing that couples struggle with is not living within their means. They may not make enough money individually or together to afford the kind of lifestyle they lived when they were at home or in college. Keep a record of your expenses every month, and set a monthly budget based off of what you spend on. The more you understand your monetary influx, the better you will be at budgeting and saving money.

Reward yourself.

Debt can sometimes pile up and seem an insurmountable peak to overcome. Set goals for yourself for your payments and how you want to pay them off. When you pay off a loan, don’t forget to celebrate with a night on the town or a fancy dinner, because working hard to overcome debt deserves recognition.

Monitoring and changing spending habits to fit your loan payments and lifestyle will help you overcome your debt and learn to live more comfortably within your means.

Written by Stephanie Black, Journalist for Money on Your Terms

Imagine if someone said that you have 60 minutes to solve your money problems, and that if you do, you would be given 25 million dollars. Ready. Set. Go.

This deal seems easy and accomplishable, but most people would ultimately fail. They wouldn’t know where to start. They would be completely lost.

You Hold The Key To Your Solution

But ironically, you hold the key to your financial solution. All you have to do is find out your money personality, which financial coach Jordan E. Goodman created to help people like you, with normal finance problems, get tailor-made advice to becoming financially sound.

These six money personalities range from being thrifty or extremely complacent, to spending way too much and taking too many risks. Goodman calls them strivers, ostriches, debt desperadoes, coasters, high-rollers, and squirrels. And, finding out your financial personality, which keep in mind may be different from your spouse’s, will get you on track to starting your money makeover.

Your Past has Created who you are Today

Discovering this personality all starts with evaluating your childhood experiences with money. Believe it or not, these experiences made you who you are today financially.

First and foremost, you must evaluate how you feel about money in general. This includes recognizing your experiences with money during your childhood and acknowledging your fears and fantasies with money. Your feelings about money all tie back to your upbringing.

A friend of mine lost his house when he was a kid. His parents had spent money all over the place and didn’t save toward their mortgage. As a young boy, he blamed himself and became determined to get a job that would give him financial security. He eventually chose a major in risk management so that he could manage situations and protect himself with insurance. He learned the power of spending and saving, and set himself up well going forward. This one event, losing his house as a child, affected his life decisions. And, if you can think back to your experiences with money during your childhood, you can find out how it has affected you, too. Maybe you didn’t have much money growing up. Maybe your family always had an abundance of it. Maybe your family split up because over money, and you shun it.

Those experiences contribute to how you feel about money. Do you feel deserving, powerful, confused, happy, insatiable, entitled, guilty, corrupt, or fearful? There is always an emotional component to money.

Evaluate and Talk with your Spouse

Once you know your feelings toward money, you can connect it to your financial situation now.

Do you spend a lot of money?
Are you saving everything for the future and not fulfilling any of your desires now?
Do you take a lot of financial risks or think you’re invincible?
How are you doing financially, honestly?

These questions are good starting points for conversations with your spouse. Not only will you be bonding on an emotional level, but you will also be helping to understand why each other feels the way they do about money and how it’s affecting your finances now. Talking will help put some of your money matters at ease.

What are your goals as a couple? Have you even discussed goals with your spouse? It is very important to know what you want? But, once you assess what you want, you will know what to do — how much insurance to buy, where to invest your money, whether to buy that dream home, or whether to quit your job and start a new venture.

Once you answer these essential questions. You are ready — ready to find out your money personality, how to adjust your finances based on it, and how to handle your finances based on your spouse’s money type, as well.

Written by Epiphany Johnican, Journalist for Money on Your Terms

Spring is the beginning of wedding season: the time when many couples get engaged and start planning for marriage. Having a “ring by spring” can be really exciting, and it’s easy to get caught up in all of the wedding planning. It’s so easy, in fact, that couples can overlook the importance of saving money for marriage.

Wedding costs have hit an all time high, according to a Real Weddings Study done by The Knot. Many couples dream of having a grand wedding, with the bride walking down the aisle with all the royal treatment, but not every girl has parents that are the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. Some exceed their budgets because they have little to no experience planning a wedding, while others do not realize the cost of a wedding and end up running over budget or unable to afford it.

Older generations did not have the expectations for big weddings; all they had was their love. Nowadays, couples need to talk about money, not only for the wedding, but also for their journey together as a married couple.

Marriage is not just the act of getting married, but the beginning of a commitment to someone. That commitment includes sharing financial responsibilities with one another. If you don’t know one another’s saving and spending habits, now is the time to learn.

Communication is essential in any relationship. “The ability to communicate with your partner in a completely open fashion about everything from intimacy to personal goals is the single most important element you and your partner can cultivate,” says Trent Hamm for U.S. News. “If you’re going to make a lifelong commitment to each other, you need to establish open and equal communication.”

Talking about money before marriage strengthens communication with your spouse, and helps you move toward a happy and fulfilling marriage. It is important to work together in forming a plan for your marriage. This doesn’t mean that couples have to know all the answers for the future, but it is important to work together and save money for marriage.

Over the course of your relationship, you’ve probably learned a lot about one another’s money handling strategies. One of you may be a saver; the other might be more of a spender. At first, it can be tricky to deal with your different money management styles. Saving money for marriage might have different meanings for the both of you. It is better to talk about your money personalities and how you can work together with them.

There are several money matters to discuss if you plan on saving money for marriage. You should talk about:

An emergency fund.

First thing you should work on as a couple is a plan for an emergency fund. At Couples Finances, this is called a Smart fund. This is money that you and your future spouse should set aside in case of an unexpected expense, a sudden job loss, or another emergency. That way, if a problem arises, you will have some back-up money to help you figure out your next step.

Where you see your futures selves.

On your tenth wedding anniversary, where do you see yourselves? Have you bought a house, or invested your money? How about on your twentieth anniversary? Do you have money for children and college? Asking these questions early on in your relationship allows you and your future spouse to set goals to save money for your marriage.

Your individual credit histories.

It’s important to look at both of your credit scores and credit histories. Combined credit might affect your ability to buy a house or take out a loan together. Share your financial histories with one another, so that as a couple you are able to understand your situation and work together to form solutions to debt issues.

Your student loan and credit card debts.

When you get married and your individual finances become shared, it’s important to understand what kinds of student loan debts you each may have acquired during college. Just like your credit histories, your individual debts will affect how you look at your money as a couple.

It’s also important to talk about credit card debts and any other debts you may have gained over time. Individual debt affects the way that couples address their shared finances. When couples get married, they become partners, and should have plans for how to tackle their problems together and find the best solutions.

Marriage season is an exciting time, but it’s also a season for saving your money. Just as your wedding will cost money, it also costs money to be married, so now is the time to form money-saving habits so you and your future spouse can continue to have a fulfilling relationship. When you save money for marriage, you and your spouse will be better equipped to solve any money issues that come your way, and more able to accomplish your money goals.

April 15th, Tax Day, is fast approaching.

Congratulations to those of you that have already have successfully filed your taxes.

If you haven’t filed your taxes yet, it is a good time now to gather all your documents and schedule a session with your tax preparer or get the necessary forms from www.irs.gov if you are a do-it-yourself type.

Last year’s average refund was $3,100, so maybe this is a good motivator to get it done. Once you are done, hopefully you can celebrate with a nice check from Uncle Sam.
With that much money coming back, I am sure the masses will be planning that Vegas trip to let loose or wanting to sail away on a Caribbean cruise. They certainly can justify doing that because they can say, “I earned it.”

I propose a better idea this year, like doing something smart with the money to set the foundation for financial security for you and your family.

What I mean by being smart with it is to save a little of it and put the rest toward paying down some debt.

To illustrate what I propose, I will use last year’s average refund of $3,100.

This is what I would advise. First, take a small portion of the money, 5%, to reward yourself for working so hard. That would amount to $155. Take this money and have fun. Go out to your favorite restaurant, or spend some time at the spa, or buy something on Amazon that you have had your eye on.

After you are done rewarding yourself, then it is time to put the remaining $2,945 to good use.
As a financial coach, I find too many people lack any type of savings to handle even the smallest emergency. Let’s say the transmission goes out on your car, or Johnnie sprains his ankle, or the pipes in the bathroom rupture. Having an emergency fund brings security to people’s lives, knowing they have money saved to handle an emergency instead of having to scramble to find the money or getting themselves deeper in debt by putting it on a credit card.

So, in our example, you would put $1,000 of the $1,945 into an emergency savings account at your local bank or credit union. You will feel a sense of security when this is done.
Now you have $1,945 left. This is still enough to take that Vegas trip, but the money would be better served by tackling your debt load. Paying down debt should be the next step with the money.

I advise clients to pay off people they know first, like their family, friends, or coworkers. I believe strongly that borrowing money from people you know is a bad financial decision. So I always advise paying them off first. Then from there, chipping away at the high-interest debt would be the next step; most likely this will be credit card debt.

So, in 2015, I would suggest doing something different and being smart with your tax refund. Put it to good use and build financial security for you and your family by funding an emergency fund and getting into the habit of paying down debt. You will find that, by doing this, you will be much better off than feeding the one-armed bandit in Vegas.

Tim Mann is a highly sought-after financial coach who meets with local clients in his sunny office in Bermuda Dunes, CA. He is also available remotely by phone, FaceTime, or Skype. He wrote the best-selling book Money on Your Terms and conducts his radio podcast, The Money on Your Terms Show, to educate people on all aspects of money. He is passionate about coaching people on how to get out of debt and learn how to save more.

If you’d like to learn more, please explore the site, sign up for Tim’s FREE newsletter, or get in touch to set up a complimentary consultation at (818) 292-2548.

Way to go on at least reading this about taking the first step. In order to start the process of getting out of debt, the best advice I can give you is to put the brakes on using debt to pay for your lifestyle. Other than having a home mortgage, all other forms of debt should be stopped.

See, if you continue to use credit cards, get a car loan for you cars, fund college with student loans and use the other thousands of loan products out there, you are not getting a handle on curbing your appetite for debt. Debt has become such an addiction that we even borrow money against our 401K retirement account. What a bad financial decision that is!

If you are ready to pay down debt, then the first step is to stop using it. This is a simple idea but seems to be hard for people in our society since we have been so conditioned to use every form of it from credit cards to home equity loans. They have even come out with Apple pay; it is everywhere.

How do you make the shift? Start the process by developing the habit of paying for things with the money you have, not money you borrow. Continue to pay monthly expenses like your mortgage or rent, car payment, insurance, utilities and cable bills by check or through online ACH bank transactions. For all other expenses and purchases, use cash or a debit card.

It is that simple: You use cash and a debit card to pay for your lifestyle. After you get comfortable with using cash and a debit card, and you have stopped making future purchases with debt, you can then develop a plan of action to pay down your existing debt: your credit cards, car loans, student loan, etc.

You can do this!

As I have made the commitment to help people become money smart, I would be happy to send you my Quick Start Guide to Getting out of Debt. It is an easy read packed with what to do to break the cycle. This is the same Quick Start guide I give my coaching clients.

Just email me at tim@moneyonyourterms.com and type: I am ready to get out of debt, Tim.
I will then send you a copy of the guide.

As a favor, like us Facebook.

Tim Mann Financial Coaching.

I am here to build a community where people can take control and become smart about their money. My vision is to see people at a place in their lives where they are living on their own terms instead of everyone else’s terms.

Where you are at today financially is a combination of all the financial decisions you’ve made up to this point in your life. Most people have never been taught about finances; furthermore, very few have had any type of financial coaching. Money has been something we just learned about along the way. Sometimes that learning experience becomes very costly because of the lack of knowledge or poor planning we often do before making a financial decision. I will be the first to admit that I have made my share of financial mistakes. Some mistakes were extremely painful, while other mistakes were not so painful. I was thinking, what if one could eliminate the majority of bad financial decisions in the first place? Wouldn’t that make life a whole lot easier?

Here are some quick strategies you can use to reduce your odds of making financial mistakes.

Learn from Others
Curiosity is a good thing. Read about successful people. Successful people have their share of failures along the way as well. It is simply the price you pay to become successful. Billionaire Real Estate Builder Donald Trump sums it up by saying, “Always try to learn from other people’s mistakes, not your own- it is much cheaper that way!”
There is so much information out there about the mistakes people have made; open your eyes to them. Become curious and study their mistakes so that you can avoid them all together.

Become a Detective
To reduce your odds even further from financial mistakes, gather as much information as possible about your future financial decisions. Knowledge is power. I love this quote by publisher Charles Knight. “Every mistake that I made – and we all make mistakes – came because I didn’t take the time to get the facts. I didn’t drive hard enough.”

Today, when I am making any type of financial decision, I research everything about that financial matter. I don’t want to go into it blindly. I want to understand everything about it. I want to know all the details and costs involved. Gathering all the information is key. It is very important to do as much investigative work as possible to reduce the odds of making another financial error.

Have a Plan
Very few people have a Financial Plan in place. Money is so important in our lives, but the masses brush it under the rug. Do the opposite; get a plan in place. Take things in small steps instead of trying to take a giant leap. If you make smaller financial choices along the way, you are reducing your risk.  Financial Planning is very simple; it is not rock science. To get started, have the following:

– A monthly budget
– An emergency fund
– A retirement savings plan
– Adequate amounts of insurance
– And create a debt reduction plan

If you start focusing on these areas of financial planning, you will eliminate the majority of financial mistakes people are making out there.

Put the odds in your favor and keep more money for yourself by learning from others’ mistakes, gathering the details, and putting a financial plan in place. This way, you will eliminate the majority of financial errors you could make and you will be able to enjoy more fruits of your labor.

When was the last time you had a disagreement or argument about money? Money conflicts are normal in any relationship, however with most couples it’s how they handle the fight that makes the difference between continuous harmony or disharmony.

When working with couples, I often find that it is how they are communicating about money issues that causes the friction. Most of the time butting heads can be avoided if the couple simply worked on better communication.

Here are some tips to help you work through those heated discussions so that you are working together instead of against each other. This guide will not only will help you improve on your communications about money but it will also help you with your discussions on non-monetary issues as well.

1. Timing is Everything:
When a fight is ensuing, often it can be attributed to your own emotions in the moment as opposed to what your partner did or did not do. Maybe you had a bad day at work, or your kids are on your nerves, or you are just feeling under the weather. Being drained, tired, or irritable is not the best place to be in when discussing money with your partner. When you are in a relatively calm and positive state, with less on your mind, is a better time to chat. If the time is not right or fighting has begun, the best thing to do is tell your better half to take a break and return to the discussion at another time. This can be as simple as the sentence: “Let’s take a break, and set up another time to discuss this.” Instead of walking away or storming out of the room, end with an agreed time where both of you can return to the issue at hand. Remember: abandonment is not what your love signed up for.

2. Use of Technology:
Technology allows information to travel to us at lightning speed. Are we better off with smart phones, Facebook, texting, and emailing? The answer depends on how it is used. Although technology generally has had a positive impact on basic communication, it tends to be better to discuss contentious money issues in person. When discussing a hot money issue, texting, messaging on Facebook, or emailing are not your communication tools of choice. (And yes, people actually air their dirty laundry on Facebook.) Think about it: you don’t know how someone is really feeling by a few words in a message. Let your fingers do the walking by dialing the phone. How much quality is there in a text or email? You need to hear their voice. Quality comes from spoken words, connecting with one another and talking it through. It is time to get back to the old faith form of communication: Talking to each other.

3. Identify What is Really Bothering You:
Money alone is not always the issue. Most of the time there is something else that is contributing to the problem. Maybe you don’t know the full reason why your spouse made a certain decision, and you jumped to conclusions. Or maybe you felt left out or left in the dark about how money was spent. Or something occurred that triggered memories of a childhood experience or a past relationship which has nothing to do with your honey. Next time you are feeling upset about a money issue, take a look within and assess the whole range of things that are bothering you before lashing out.

4. Focus on the Problem:
When things have reached the tipping point, emotions fly and sometimes people bring up prior problems within the relationship, both momentary and otherwise. Remember: you want to move forward not backwards. Reverting to the past can unnecessarily complicate matters with other issues that don’t necessarily help solve the problem at hand? Focus your energy only on resolving your single money issue. Agree that you both can meet and discuss other issues another day. You want to build momentum and confidence that will allow you to get through one issue. So focus on the problem at hand and create solutions together.

5. Create Solutions that have Options:
When I work with couples, I like to create several different options so they can choose which one will work best for them at the time; that way you can always move to Plan B if Plan A is not working. This allows couples to make the best choices for their unique relationship. Did you see the movie, Argo? Ben Affleck played the real life character Tony Mendez who went in front the top brass of the United States government and said there are no good options, there are only bad options. Affleck said, “This is our best bad option.” That best bad option rescued 6 American citizens out of the hostile Iran back in 1980. Brainstorming and creating options will do wonders for your relationship and help you build a skill-set to solve future problems. This shows that you are working together which is important in any relationship.

So take these 5 Couples Financial Counseling tips and the next time you find yourself in a heated battle with your spouse or significant other remember them. They will allow the heat to settle so that you can cool-headedly brainstorm together and find solutions to your money problems. Going forward, invest in your relationships by fighting fair.