Financial Literacy Month

Financial Literacy Month – Tip #1

Here’s the tip from January 14 – Analyze Your Bills month:

Roadside Assistance

I analyzed our car insurance as well as other related bills and added coverage to my insurance. For example, I added roadside assistance for less than $20 per year for two cars and was able to eliminate the auto club bill that was over $100 per year. The concession is that I have to pay for towing and then submit a bill for reimbursement. This was a no brainer for me saving 80%. What do you need to change?

To purchase a copy of either of my books Thrive In Five: Take Charge of Your Finances in 5 Minutes a Day or 111 Ways To Save

#JillRussoFoster #30WaysToSave

Financial Literacy Month Starts Wednesday!

April is Financial Literacy Month and I want to spread the word so that everyone can understand and improve their finances.

For the month of April, we will be posting daily tips from my book Thrive In Five: Take Charge of Your Finances in 5 Minutes a Day on Twitter, LinkedIn and my Facebook Fan Page. We need you to share and repost to your connections and friends so that these simple tips spread across the internet. My goal is to increase my exposure and therefore increase the number of people who improve their finances.

First, remember to connect with me through social media – Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook Fan Page, or you can forward this blog post to your family and friends for them to sign up for the newsletter. Thank you for spreading the word.

We want everyone to have some extra cash this April, so let’s make it rain by sharing financial information that really works.

To purchase a copy of either of my books Thrive In Five: Take Charge of Your Finances in 5 Minutes a Day or 111 Ways To Save

Watch for my first post on April 1st. 🙂

#JillRussoFoster #30WaysToSave

Spring Cleaning Your Finances & More

In honor of spring – which we will see today in the northeast – I will be posting about spring cleaning.

Today, let’s discuss your passwords and computer.

Have you done these things lately (if not, now is a good time):

Change your passwords – remember that they should be of strong strength and no two passwords should be the same. Worried that you will forget them, consider a password management system. If you are using a password management system, do a clean up. You should change your passwords often.
Make sure your software is up to date, run updates. And while your at it, when was the last time you ran your virus protection / malware scans. If you can’t remember, then it’s time to do this now.
No one likes to lose anything, do a back up today. Consider automatic back up both local and in a cloud. Many years ago, I had an office broken into and the computers were smashed as well as the local back ups (this was before clouds) were stolen. Luckily for me, my hard drive was recoverable after many weeks without the data and at a hefty price. I have learned from this experience, you should to.

Visit my resources page for suggestions of the products that we use.

More next week on spring cleaning in honor of the season.

#30Ways2Save for Financial Literacy Month April 2014

I’ll add a video here each day in April. The newest video will be on top. Scroll down for all budgeting tips you can handle!

How to take the trip of a lifetime (cheaply). For more details on our amazing trip (and our amazing savings) go here

What do you do when you checkout at the grocery store? Look at the gum, the magazines, talk to the cashier? Here’s what you should be doing.

How to get deals on concerts and events

What about rewards cards? Are they worth it?

How to negotiate a lower price

Where to find free videos, music and audio books

Which foods are always 50% at the grocery store?

What’s your bank charging you? Find out how you can avoid bank fees in today’s #30Ways2Save tip.

Have you ever run into a store for just 1 item, and come out with 20 instead? Those impulse buys can be budget killers. Here’s the best way to stay on track

Eating on a budget? Turn 1 healthy, filling meal into 2 healthy, filling meals

Get Matching Funds to Double Your Savings with This Program (If You Qualify)

How to keep your frequent-flyer account active and earn miles – without flying!

Lower your electric bill with this easy trick

How to find free workouts in your neighborhood

What to do when your rates increase

Where’s Your Unclaimed Money?

Use Cash to Avoid Overspending in Grocery Stores and Restaurants

Prescriptions – Can You Get Them Cheaper?

Shop Off-Season for Beautiful Clothes on a Budget

Free Movies and Entertainment (without pirating)

Our Financial Literacy Month tips were from Thrive in Five

I was so happy to give you a month of savings ideas for Financial Literacy Month. I really hope they inspired you to think about your future and what you can do today to make your dreams a reality.

Every tip I shared with you was from my book, Thrive in Five. In Thrive in Five, I suggest improvements you can make to your finance situation in just 5 minutes a day for 1 full year. I ask you to take a hard look at how you do things and to make small changes with big impacts.

Each chapter is a month in the year.

January – Analyzing Your Bills
February – Reduce or Eliminate Expenses
March – Saving More
April – Organization
May – Clutter Cleaning
June – Selling or Donating
July – Credit
August – Debt Reduction
September – No Spending Month
October – More Income / Planning Ahead
November – The Holidays
December – Money Drains

Because I wanted you to focus on your savings, I gifted you March for Financial Literacy Month. If you want to make big improvements with small steps, do get the book!

Another day to catch up on saving money

Financial Literacy Month is almost over! I can’t believe it myself.

This has been a jam packed month. I’ve really worked hard to push money saving ideas your way so you can afford to retire, have an emergency savings account, or just take a vacation without touching your credit cards. Today and tomorrow should be used to catch up on anything that you haven’t completed or something that you need more time to research. You should take extra time on retirement planning.

Tomorrow while you’re catching up, I’ll introduce you to another important step you should take soon.

catsup

Keep Your Savings Accounts Away from the ATM

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One thing I’ve learned over the years is not to have my savings account linked to my debit / ATM card. If I want to make an impulse purchase, I have to put some thought into it and move money either online or at the bank. This delay gives me time to talk myself out of wasting my savings on something I don’t really need.

An added benefit to keeping your accounts separate, is that if your debit card is stolen, the thief cannot access the money in your savings.

Transfer to Savings Automatically

savings-automatic

Have you struggled to save money because there never seems to be anything left over? Big surprise! We tend to spend the money we have in front of us. Getting a raise never seems to help, because that money disappears, too. There’s always something we think we need right now.

The best way to grow the money in your savings account is by setting up an automatic deposit from your paycheck. That way you never see it to spend it. If your company doesn’t offer this, that’s not a problem. Have an amount set up to be transferred automatically from your checking account to savings on a regular basis. The benefits here are that you are saving without any effort on your part and the money isn’t in your checking account to tempt you.

Make Payments towards Your Retirement

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Making payments towards retirement doesn’t have to be difficult. Remember what you’re saving money for. You want to retire some day, so you can enjoy some golf and vacations when you get older without having to work.

There are few ways to fund your accounts. If you receive large bonuses, you could simply deposit them into your IRA or 401K and just live within your regular paycheck. That won’t be possible for everyone. Most of us calculate the amount to pay by dividing our maximum contribution amount by the number of pay periods per year. Basically, we’re taking the money out of our paychecks.

The key is to act like it’s not yours to spend. This is your fun money, so you can take the grandkids to Disneyworld and finally take the European cruise, without having to worry about where you’re going to live or how.

Shop around before opening an IRA

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Opening your own IRA is a great idea, but do your research first.

Make a few appointments to interview banks and investment companies. What are their fees? What types of investments do they offer? There are many options to choose from.