Organization & Planning

Financial Literacy Month – Tip #9

Selling

Here’s the tip from June 8 -Selling or Donating month:

There are many ways you can sell unwanted items. Possibilities include consignment shops, thrift stores, online selling or classified ads, tag sales and auctions. You need to determine first if you want to do all the work and have the time or is it best to delegate to someone else. Today you need to think about your situation.

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

What To Do At Home

In these troubling times, people are staying home more. We are doing the same by staying home and limited what and when we go out. After a while, it can be pretty boring. So here are some suggestions that we are doing:

Have you wanted to visit a National Park? Now you can tour them from the comfort of your home with virtual tours.
How about seeing a famous museum? You can see some of the world’s famous museums from your sofa.
How about your local library. Ours is closed, but we have many digital options, such as music streaming, digital books and comic books (audio and e-books) (Overdrive), magazines (RB Digital), movies and TV (Hoopla and Kanopy), newspapers, online courses (Great Courses) and more. Try it, you may like it – we do.
Start a project that you have been meaning to do. I have been doing projects in my home in my spare time for the last few years to get more organized and have accomplished so much, but there is more to do. I have completed sorting all family photos, movies, slides and there are all digitized. I have sorted paper records and scanned, shredded and tossed. I was able to sell three filing cabinets by getting rid of paper. Now I am tackling my father’s newspaper clippings.
Catch up on those books that have been sitting on your night stand.
Now that your home, you may want to cook more meals or try a new recipe.
If the weather is nice in your area, it’s spring and time to get out in your yard.
What can you do to help out a family member or neighbor? Maybe they need someone to talk to. Check in with these people by phone, video chat and email.
With our gyms closed, we still want to exercise. We have been taking daily walks around the neighborhood. If you want something more formalized like a class, many gyms are streaming virtual workouts that you can follow at home.
Support your local community. Several people in our town have contributed money and purchased take out food to help the local business and had them delivered to our hospital’s emergency room. Please check with both the business to see if they are open and have the delivery capacity as well as if the recipient can accept the gift.
Miss not going to a Broadway show? Playbill is giving you the information to be able to watch some of your favorite Broadway shows from home.

For more suggestions, here’s are more from USA Today and Lifehack

What area you doing? Let me know.

Automatic Transfers To Save More

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 or want 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.

In addition, don’t have your saving account linked to your checking account on your ATM card. Why you ask? It’s too easy to transfer the funds without any thought. Also, you might want to have your saving account at another financial institution. You can access when you need the funds, but it isn’t that easy – so you will have time to think about withdrawing the funds.

Start to put your savings on automatic pilot today.

What Are Your Financial Goals for 2020?

What is it that you want to achieve with your finances? Is it to have an emergency fund? Is it to save for a specific goal such as a down payment on a home / car? Do you want to save more for retirement? Whatever you want you can achieve it.

Start by writing down your goal (in a SMART format). Then break it down to manageable steps.

For example, I want to save $500 by the end of the year – that’s

that’s $41.67 per month
that’s $9.62 per week

Now think of ways to find that money to save

could you bring your lunch / coffee to work one day a week
could you add an extra week between haircuts / manicures (if you do your nails every other week that’s 26 times a year, switching to every three weeks would be 17 times a year – that’s a savings of 9 manicures)
could you cancel or reduce your unused memberships / subscriptions
could you research lower costs for utilities / insurance
could you eliminate a fee (bank account, credit card and more)

With this in mind, you could find the $9.62 a week to save to meet your goal.

Remember that breaking it down to manageable steps is key so it doesn’t seem so over whelming.

Let me know what your financial goal is and maybe I can help you break it down in to smaller steps.

Happy Holidays!

My Year’s Recap

2019 has been a year of cleaning out for us. We have eliminated lots of items from our home by recycling / tossing, selling, donating and more. Each and every month we have gotten rid of items – everything from paperwork (which was scanned and originals shredded) to unused exercise equipment to streamlining our clothing.

Here are some of the specifics we did:

Donated formal attire to the local high school formal attire club, work clothes to Dress For Success and more
Sporting Equipment to the local sports drive
Books to the Library Book Sale fundraiser
Cell phones and accessories to Cell Phones for Soldiers
VHS movies to local senior living facility
Tools and ladders to Habitat for Humanity Restore
Old sheets / towels to the animal shelter
Electronics to the Salvation Army
Stuffed animals to the local thrift shop
Office supplies to several non-profits based off their wish lists
Clothing to the local food / clothing bank

Sometimes this seemed like a never ending project, but there has been much progress. For more information and ideas on what to do with your stuff, please visit my Resources page.

Here’s to a more organized 2020!

Oh No, The Holidays Are Coming!

The holidays are coming! The holidays are coming! Guard your budgets and hold onto your wallets. You might be thinking I’m crazy, but the retailers have positioned their holiday displays to disarm you of your cash, especially this year with fewer shopping days between Thanksgiving and the Holidays.

Did you shop on Black Friday and Cyber Monday?

Can you make this year different? Can you stick to your list and not overspend? You can if you make a detailed plan. Write down exactly what you will be buying and the dollar amount you plan to spend.

Here are some suggestions that should help you with your holiday budget list.

1. Gifts

How much for immediate family?
How much for extended family?
How much for friends and co-workers?
How much for people whose services you use?

2. Entertaining

How much will it cost when you host a gathering?
How much will you spend on hostess gifts when you attend a party?

3. Travel

How much will it cost for local travel (gas, tolls, parking, etc)?
How much will it cost for long distance travel?
How much will it cost for vacation?

4. Traditions – this can be anything from an afternoon tea to a night on the town.

If you write it all down, you might realize you’re planning on spending $300-$500 on gifts for people who aren’t on your immediate family list. And hosting dinners can be expensive just because you want to put on a good appearance. Ever notice a big stain on the tablecloth and found yourself running to the store at the last minute to buy one full price?

Holiday fun can wreak havoc on your budget, but it doesn’t have to. Now is the time to get a jump start on planning, and to put away money for the details that are important to you. Think of it as your own layaway plan. Take money out of each check, and spread out your spending, that way you won’t have buyer’s regret in January.

Doing this now may make January 2020 less stressful.

Tipping – Should You And How Much

Do you ever wonder should you tip this person? Personally, the answer for me is sometimes “yes” and sometimes “no”. For me it depends on the service I receive – was it Thank You! good or exceptional, did someone go out of there way and do something extra?

When I am in a restaurant, yes I tip the server. When I use a car park service, yes I tip the attendant. Also, I tip for personal services – hair cuts, nails, porter at airport and more. The list goes on and on. There are so many to tip in our lives, and even more so now that the holidays are approaching. But who and what do you tip and how much?

And the next question for me is – how much? Cash is always a great option for giving, but may not be the answer for your budget. Other ideas, might be a thank you note, a call to a company to tell them what I great experience you received from someone that works there, a bouquet of flowers, baked goods, etc.

As the holidays approach, here are suggestions from Real Simple Magazine with who and what.

Asking Those Questions

With the holidays fat approaching and family gatherings, now is the time to assess your life.

For those of us in the sandwich generations (parents and kids), you need to think about your aging parents. Are they prepared for what comes next? Are you prepared for what’s next?

Where are some ideas for what you need to know:

What are their finals wishes
Do you know what assets, insurance policies, etc they have and where are those documents?
Do they have all the legal paperwork in place – wills, power of attorney, medical directives, etc

It’s a difficult conversation to have, but it’s extremely helpful to do this ahead of time.

Personally, my father was very forthcoming with this information, so I had it easy. But even then, there was still a life insurance policy he must have forgotten about. I found it through a search of unclaimed funds website for my state. It was probably a policy that he (or his parents) had taken out years before.

I can’t imagine not having this information and knowing where things are. What about you? Do your kids know this information about you?

Take some time to have this important conversation when your family gets together.