Getting a jump start on 2020

• by secure_investors
• Posted on 11 November, 2019

By Bryan Spencer, President

With less than two months before the start of the new year and a new decade, reviewing where you are financially and where you want to be over the next couple of years is important.

I am not talking about New Year’s resolutions; I feel like people rarely accomplish the goals they have set before the New Year. Still, I believe it’s important to set goals and review the past year.  At the end of each year, I typically review the year and I ask myself three questions:

1. What did I do this year that worked? Something that was a win and I am proud of – something I did that made a difference, either professionally or personally.
2. What wasn’t working? This is something that may be setting me back from not reaching my goals – financially, professionally or personally.
3. What lessons were learned this past year?  The process of reviewing this is not to look at all of your mistakes, but to bring knowledge about what you have learned and seeing the opportunity from that experience.

This review helps me to also take an honest look at my financial groundwork. Whether it’s my investments, savings or reaching my goals for growing my business.  Am I making strides to improve my financial foundation?

I encourage you to do this.  Think about your successes and which have ones have been beneficial – especially for something as important as your money, and don’t wait until January to do this – the next month is going to bring chaos with the holidays, take some time to do this over the next few weeks.

For me, with over 25 years in the financial services industry I have learned a lot about helping people save and invest their money, protecting their loved ones and reaching their goals financially by sharing my knowledge.

I encourage you to create a realistic plan that will work for you – use these steps to make 2020 better than in 2019.

1. Review the past year and your expenses, while this doesn’t sound like much fun it’s important to do in order to achieve what you want for 2020.

• How much money was spent on frivolous things, coffee, eating out, etc?
• What were the expenses that you had to cover such as utilities, mortgage or rent versus things you purchased that you wanted that wasn’t a necessity? 
• What do your expenses look like compared to your savings?
• Do you have debt you would like to pay down?
• Review your subscriptions, phone subscription apps, streaming services, reoccurring expenses you aren’t using.

Reviewing these expenses can be eye-opening and can help you maybe find some savings.

• Track your expenses.  Write everything down or keep all of your receipts. This will help you know where your money is going.  With one click purchases and automatic billing, it’s easy to spend mindlessly.

Get in the habit of tracking expenses on a regular basis.  If it’s too overwhelming to do it monthly, schedule it in your calendar every quarter on a specific day. Tracking your expenses gives you control of your money.

• Set some clear and realistic goals for the next year. Whether it’s saving an extra $500 a month in savings to automating and maxing out your Roth IRA contributions (your money will grow tax-free), or by bringing your lunch to work each day instead of going out to eat. At the end of the year, you will see the benefits and rewards. Remember as well by reviewing and tracking your expenses you can tweak the strategy as the year goes on.

We all have goals for the future. Perhaps yours is to retire early or to travel out of the country. But while our goals often depend on money, few of us know exactly how much we’ll need or how much we have to save each month to get there.  I hope I have inspired you to take on 2020 with a new financial plan.

Bryan Spencer, the Co-Founder of Secure Investors Group, has a long-established financial career in researching the financial services industry, finding partnership opportunities that create exceptional value for business owners and their consumers.