5 Reasons You Need to Organize Your Finances Today

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I have a special treat for you today! My sweet friend Lindsay from One Beautiful Home is here to share her brilliant tips for organizing your finances. With our fifth little mouth to feed entering the world at any minute, you can probably understand why money is on my mind. #collegetuition ????

So without further ado, here’s Lindsay!

I feel like everybody and their brother, want to be organized. We all want beautiful pantries, with labeled shelves, closets that never have piles of folded shirts that fall on the floor, as you try to pull one out. A system for our children’s toys, so that a stranger may not even know that you own 2 billion fisher price little people. But, what people fail to realize is that everybody and their brother need to have their finances organized!

I am serious when I say that this is a need. I can also say with no exaggeration that organizing our finances has absolutely transformed our lives! Before I tell you a little bit more about my story, I want to share 5 reasons organizing your finances should be at the top of your to-do list!

Major Stress Relief- Knowledge is power, and power defeats stress, every time. Knowing, truly knowing how much money you have in the bank (even if that number is only $50.00) is so much better than not having a clue. With knowledge you are able to formulate a “plan” (if needed) without it, you are flying blind through the mountains of Alaska – aware you are going to crash, you just don’t know when.
The “God Forbid” scenario- I cannot even type out the worst case scenario, so lets just go with you (Or whoever pays yours bills) “Eat too much chocolate one night, and fall into the most restful coma for 4 months, before waking up completely refreshed and ready to take on the world” – What would happen? Would you (or they) have any clue where to start with the finances? Would you start getting behind on bills, late fees piling up, past due balances because you (or they) have no clue what gets paid, how much, and when?
You’ll Save Money!- I cannot even tell you how many times I have heard of people paying $35.00 (or more) in late fees multiple times a month because they miss their due date. Not because they did not have the money to pay, simply because they “forgot”. That is absolute insanity!
Improved Credit- I guarantee that if you go from “No financial System in place” to having a real system – your credit will go up. And here is why:
1. No more missed payments!
2. If you use my system, you’ll have a clear picture of your financial health, so you’ll know if you need to pay down debt, which debts to pay down, and how to pay them down!
You can live debt free – Having organized finances will not automatically pay off all of your debts – however if you use the right one, you can formulate a plan that is suited for your family to pay down your debts quickly, and nearly painlessly. You really can, we are!

So those are just 5 (of a hundred+) reasons why you need to get your finances organized. Now you might be thinking – that is sounds great in theory, but who has the time, the energy, and the ability to get it all sorted out? Well I did, and I am sharing it with all of you!

See here is a super quick version of our Debt story (If you want you can read the whole thing, here).

Two and a half years ago – I felt like our lives were going to collapse at any moment. My husband had just graduated with his Executive MBA – and we were going to have to start paying back the massive student loan – on top of his undergraduate degree, a mortgage and a car – not to mention one preschooler and a baby on the way.

I have always paid our bills, and made sure they were paid on time, but the whole system felt insecure. I hated that all the information and job fell onto my shoulders, and that if something were to happen to me my husband would not know where to begin (financially). I also though that with this new loan we would be in massive amounts of debt our entire lives (again not exaggerating). So as soon as I picked myself up off the floor, from seeing the student loan repayment book- I got to work.

I searched high and low looking for a Financial Planner that would:

Help me organize all of our bills
Help me get a true picture of the state of our fiances
Help me setup a payment “system”
Keep me motivated
Have all our information in one spot in case God Forbid, something happened
Track our financial goals
Help us PAY DOWN OUR DEBTS!
and a heck of a lot more…

As it turns out, I was not able to find anything of the sort! So I created one. I have created one every year since, tweaking and making improvements a little bit every year.

Using this system, readers have told me that they have paid of $40,000 of their debt in a single year. Many who have taken Dave Ramseys Financial Peace Course (We did, too!) have said it was better and easier to use (I agree!). Everything you need to dominate and organize your finances is in one place!

I wanted to do a little something as a thank you to Emily, for letting me share my story with all of you. If you purchase the 2017 Financial Planner, make sure you use the code MyLoveForWords to receive 10% off! (That makes the tier 1 package – where you get the Financial Planner AND a Bill Pay Workbook less than $5.00!) You can check out all of the options right HERE.

Even if you do not use the 2017 Financial Planner, please take the time to create your own system and get those finances organized – it will change your life!

xoxo, Lindsay