If you are like me, then you would want to have or enjoy life doing the things you love the most. You might also have it as a goal to spend time with your loved ones. To make this dream come true, you are required to learn how to manage your personal finances. This means that managing your money are central to having a fulfilling and less-stressful life.
I do not know what money means to you, but to have your personal finances in order is going to provide you with peace of mind.
It is good when you know the money you earn, how you spend it and the areas you invest your surplus cash.
Having financial health is a very important thing. You get the opportunity to truly enjoy life when you can be able to account for your money.
In this article, I will be discussing with you about personal finances and the role this plays in our life.
What is meant by Personal Finance?
Personal finance is the process of planning and managing personal financial activities such as income generation, spending, saving, investing and protection.
The process of managing one’s personal finances can be summarized in a budget or a financial plan.
This guide will analyze the most common and important aspects of individual financial management.
Personal finance refers to the financial management of your personal or your family’s resources.
It comprises of how you manage your money through expenditure, investments and savings, considering various life events and risks.
Related Article: 21 Tips on How to Manage Your Money Wisely
Other aspects of personal finance include banking, budgeting, retirement planning, insurance and estate planning among others.
The term personal finance can stand for the entire financial industry in an individual’s life. This includes all the institutions that offer financial services to an individual.
Personal finance focuses mainly in meeting the individual or a person and caters for both long and short-term financial goals.
Whether you have enough money for your essential monthly bills or you want to plan for your retirement, this is all personal finance.
Being financially literate helps you to distinguish between financial decisions that will be beneficial, and those that will be detrimental to your financial future.
Having a plan for your finances will help you meet your short and long-term needs, without going beyond your income limits.
The sooner you start to plan your finances, the better. To ensure all your assets, your income and expenditure are catered for, you can use useful tools such as personal capital that will cost you nothing.
You can use a tool or app to track all your investments as well as your cash flow.
Why Personal Finance is Important
Having basic personal financial skills is one of the most important things you can do to live a healthy, happy and secure life.
Your level of understanding around the fundamentals of budgeting, saving, debt and investing will impact every part of your life and can mean the difference between prosperity and poverty.
Reasons Why Personal Finance is Important
Have you ever sat back to think why personal finance is such an essential aspect of your life?
Well, sometimes you are so caught up in the daily activities that you forget how crucial it is.
It is important to understand why you must manage and plan for your money at every step of life.
Without personal finance, it is possible to live a life of bondage without knowing how to get off debts or adequately pay for your bills.
When seeking financial freedom, personal finance plays a significant role.
Therefore, having the necessary personal finance skills will help you to ensure all your money is managed well. This will help propel you to a bright financial future.
The purpose of financial planning can never be exhaustively explained.
9 Top Reasons Why Personal Finance is Important
The reasons are for personal finance include;
- Ensures that you meet your money needs.
- Helps you to manage your income.
- Budgeting, spending and savings.
- Personal finance and cash flow.
- Offering family security.
- Provides better financial understanding.
- Keeps you off unmanageable debts.
- Growing your assets.
- Raising your standards of living.
5 Key Areas of Personal Finance.
As you might imagine, personal finance has some key areas that you should consider.
It is important for you to explore each area of personal finances to ensure that you financial situation is all rounded.
Having a good understanding of this topic is critical to your personal financial success.
The main areas of personal finance are;
- Income
- Spending
- Savings
- Investing
- Protection
The above key areas of personal finances should guide you in creating your personal financial plan.
Ensure that you cover each area. It will help you manage your personal finances in a better way as well as provide you with security and peace of mind.
Example of Personal Finances
The term personal finance is all about how you as an individual or your family manages your money, saves and invests.
It is the financial management you perform in terms of spending, budgeting, saving and creating a retirement plan.
-
Expenses
Your expenses can include paying bills, rent, mortgage, shopping, paying for a round of drinks with friends, fuel for our car, buying presents and making donations to charity. Also credit card and tax payments
-
Income
This includes salaries, pensions, money gifts, hourly wages, commissions, dividends and bonuses among others.
You should learn how to manage and spend your salary wisely.
-
Savings
Savings include bank deposits and pensions.
-
Investing
This can cover such things as stocks or shares, starting a business and investing in someone else’s business.
-
Protection
When it comes to protection in personal finances, it means taking action to safeguard against adverse or unforeseen events.
In that regard, this would include such things as house insurance, car insurance, income protection insurance and home content insurance as well as your health insurance covers.
The idea here is taking actions to protect yourself and financial interests of your loved ones.
Personal Finance Tips for Beginners
I know you are here because you want to improve your personal financial situation. It is important and I salute you for taking the first step towards this.
In order to help you manage your personal finances better, I have listed down ideas and tips that you can use.
These will be your guiding principles as you learn how to generate an income, manage expenses, create a budget, save and invest your money.
11 Tips on How to Manage Your Personal Finances
The top and best personal finance tips for a beginner include;
- Create a simple budget.
- Write down all your debt and create a plan to pay.
- Audit your lifestyle and learn to be frugal.
- Create a savings plan and stick to it.
- Use money and budgeting apps to stay organized.
- Start a side hustle to increase your income.
- Invest in assets and not liabilities.
- Learn about personal taxes.
- Research on insurance covers and policies.
- Invest in yourself – increase financial knowledge.
- Have clear financial goals.
You should also read this; 12 Best Personal Budgeting Apps Today
Conclusion
In conclusion, your personal financial journey or story is best told by you. The decisions you are making and steps you are taking are going to determine how financially stable you will be.
You should be clear on how you are going to manage your personal finances.
Understanding your income and your expenses is a good starting point towards having financial freedom.
It is also important to ensure that you are managing your debts. If you have existing debts, take steps towards paying them off and reducing your exposure to debt instruments.
You should also find ways to increase your income through cutting down on expenses, and starting income generating activities.
For example, you can start a blog and earn money. There are many people who are using this business model to create wealth for themselves and their families.
Trying to understand your finances is one step to having a stable financial future.
And, although some will still not make a change until they are too deep in financial crisis, I hope that you won’t be one of those who will always ask, “Why is personal finance important” after this article.
Make a change now and impact your future finances.