I personally never make New Year's resolutions because I've found that you're way more likely to stick with it if you start it right now, rather than waiting until a specific time. "I'm going to start my diet...on monday!" sound familiar? How well does that work?
So today is the time to start! Here are three easy steps to get you started.
First, open 3 accounts. One for an emergency fund. One for your retirement (IRA - Individual Retirement Account). One to pay down debt. You can open all three of these at a bank and tell them what each one is for.
Secondly, go to your Human Resources department at work. They're the ones that handle all of the payroll checks. Tell them that you want to initially fund those three accounts with $1 each just to make sure it works properly via direct deposit. This gets your foot in the door and gets you use to money coming out of the paycheck each pay period.
Thirdly, once that's done either weekly or periodically up the amount that you contribute to each account. If you do it online, it's super easy and you don't have to bother HR every time you want to. Otherwise just tell them that you want to increase the amount by $5 each pay period until you reach say $100 for each account each weekly pay period (adjust according to how often you get paid). This will mean the difference between being debt free and retired vs being broke in 30 years. What you'll notice is that you adjust your lifestyle based upon your take home pay. You eventually won't even notice it. The government figured this out 3 generations ago, which is why they automatically take it out each pay period, rather than have you pay on April 15th each year.
-CC
So today is the time to start! Here are three easy steps to get you started.
First, open 3 accounts. One for an emergency fund. One for your retirement (IRA - Individual Retirement Account). One to pay down debt. You can open all three of these at a bank and tell them what each one is for.
Secondly, go to your Human Resources department at work. They're the ones that handle all of the payroll checks. Tell them that you want to initially fund those three accounts with $1 each just to make sure it works properly via direct deposit. This gets your foot in the door and gets you use to money coming out of the paycheck each pay period.
Thirdly, once that's done either weekly or periodically up the amount that you contribute to each account. If you do it online, it's super easy and you don't have to bother HR every time you want to. Otherwise just tell them that you want to increase the amount by $5 each pay period until you reach say $100 for each account each weekly pay period (adjust according to how often you get paid). This will mean the difference between being debt free and retired vs being broke in 30 years. What you'll notice is that you adjust your lifestyle based upon your take home pay. You eventually won't even notice it. The government figured this out 3 generations ago, which is why they automatically take it out each pay period, rather than have you pay on April 15th each year.
-CC
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