Money Problems

                                                                1.

When you throw the word money around you can get a whole mix of emotions. TO some people it’s taboo to other’s it is God, and everything in between. The reality is we all have some sort of relationship with money. What I will argue is that no matter your relationship or point of view – you should have it. We need it. We live in an exchange economy, so money quite literally makes the world go round. With the invention of money came the result of trading time for it. Being that our time is finite it is quite encouraging to understand that wealth is infinite. We can leverage our assets, cash, gold, and our influence to save/create time. What I will focus in this article is a system of 3 departments to have more money in your pocket. It requires a business mindset.

                                                               2.

The mindset we as humans have to have is operating our finances like a business. There is arguments for even creating your own personal brand with social media to separate yourself from the average person. Which can be beneficial, however I am going to talk about the logical approach of managing your financial mindset. The three business departments you are now in charge of is your Revenue (sales), Cost, and Reserves.

                                                                        3.

Revenue, also known as sales. This is how much money we are bringing in. It should come without saying, but how much you want to bring in is completely dependent on your goals. If you’re every 20-40 year old who wants to be a billionaire – you’re going to need a fucking lot. I am going to be very conservative and give us all a goal to make $100,000 this year. ( I hope it doesn’t offend you). If you need bigger numbers which eventually you will, just take the concept and apply it to your numbers. In order to accomplish our goal we are going to have to make $8,333/ month (mo). Or have a job that pays $50/hr and work a 40hr work week. Now, as CEO of the revenue department we need to find creative ways to make this happen if we don’t have this coming in. We can uber on the side or find side gigs. We can create a service or product that solves people’s problems. Remember money is time being traded. When you go to the store, you are paying money to not have to go through the hassle of making the shoes yourself. A shoe building process that would take you hours to do can easily be avoided by walking in to a retail store, saving you hours. Unless you are picky, those hours will be spent trying different styles on. To add to your revenue you can create time for people by babysitting or by selling a product. The product would need to sell for $20 and to 415 people/mo or vice versa. A product priced at $415 with 20 customers/mo. You can adjust product price or dollar per hour. The important thing is understanding the concept of money and the realistic ability to hit $8,333/mo. It comes down to $269/ day. If you are chasing the elusive million adjust your numbers accordingly – the numbers only get bigger. However, they are attainable with multiple streams of income. Which we will explore in a different article. For now the target is hitting the #’s.

                                                            4.

Cost. Is definitely the hardest topic to talk about because no one likes to see their bank statements at the end of the month. At least not anyone doing a poor job in the finance aspect of life. Which I suspect is you if you have read this far. Being that it is hardest, it is also the most important of the three. No matter how much money is coming in from the guys working hard in the revenue department if our cost department is not discipline enough we will fail. We will also end up like Nicholas Cage and having a dinosaur skull as the least impressive item in our debts. As conscious animals we hate the idea of not being competent or of the inability to make rational decisions. Which is why we don’t track our spending. Out of sight out of mind. I am not your dad so I’ll spare you a lesson of psychology and how bad we are at making decisions. We do better at making decisions by having automatic systems that create awareness to our expenses. My favorite tool is mint. You can link all your accounts and have a weekly and monthly report of all your transactions. When I did this I found out $400 of my hard earned money was going to alcohol and bars a month. ( Oh no, am I an alcoholic? Do I have a problem? No way I am spending 4 fucking hundred dollars on alcohol. This has to be wrong. Oh fuck now I am denying I have a problem, this has to be a serious problem now…. No, no I am only in college its okay). So hopefully you will not be as shocked to see were your money is going. The first solution to improving is to develop an awareness. From there we can calculate our fixed expenses and our non-fixed expenses. Fixed would be a recurring payment you can depend on having each month. Rent, bills, gas, etc. Non-fixed would be stuff that changes but is an expense. Entertainment, shopping, etc. They fluctuate month to month. Some people allocate certain percentages others set a budget. Do whatever works for you try different strategies and stick with what works for you. The biggest thing in this category as boring as it may sound is: Do not spend more money than you make. The difference of these two will give us a profit. Which is what we keep. Then it goes to the boys in the reserves department.

                                                            5.

Reserves. This is where the big balls hang out. The reality is that this is where its make it or break it. What we do with our extra cash is what will lift you and your family to the next level. The worst thing in the world that can happen is not tragedy. An unexpected loss, accident, injury, or any unforeseen tragedy. The worst thing is not being prepared for it. It’s going to happen to you. You are not special. Everyone in this world is unable to escape suffering. Now on the opposite spectrum the second worst thing that can happen is being presented an opportunity and not being able to take advantage of it because you don’t have the resources. We always need cash on hand. The reserves takes care of this for us. Having a rainy day fund – 6 month expenses. After that is storage. Some people call it savings, we will call it money ready to invest. This is money we do not touch until its ready to be put to work. I recommend an online bank account and throwing the debit card. Keep the checkbook to only write big checks when it is time. The big takeaway here is the bigger the reserves the more get out of jail free cards, and opportunities you get.

6.

There is so many tricks and strategies out there that work. There are so many topics that are related to money. Taxes, debt, investing, etc. All however are encompassed by 3 departments. Keep it simple. If you are a person in debt and want to get that resolved first then we should start with our cost department. Find ways were you can cut expenses and be more aggressive with your repayment. By using the money in your reserves. If you have low debt and want to start with your revenue find creative ways to sell a service or product. Then work your way to managing cost accordingly, build the reserves, and add streams of incomes. The cycle is the same three. Repeated over time we get to our financial freedom goal of whatever that number is for you. Remember money will not solve money problems. If I give you a $100,000 today you still do not have a revenue department that can produce 100 thousand, or a cost department that can manage it. Build your systems, for they will solve your money problem.