October 22, 2023 • 31 mins
Using the control center to help reduce spending is a benefit of doing a control center. Seeing where money is going and taking control of spending help reduce debt. Keeping spending under control is necessary and is easy to do once know where the money is going. This episode will cover everything needed to control spending.
Article Links:
https://navicoresolutions.org/resources/blog/5-money-management-basic-habits-for-financial-success?gad=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjw7JOpBhCfARIsAL3bobeIFE1nz6I4LqCN92d_N7p-xfgX_Lzy4cATLnxLprmfSnsOlT_DhD4aAm9xEALw_wcB
https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/how-to-stop-spending-money-8-ways-to-resist-the-urge
Please support the show by subscribing, can cancel at any time. Thanks for the support.
- Subscription page: https://www.buzzsprout.com/961804/support
- Contact: ReduceDebtIncreaseWealth@Gmail.com
- Wanting Budget Spreadsheet Place Spreadsheet as Subject
- https://Happygiraffe.org/live
- https://www.shopfinancial.com/lantianbaiyu/
All other inquires place topic into Subject.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:02):
Hello, I'm your host, Mr. Chuck, I retired accountant
turn truck driver, I reduce mydebt in a relatively short
period of time. debt reductionto achieve financial freedom
takes commitment, confidence,determination.
(00:24):
Everything to reduce debt, usingthe control center to help
reduce spending is a benefit ofdoing a control center. Seeing
where money is going and takingcontrol spending help reduce
debt. Keeping spending undercontrol is necessary, and is
easy to do once know where themoney is going. This episode
(00:47):
will cover everything needed tocontrol spending. The last part,
I'm going to give you ideas onhow to reduce your spending,
once you get everything inplace, so you can see where your
money is going. And it startsout with track your spending, I
(01:11):
have links in my show notes totwo articles that I'm going to
refer to a V can read them infull, that's good. If you're
interested in the program I useto get out of debt, there is a
link in my show notes, the verylast one shop financial, you're
gonna have to copy and paste thelink comes up, it should say
(01:33):
mainland and chuck in the upperleft hand corner.
And if you just follow what yousee there, it will eventually
get back to me if you decide youwant to get more information. So
let's startan order to reduce your spending
and get your spending undercontrol, he first got to realize
(01:55):
you have a problem.
Once you've done that, you'reyou're gonna you're starting,
you're in the right place. Andyou got to start tracking
everything going through yourchecking account, and all your
credit cards that you use on aregular basis. Now my debt
(02:17):
reduction plan, the first thingyou got to do is quit using
credit, you got to quit usingyour credit cards, you gotta
quit borrowing money to pay forthings that you need to pay for
on a monthly basis.
Once you do that, you you needto focus on where your spending
(02:40):
is going. If you know you'rebuying too many clothes, or if
you're going out to eat dinner,every single meal, those are the
two places you need to focus onfirst, he got to go to the
grocery store and buy groceriesand eat your meals at home.
Unless you're traveling or atruck driver. And you can't do
(03:02):
that. I assume everybody's got aplace they go to at night, and
they probably have a kitchen. Soyou'll be able to cook your own
food. Even if you go to thegrocery store and buy the pre
made meals, that's most likelygoing to be cheaper than going
to a restaurant for every meal.
Also another place is make yourcoffee at home, you can spend a
(03:25):
save some money there. Beforeyou start doing these things.
Those are the obvious choices.
You need to track your spending.
And tracking is just a matter ofhaving an application where you
put in your information. Ittakes five once you have
(03:45):
everything set up takes five to10 minutes every week. Keep it
up to date, and you have astart. You know where your money
is coming from, you know whereyour money is going for your
checking account and all yourcredit cards. Let's stick with
that for now. Of course you knowthat you got your mortgage
(04:05):
payment or your rent, you knowyou have your monthly utilities.
If you're using your creditcards to pay those monthly
bills, you have a problem. Hegot to quit doing that. He got
to focus on Pan air regularmonthly bills which I referred
to as needs first, and then payin your minimum payment on your
(04:30):
credit cards and all your debtsecond, and then building up an
emergency fund or a savingsaccount. Third, if you do those
things, you're gonna startgetting your debt under control.
Everything else you do is onlygone to speed up the process. So
(04:53):
if you can get your spendingunder care
control. Look for ways to reduceyour spending, do it month in
and month out, you're going toincrease your savings much
faster, you'll be able then toapply a larger dollar amount to
(05:15):
one of your credit cards, let'ssay, your debt, thus, paying it
down a little bit fastertracking, and then a control
center, a control center is abudget. Most people don't like
to do a budget because one ayear think it's too time
consuming, it's not cheap, do itthe way I lay it out, and only
(05:38):
takes you maybe 1020 minutes amonth. If that, the more you do
it, the faster is gonna becomethe more familiar with the
process, the quicker you will begetting the results that you
need to identify the areas whereyou need to focus on reducing
(06:03):
your spending, it could be justshopping, it could be your
titties are extremely high. Andmaybe you think you don't have
control. But you do can alwaysuse less of everything. And how
you go about it is up to you,you have to make a conscious
decision to do it. If you justkeep doing everything you've
(06:27):
been doing in the past, you'renot gonna get your life in your
financial life under control.
And that's what we're strivingto do with this podcast. So you
do your tracking, you use thatinformation, you create yourself
a report by category, you createyourself a budget or control
center. And once you have thatdone, then you can look more at
(06:51):
the details. And I will startwith housing, your needs are
housing, transportation, food,three basic things, that's a
start. After that, then you haveyour debt savings and credit
payments. That's not anywhereelse would be mostly credit
cards, personal loans, paydayloans, things like that. So our
(07:15):
goal here is to free up money tohelp pay down that the less debt
you have, the more money you'regonna have to put it towards
another debt. And so the cyclestarts out slow, that over time
is gonna speed up. So the firstthing you need to look for once
(07:41):
you have your tracking done forat least a month, and over time,
you're gonna be continually dothese things month in and month
out is just not a one timething. You're always gonna be
looking at, where can I savemoney? Where can I reduce my
spending, not only in shopping,not only in going out to dinner,
(08:01):
not only on entertainment items,but on everything that you're
paying for how can you reduceyour spending, you have to be in
that mindset to get your debtunder control. So let's start
with housing. Well, first ofall, if you have a mortgage or
rent, you're pretty much stuckwith that. And if you have rent
(08:24):
that's way too high, and that'sputting a strain on your budget,
then when your lease ends, lookfor a cheaper place to live, if
possible, maybe you're alreadyin the cheapest place you can
live. So maybe there's verylittle we can do in the housing,
mortgage rent category, butthere is a little bit you find
(08:47):
someplace else, maybe have morehouse than you need. You can
always sell the house and buysomething more affordable for
your particular budget. Maybeyou got in that situation
because it was you and yourspouse were working you got your
loan for your mortgage with twopeople working maybe started
(09:07):
having children now your spouse,one of you has quit working. So
that puts a strain on yourbudget. So some things are in
your control and some things arenot utilities are in your
control. If you don't have acontrollable programmable
thermostat for your electric,when your heat, then you have to
(09:31):
get that that's one of the firstthings you have to do. If you
have an older home. You got tolook at why is your heating cost
so much why's your eighth airconditioning cost so much? That
could be because you don't haveenough insulation in the attic.
And that's something you coulddo to help overall reduce your
(09:53):
costs. You can also look atimproving the home as far
his windows are concerned,Windows old windows leak a lot
and they let in a lot of cold orwarm air. So you could upgrade
your windows, I know these areexpensive items, and the won't
(10:13):
be able to do them right away.
But these are things you need tobe thinking about to do in the
future. If those categories havealready been done, you're in
good shape. So now you need toprogram your thermostat, I'm
going to start out with airconditioning. And this is what I
do. When my air conditioning ison in the summertime, I set it
(10:35):
at a higher temperature duringthe day that nobody is home
during the day, then set it at ahigher temperature. So you let
it warm the house up, I go up ashigh as 78 degrees, you could go
as high as 80 degrees. And thenat night, when the sun goes
(10:57):
down, it gets dark out, it'scooling down outside, then
that's when you set thetemperature and for your AC at a
lower, I set it at 72 housecools down. So it's comfortable
and cool at night. But duringthe day I let a warm up, but it
takes to three or four o'clockin the afternoon to warm all the
(11:20):
way up. Unless it's extremelyhot out, my AC is not going to
kick on. So when everybody elseis running their air
conditioning, mine is sittingidle, the house is little bit
warm. But if nobody's home, whocares. Or if you get home at say
536 o'clock, you can programyour thermostat to lower down to
(11:43):
78 degrees, say you have a setan ad and then at 530 Set it to
bring it down to 7778 76 cooleddown a little bit so it's
comfortable. And then nineo'clock at night. 10 o'clock on
might bring it all the way downto 72. And your air conditioning
(12:03):
won't run as much and you use alot less electricity. I
basically do the same thing withmy heat. But it's this the
reverse. I bring it up to atemperature around 68 degrees.
And then my I let it fall downto about 6665 degrees. And then
(12:26):
during the day I warm the houseback up when the sun is out and
it's a little bit warmeroutside. That's how you can help
reduce your electric bill otherthan turning off lights when you
don't need them. I know LEDlights don't use much. I know
fluorescent lights don't usemuch. Anything you can do to
(12:48):
reduce your overall electriccosts is helpful. Don't leave
lights on 24/7 Turn them offduring the day. Don't leave
lights on in a room nobody's in.
Don't let TVs run if nobody isin there. If you leave the room
(13:08):
and be gone for an hour, turnthe TV off and come back.
Article I have even says anyappliances you're not using to
unplug them because they'redrawn little bit of current. So
if you have a microwave you onlyuse a couple times a day, plug
(13:28):
it, plug it back in when you useit and then unplug it. And that
way it won't be drawn any typeof current because he have maybe
a clock in there or whateverthat goes with your coffee pot,
your microwave, convectionovens, whatever you may have
sitting on the counter that youleave in, plugged in 24/7 On
(13:51):
Plug them when you're not usingthem. All these things will add
up over time and help you savemoney. My have natural gas for
my heat.
So that's pretty much controlledthrough my thermostat and how I
set my thermostat up to heat thehouse. I have nobody's home, I
(14:14):
let it get colder. I bump up theheat a little bit before I get
home and then later at night. Ibump it up a little bit more to
keep it comfortable. And thenduring the day I let it drop
down. If you have a wellinsulated house with good
windows that takes a long timefor the House to cool down or
(14:37):
warm up depending on the seasonyou're in. Home Insurance you
are required by your mortgagecompany or even if you don't
have a mortgage, you shouldstill have home insurance. Once
a year shopped around before yourenew it, shop around and see
what's out there.
I just recently had a problemwith my insurance company I
(14:59):
shopped aroundThen I reduced my home insurance
by $300 a year, don't sound likemuch, but then that's $300 more
I have. Same thing with carinsurance for your
transportation, same thing foreverything, any insurance that
you're paying for shoppingaround, get prices on a yearly
(15:20):
or regular basis, maybe everycouple years. So that's housing,
part of housing that I includeon their housing is my internet
service.
I only pay for what usage or theamount of
(15:42):
megabytes or however they go by,that I can use. So if I have a
device that only can use 500megabytes, and that's my largest
device, I'm only paying for 500megabytes on that pan for 1000
megabytes, or what kilobytes orwhatever they call it, I only
pay for the maximum amount theprice can handle or will use for
(16:09):
the internet, I have no problemswhatsoever on streaming, I have
no interruption, I have nowaiting on it to load or catch
up. I have no those problems.
And that's how you save somemoney. Also, if you have
(16:31):
internet service, and you havecable, you're spending too much
money, you can get rid of thatcable service for your TV, and
stream. That way you'remaximizing the use of your
internet, you're paying for thatanyway, and what are you using
it for, you're just going onlineto do some shopping on your
(16:55):
computer, or to look up someYouTube video or whatever the
case would be.
You're not being efficient withwhat you're paying for high
stream 90% of all my TV, theother 10% is free TV over the
(17:15):
air, I bought myself a digitalantenna, I get a bunch of
stations I don't have to pay forand never pay for your local
channels through your cable, orthrough a streaming service. He
don't have to do that. It's it'sa little bit of a pain to switch
back and forth. But it's nothard. You just select your input
(17:39):
on your TV and select you changeyour input and boom, you're
there.
It only takes a few seconds. Andonce everybody knows how to do
it, it's no big deal. Onstreaming, you want to keep it
under control. You don't itstreaming for everything you
ever want to watch, you want toget one service that gives you
(18:03):
most of everything you run awatch.
So if you got cable TV, I haveone service where I can watch
all those same channels througha streaming service. Except for
news which I don't watch anyway. And sports. Most of my
sports I watch through the freeTV through my antenna.
(18:27):
When the college football gamesare in the playoffs, and
December through January, I willpay because all the services are
month to month. So if I don'thave ESPN one to five, whatever
there is, I then will pay forone month of service for to
(18:52):
watch those games off to have anice ESPN, I'll pay for one
month service, or watch thegame. As soon as the game over
the next day. I'll go in andcancel it and you'll get a
prorated bill, I minimize mystreaming costs by not paying
for things I don't watch on aregular basis. And then if I
(19:14):
need it, then I'll pay for itfor one month. Watch what I want
to watch ending cancel it.
That's the beauty of thestreaming service the month the
month so you're not locked in.
And you can only you can do itfor a week also or two weeks and
doesn't much matter. And May ifyou never signed up for that
particular streaming servicebefore you can get a trial
(19:37):
period for 30 days. So you mightbe able to watch where you want
to watch at no cost at least thefirst time. I did that for two
or three years until I ran outof services I could use. Now I
just pay for it for one month ona service I already have. I just
expand the service. Pay use itfor the
(20:00):
time period I need and then Icancel, the part that I
expanded. Cable TV is veryexpensive. And that's a good way
you can say money, your cellphone service. Same thing, if
you've had the same serviceprogram for more than a couple
(20:20):
of years, check with your phoneprovider to see if they have any
other new pricing and effectwhere you can get same or better
service at a lesser cost. Thatis something you need to
continually check for. Andthat's one of the reasons I
never get a phone through aservice, I buy my phone
(20:43):
outright, and then have an iPad,so it's unlocked. And then I
will be able to change serviceswhenever I feel like and if I
can find a better plan, thatgives me the same level service
at a less monthly fee, howtransportation is a little bit
harder, because gas price goesup and down. I've came to
(21:07):
conclusion that I don't want tofill up my gas tank every week,
or every time it's empty. Sowhat I do is only put in the
amount I'm gonna need for one ortwo weeks, maybe it's 10
gallons. And then I hope theprice drops a little bit which
sometimes it don't, so that Inot putting all my money into my
(21:32):
gas tank, instead of paying $60on the fill up, put $30 in, I
drive for a week, week and ahalf, and then I put maybe
another $30. And maybe overtime, it's kind of even out the
same. But that leaves money inyour checking account in case
something else comes up, hemight have a bill that's due, he
(21:54):
might be 30 bucks short thatweek, and you're gonna get paid
a week from now. But you'll havethe extra money there to pay
that bill. So it can be timelypay. So it's managing your
money, it's keeping track ofyour money as keeping control of
your money, that's important.
Our service, you need to setaside a little bit every pay,
(22:17):
and to a savings account, youremergency fund, and DEXA needed
for oil change or car repairs orcar maintenance. And then you
have the money there. When thetime comes to do that oil
change, it's gonna cost you60 7080, whatever, $100 you'll
have the monies and it's notgonna hurt your weekly budget
(22:41):
for that particular time period.
Because you just transferred outyour savings. It's in your
checking, use your debit card.
When I say quit using yourcredit cards, I mean, quit using
your credit cards, you got tostart paying for everything,
using your debit card, orgetting cash out your bank and
(23:02):
paying cash for everything. Ithink most people use their
debit card. But it's important,you got to know how much is in
that checking account, you gotto know how much you can afford,
how much of that money has beenearmarked for groceries or
gasoline, or maybe a utilitybill coming up. Because if
you're not paying all yourmonthly bills on time, you're
(23:25):
paying too much because you'repaying late payment penalties,
they might be charging youinterest, you're just paying too
much. So you have to startpaying everything on time, you
need to build up your emergencyfund. So if an unexpected
expense comes along, you havethe money available to pay for
(23:46):
most of it if not all of it.
That way you can minimize theusage of your credit cards. I
only use credit cards to buystuff online. I generally pay
them off every month, so I haveno big deal. Now my budget, I
have set aside X amount of moneyto apply to my credit card. Some
(24:09):
months I go over that somemonths I'm under it, but I have
a set amount of money alreadydesignate to pay for that credit
card. Don't use your credit cardto buy things if you don't have
the money to pay for it today.
You can always use your creditcard to buy some online and pay
it off every Friday. He can goonline and he can pay off your
(24:33):
credit card balance on Friday.
If you have a credit card was azero balance. That way you're
not carrying any debt. Don'twait the 30 days because some
miles could happen and then themoney is used somewhere else.
That credit card payment comesdue. He can't pay it. You make a
(24:55):
minimum payment you make a latepayment you're gonna pay more
interest you don't pay morefees. So you want to avoid doing
those things, bank fees, keepthe minimum balance that your
bank requires in your checkingaccount, or you'll be charged a
fee, I set my budget up, so thatI have at least $300 in my
(25:16):
checking account at the lowestpossible balance, if I pay off
everything pay for everything, Iknow I'm gonna have at least
$300. And that will get methrough next pay period.
Whenever that may be, that willget me to there, so I don't run
low. So the banks not chargingme a monthly fee, or charging me
(25:39):
an overdraft fee or charging methe reserve fee for using their
line of credit to fund mychecking account. Dining Out is
very expensive, try the eat moreof your meals at home. But that
doesn't mean you have tocompletely stop. It means keep
(26:00):
it under control, he can stillgo out once a week, once a
month, and celebrate a anachievement, you may may be paid
off a credit card, but you cango out and have dinner and
celebrate that by eating out.
(26:21):
But if you can keep your foodbills as low as possible. I'm
not saying that you're gonnastarve to death. I'm not saying
you're cutting back on eating,unless you're on a diet and you
want to, I'm saying we'rekeeping our spending under
control. By reducing the numberof times we're eating out.
(26:43):
Clothes only buy clothes whenyou absolutely need them, make
sure they're wore out before youreplace them. I generally like
shoes, for instance, I haveshoes I wear when I'm dressed up
or going out. And then whenthose shoes wear out a little
bit, then I rotate them to mywork shoes where I do work
(27:07):
around the house. And then whenthey wear out from that I throw
them away. And then I rotate myshoes again and buy one new
pair, maybe a brown pair or ablack pair depending on which
one wore out. So that's how Ikeep my clothing under control
and insurance. He always checkin for better prices before you
(27:32):
renew your insurance policy tomake sure you're getting the
best possible deal. I'll be backin one moment with my final
thoughts.
If you're interested in learningabout an online software that
helped myself get out of debt,it does tracking, budgeting, and
keeps track of all your assetsand all your debt. And even
(27:55):
tells you how much and when totransfer money into your savings
account. And how much and whento transfer money to your debt
and which debts to pay off andorder. First. It's not cheap.
It's a one time payment. But itwill definitely be an investment
(28:15):
something and yourself and aninvestment in your personal
financial life. If you'reinterested, send me an email at
reduce debt increasewealth@gmail.com. And I'll send
you the information about thisonline software that worked
(28:37):
great for me. The most expensivethings is cable TV, your cell
phone, replacing your cell phoneevery year, maybe wait three or
four years cut down on thatexpense. Dining out too much.
Not going to the grocery store.
(28:58):
And utilities set too high ortoo low. Depending on air
conditioning or heat. And justhaving a house you can afford to
start with. There's things youhave to do. And that's pay your
bills monthly bills every monthon time. That will save you
money.
(29:20):
Your needs are housing,transportation, food savings,
credit card debt, insurancethat's not anywhere else, which
would be life insurance,disability insurance. Depending
on your age, what you have. Oneof the way you can save money on
life insurance is if you'reyounger, do term insurance is
(29:43):
much cheaper than whole lifeinsurance. That's up to you.
Shop around, try to get a decentrate as far as your car, only
put enough gas in there whatyou're going to use for that
particular pay period and thentry them
minimize your running around,try to make two or three stops
(30:06):
in one trip. So you're notmaking three or four trips, make
one trip, go to the grocerystore, pick up your children, go
to the hardware store, then backhome. Don't make that three
separate trips. Try to controlhow often you're using your car,
back and forth to work, maybe onyour way home from work, you
(30:28):
stop at the grocery store, soyou're not making that extra
trip.
Whatever you can do or think ofto save money is your mindset.
Those are the things you shouldbe doing. And you need to get in
the habit of doing it. You canalso automate all your monthly
bills, so they're paid on time.
If you're confident you're gonnahave the money available in your
(30:52):
checking account, to pay themevery month on time, then
automate it, then it will happenyou'll never be late again. also
automate a little bit of yoursavings. Put if you want to put
2% of your take home pay in thesaving every pay period,
automate it and they will happenautomatically and you'll forget
(31:14):
about it. And that's a good wayto build up your savings. Keep a
minimum balance in your checkingaccount. Keep a minimum bounce
in your savings account, so youcan avoid those bank fees.
Everything you do is gonnaaffect your financial life. So
by controlling everything youdo, you can control how much
(31:37):
money you're spending, andyou'll be glad you did. So
Hello, I'm your host, Mr. Chuck, I retired accountant
turn truck driver, I reduce mydebt in a relatively short
period of time. debt reductionto achieve financial freedom
takes commitment, confidence,determination.
(00:24):
Everything to reduce debt, usingthe control center to help
reduce spending is a benefit ofdoing a control center. Seeing
where money is going and takingcontrol spending help reduce
debt. Keeping spending undercontrol is necessary, and is
easy to do once know where themoney is going. This episode
(00:47):
will cover everything needed tocontrol spending. The last part,
I'm going to give you ideas onhow to reduce your spending,
once you get everything inplace, so you can see where your
money is going. And it startsout with track your spending, I
(01:11):
have links in my show notes totwo articles that I'm going to
refer to a V can read them infull, that's good. If you're
interested in the program I useto get out of debt, there is a
link in my show notes, the verylast one shop financial, you're
gonna have to copy and paste thelink comes up, it should say
(01:33):
mainland and chuck in the upperleft hand corner.
And if you just follow what yousee there, it will eventually
get back to me if you decide youwant to get more information. So
let's startan order to reduce your spending
and get your spending undercontrol, he first got to realize
(01:55):
you have a problem.
Once you've done that, you'reyou're gonna you're starting,
you're in the right place. Andyou got to start tracking
everything going through yourchecking account, and all your
credit cards that you use on aregular basis. Now my debt
(02:17):
reduction plan, the first thingyou got to do is quit using
credit, you got to quit usingyour credit cards, you gotta
quit borrowing money to pay forthings that you need to pay for
on a monthly basis.
Once you do that, you you needto focus on where your spending
(02:40):
is going. If you know you'rebuying too many clothes, or if
you're going out to eat dinner,every single meal, those are the
two places you need to focus onfirst, he got to go to the
grocery store and buy groceriesand eat your meals at home.
Unless you're traveling or atruck driver. And you can't do
(03:02):
that. I assume everybody's got aplace they go to at night, and
they probably have a kitchen. Soyou'll be able to cook your own
food. Even if you go to thegrocery store and buy the pre
made meals, that's most likelygoing to be cheaper than going
to a restaurant for every meal.
Also another place is make yourcoffee at home, you can spend a
(03:25):
save some money there. Beforeyou start doing these things.
Those are the obvious choices.
You need to track your spending.
And tracking is just a matter ofhaving an application where you
put in your information. Ittakes five once you have
(03:45):
everything set up takes five to10 minutes every week. Keep it
up to date, and you have astart. You know where your money
is coming from, you know whereyour money is going for your
checking account and all yourcredit cards. Let's stick with
that for now. Of course you knowthat you got your mortgage
(04:05):
payment or your rent, you knowyou have your monthly utilities.
If you're using your creditcards to pay those monthly
bills, you have a problem. Hegot to quit doing that. He got
to focus on Pan air regularmonthly bills which I referred
to as needs first, and then payin your minimum payment on your
(04:30):
credit cards and all your debtsecond, and then building up an
emergency fund or a savingsaccount. Third, if you do those
things, you're gonna startgetting your debt under control.
Everything else you do is onlygone to speed up the process. So
(04:53):
if you can get your spendingunder care
control. Look for ways to reduceyour spending, do it month in
and month out, you're going toincrease your savings much
faster, you'll be able then toapply a larger dollar amount to
(05:15):
one of your credit cards, let'ssay, your debt, thus, paying it
down a little bit fastertracking, and then a control
center, a control center is abudget. Most people don't like
to do a budget because one ayear think it's too time
consuming, it's not cheap, do itthe way I lay it out, and only
(05:38):
takes you maybe 1020 minutes amonth. If that, the more you do
it, the faster is gonna becomethe more familiar with the
process, the quicker you will begetting the results that you
need to identify the areas whereyou need to focus on reducing
(06:03):
your spending, it could be justshopping, it could be your
titties are extremely high. Andmaybe you think you don't have
control. But you do can alwaysuse less of everything. And how
you go about it is up to you,you have to make a conscious
decision to do it. If you justkeep doing everything you've
(06:27):
been doing in the past, you'renot gonna get your life in your
financial life under control.
And that's what we're strivingto do with this podcast. So you
do your tracking, you use thatinformation, you create yourself
a report by category, you createyourself a budget or control
center. And once you have thatdone, then you can look more at
(06:51):
the details. And I will startwith housing, your needs are
housing, transportation, food,three basic things, that's a
start. After that, then you haveyour debt savings and credit
payments. That's not anywhereelse would be mostly credit
cards, personal loans, paydayloans, things like that. So our
(07:15):
goal here is to free up money tohelp pay down that the less debt
you have, the more money you'regonna have to put it towards
another debt. And so the cyclestarts out slow, that over time
is gonna speed up. So the firstthing you need to look for once
(07:41):
you have your tracking done forat least a month, and over time,
you're gonna be continually dothese things month in and month
out is just not a one timething. You're always gonna be
looking at, where can I savemoney? Where can I reduce my
spending, not only in shopping,not only in going out to dinner,
(08:01):
not only on entertainment items,but on everything that you're
paying for how can you reduceyour spending, you have to be in
that mindset to get your debtunder control. So let's start
with housing. Well, first ofall, if you have a mortgage or
rent, you're pretty much stuckwith that. And if you have rent
(08:24):
that's way too high, and that'sputting a strain on your budget,
then when your lease ends, lookfor a cheaper place to live, if
possible, maybe you're alreadyin the cheapest place you can
live. So maybe there's verylittle we can do in the housing,
mortgage rent category, butthere is a little bit you find
(08:47):
someplace else, maybe have morehouse than you need. You can
always sell the house and buysomething more affordable for
your particular budget. Maybeyou got in that situation
because it was you and yourspouse were working you got your
loan for your mortgage with twopeople working maybe started
(09:07):
having children now your spouse,one of you has quit working. So
that puts a strain on yourbudget. So some things are in
your control and some things arenot utilities are in your
control. If you don't have acontrollable programmable
thermostat for your electric,when your heat, then you have to
(09:31):
get that that's one of the firstthings you have to do. If you
have an older home. You got tolook at why is your heating cost
so much why's your eighth airconditioning cost so much? That
could be because you don't haveenough insulation in the attic.
And that's something you coulddo to help overall reduce your
(09:53):
costs. You can also look atimproving the home as far
his windows are concerned,Windows old windows leak a lot
and they let in a lot of cold orwarm air. So you could upgrade
your windows, I know these areexpensive items, and the won't
(10:13):
be able to do them right away.
But these are things you need tobe thinking about to do in the
future. If those categories havealready been done, you're in
good shape. So now you need toprogram your thermostat, I'm
going to start out with airconditioning. And this is what I
do. When my air conditioning ison in the summertime, I set it
(10:35):
at a higher temperature duringthe day that nobody is home
during the day, then set it at ahigher temperature. So you let
it warm the house up, I go up ashigh as 78 degrees, you could go
as high as 80 degrees. And thenat night, when the sun goes
(10:57):
down, it gets dark out, it'scooling down outside, then
that's when you set thetemperature and for your AC at a
lower, I set it at 72 housecools down. So it's comfortable
and cool at night. But duringthe day I let a warm up, but it
takes to three or four o'clockin the afternoon to warm all the
(11:20):
way up. Unless it's extremelyhot out, my AC is not going to
kick on. So when everybody elseis running their air
conditioning, mine is sittingidle, the house is little bit
warm. But if nobody's home, whocares. Or if you get home at say
536 o'clock, you can programyour thermostat to lower down to
(11:43):
78 degrees, say you have a setan ad and then at 530 Set it to
bring it down to 7778 76 cooleddown a little bit so it's
comfortable. And then nineo'clock at night. 10 o'clock on
might bring it all the way downto 72. And your air conditioning
(12:03):
won't run as much and you use alot less electricity. I
basically do the same thing withmy heat. But it's this the
reverse. I bring it up to atemperature around 68 degrees.
And then my I let it fall downto about 6665 degrees. And then
(12:26):
during the day I warm the houseback up when the sun is out and
it's a little bit warmeroutside. That's how you can help
reduce your electric bill otherthan turning off lights when you
don't need them. I know LEDlights don't use much. I know
fluorescent lights don't usemuch. Anything you can do to
(12:48):
reduce your overall electriccosts is helpful. Don't leave
lights on 24/7 Turn them offduring the day. Don't leave
lights on in a room nobody's in.
Don't let TVs run if nobody isin there. If you leave the room
(13:08):
and be gone for an hour, turnthe TV off and come back.
Article I have even says anyappliances you're not using to
unplug them because they'redrawn little bit of current. So
if you have a microwave you onlyuse a couple times a day, plug
(13:28):
it, plug it back in when you useit and then unplug it. And that
way it won't be drawn any typeof current because he have maybe
a clock in there or whateverthat goes with your coffee pot,
your microwave, convectionovens, whatever you may have
sitting on the counter that youleave in, plugged in 24/7 On
(13:51):
Plug them when you're not usingthem. All these things will add
up over time and help you savemoney. My have natural gas for
my heat.
So that's pretty much controlledthrough my thermostat and how I
set my thermostat up to heat thehouse. I have nobody's home, I
(14:14):
let it get colder. I bump up theheat a little bit before I get
home and then later at night. Ibump it up a little bit more to
keep it comfortable. And thenduring the day I let it drop
down. If you have a wellinsulated house with good
windows that takes a long timefor the House to cool down or
(14:37):
warm up depending on the seasonyou're in. Home Insurance you
are required by your mortgagecompany or even if you don't
have a mortgage, you shouldstill have home insurance. Once
a year shopped around before yourenew it, shop around and see
what's out there.
I just recently had a problemwith my insurance company I
(14:59):
shopped aroundThen I reduced my home insurance
by $300 a year, don't sound likemuch, but then that's $300 more
I have. Same thing with carinsurance for your
transportation, same thing foreverything, any insurance that
you're paying for shoppingaround, get prices on a yearly
(15:20):
or regular basis, maybe everycouple years. So that's housing,
part of housing that I includeon their housing is my internet
service.
I only pay for what usage or theamount of
(15:42):
megabytes or however they go by,that I can use. So if I have a
device that only can use 500megabytes, and that's my largest
device, I'm only paying for 500megabytes on that pan for 1000
megabytes, or what kilobytes orwhatever they call it, I only
pay for the maximum amount theprice can handle or will use for
(16:09):
the internet, I have no problemswhatsoever on streaming, I have
no interruption, I have nowaiting on it to load or catch
up. I have no those problems.
And that's how you save somemoney. Also, if you have
(16:31):
internet service, and you havecable, you're spending too much
money, you can get rid of thatcable service for your TV, and
stream. That way you'remaximizing the use of your
internet, you're paying for thatanyway, and what are you using
it for, you're just going onlineto do some shopping on your
(16:55):
computer, or to look up someYouTube video or whatever the
case would be.
You're not being efficient withwhat you're paying for high
stream 90% of all my TV, theother 10% is free TV over the
(17:15):
air, I bought myself a digitalantenna, I get a bunch of
stations I don't have to pay forand never pay for your local
channels through your cable, orthrough a streaming service. He
don't have to do that. It's it'sa little bit of a pain to switch
back and forth. But it's nothard. You just select your input
(17:39):
on your TV and select you changeyour input and boom, you're
there.
It only takes a few seconds. Andonce everybody knows how to do
it, it's no big deal. Onstreaming, you want to keep it
under control. You don't itstreaming for everything you
ever want to watch, you want toget one service that gives you
(18:03):
most of everything you run awatch.
So if you got cable TV, I haveone service where I can watch
all those same channels througha streaming service. Except for
news which I don't watch anyway. And sports. Most of my
sports I watch through the freeTV through my antenna.
(18:27):
When the college football gamesare in the playoffs, and
December through January, I willpay because all the services are
month to month. So if I don'thave ESPN one to five, whatever
there is, I then will pay forone month of service for to
(18:52):
watch those games off to have anice ESPN, I'll pay for one
month service, or watch thegame. As soon as the game over
the next day. I'll go in andcancel it and you'll get a
prorated bill, I minimize mystreaming costs by not paying
for things I don't watch on aregular basis. And then if I
(19:14):
need it, then I'll pay for itfor one month. Watch what I want
to watch ending cancel it.
That's the beauty of thestreaming service the month the
month so you're not locked in.
And you can only you can do itfor a week also or two weeks and
doesn't much matter. And May ifyou never signed up for that
particular streaming servicebefore you can get a trial
(19:37):
period for 30 days. So you mightbe able to watch where you want
to watch at no cost at least thefirst time. I did that for two
or three years until I ran outof services I could use. Now I
just pay for it for one month ona service I already have. I just
expand the service. Pay use itfor the
(20:00):
time period I need and then Icancel, the part that I
expanded. Cable TV is veryexpensive. And that's a good way
you can say money, your cellphone service. Same thing, if
you've had the same serviceprogram for more than a couple
(20:20):
of years, check with your phoneprovider to see if they have any
other new pricing and effectwhere you can get same or better
service at a lesser cost. Thatis something you need to
continually check for. Andthat's one of the reasons I
never get a phone through aservice, I buy my phone
(20:43):
outright, and then have an iPad,so it's unlocked. And then I
will be able to change serviceswhenever I feel like and if I
can find a better plan, thatgives me the same level service
at a less monthly fee, howtransportation is a little bit
harder, because gas price goesup and down. I've came to
(21:07):
conclusion that I don't want tofill up my gas tank every week,
or every time it's empty. Sowhat I do is only put in the
amount I'm gonna need for one ortwo weeks, maybe it's 10
gallons. And then I hope theprice drops a little bit which
sometimes it don't, so that Inot putting all my money into my
(21:32):
gas tank, instead of paying $60on the fill up, put $30 in, I
drive for a week, week and ahalf, and then I put maybe
another $30. And maybe overtime, it's kind of even out the
same. But that leaves money inyour checking account in case
something else comes up, hemight have a bill that's due, he
(21:54):
might be 30 bucks short thatweek, and you're gonna get paid
a week from now. But you'll havethe extra money there to pay
that bill. So it can be timelypay. So it's managing your
money, it's keeping track ofyour money as keeping control of
your money, that's important.
Our service, you need to setaside a little bit every pay,
(22:17):
and to a savings account, youremergency fund, and DEXA needed
for oil change or car repairs orcar maintenance. And then you
have the money there. When thetime comes to do that oil
change, it's gonna cost you60 7080, whatever, $100 you'll
have the monies and it's notgonna hurt your weekly budget
(22:41):
for that particular time period.
Because you just transferred outyour savings. It's in your
checking, use your debit card.
When I say quit using yourcredit cards, I mean, quit using
your credit cards, you got tostart paying for everything,
using your debit card, orgetting cash out your bank and
(23:02):
paying cash for everything. Ithink most people use their
debit card. But it's important,you got to know how much is in
that checking account, you gotto know how much you can afford,
how much of that money has beenearmarked for groceries or
gasoline, or maybe a utilitybill coming up. Because if
you're not paying all yourmonthly bills on time, you're
(23:25):
paying too much because you'repaying late payment penalties,
they might be charging youinterest, you're just paying too
much. So you have to startpaying everything on time, you
need to build up your emergencyfund. So if an unexpected
expense comes along, you havethe money available to pay for
(23:46):
most of it if not all of it.
That way you can minimize theusage of your credit cards. I
only use credit cards to buystuff online. I generally pay
them off every month, so I haveno big deal. Now my budget, I
have set aside X amount of moneyto apply to my credit card. Some
(24:09):
months I go over that somemonths I'm under it, but I have
a set amount of money alreadydesignate to pay for that credit
card. Don't use your credit cardto buy things if you don't have
the money to pay for it today.
You can always use your creditcard to buy some online and pay
it off every Friday. He can goonline and he can pay off your
(24:33):
credit card balance on Friday.
If you have a credit card was azero balance. That way you're
not carrying any debt. Don'twait the 30 days because some
miles could happen and then themoney is used somewhere else.
That credit card payment comesdue. He can't pay it. You make a
(24:55):
minimum payment you make a latepayment you're gonna pay more
interest you don't pay morefees. So you want to avoid doing
those things, bank fees, keepthe minimum balance that your
bank requires in your checkingaccount, or you'll be charged a
fee, I set my budget up, so thatI have at least $300 in my
(25:16):
checking account at the lowestpossible balance, if I pay off
everything pay for everything, Iknow I'm gonna have at least
$300. And that will get methrough next pay period.
Whenever that may be, that willget me to there, so I don't run
low. So the banks not chargingme a monthly fee, or charging me
(25:39):
an overdraft fee or charging methe reserve fee for using their
line of credit to fund mychecking account. Dining Out is
very expensive, try the eat moreof your meals at home. But that
doesn't mean you have tocompletely stop. It means keep
(26:00):
it under control, he can stillgo out once a week, once a
month, and celebrate a anachievement, you may may be paid
off a credit card, but you cango out and have dinner and
celebrate that by eating out.
(26:21):
But if you can keep your foodbills as low as possible. I'm
not saying that you're gonnastarve to death. I'm not saying
you're cutting back on eating,unless you're on a diet and you
want to, I'm saying we'rekeeping our spending under
control. By reducing the numberof times we're eating out.
(26:43):
Clothes only buy clothes whenyou absolutely need them, make
sure they're wore out before youreplace them. I generally like
shoes, for instance, I haveshoes I wear when I'm dressed up
or going out. And then whenthose shoes wear out a little
bit, then I rotate them to mywork shoes where I do work
(27:07):
around the house. And then whenthey wear out from that I throw
them away. And then I rotate myshoes again and buy one new
pair, maybe a brown pair or ablack pair depending on which
one wore out. So that's how Ikeep my clothing under control
and insurance. He always checkin for better prices before you
(27:32):
renew your insurance policy tomake sure you're getting the
best possible deal. I'll be backin one moment with my final
thoughts.
If you're interested in learningabout an online software that
helped myself get out of debt,it does tracking, budgeting, and
keeps track of all your assetsand all your debt. And even
(27:55):
tells you how much and when totransfer money into your savings
account. And how much and whento transfer money to your debt
and which debts to pay off andorder. First. It's not cheap.
It's a one time payment. But itwill definitely be an investment
(28:15):
something and yourself and aninvestment in your personal
financial life. If you'reinterested, send me an email at
reduce debt increasewealth@gmail.com. And I'll send
you the information about thisonline software that worked
(28:37):
great for me. The most expensivethings is cable TV, your cell
phone, replacing your cell phoneevery year, maybe wait three or
four years cut down on thatexpense. Dining out too much.
Not going to the grocery store.
(28:58):
And utilities set too high ortoo low. Depending on air
conditioning or heat. And justhaving a house you can afford to
start with. There's things youhave to do. And that's pay your
bills monthly bills every monthon time. That will save you
money.
(29:20):
Your needs are housing,transportation, food savings,
credit card debt, insurancethat's not anywhere else, which
would be life insurance,disability insurance. Depending
on your age, what you have. Oneof the way you can save money on
life insurance is if you'reyounger, do term insurance is
(29:43):
much cheaper than whole lifeinsurance. That's up to you.
Shop around, try to get a decentrate as far as your car, only
put enough gas in there whatyou're going to use for that
particular pay period and thentry them
minimize your running around,try to make two or three stops
(30:06):
in one trip. So you're notmaking three or four trips, make
one trip, go to the grocerystore, pick up your children, go
to the hardware store, then backhome. Don't make that three
separate trips. Try to controlhow often you're using your car,
back and forth to work, maybe onyour way home from work, you
(30:28):
stop at the grocery store, soyou're not making that extra
trip.
Whatever you can do or think ofto save money is your mindset.
Those are the things you shouldbe doing. And you need to get in
the habit of doing it. You canalso automate all your monthly
bills, so they're paid on time.
If you're confident you're gonnahave the money available in your
(30:52):
checking account, to pay themevery month on time, then
automate it, then it will happenyou'll never be late again. also
automate a little bit of yoursavings. Put if you want to put
2% of your take home pay in thesaving every pay period,
automate it and they will happenautomatically and you'll forget
(31:14):
about it. And that's a good wayto build up your savings. Keep a
minimum balance in your checkingaccount. Keep a minimum bounce
in your savings account, so youcan avoid those bank fees.
Everything you do is gonnaaffect your financial life. So
by controlling everything youdo, you can control how much
(31:37):
money you're spending, andyou'll be glad you did. So
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.