Setting financial goals

  1. Short Term – Examples – live within your means, pay off debt, set goals
  2. Medium Term – Examples – save, transfer your money to your accounts, invest, get a mortgage
  3. Long Term – Examples – pay off mortgage, investments, superannuation, retirement

Setting financial goals in my life has seen me do all sorts of things.  As a child I bought investment bonds from a bank as I’d learned about receiving interest from banks.  I put money in term deposits. (Not very effective today with current interest rates). As a University student I bought shares from organisations going from private to public funding. I bought units in managed funds. I got a credit card to travel overseas and obtain a credit rating.  I paid off my credit card monthly so I paid no interest. I have an excellent credit rating as I pay all my bills on time. I attended seminars on buying investment properties. I bought a house.  I bought an investment property (having learned the tricks from the seminars I followed these myself and avoided the overhead costs of the seminar systems).  I salary package fortnightly amounts to a retirement fund.

All these things have been done to have the money I have available to me ‘work’. As with any of these strategies – sometimes they work and sometimes they don’t. For me it was the managed funds that didn’t work as I had planned. In hindsight (always a great teacher) it was because I wanted ‘a little bit more’.  I see know that that is why setting goals in investment can be beneficial – such as when I’ve reached  x amount. That was also what caused my downfall. I wanted to reach $30,000. I was at $28,000.  Doesn’t seem so unreasonable until the unit price crashes. I walked away with $15,000. Might as well have kept the money under the mattress.

I am not a financial advisor. This information is for you to think about options in your life.

What financial goals are you going to set?