Tag Archives: financial plan

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Your Path To Financial Freedom: Debt Elimination App

This is the fourth exercise in a series designed to walk you through an entire financial plan.  The exercise is embedded in an Excel spreadsheet you can download and save for personal use.  You can find the backdrop for the exercise HERE or just jump right in with the instructions given below:

If you refer back to the Personal Balance Sheet you created, you will have already compiled your debt information in the liabilities section.  Next to each liability, put an “X” next to bad debt and a check mark next to better debt.[i]  Then, transfer the bad debt to the Debt Elimination App available on our web site and customize your Debt Elimination Plan.  List the debts in the order in which you will pay them off.  If you want to get that ball rolling faster emotionally, take Dave Ramsey’s advice and pay your cards off in order of smallest to largest balances.  If you want to save the most in interest payments, list the debts from the largest interest rate to the smallest.

When you make that last payment, celebrate!  Take your next month’s payment—a significant chunk of cash flow that you’ll now be able to plough into more generous budget categories and investment for the future—and throw yourself a party.  Invite family and close friends who’ve supported you throughout, and enjoy the peace of mind that comes with being debt free.

If you don’t have any Xs on your Debt Audit because you only have better debt, you need not put yourself through a financial boot camp, but deliberate over the debt you do have and consider whether or not a debt repayment acceleration plan may be right for you.  If so, use the Debt Elimination App to plan your course of action.

Click HERE to access the app!

[i] There is no “Good Debt”—just “Bad Debt” and “Better Debt.”  Bad debt is debt on ANY depreciating assets, including automobiles, but especially things like furniture, appliances and unsecured credit card debt.  Better debt is debt on appreciating assets, like homes, education and businesses…within reason.  If you’re curious how to differentiate between the two in your specific situation, email me at tim[at]timmaurer[dot]com.

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Winner’s Wisdom — The Ultimate Financial Plan

Recent turbulence in the financial markets has caused us all to question our financial plans.  We are bombarded daily with advertisements and sales pitches from self-proclaimed experts, financial gurus, and all manner of miracle money managers wanting to sell us their financial plans.  Buying someone else’s financial plan is much like buying someone else’s shirt.  Odds are it won’t fit, you won’t like it, and the process is somewhat distasteful.

Recently, my coauthor Tim Maurer, who is a certified financial planner, and I have completed a new book — The Ultimate Financial Plan.   In our book, we do not provide answers as much as we pose questions and give readers the criteria to develop their own strategies and surround themselves with their own team of experts.

In The Ultimate Financial Plan, I focus on what I call Timeless Truths.  These are the age-old principles that guide our lives and, therefore, our money.  Over the years, I have found that it is easy to manage my money, but it is difficult to manage me.  Money is a tool or a vehicle.  It has no use other than to do what you want it to do and take you where you want to go.  Any decent financial plan has, therefore, got to be customized for you.  No one else knows your hopes, dreams, and ambitions or the plans that you have for your family or your future.

Once you’ve decided where you want to go in your life, then you’ve got to make your money work for you as hard as you have worked for it.  My coauthor, Tim Maurer, has all of the credentials, certifications, and experience that I would want from any financial planner, but the reason I am pleased to have Tim as my coauthor is the fact that in his financial practice and in his life, he puts people first.

In our collaboration, Tim deals with Timely Tips designed to help you financially get from where you are to where you want to be.  He also helps you look beyond the smoke and mirrors created by bias in the marketplace.

You have got to understand that everybody who wants to sell you a financial product or charge you to manage your money has a bias.  This is not bad.  It is simply reality and a part of human nature.  We all know that when we wander onto a car lot, we will be invariably approached by a sales person wanting to sell us a car.  We all understand that the car dealer and his sales people have an ulterior motive in having us buy their car.  The same is true in the financial services industry.  Whether it be a broker, banker, insurance salesman, financial planner, or a guy like me who sells books, we all have built-in motives to get your business.  This can be healthy and natural when you begin to understand how the finances work and how the profit is structured behind the curtain.

It is my hope that The Ultimate Financial Plan will be entertaining, informative, and serve as your ongoing roadmap to reach your financial destination.

As you go through your day today, realize that the ultimate financial plan is the one that will take you on a customized route from where you are to where you want to be and will make your money work for you.

Today’s the day!

This is the latest “Winner’s Wisdom” column by Jim Stovall — co-author of The Ultimate Financial Plan.

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Ben Franklin Was Wrong!

Benjamin-franklin-dollar-billBen Frankin was, without question, a man of wisdom.  He was right about many things, but one area in which I must respectfully disagree with the sage is his insistence that the only certainties in this life are death and taxes.  Of course, taxes and death are hard to avoid, but there are also other things in life that we will most definitely not evade.  In this last of an 18 blog series on the subject matter contained in the book I co-authored with best-selling author, Jim Stovall, we address another one of those certainties and the steps that one must take to adapt and thrive in the face of it.

 From The Financial Crossroads, Chapter 18, “Your Story, Your Plan”:

We have made reference in other parts of the book to the oft quoted phrase about death and taxes.  I enjoy history, so I had to trace its origin.  It appears that Daniel Defoe, in 1726, was the first to make this now famous claim, albeit more eloquently: “Things as certain as death and taxes, can be more firmly believed.”  Much closer to the modern day phrase, however, was Ben Franklin’s redux in a letter to Jean-Baptiste Leroy in 1789, in which he said, “In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Regardless of the veracity of this line of thought, I find it all quite depressing.  But I do think that we could turn this into a phrase in which we’d all agree: One guarantee in this world is change.

Do you embrace, reject, resist or retreat from change?  The fact that you purchased this book tells me you probably don’t reject it.  That you read this far tells me you probably don’t resist it.  The question now, however, is whether you will embrace it or retreat from it.  The easier path is to retreat, because as Arnold Bennett tells us, “even a change for the better, is always accompanied by drawbacks and discomforts.”  Regarding the intersection of money and life, there are two different types of change: fundamental change and practical change.  In a perfect world, fundamental change happens first and practical change follows almost effortlessly.  But fundamental change does not always come easily.  Often times, practical change precedes fundamental change as we allow a discipline to shape our view fundamentally.

A fundamental change is seeing the world as a risk manager; practical change is altering your insurance policies.  Fundamental change is shifting from a retirement plan to a fulfillment plan; practical change is taking degree or certificate college courses that could lead to a job change.  Fundamental change is seeing your estate plan as a legacy plan; practical change is updating your will.

Practical change is cutting up the credit cards, your path to more; fundamental change is genuine contentment with enough.  Practical change is beginning a giving program; fundamental change is having less of an attachment to material things.  Practical change is writing your Personal Money Story; fundamental change is realizing its significance.  Practical change is dealing with the dollars and cents in life; fundamental change is life itself.