Once you’ve mastered the art of deciding how you intend spending your money, you’re already on the correct path. You’re controlling your money, instead of letting it control you. You’re the boss, don’t forget that because it’s an important thing to remember when life happens.
Funny enough, when it comes to trying to decide who will win the all-Ireland or what next week’s lotto numbers will be, we all accept that we can’t predict the future. However, when it comes to managing our money, we all feel we know exactly what will happen, how much we will get and how much we will spend. Then, life happens.
We can’t for one minute predict what is going to happen, what last minute party we decide to go to or even what party we decide to skip to catch up on an assignment. We also can’t be expected to know that in two weeks’ time, we’ll have to fork out €60 for a filling in the dentist.
By being the boss of your money, you can ensure that as life happens, you get to change the role you have given to your money. So, if you have to spend on an dentist visit unexpectedly on Wednesday, you then get to decide what pot of cash you are taking it from. Maybe it’s the ‘groceries’ or the ‘night out’ you had planned for Thursday. Obviously the sensible options is not to go out Thursday because you have a bad tooth ache but you also have got to remember you are a student. You’re not supposed to be sensible, well not all the time anyway.
The trick about managing your money is to do it every single day. If you leave it to once a week or once a month, it becomes a real chore. But do it daily and it only takes a few minutes, it means you are totally on top of things. You know what is still to be paid, you can make informed decisions as life happens and most importantly, you are in control.
Strangely enough, most people say they can’t budget because they always get hit with surprises. But the more frequently you check in with your finances the less surprises you seem to be hit with. Regularly checking in on your finances can also help you identify patterns. Say you notice a pattern that you usually go out 3 times a week. Next time it’s coming towards the end of the week and you’ve only been out twice, you won’t be surprised that you end up going out for the third time this week, like you did every other week.
To help you spot patterns, when you do spend, write down the details in your BOI planner. So, for example:
- Coffee €3
- Burger €5
- Credit €20
By doing this, you can decide at the end of the week what stuff was important and what wasn’t. It can become even more powerful if you get the other people you live with doing the same thing. Take this small example. Let’s say there are 3 of you sharing accommodation together. You notice a pattern that you each spend €5 a day on coffees. Between you that’s €15 per day on coffee, which is €105 a week, which becomes €3, 360 over a 32 week college year.
Now, if you identify this early enough in the year then you can be clever and chip in for a really good coffee machine for the house/apartment. Even if you manage to spend €1,000 on the machine and all the capsules for the year, you still end up with €2,360 to spend on other stuff between you over the year.
There are lots of examples of this, from sharing subscriptions for stuff like Netflix and dropping the monthly cinema visit, to making sure you’re on the right mobile phone plan. You could join a GAA club with a gym instead of an actual commercial gym. Just be sure you’re not new to GAA if doing this one, as you will be expected to play!
Start thinking about your finances daily and you’ll start to recognise these patterns. You’ll have less ‘surprises’, have more money for the things you want and will spend less money on things that ultimately turn out to be a waste of money. Do this right and regularly and you’ll quickly realise you’re the boss.
