Guide to Personal Finance

Guide to personal finance essentially involves planning for taxes, building an emergency fund, managing debt, protecting with insurance, planning for retirement, investing beyond 401K, and creating an estate plan. Emergency fund often comes in handy and understanding and managing debt is a vital part of creating a financial plan. People with good financial plan make use of insurance and individuals aged around 50 should necessarily opt for long term care insurance. Personal finance includes managing individual finances, family finances, taking responsibility of current financial situation, taking responsibility of future financial situation and setting financial goals. Handling individual financial tasks and saving money for emergencies come under personal finance.

Personal finance is a very broad term that covers managing money, saving and investing. People can learn personal finance through online articles, courses, blogs, podcasts and books. Managing personal finance includes income, spending, savings, investments and protection. Using credit cards wisely is a key aspect of personal finance management and personal finance is all about meeting personal financial goals. Saving for child’s college education is an integral component of personal finance management strategy.

Income as the Starting Point of Personal Finance

Managing personal finance has become critical than ever in USA when inflation is eating away at purchasing power and prices are increasing. Income is often referred as the starting point of personal finance and managing spending is a vital aspect of personal finance. It is a fact that investing comes with its own risks and protection includes life insurance, health insurance, estate planning and retirement planning. Wealth management, loans, debt, budgeting, retirement, taxes, risk management, estate planning, investments, insurance, credit cards, home and mortgage are prominent personal finance services. Growing number of personal budgeting mobile apps have made managing personal finance quite easy.

It is quite important to ensure that money is set aside for unexpected expenses like medical bills, car repair, and day today expenses if we lose job. Graduated repayment, extended repayment, and income driven repayment are flexible federal repayment programs worth checking. It is essential to borrow only what we can repay and credit card is often a major debt trap. Using a debit card is a great way to ensure that we will not be paying for accumulated small purchases over an extended period with interest rates. People can reduce income tax by investing in plans like IRA(Individual Retirement Account), 401K and 403B.

Teaching Kids the Value of Money

It is important to teach children the value of money and investing is one part of planning for retirement in the contemporary age. Insurance can cover most of the hospital bills and medical expenses is a leading reason for debt. Almost all media publications give personal finance advice and reading personal finance blogs is an excellent way to learn more about personal finance. Some of the personal finance best sellers like I Will Teach You to Be Rich, The Millionaire Next Door, Your Money or Your Life, Rich Dad Poor Dad, and Personal Finance for Dummies will be available in your local library. Free online courses are another great resource to learn more about personal finance. Personal finance podcast is a fantastic way to learn more about managing money.