Unfortunately most parents don’t teach their kids about money. As a result, their kids grow up financially illiterate. You can do something about that. 

If your family is having money problems, don’t try to hide it. Your kids are probably aware of your problem anyway. When you do talk to them about the situation, be positive. Explain that money is a good thing when it is used respectfully; how it can help you lead a better life and help others who are in need. So when is the right time to begin teaching your kids about money?  It is never too early to learn about the value of money and how to budget and save.

It’s Never Too Late …. Or Too Early! 

1. Help your children set goals.

Ask your children what they want when they grow up? Every child wants to be someone like a doctor or a fireman but what do they want? How do they want to live? Help them set some goals early and explain that proper saving and investing is a huge part of getting what they want.

2. Help put goals into action.

Develop a rough financial plan with them. This is great fun and you will learn a lot by teaching them. If you have a financial planner you could introduce them to your children. This will help your kids see that saving and investing is serious business.

3. Open savings accounts early.

Take your children to the bank as soon as they understand basic money principles. Open savings accounts in their names and go over the statements with them as they come.

4. Give your children choices.

A big birthday party, for example, is expensive. What if your children would be just as happy with cake, ice cream and some games with their friends? Say something like, “A big party like we had last year cost £200.00. What if I put £175.00 in your savings account and just spent £25.00 this year?” Some of your children will still want the big party but you might be surprised to learn that some will be listening to you and will choose the savings option.

5. Encourage giving from an early age.

There are many ways of giving: time, money, jobs, taking part in sponsored events etc. For young children, sharing begins with letting others play with their toys and learning to take turns. Then as they get older, children see you share your time, energy or money with people who are less fortunate or unable to do for themselves. Children learn what they live.

To encourage giving money use a separate piggy bank or jar labelled giving. Encourage children to put some of their money aside each week: 10p in every £1 is the amount often suggested, but you can discuss this with your children.

Discuss with your children how they want to spend their ‘giving’ money. They might want to use it for sponsoring friends, for giving to a charity, for appeals on the TV, for special gifts for people (in hospital or in an orphanage abroad etc.).

There is nothing training cannot do. Nothing is above its reach. It can turn bad morals to good; it can destroy bad principles and recreate good ones; it can lift men to angelship.

Mark Twain

Julia Simavi

Money is a tool to help us achieve some particular goal. Money is for making things happen. If the way we handle our money conflicts with our personal values, we are not going to have fulfilled lives. All you need to do is get clear about your values. Put your money where your values are. Once you have done that, it will be easy to develop your financial goals.

We recognise that money is important but when your goals and values are not in line it is as if you have two horses pulling you in different directions.

Ask yourself, if you had a magic wand, what would you like to see included in your future? Ignoring the ideas of how you’ll get there, vividly imagine your ideal life, and what would be included in it. Then take a few minutes to list, on paper or on your computer. Here are some examples, but you could well have some different goals or values:

Personal Goals:

• Have £1 million
• Not run out of money
• Change jobs by…
• Retire by age…
• Save X amount by…
• Get an international job by…
• Be fluent in French by…
• Donate money
• Start my own business
• Get married
• Stay married
• Buy a house
• Get a new car
• Retire rich
• Travel

 Values:

• Freedom
• Security
• Achievement
• Work-life balance
• Job security
• Happiness
• Helping others
• Doing meaningful work
• Relationships
• Happy family life
• Personal growth, learning
• Variety and excitement
• Free time for personal interests
• Financial success
• Travel
• Confidence
• Making a difference
• Realizing my true potential

No matter what and how big your dreams are, it’s important that you make it a habit to write them down on paper. Yes, you read it right – write them down on paper.

You might be thinking, how can such a simple task of writing down my goals on paper help me achieve them? I am a firm believer in goal setting. I believe it works. It has been said that a goal is a dream with a deadline.  

I know that unless you put your goals in writing, your chances of achieving them are quite small. This is the first step you have to do to show your commitment in achieving your goals.Our subconscious mind is a goal-seeking mechanism that unless given an objective to achieve, it floats around aimlessly. Once it has an objective or a target to aim for, your subconscious mind will employ you with the technique needed to manifest your desires.    Each of your goals should have these main characteristics;

1.     Your goals must be believable. 

Let me repeat that; your goals must be believable. To whom? To only one person in the whole world? You. It doesn’t matter who else believes in them; in fact, most of your goals should be too personal to reveal even to your spouse. But unless you believe that you can achieve them, you won’t.  

2.      Your goals must be clearly defined. 

If you’re not exactly sure what your goals are, you don’t have goals. Wishes or hopes maybe. Goals, no. They must be specific, and the more specific, the better. 

3.     Your goals must be vividly imagined.

If you can see yourself in possession of your goal, it’s half yours. Several times a day, form the habit of vividly imagining yourself having your goal. Write down your goals on a paper and stick them anywhere you can see it everyday. Take some immediate action within 48 hours to start moving toward your goal and then take small action steps toward your goals everyday, and of course, don’t forget to put yourself on the line.

Thoughts become things… so choose the good ones!

Mike Dooley

Have a great Sunday.

Julia Simavi

How are you feeling? Overtired? Overstressed? Overworked?

It’s easy to be positive when everything in life is going great. The hard part is staying positive when things go wrong.

Here are some tips to take you to a different consciousness;

1.     Do what you love to do. Do what you love to do, to make a difference! The only way to do great work is to love what you do. Successful people win because they love what they do. All of them have a very strong desire to succeed. They have passion for their field, their business. 

2.     Do your best. Do your best at every job. Success generates more success. Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best. Doing your best is taking an action because you love it, not because you’re expecting a reward. 

3.     Thing big- Thoughts become things. Don’t give any power to what you don’t want in your life. And think BIG thoughts. Think BIG dreams. And when you doubt, say “Why not?” 

4.     Dare to be different, think different. Celebrate our differences. 

5.     Ask for feedback. We should get feedback about our efforts from several different sources. 

6.     Learn from failures. If you aren’t failing, then you really aren’t trying anything new. Don’t fear failure, learn from it.   

7.     Don’t Take Anything Personally: Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. 

8.     Don’t Make Assumptions: Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings.

Staying positive is not about putting on a fake smile or believing you can do it all yourself. Rather it’s about being optimistic and living with hope and having faith. The measure of our success will not be determined by how we act during the great times in our life but rather by how we think and respond to the challenges of our most difficult moments.

I would like finish with a quote from Steve Jobs who is an inspirational person to me. Steve Jobs is one of the most successful entrepreneurs of our generation. His success story is legendary. Put up for adoption at an early age, dropped out of college after 6 months, slept on friends’ floors, returned coke bottles for 5 cent deposits to buy food, then went on to start Apple Computers and Pixar Animation Studios.

“Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith.” Steve Jobs, Apple Computer 

Sending Positive Energy Your Way! 

Julia Simavi

Credit wisely used is a rich asset to financial success; credit that is abused or over-used is a clear path to indebtedness and financial failure. Credit is not desirable if used to postpone financial disaster a little longer. I think credit cards should be renamed “debt cards”.

There are two types of debt- good and bad.

Good debt

Good debt is the debt created when you buy something that is likely to go up in value. It’s called “good” because it serves a purpose. In fact, mortgage debt is often referred to as good debt to have, particularly over the longer term.

Bad debt

It is the debt created when you buy things that will go down in value. The commonest form of bad debt is credit cards, personal loans and store cards. When you buy clothes, they’re probably worth less than 50% what you pay for them when you walk out the door, so if you borrowed to pay for them, that’s bad debt. Good debt or bad debt, here is pleasant point to remember about indebtedness: if you are in debt, it is because someone believed in you and had enough faith in you to trust you financially. Indebtedness may appear to be very big in your world, but it need only be a temporary situation if you dare to begin believing there is a way out.

Rich thinkers spend their money on assets- things that will make them more money in the future.

Poor thinkers spend their money on expenses and liabilities-necessities that cost them money now and pointless things that seem fun at the time but will cost them more money in the future. 

I ran across amazing quotes today in the book I am currently reading “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”. What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money – That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not! was written by Robert Kiyosaki.

It was the book that launched Kiyosaki into the success of an Internationally best selling author. Rich Dad, Poor Dad talks about how to be financially successful from investing, real estate, owning businesses, and using finance protection tactics.

Rich Dad, Poor Dad Book Quotes

“We go to school to learn to work hard for money. I write books and create products that teach people how to have money work hard for them.” Robert Kiyosaki

“The only way to get out of the “Rat Race” is to prove your proficiency at both accounting and investing, arguably two of the most difficult subjects to master.” Robert Kiyosaki

“I have mentioned before that financial intelligence is a synergy of accounting, investing, marketing and law. Combine those four technical skills and making money with money is easier.” Robert Kiyosaki

“Many of today’s youth have credit cards before they leave high school, yet they have never had a course in money or how to invest it, let alone understand how compound interest works on credit cards.” Robert Kiyosaki

Have a great day.

Julia Simavi

When you decide to change your habits it will be difficult at first because it is hard to change the habits of spending that we have had for so long. Along with getting prosperous attitudes about your financial affairs, it is good to do whatever tangible or intangible thing you can to get the feeling that you are cleaning up indebtedness. 

Be Frugal 

If you have not already, read the book “Millionaire Next Door.” This really opened my eyes to the world of the rich. People become rich through saving and investing wisely, not by earning a great deal of money. 

Pay yourself first  

In 1926, George Clason wrote a book called The Richest Man in Babylon- one of the great success books of all time. In my opinion, the most powerful idea that the book presents is that you should live on 90% of your income. That is, for every £100 pound that you take home, automatically £10 pound should go into savings. If you can save more, great, but 10% is the minimum. This is the only way to stop living from pay check to pay check. The situation is slightly different if you are in debt. The book then advises that you live on 70% of your income. 20% would go to pay down the debt, and 10% would still go to savings. Once the debt is gone, you can go back to living on 90%. 
 

Look into Compound interest if you haven’t already

Albert Einstein once called compound interest “the greatest mathematical discovery of all time”.The concept is this. When you invest money you earn interest on your capital. The next year you earn interest on both your original capital and the interest from the first year. In the third year you earn interest on your capital and the first two years’ interest.

The concept of earning interest on your interest is the miracle of compounding. Once your debt is under control, you can start to use Compound Interest in your Investing strategy.

The earlier you start investing, the more time you leave for the miracle of compound interest to take effect.Basically you are getting “interest on the interest” earned so the net change increases every year provided you make no withdrawal.

Compound Interest works on 2 variables – time and rate – the longer your money has to grow, the faster it will grow, and the greater the interest rate your money is getting then the greater will be your rewards. It’s very much like a snowball effect. As your capital rolls down the hill it becomes bigger and bigger.

Even if you start with a small snowball, given enough time, you can end up with an extremely large snowball indeed.

Julia Simavi.

Hi, My name is Julia and I am really excited to be writing this blog.

I am an award winning debt advisor with many years experience helping people in debt. I love helping people and believe that one of the key issues for people in debt is to think positively. This blog will discuss various elements of thinking positively. I will also cover dealing with stress and planning for the future.

I hope that this will be useful to the members of iva.co.uk. Please contact me with any questions.

Julia