The first step: If you don’t keep accounts, how can you explain yourself (accounting)
First of all, the first step to saving money is self-awareness. Only by knowing where you usually spend money Only when you have a clear mental account book of how much money will you spend can you formulate a targeted money-saving plan.
Instead of just shouting slogans and talking on paper. Make plans that don’t fit and give up prematurely.
So how do you figure out your financial situation? ——Yes, it’s accounting.
Keeping accounts may not seem difficult, but it is actually quite a trivial matter.
So use good tools. For example, compared to paper-and-pencil account books, mobile accounting software is a more efficient and convenient accounting tool
Tools
And since it is a couple doing accounting together, it is recommended to choose An App that can handle simultaneous accounting.
Various accounting apps
There are still many such software. If you search for any accounting software in the app store, it should have this function.
Methods
In addition to tools, there are also many different options for accounting methods.
A? Record every expenditure
For example, my habit is to write down every expenditure. So every time I make a payment, my first reaction is to keep accounts.
B? Record once a month (cycle)
But this is still very troublesome after all, so you can also choose to fix one day a month and record the Alipay, WeChat, and credit card information of two people. , bank card and other accounts are exported, and then uniformly imported into the APP for statistics.
In short, both accounting methods have their own advantages and disadvantages. Just choose the one that is more suitable for you.
Accounting is not the most important thing, it is just a means rather than an end.
In general, when there are no major changes in life, you only need to record the account books for 1 to 2 months to provide the basic required data. The next step is - the second step: overall strategy, classification analysis (accounting analysis)
After holding the data, the young lovers can do the following to save money and save money from two aspects. Long-term planning.
The first aspect: Category analysis When keeping accounts, there will be various categories of expenditures, such as catering, transportation, rent, medical care, interpersonal relationships, etc.
Account book classification
Based on 2 months of accounting data, young couples can see how much money was spent on these categories in the combined account books.
Classification of expenditures
It is not enough to classify expenditures only according to their purpose.
There are also the following criteria:
Necessary expenditures that cannot be saved
Expenditures that can be reduced
Absolute wasteful expenditures
Unexpected expenses (inevitable)
If you want to save money, the most important thing is to identify where money must be spent and where it can be saved?
And this is different for different people.
Itemized analysis
The first item, including necessary food, rent, transportation, etc., is a necessary expense that cannot be saved.
The second item, the expenses that can be reduced, depends on your own situation. For example, if you find that there are many situations in the account book, outside, eating out, etc., you can appropriately reduce this part of the expenses.
The third item is absolutely wasteful expenditure, such as signing up for online courses but not studying at all, such as getting a fitness card worth several thousand yuan and only going there once, etc.
The fourth item, unexpected expenses, is very important, such as illness, maintenance costs, etc. It’s an expense we didn’t expect, but it’s something that will definitely happen.
This is why couples or families must have savings, because unexpected accidents will definitely happen.
If we don’t have any spare savings and encounter this situation, we will be embarrassed and have to borrow money from our parents or friends.
Unexpected situation: illness
Overall planning
After the above series of analysis, *** the young couple who live together and keep accounts have already analyzed their expenses I have a very clear understanding. Then you can analyze it item by item and make a budget for your expenses.
For example, in terms of food, the two of them cut down on eating out and taking out food, and chose to buy more ingredients to cook by themselves, thereby adjusting their monthly catering expenses from 1,000 to 800, and so on.
Finally, add up the various expenses to get the total budget for the next month.
PS: Of course, be careful not to think about reaching the sky in one fell swoop, so be sure to leave some room for yourself in your monthly budget. For example, other expenses are 200, etc. Step Three: Budget Execution, Actual Comparison
Budget Execution, Actual Comparison After setting the budget for next month, the next step is implementation.
The key point is to allow two people to have a strong psychological balance when spending money. In this way, you can have limitations and be aware of it.
It is recommended that both people strictly follow the budget. Of course, if it is an unexpected situation, it does not need to be included.
Actual Comparison
Within a few days after the end of the month, compare budgeted expenses with actual expenses again to see where things were missed.
What was executed well. Then make adjustments based on the actual situation of the two people.
Deposits = Income - Expenses
The actual amount of deposits for two people is the balance of their incomes this month - their actual expenses.
After a few more months of execution, you can also choose to deposit the balance into another bank card. Seeing the gradual accumulation of the amount will make the two people's sense of accomplishment increase day by day, so that they will be more motivated to make deposits.
The fourth step of depositing: timely adjustments and iterative updates (budget)
Realistic situations will change, such as job changes, illness, moving, and other unexpected events. This leads to changes in expenditures, so the budget can also be changed based on actual conditions.
Continuously record, adjust, and iteratively update, so that you can clearly understand your expenses and be aware of them. SUM saving money is a means, not an end
PS: It is clearly said that the young couple wants to save money together, why not just talk about how to save money, but keep talking about accounting and analysis issues?
Based on personal experience and complaints from many netizens on the Internet, if you take the initiative to save money, it is easy to only focus on the amount of money saved. Once you save 5W or 10W, you will either Make people feel rich and think about how to reward themselves.
Or you just feel like you don’t know what to do with your money, so you lose the motivation to save money and give up.
In fact, this is all due to not clarifying one's own goals and reversing means and ends.
For couples, saving money is not a goal, but a means.
A happy life is the goal
Money is a tool that makes two people's lives better. Money ultimately serves your own happiness. In other words, the ultimate goal of saving money should be to provide a happy life for two people.
Couple
So when saving money, or two people saving up, the goal must not be the amount of money, but to let the two people develop good habits. Being able to have a clear understanding of money, knowing how to spend it, and spending it reasonably can achieve the ultimate goal of saving money: let the money provide services and guarantees for a better life for two people.