I read an article a little over a week ago and I honestly haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.
It was titled ‘12 Personal Finance Moves You Should Make by Age 30′ and it essentially outlines 12 finance goals that all women should be aiming for/achieving by the time they’re 30. In other words it outlines very clearly just another way that I am seriously failing at ‘adulting’.
Now, I am self-aware enough to know that I am not great with money and never really have been – I make a conscious choice not to check my bank balance from about 10 days before pay day (being paid monthly does NOT help!) and just hope for the best – but this list has put my failing into a whole other realm.
The 12 jokes goals are below:
- You should already have an emergency fund. Experts generally recommend six months’ worth of living expenses.
- HAHAHA what?
- You should be anticipating, preparing, and saving up for big expenditures. For example, you should factor in your wedding, a house, children, a pet, and other similar major expenses.
- I live in Sydney so owning a house is definitely not a thing, my 2 cats live very happy lives with my parents in Towsnville and a wedding in the future is looking pretty unlikely. I’m going to assume given the above that I can pretty much ignore this one altogether.
- You should have mastered the art of automating. Sending a chunk of your cash automatically to your savings every month means you’re paying yourself first.
- Not a huge priority to ‘automate’ the transfer of the $25 a month I have left for savings. Because, I am a mature adult though, (and so I don’t feel like a complete failure) I have subsequently set this up. #killingit
- You should know how to live within your means but enjoy life at the same time.
- HAHAHA what?
- You should be regularly keeping an eye on your superannuation
- HAHAHA what?
- You should have prepared a will.
- I don’t own anything but I agree it is probably important to get my affairs in order. So, here it is: Mum, you can keep the cats and soz lol about never paying you back the full amount for the car.
- You should be paying off and prioritising your high-interest debt.
- See above, Mum.
- During your 20s, you should be trying to raise your credit score.
- My Dad had to bail me out of an impending law suit with Video Ezy once because I had an overdue fee that was getting so high they threatened to sue. So, I’ve never checked (I don’t know how) but I’m going to go ahead and assume that my credit score is pretty much impeccable.
- You should already have some practice with negotiation — with salary, with service providers, and more.
- I have never negotiated anything with anyone and have actually said to service providers on more than one occasion “I don’t actually care what you best offer is, I just want to get off the phone so if you can just punch in whatever and that’ll be sweet with me”. So, safe to say I’m a real shark at the negotiating table.
- Fidelity recommends having a retirement fund that’s equivalent to your annual salary by age 35. At age 30, you should be on track for that.
- Why do I need to keep an eye on my superannuation and have a retirement fund? Isn’t super THE retirement fund?
- You should already have read a couple of personal finance books.
- Maybe Popsugar should spend a little less time reading personal finance books and little more time reading simple maths books because that’s only 11 goals and this article says there are 12.
I’ve officially got less than 3.5 years to get my shit together finance wise. I’ll start next month.
Probably Not a Thing 