5 Money Power Moves for 2019
You can start your year right money wise by adopting the following money power moves and setting your base right.
1. Financial goals
Imagine a car without a steering wheel or even a headless chicken. With no financial goals in sight, that’s how most of us live out our lives financially. Start this year by taking some time to start by noting down all possible goals you want your money to achieve. Divide them into short-term, medium-term and long-term goals and rank them in order of priority. Look for professional advice to make a plan to achieve those goals and start executing it to make the most efficient use of your money.
2. Review your Insurance
Two of the most important types of insurance that you must consider are life insurance and health insurance. When it comes to life insurance, ask yourself if your death would impact anyone else financially? If the answer is yes, ensure you have a life insurance policy. Every year, you must review it and see if the cover is still adequate for your needs and to cover the financial goals of all your dependents. When it comes to Health Insurance, do not depend solely on your employer group insurance. Ensure you have a family floater policy that has an adequate cover and all members of your household are covered under it. In case you own a car, check that the insurance is up to date and checks all the boxes in the instances covered.
3. Loan repayment
Most of us at any given point of time are repaying multiple loans simultaneously. After the initial setup, we end up getting into the unconscious cycle of letting loans run their course. However, the start of the year is a good time to consolidate your details and review where you stand. Know what loans you are repaying, the interest rate, the principal outstanding and the number of months remaining for you to pay it off. Try to see if you can repay any of those loans before time. Most importantly, if you have very high interest loans or multiple small loans that you can barely keep track of, look for a cheaper Personal Loan. Using that amount that you can easily borrow from online providers like Money View, you can pay off more easily and use the amount to close those high interest loans.
4. Calculate your Income tax
A surprisingly ignored aspect of money by most people is Income Tax. Most of it is due to the initial complexity in understanding the rules of the game. However, I believe it is a one-time pain. Once you understand the basics, you can end up saving and being aware of quite a bit of your money. So, this new year, take a look at your pay slips or business income to understand your gross income tax calculation. Then, check for all possible areas of Income tax exemption and see how much of it you are availing and what is the further potential that you can tap. Ensure you make the most of income tax exemptions in a judicious manner, be it by availing Home loan exemption or for your Life Insurance premiums or by investing in Section 80C approved instruments like ELSS mutual funds, PPF etc. Check out this comparison of some of the common Income Tax instruments
5. Income appreciation
A new year is a great marker of time and helps us structure our lives. Look forward to 2019 as the year that you would want to increase your income. If you are a salaried person, then maybe it will come through better negotiation for an increment or a job change. If you run your own business, it will probably be a result of aggressive business expansion. Today, side hustles like freelance writing or tutoring are an increasingly popular avenue to increase income. Plan your year in a way that you focus on and act on increasing the inflow of money in your life.
A year is a long time and if planned well we can achieve a lot in that span of time. Plan these powerful money moves in the start of 2019 for a financially healthy New Year!