As many of you know or maybe don’t know, I am a huge football fan. I can not wait for the NFL season to start. It kickoffs with my defending Super Bowl Champion New Orleans Saints taking on the Minnesota Vikings. WHO DAT Its not going to be an easy task for the Saints to repeat as Super Bowl Champs. The team has to focus on one game at a time in order to repeat as Champions and TWO DAT. Its the same with your personal finances. If you want to simplify you have to tackle each financial task one tackle at a time. Don’t try to financially multitask and take on more than you can handle. Its much easier to tackle each task one at a time. Here is a quick list of financial task you should tackle to simplify your finances:

BANKING

• Consolidate your bank accounts
• Sign up for online banking
• Set up account alerts

DEBT

• Consolidate your credit cards
• Eliminate credit card balances or put plan in place to eliminate it
• Refinance your mortgage or renegotiate your credit card interest rate

INSURANCE

• Evaluate your all of your insurance coverage
• Determine if you have enough coverage
• Are you paying to much for your coverage

RETIREMENT

• Consolidate your retirement accounts
• Are you on track to reach your retirement goal?
• Have you reallocated your retirement accounts?

EMERGENCY FUND

• Have you established an emergency fund?
• Do you know how much it should be funded with?
• Is it adequately funded?

ESTATE PLAN

• Do you have a will in place?
• Have you reviewed the beneficiaries, executor, and guardians you established?
• Is you family aware of your intentions in your will?

EDUCATION

• Do you have education saving plan in place?
• Have you set a goal for what how much you will need?
• Do you review you plan regularly?

TAKE ACTION

Determine which financial task would help you simplify your personal finances and tackle this one first.  Ask yourself the three basic questions provide.  Once you tackle the first one move on to the next.  After you tackle each one at a time your financial life will become simpler and you will begin to live a simple financial lifestyle you want to live.

Til next time remember to take it one tackle at a time.

This post was featured in Carnival of Personal Finance #274: I Love NY Edition.

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We say we want to simplify our finances but do you always find an excuse when it comes to certain financial topics. One topic many of us fail to consider when simplifying our personal finances is estate planning or just the simple step of having a will drafted. This is one subject many of us do not like to discuss. Since we do not like to discuss it, we usually do not plan for it. Having a will not necessary help you simplify your finances but will help simplify your finances for the loved ones you leave behind. Even though we all know having a will in place can make the settlement of your estate large or small much easier on our loved ones the majority of us do not have a will in place. So what is your excuse for not having a will?

Here are 10 reasons many of us have not drafted a will:

1. Attorney fees – Why should I pay to have my will done? All the attorney will do is type my will instead of hand writing where I want my assets to go to. I think I will save a few hundred bucks and type it myself. Also what value will the attorney add for the money that I will end up paying.

2. Not alive why should I care – I will not be around so why should I plan how my assets will be divided. I believe my ex-spouses and children are more than capable of dividing my assets evenly so that everyone is happy and gets their fair share.

3. Like to see family fight - When there is a disagreement they just argue until everyone gets what they want. Its actually entertaining to see who will win. So why make it easy on them by telling they who gets what.

4. I enjoy paying taxes- I believe contributing 50% of my estate to the government is a good use of funds. I will not need it so why not give it to a good cause.  Also my family can live on 50% of my assets any way.

5. My elected officials can handle it better than I can Since I have elected these individuals to represent me, I believe they have my best interest at heart and will implement laws that will benefit me and my family. They will know how my assets should be distributed.

6. My spouse can survive without me – My spouse is more than capable of handling my estate. I am sure a how to handle an estate book can teach them what to do.  Right. Better yet my spouse has a job and can survive on just one salary.

7. I have no assets or money why bother – I have more debt than assets what’s the point. The debt collectors will take my assets any way.

8. My minor children will be in good hands with a state agency I don’t need to name a guardian for my children. The state child care services will be just fine.

9. My spouse and children can handle large sums of money Usually when my family receives money they just spend it so why bother restricting what they can do with it. I don’t want to tell them what to do with it. I want them to enjoy it.

10. I will never die – I am still young and in good health and I don’t plan on dying in the near future. I want to enjoy these birthday freebies forever. So what is there to plan for.  When I am ready to die I will plan for it.

So which one of these is your excuse for not drafting a will. Yes we don’t like to talk about death but it is something that will occur in our life time. We just hope that you have planned for it. Having an executed will will make life much easier for those who you leave behind.

TAKE ACTION take some time to think how you want your assets distributed and who you want in charge of managing your affairs when you are not around. Make sure you put some thought into it and then find an attorney to draft a will based on your circumstances. Trust me its worth it.

Til next time take one step at a time to simplify your personal finances.

This post was featured in Carnival of Personal Finance

If you would like more tips to help you simplify your personal finances make sure you subscribe to simple financial lifestyle email newsletter and subscribe to RSS feed for blog updates.

How can one number simplify your persona finances?  Yes it is true.  One number can help you simplify your personal finances.  This number will make things easier for you and will help you reduce your financial stress.  This number is not a large number.  You are probably thinking yes one very large number can help me simplify my personal finances.  If you read Would winning the lottery simplify your personal finances?, you will know that I do not believe having a large amount of money will simplify your finances.  Let me stop the suspense and tell you.  The number 1 can help you simplify your finances very easily.  Think about it if you only had:

One checking account and saving account- you will know where all of your money is held.  There is no need to have a spreadsheet to keep track of all of your accounts.  Less mail to receive with only one account.  Less accounts you have to balance at the end of each month.

One bank – you will never have to think which bank account do I need to take the money from.  No need to think about which online bank account I need to log into.  Everything for your finances can done at one location or one login.

One mortgage – if you need two mortgages to purchase your house should you even be purchasing the house.  You can only live in one house at a time so why would you need two.  Just think of the up keep you would have with two homes.

One car per driver – If you are lucky you may be able to have one car for the entire family.  That would save you alot of money.  But that is not always practical.  So stick to one car per driver in the home.  If you have three cars and only two drivers, how often is the extra car driven.  You can save on maintenance  and insurance by getting rid of that extra car.

One cell phone – unless your job requires you to carry a phone for work.  You do not need more than one cell phone.  Eliminate that additional expense.

One investment account – its much easier to keep track of your investments if you only have one account.  You will have a better understanding of your overall asset allocation as well as keeping track of your investment performance.

One credit card – yes having only one credit card came significantly simplify your finances.  It limits your spending, can help you eliminate credit card debt and enables you easily track your spending and credit card debt.  Eliminates the need to pay multiple bills each month.

One service provider – if you can consolidate your utilites to only one provider that will eliminate the bills you have to pay.  This is not always possible but can simplify your finances if you can do this.

One advisor – do you really need more than one investment advisor or accountant.  Probably not.  Decide which one provides the services you need and best fits with your goals and objectives.

One insurance provider – usually you can consolidate your home and auto insurance which may lead to a discount.  Is there really a need to have separate insurance companies.  Again reduces the number of bills you must pay and keep track of.

So you can see how the power of one can help you simplify your personal finances.

Can you think of any other ways to reduce to one to help you simplify your personal finances?

If you would like learn more tips to help you simplify your personal finances make sure you subscribe to simple financial lifestyle email newsletter and subscribe to RSS feed for blog updates.

This post was featured in Carnival of Personal Finance: Parts of Speech Abuse Edition hosted by Mighty Bargain Hunter.