How To Avoid Repeating 2007 Financial Goals in 2008
2006 has gone and the new year is here. Have you set yourself any financial goals for 2007? Consider the following:
* Save at least 10% of my monthly income;
* Reduce my credit card balance;
* Buy life insurance; evaluate my investment portfolio;
* Start retirement planning
Sound familiar? These goals are more like an echo from the past - these are goals that we set last year, and the year before last. The question we need to ask is why these goals surfaced again this year?
The simple answer is we mess-up and over confidence.
We all mess up financially, small or big, in some points of our life. If we don’t admit them, the chances are we are far more likely to repeat such blunders. List down the top 3 to 5 financial mistakes you made and have them pasted in your bedroom, bathroom, kitchen or in front of your TV set to serve as a constant reminder, and a form of ‘public humiliation’ for you. It wills works.
After acknowledging your earlier financial blunders, it is time to reevaluate your discipline and forecasting capability.
For example, giving your current lifestyle and other commitments, how realistic is to achieve the 10% saving goal? Looking out, evaluate how the big picture macroeconomics can helps or hurts your financial goal? Take this down: KLCI index closed at 1068 at the last trading day of 2006, inflation stood at 3.8%, GDP at 5.5%, and BLR at 6.75%. Now ask yourself how these key indicators will likely to change in the next 12 months, and to what extent they will affect your financial goals. Your predictions will guide you to setting a more realistic and achievable financial goals.
Hopefully, 2007 will not be the same again.