Financial Plan

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Modesto Junior College *

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230

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Finance

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Jan 9, 2024

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Ashley Weaver Personal Finance BUSAD 230-9441 Creating a Financial Plan December 11, 2023 1
Overview My current life stage is I am 37 and currently engaged, though technically single if you were to look at is from a tax point of view. In my home there is currently my fiancé who is 37, my son who is 4, and myself. I am currently a para educator for Stanislaus County. A short-term goal that I have is to create and maintain an emergency fund by opening a separate account at a different bank than I am currently using and put aside $100 from every paycheck. Another short-term goal I have is to buy a new car. I plan to achieve this goal by setting aside an additional $100 a month for a “New Car Fund”. To be able to achieve this goal I am committed to cutting by my spending on eating out from what it currently is to either twice a month, but hopefully cutting it back to once a month and then cutting out eating out altogether unless it is a special occasion. A third short term goal I have is to remodel my bathrooms. I plan on achieving this goal by learning how to do most things myself to help cut costs and to start a “Home Improvement Fund” where I set aside $50 a month plus all bonus’s’ for said fund. I also plan on starting a 100-envelope challenge binder that I have seen online to help set aside extra money that at the end of the year I will split between each of the three short term goals I have. One intermediate goal I have is to buy a bigger home, with my growing family my current home is getting a little too small. A second short term goal I have is to reduce my debt both personal debt and student loan debt. A. third intermediate goal that I have is to achieve my master’s degree in psychology. One long term goal I have is to have a college fund for my son and or future children. A second long term goal I have is to have a nice retirement fund. A third long term goal I have is to travel around Europe for a month once I retire. I see all of these goals as attainable as I have a decent job right now, but my fiancé makes good money as a firefighter for Cal Fire, and we have both agreed that these are both of our goals when we got engaged. 2
Specialized Financial Activities To achieve my financial goal, I first plan on creating out a monthly spending budget for our household. Whenever we spend money, I plan on inputting that into a spreadsheet that deducts what we spent from each category and at the end of the month look over the spread sheet to see how our spending went and what we need to change. I also plan on continuing my education so that I may move up in my job and increase my income which in turn helps reach these goals. I also plan on reducing my spending on unnecessary things such as eating out and streaming services. Additionally, I plan to increase my retirement savings fund and I also plan to invest in stock with the help of a financial and stock advisor. Planning My plan for spending and saving is that every month I plan to save overall $50 more than I did the previous month outside of my already planned savings funds. I have already started this as I am currently planning my wedding. After I get married my fiancé and I have planned that every month he is working his at least half of his overtime will be going to our financial goals both short term, intermediate, and long term as well as putting our taxes and my bonus’s’ towards said funds. We also plan that by the end of next year we will not be eating out like we are now and only limiting it to special occasions. I also am upping my contribution to my retirement fund and my fiancé has his retirement fund set up to where we will be comfortable when we retire. He additionally has set up a nice life insurance policy so that God forbid something should happen to him since he is a firefighter our children and I will be financially stable and able to live how we are now for about five years while I regroup our lives. The Role of Credit 3
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I will be the first to admit that I don’t have the best credit, however I am fortunate that my fiancé does. Our plan is that once we are married, I will be added to his 2 credit cards to help raise my credit score for when we plan to buy another home. As far as consumer credit or open-end credit that is all we plan on using. Eventually when I am able to raise my credit score, we plan on using closed-end credit possibly to buy a new car if we don’t have enough saved but we will defiantly be using closed-end credit for a mortgage loan when we purchase another home. Some benefits of credit include being able to purchase things when you are low on funds, being available in emergencies, and the ability to own a home, car, or furthering one’s education. Some disadvantages of credit are the loss of your collateral used for loans, falling more in debt because you can’t pay back the credit, and the strain it puts on relationships when you are under. Risk Management Currently I have most of the insurances that you listed, the first that I find most important is health insurance. Health insurance for my family is a top priority as without it we would be paying hundreds if not thousands of dollars if we were to become sick or injured. With my current health insurance, the most we pay is a $100 copay for an emergency visit. Life insurance id something my fiancé and I both have already established so that in the awful chance something does happen to one or both of us whoever my son if left in the care of money will be the last thing they need to stress about while grieving and trying to establish a new way of life. Automobile insurance is something we both find important as well as if we got into a serious car accident tomorrow neither one of us has the extra money to cover a new car, medical bills, or loss of wages for the others involved in the accident or ourselves. Homeowner’s insurance is another important factor that we have so that in the off chance something happened to our home 4
we would not be without them means of another home or living arrangement or the means to replace what was damaged or even possibly stolen if that were to be the case. Retirement Planning My perfect retirement would include a trip to Europe for a month and then to live on my little piece of land with my garden near my children and grandchildren with once a year going on a big family vacation. I plan on being retires for at least 20-30 years depending on how long I live. I think with the plan my fiancé and I have in place we will defiantly be able to achieve our retirement goals as we are already planning to buy a home with an acre or two when we purchase our next home, if we can achieve that then by the time we retire we should have our home paid off if not almost paid off. Estate Planning I have already begun estate planning as I have life insurance set up and a will in place, should I die tomorrow my son gets all my assets put into a savings account for him to access when he is 25, or 18 if he decides to attend college. When I pass away in the future, if my future husband is also deceased, I plan on leaving everything I have to my children splitting in straight down the middle including the sale of my home unless one of them wants to buy the other one out if I have more children. Reflection My current spending and savings activities do not necessarily align with all my financial goals, however as I have stated, I know once I am married my goals will be obtainable with my husband as he is very good with money and has helped me be better with my savings and sending since we have been together. The one deliberate thing that I need to do is make sure I stick to my financial plan and budget and not get comfortable just because I like the number in. 5
my savings accounts. The most challenging area will savings for me as being a single parent for so long savings was minimal for me and anytime, I would get extra money as say my tax return I would spend it all on necessities as I didn’t have the means for them the rest of the year, for example new couch or a new dishwasher. The topic that was most meaningful to me was financial planning as before this class I had no real financial plan aside from insurances and a retirement fund nor would I have even known where to start when creating a financial plan. 6
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