Weekly planning, a good way to start taking care of money

Prioritizing your spending and savings, leaving everything organized, is important if you want to take care of your money. But a lot of people get discouraged just from thinking about planning. Calm down, there's a way. Have you ever thought about starting with something easier, like a 7-day financial plan?

This smaller version of traditional financial planning (which is usually monthly, semi-annual or annual) can help a lot in organizing day-to-day accounts. But it also works as an exercise in self-knowledge. You choose what is most important and urgent for you - and for that, you need to know what you want.

So let's go by parts.

What is financial planning

Financial planning is basically a plan of what you need and want to do with your money. It considers the present (your current expenses and income, for example) and projects itself into the future (where you want to be in a certain time).

It's not just for those who have money, ok? In fact, those who have little money in their bank account or spend all (or almost all) what they earn need even more financial planning. Having a plan protects you from a bad time, helps you pay off debt and save for any goal.

Why do this every week?

Every routine has to start somewhere, right? And running 5km is easier than running a marathon. The same goes for taking care of money.

A weekly financial plan allows you to look at a shorter period of time. Starting from your day to day, you think about how much money you need to spend during your week.

Each week has different events (gas, groceries, happy hour, etc), but at the same time a regularity is maintained. So it's a way to test, with controlled interference, your ability to organize.

How to make a weekly financial plan

We have a 7-day planning version called Fincare Agenda. It was sent to our first customers, in an exclusive edition. But you can download it below:

Download Fincare Agenda

Set your 7-day financial planning using our model, the Fincare Agenda.

Download

Use our model (or make yours) following these steps:

Building your plan base

1. Write down how much you earn in the month.
2. Add the non-negotiable expenses of the month, like electricity bills and rent (it's worth creating a ,, for them in the app).
3. Do the math to find out how much you can spend per week on whatever you want: (total you earn in the month - non-negotiable expenses)/4.

What to adjust week by week

1. Write down the month, the week, the amount available for the week, and the sum of spending for the previous weeks of the current month.
2. Adjust the amount you have for the week: discount (or add) how much you spent more (or less) in the previous week.
3. In the sheet spaces, write the goals you have placed in your N26 app spaces.
4. In the spaces on the sheet, write down what you want to buy, what you want to set aside money for (worth reading more about ,,) and the value of each item.
5. Number each item in the square next to them, according to their priority. Risk when you do.
6. Write down how much you want to spend on each space for the week, without letting their sum exceed the total you have for the week.
7. In the N26 app, split the money across your spaces as you calculated to spend on each (don't forget about non-negotiable expenses).
8. At the end of the week, write down how much you spent on each space and if everything went according to plan (if you went a little overboard, make up for it next week).

If you like this method, repeat every week on a new sheet.

If it didn't work for you, that's fine :) Keep looking for the best way to prioritize your spending. We have some tips here at N Cuidados.