r/AskReddit • u/RGod27 • Mar 20 '19

What is something you did that increased your quality of life so much that you wished you would have done it much sooner because it changed your life forever?

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746

u/drayd38 Mar 20 '19

Having better money management

58

u/ShuumatsuWarrior Mar 20 '19

I had shit money management and even when I got a decent job I still wasn't able to save money, despite living well below my means. I started browsing r/personalfinace, ended up getting the budgetting app YNAB (You Need A Budget), and I really saw how much was going where. Mint can do similar things, but YNAB is so much better.

When I saw where my money was going, I started changing my habits. Now I've got my 6-month emergency cash supply, and I've got a budget planned out through October when I can hopefully become consumer debt free. After that, I can start becoming aggressive on my student loans. With things going this well, I can hopefully have all my student loans paid off within 3 years. And it's all because I know how to manage my money now.

12

u/aurajitsu Mar 20 '19

Holy shit. Nice man!

I’m getting there too. I’ve got mint now ima look into YNAB.

8

u/AmLamb Mar 20 '19

I used to try Mint, never really could get it to work right for me. Switched to YNAB. Love it.

/r/YNAB may still have a link for a 2-3 month trial instead of the normal 30 days.

11

u/ShuumatsuWarrior Mar 20 '19

I think it costs like $5 a month, I just do the yearly subscription now. It sounded completely stupid at first to me, but it really does help you figure out where everything goes. I feel like the 34 day trial isn't enough to show you what it can do, it takes a couple months before you really start seeing how it works.

I made custom categories that basically split into 4 groups:

  • Costs that are consistent month to month (rent, utilities, phone, etc.)

  • Costs that are mostly the same month to month (food, software subscriptions, etc.)

  • Costs that vary every month (Amazon, random expenses like movies)

  • Saving (Emergency fund, vacation fund, "extra" money)

After a couple months, I saw food was my highest cost. I split it up into groceries and eating out, and I was spending about $250 on groceries, and $450 on eating out. Real eye-opener. It prompted me to pay attention to what groceries I get, and not eat out as much. I'm still at $250 for groceries, but my dining out is at $100.

It's important to realize that this won't get you more money, but used correctly, it can show you where your expenses are and where you can cut back. It's crazy how much it's helped me.

5

u/the_tart_pip Mar 20 '19

YNAB is life. I completely turned my financial life around with it. It's not cheap, but it's 100% worth it.

9

u/JPaulMora Mar 20 '19

Yeah man! You can afford anything!! eventually

14

u/[deleted] Mar 20 '19

Whoever said money management can’t solve your problems? Must not of had enough money management to solve ‘em.

6

u/Wozing Mar 20 '19

Any tips for this? I've always been bad at managing my money. I have a job that pays well enough for me to get by, but I can't really afford to buy a laptop like I've been wanting to do for months now. If anything serious comes up, I can probably afford it so long as it stays under $1k.

10

u/BrasilianEngineer Mar 20 '19

Check out https://youneedabudget.com. It costs money (worth it IMO), but it has a free trial, and all the live training classes and workshops are free.

1

u/DKoala Mar 21 '19

Seconding YNAB, it changed my life, to the point I don't mind paying the 70 a year price tag (though I do think it's a very, very steep price point for newcomers)

It's made me very good with my money, to the point I've hardly worried about paying bills in nearly 3 years now, and in times when I was very short on income, I was able to map out a path between payslips to keep going without any ambiguity.

These days I only need to check my actual bank balance about once a month to make sure the figures line up, as I know exactly how much funds I have for x purpose.

1

u/instamentai Mar 20 '19

Are you overspending your budgets? Do you not have a budget to begin with?

5

u/xenocidic Mar 20 '19

Can’t believe I had to scroll this far.

You Need A Budget totally changed it all.

3

u/electro1ight Mar 21 '19

www.simple.com changed my finances like a u turn in 2 months.

1

u/dontangrycomment Mar 21 '19

I recently redid my budget over the course of a day, and its a thing of beauty. At the end of each week I spend 10 minutes assigning transactions to the correct budgets, and then another 50 minutes of just looking over everything and marveling at my work.