My money goals 2018

Seeing my money goals in writing…

I haven’t written out my goals in a while so this post is a good exercise for me. It’s important to write down your money goals. There’s something about seeing your hopes and ambitions in writing that makes it more real. People don’t ask for things “in writing” for nothing.

My 2017-18 were high spend years because I did two rounds of IVF. No-one really plans to do IVF and I didn’t have time to put it off and save up as I was 42 years old.

So the upshot of that is that after using up my emergency fund, I took on some quite chunky credit card debt.

As a result, my short and mid term goals are really all about recovering from that: paying off credit cards and building up an emergency fund.

One of my life goals is to be financially able to choose when and where I work. Commuting is draining and takes me away from my family. I have short, mid and long term targets to hit to reach my goal, so I know what I’m aiming for at every stage!

Of course my long term goal is retirement. It’s a long way off, but writing this is reminding me to review my pension and see if I should be increasing my contributions.

My money goals 2018

Short term goals

1. Pay off my highest interest credit card by end of February, in instalments of £1000 a month.

2. Build up a joint emergency fund – set aside £50 each a month each.

3. Review pension this month and check I am on track to have 500k in the pot for retirement. See if I can increase contributions if necessary.

4. Gain enough website traffic to join a decent online ads programme to start generating revenue. Target date March 2019.

Mid Term Goals

1. Once I’m on an ad programme, start to generate some income from the ads on the blog by increasing traffic. Aim is to get to £500 a month by July 2019.

2. When first credit card paid off move onto the other one (yep there’s more than one). Keep up payments of £1000 per month until it’s gone.

3. Take next summer hols off work by building up savings to cover 6 weeks of expenses.

Long Term Goals

1. Build up my side hustles so I am free to work when and where I want. Websites/ online freelancing. Target 5 years time.

2. Have 500,000 in my pension pot by the time I am 60. Check I am on target to do this every year and up my contributions if not.

So there you have it!

There are lots of other things I want to do with my money but I find that sticking to just a few focused things makes it easier to stay on track.

What are your money goals? And how are you doing with them? Drop me a line or comment below.