Financial goals can be set anytime, you don’t need to wait for the new year or a new financial year to do it.
How To Achieve Your Big Financial Goals
Anything you save for, from dental work to a house deposit, can feel like a big financial goal and sometimes too hard.
Especially with rent/mortgage payments as they are, interest rates increasing and it seems every other expense we have has gone up drastically too.
Here are a few things you can do to achieve our financial goals.
1. Get Specific
Be clear about the goal, what it is, what you need to do to achieve it, what the timeframe is etc.
Knowing exactly what you want and how long you have to achieve it enables you to make a proper plan to make it happen.
Write down exactly what your goal is with full details.
Include the cost, how long you have and split the cost into each pay so you know exactly how much you need to save.
2. Create a Plan with Actionable Steps
Without a plan and taking action, you won’t achieve your goal.
Break your goal into achievable actions, even better, break it into things you can do each day to get you closer to your goal.
Use Atomic Habits and The 12 Week Year to help you create new systems and habits to achieve the goal.
Small, consistent efforts will ensure success more than random, big gestures so don’t dismiss the little steps.
Check out these 9 frugal habits to save thousands and these 5 habits for financial freedom and success.
Create visual reminders to help you stay focused on your goal and be inspired.
Pictures, a vision board, affirmations, quotes around the house, change the wallpaper on your devices and make your passwords coded versions of your goal.
Doing these things keeps your goal front of mind and helps your mind see opportunities to achieve it faster too.
Next, look for opportunities to help achieve it faster e.g. find ways to increase your income without working more, try a side hustle such as one or more of these 24 ones for 2024.
Consider doing one of these 9 savings challenges to help stay motivated.
Track your progress whether through an app or printing out a savings tracker because seeing your progress can help you stay focused.
3. Celebrate
It’s important to celebrate your achievements so when you hit that big financial goal, celebrate.
Achieving the goal might feel like celebration enough, especially if it was buying a house or a car.
It can be nice to get in the habit of celebrating our achievements, no matter how big or small.
Congratulate yourself, celebrate then take some time to set a new goal.
4. Review
Whether you achieved the goal or not, reviewing what worked and what didn’t is important.
There are always going to be goals you want to achieve so knowing how to do it easier can help.
Think about all the things you did to achieve the goal, what you might do differently next time and what you’d do again.
This knowledge is valuable because it can save you significant time and money when working on future goals.
What We Did to Achieve Some of Our BIG Financial Goals
To get more specific, here are some of the goals we have achieved in the last few years.
Securing full custody against an abusive ex. How? With these tips: how to afford legal fees and custody, how to get full custody and tips to help you win in court.
We faced extreme obstacles with bushfires, lockdown overseas, a cyclone etc. Check how how to handle emergencies and tips to prepare here.
We had to repatriate, set up a house again, found out I was pregnant and had numerous health issues plus we were arranging his residency visa as he was only on a tourist visa.
Here are 9 tips for a pregnancy on a budget, more tips for having a baby on a budget and how to upgrade your life if you’re broke.
Check out how to get your family on board with saving money for tips on managing that.
Travel for various things: ways to make money while travelling and loads of tips to save money with travel.
With all of the above, we had to be disciplined, practice frugality, watch our spending and jump on opportunities.
