It is that time of the year when we make plans (I prefer to call them plans, not resolutions) for the new year. As is the tradition for the third year running, the #52WeekChallengeTM 2018 is here! The Challenge has three goals: Nurture a savings habit by helping you set a savings goal, then working towards hitting it. Curb unnecessary and impulsive spending. In its purest form,…
Read More
There is a joke that every Kenyan has a side hustle, so this article is probably moot but I will write it nonetheless. In this age of passion, we are told that we should discover what we are passionate about and should we single-mindedly pursue that passion, we shall not only find financial success but personal fulfilment. Life is not that perfect though. Some people…
Read More
The most common reason why many people do not join SACCOs in Kenya is lack guarantors or aversion to the idea of guaranteeing other people’s borrowing. The principle behind loan guarantors is that should you fail to repay your loan, the SACCO can recover their money from the people who have signed up as your guarantors in addition to your shares. Different SACCOs approach this in a…
Read More
When I shared about my losing my #52WeekChallenge savings on the Telegram Group, one of the participants asked me a challenging question: Don’t you have an emergency fund? See how wonderful accountability is? We all know that an emergency fund is Personal Finance 101. When you start earning money, first thing you should do is build up a fund of at least 3 months of your…
Read More
Last week, I was forced to withdraw most of the money in my #52WeekChallenge Lock Savings Account. On Friday last week, I had Kshs 35,213 saved. I was feeling really proud of myself because I was ahead on the challenge, having ticked off the crazy December weeks. I am not under any obligation to share my finances on this blog, but I am writing this…
Read More
When we had our last #52WeekChallenge Twitter chat, I did a poll that showed some fantastic things (many people are still on course), and that some people were either lagging or had fallen off the wagon. That’s the thing though. The savings habit is a journey. Sometimes we fall off the wagon or we lag behind, but we must never stop trying. If you have…
Read More
Someone said, living a fun life and good financial management is like water and oil they do not mix. I think about this quite often, especially when I meet people who from reading my articles online seem to think certain things about my attitude and approach to personal finance. “It must be nice to be in control of your money” “You must save a lot!”…
Read More
Growing up in a Christian home, tithing as a practice was taught very early in life and reinforced throughout life . My earliest memory of actively earning an income involved a little chat I had with my mother about giving in Sunday School (church). Every Sunday, mom would give us some coins to give in church. Then one day, she told me that how it…
Read More
This post is a third on a series about how to save for our kids’ education. The first post looked at a savings account as a tool for accumulating savings and the second evaluated education insurance plans. There is consensus that when saving for the future, you should prioritize your retirement over your kids’ higher education. Why? While there are many programs that help students fund…
Read More
Yesterday, The Time published an article that cited the love for avocado as one of the things making home ownership an impossible goal for millennials. They were quoting Tim Gurner, an Australian millionaire and property mogul. “When I was trying to buy my first home, I wasn’t buying smashed avocado for $19 and four coffees at $4 each,” Gurner told the Australian news show 60 Minutes….
Read More