Who's good with money?

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I want to hear from anyone who is good, or I guess bad, with money. I wanted to talk about this more in another thread I was reading but it wasn't about money so didn't want to derail.

I'm pretty terrible with money. I was never taught anything about money, my family was not good with money. When I was young my family seemed to have lots of money, we had a really nice house and kept horses and stuff. But the late 80s recession did for all that. I'm not expecting to inherit very much.

I've always worked, but I've never earned enough to save, I don't own my home, I don't have a pension, I still run out of money at the end of the month like I used to when I was a student. I used to have a bit of debt but that's dealt with now, I have at least learned to live more or less within my means. But it's getting a bit scary because most people I know my age are at least a little sorted with regards to their financial futures. I don't even know if state pensions will still be a thing by the time I'm old enough to get one.

But I also seem to hate having money. When I get it unexpectedly, I feel a compulsion to get rid of it. Or maybe, because I live so close to the edge financially, by the time money unexpectedly turns up there's often a long list of things that have been waiting for it.

I'd like to be better with money. I don't even know where you go to learn about it, really.

Is anyone here good with money? What are the basics? Are there any good books I can read?

I'm good with money, but it's because I've always been very frugal. My parents were also frugal, even though they didn't have to be. I think it's because they lived through WWII in Europe and they became very conscious of not wasting anything, because there was rationing and sometimes particular foods were hard to come by. So I get it from them.

But for me it's almost a life philosophy: I like not having things I don't strictly need and keeping it simple. I actually enjoy that, so it's not a deprivation or sacrifice. I'm not sure that that's something that can be learned, or that most people would even want to learn it because they wouldn't like it, but it does make it so I have always been able to save, even when I had a small income.

For instance, I don't have a microwave, a toaster oven, or a regular oven. I have a two-burner induction cooktop and that's it as far as heating foods. I can make toast by putting bread in a pan on the stove. I don't have a car, which is a huge savings but not possible for most people. I ride my bike and take the bus, but I also sometimes take Lyft rides, which is still cheaper than owning a car. I live in a very small house, so my bills for heating and cooling are low. I rarely buy anything that isn't food. If I don't really need something, I just don't buy it, but again it's not a sacrifice for me. I get most of my clothes from the thrift store. I get my books from the library. Most of my furniture I got from Nextdoor or Craigslist. I used to get it from the curb on bulk-garbage days. When I was in my 20s our bed was a sheet of plywood on top of milk crates. We could afford a regular bed but chose not to put money into that.

Psychologically being frugal is a lot easier to do if you don't have to. If you have to, then you feel deprived and angry at having to put up with it. And paradoxically that causes one to spend more, because you don't want to feel stepped on.

I rarely eat out or get takeout. Eating at home is cheaper than even McDonald's, depending on what one eats. A lot of healthy foods are relatively cheap, like beans, eggs, pasta, vegetables (though these have become more expensive recently).

I had a roommate once who completely filled the bathroom with various lotions and soaps, for instance. I have one lotion and three soaps (one is a face wash). This may sound like a criticism but it's not -- again, it's a habit and a choice that I prefer but someone else might not.

This may sound like it has nothing to do with managing money, but to me not spending much money, when I can, is how I manage money. I don't sit down and write a budget, but it might help to keep track of where your money goes every day for a month, and then you have a snapshot of where your money is going and you might be able to see what you can reduce. On the other hand, this might cause more stress, in which case it might not be a good idea.

If one does get or manage to save some extra money, rates on CDs (certificates of deposit) from banks are really good right now. You can get 5% interest pretty commonly right now. That hasn't been the case for years. (This is in the US.)

Also, making the occasional relatively-expensive purchase is not as expensive as paying for something on a regular basis, which adds up to a lot more, generally. So, habits like getting a coffee from Starbucks every day, for instance, can add up to a lot over time. And so can monthly subscriptions. I try not to have more than one streaming service at a time, though I currently have two. I don't have cable TV. My phone plan is $30 a month, though there are cheaper ones. My actual phone cost $100.

Thanks for replying, Bee33, I appreciate your thoughts.

I think in many ways, I am quite frugal. I buy almost all my clothes from charity shops. If I need something like furniture I always try to get it secondhand on Facebook marketplace before I buy new.

I am an idiot for signing up for things and not cancelling them so I should probably go through my subscriptions and see what's what.

But I think mainly it's food that takes up most of my money, I do buy food and drinks when I'm out a lot. I've no idea what that adds up to, I should probably check.

It's also the case that I've never been a high earner, I've been supporting my partner for almost 20 years and my child for nearly 10 so there's just never been any extra to put aside or invest and now everything's getting insanely expensive so I'm feeling it on a monthly basis and that's crashed into a sudden awareness of my age and how unprepared I am for a time when I won't be able to work. I've never been much of a future-planner and it's started to make me panicky. I think the only real solution is for me to try to earn more.

I'd say that I'm pretty good at managing the money that I've got. I mostly have the typical ASD lack of funds coming in regularly and in sufficient quantities to make things easier.

I should be finishing my A.A.B in Accounting later this year, and I am actually pretty decent with my money. So, I guess I qualify here.

Obviously, if you genuinely don't have enough to save, then either you're going to have to find more income or some way of cutting expenses, otherwise there really isn't any advice that's going to make that work.

I personally recommend the automatic millionaire. The system below is one that I largely developed before reading it, but the philosophy and practice of it are very similar.

I personally use a 3 checking account system for all my actual spending. One for personal spending on whatever strikes my fancy. (No shame and any money in that one is fair game, I just have to stop before that account hits zero) Another account for typical expenses and an account for things that I don't expect to be taken within the next day.

Any money for the purposes of savings, investing, retirement and a future house comes out before I even see any of it. It goes straight into accounts that I can't easily access, and generally, I don't look at those accounts if I can help it.This is automatic and happens unless I do something to stop it. I mostly don't see that money at all as I have the money directed elsewhere by payroll.

I top all my checking accounts off each week to an amount that I can comfortably refill when I'm spending responsibly. And run out of my before I get to the point where it's a problem to refill the account. And I try to keep my personal spending account funded enough that I don't feel deprived if I can help it.

I'm in the process of writing this up and making some worksheets that are a little more ASD and ADHD friendly, but it does seem to help a lot, so long as there aren't any credit cards involved. That complicates things if used for things other than mandatory fixed expenses. (And may be necessary for those who live in areas where landlords are allowed to require a credit score for renting an apartment)

Don't sign up for subscriptions and if you do, use a one time use debit card for the payment. As long as you're paying ahead rather than for services already provided, the worst thing that should happen is that they suspend the account. So many services will pull shady tricks like not bothering to send a reminder email or taking the money early, that I wouldn't give them a valid CC to use without me stepping in to decide to continue.

Thanks MV, there's some really practical useful stuff in there. Particularly the keeping separate accounts for separate purposes, I'm definitely going to do that.

I can't really fault anybody on here for struggling with money, the vast majority of the recommendations I've seen are for people that have fantastic executive functioning. Even most NTs can't actually use the information, and I think people mostly read it in the hopes of becoming somebody else. On top of that, as a community, we're far more likely to have no employment, unstable employment or be "lucky" enough to just be underemployed. (Not that I don't appreciate being in that third category rather than the other two.)

I'm becoming a big believer in principles based living rather than a rules based on. The specific rules that I use for managing my money is based on principles. The money that I see in my account should be money that I can spend for the purpose it's there for. So, no money in accounts that can't be spent, hence the 3rd checking account. Money for purposes that I can't currently spend, as in longer term savings, gets hidden in some fashion. I'm more likely to do convenient things than inconvenient things. So, my savings, investment and retirement are automatic. Whenever possible, my discretionary spending is manual and with cash. And lastly, if I have to go through and categorize a million transactions, that is work, I'm not going to do it if it's something that I'm not being paid for just as an abstract "this is good for me" thing. I"m in my early 40s, if I was going to do that, I would already be doing it.

I personally find it's easier to see if I've got money there to spend, rather than reconciling the money I spent against my budget later on. A budget is really about where you want the money to go. But, the tracking is just about where it went. If you can't overspend in a category without over drafting, then there's a lot less reason to bother tracking the expenses. I generally only bother with it if I've got a category if it's a new one or if I'm overspending to see if I need to increase the budget, or cut back on spending.

Right now I'm having a little trouble, because I put some stuff on a credit card, but the balance will be paid off before the interest kicks in, so it's not that big of a deal. I just don't have the card paired to a specific pool of money, which makes it easier to not notice that I"m not spending money that's been budgeted.

For me, frugality became a lifestyle choice and mindset. It is not complicated or require a lot of executive function. It is organic. I take pride in saving money and gain pleasure from doing without things. If you look at money as a game, and winning as keeping your money, or making it last as long as possible, then that is how to save. You just find ways. I have seen plenty of folk do it. It is just an attitude.

The truth is most stuff people buy is not necessary. People complain about the price of necessities like food, but food is cheap, compared to things like Apple Iphone, or the gadgets people seem to love these days.

I do not buy (or even pirate) video games. I play chess online at chess.com. No, this is not a troll advertisement for chess.com. It is just a good site that lets you play for free. Also, there is a game called Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, and I play that. So there are a lot of free games out there that cost no money. I like playing those.

You would be surprised how cheap used books are these days.

I do not crave much in the way of variety or social interaction, so travel and dining out is largely unnecessary, and that is a huge expense for most people. Any trait you have can have pluses and minuses, it is just our job as human beings to accentuate the pluses, and downplay the minuses. We do the best we can and then pass on to the next world.

Hmm I'd like to think that I am. I don't make much, so I kinda have to be. One thing that helps is writing down every spent cent, and also having clear categories I mark it under (food, hygiene, living, medical bills etc.) That way I can always know how much I've spent on what and where I could possibly cut from. Of course, if your income is somewhat unstable and not always the same, it's wise to mark it down monthly as well, so you don't overspend on a month you get less money and know if you have more left over than usual. Took me years after starting to mark down my expenses to realize that it'd be wise to do that, too. Of course, at the time I knew how much money I got, but if I had to say how much I got in July 9 years ago, I no longer could with certainty. Could figure it out (probably) by going through some old papers, but it'd be a lot easier if I'd just written it down on the Excel -chart that I use to track my spending.

It seems to me that you are good with money. Looks like you got on top of your debt and pay your bills. Your main problem seems to be how you handle excess whenever you get any.

Out of sight, out of mind might be a useful strategy. Get a separate bank account. Not one that you would use for your everyday transactions. Maybe don't get debit card or online banking options for it. Whenever you get spare cash, put 50% into this account and then forget about it. Use the remaining 50% to scratch your itch.

^Thanks. That's good advice and I that's exactly the kind of discipline I lack. My income is irregular, sometimes I'm flush and sometimes I'm broke. I don't have systems in place to control spending when I'm in a good place so I can weather the hard times. Food for thought.