Between work, a social life, and everyday responsibilities, you probably have a full plate and a marked-up calendar these days.
Throw in summer weddings, birthdays, and bachelor parties and the desire to reduce life's "busy work" becomes even more evident.
But you can take back free time by automating your finances. Streamlining money matters can reduce your workload and improve your financial habits. Let's look at four financial areas that automating can help take off your plate:
Bills
Automating utilities, rent, and credit card payments can save you a ton of time. It can also keep you from incurring late fees and interest charges. That said, it's important to review your accounts and transactions for accuracy on a monthly basis - Try reviewing a paper statement of your activity each month while still automating payments.
Budgets
Not many of us have the time or desire to budget. But there are plenty of websites and apps that will aggregate your spending transactions and create an auto-budget for you (You can read about ours here). Doing so helps you monitor spending levels and identify where your money actually goes each month, without having to open a spreadsheet.
Saving and Investing
After evaluating your cash flow, you can put your monthly surplus to work through a systematic savings or investment plan each month. This involves automatically transferring the excess funds from your checking account into a savings or investment account, depending on the time horizon of your financial goals. This "out-of-sight, out-of-mind" approach helps you consistently save and invest no matter how hectic life gets.
Regaining control of your finances involves discipline which is what automation can bring to the table. While its still important to monitor your accounts, consider automating your "busy work" so you can spend time on the things that matter.