Try 10 year plan to help you manage your goals

Try these steps to help make sure your finances are on the right track.

13:07 26 May 2013

Northern Ireland just reviewed plans for the future and improving communities and finances. They have a tentative ten-year plan in place which is a great idea to borrow. When it comes to finances, it might be a good idea to have your long-term goals like retirement, short-term goals such as starting a savings, but also a ten-year plan for your finances.

 

What you could include in a ten-year plan:

 

• Unique—the best part about a ten-year plan is that you make it, so it fits your unique vision. Perhaps you want to be debt-free, take a long vacation, or plan for the possibility of a wedding and honeymoon, or even children. Every family is different so your goals will be completely unique.

 

• Savings goal—you’ll probably always have some sort of milestone for your savings accounts that you want to reach when you set up a ten-year plan for your finances. You can set it as an actual goal, but since this might be part of your budget anyway, your ten-year plan could just be to verify that you are on track to a specific ten-year savings goal.

 

• Giving back—even though we mostly think of finances as ways to increase our savings, earnings, or financial status it could also include special goals for giving back to the community.

 

• Investments—this is the perfect place to set up goals for your investments and the type of return you can realistically expect for any investments you make.  You obviously might not hit this goal but it’s a good way to make sure your finances are on track.

 

• University—if you have or plan to have children it’s a good idea to work in a plan for saving for university expenses or to at least be able to provide all the things that will be necessary. Adding this into your finances before its necessary is a wise idea.