7 Mistakes Women Entrepreneurs Make With Their Money and How You Can Successfully Avoid Them!

In coaching entrepreneurial women and their spouses to create financial success in their marriages I’ve noticed that there are 7 common money mistakes that women make that cause them to seek financial help.

1. The first mistake they make is constantly arguing with their partner about money and getting stuck in a blaming and complaining cycle – and they feel clueless as to how to get out of it.

2. Mistake number two is barely making enough money and feeling like they’re just scraping by each month. That begin to feel resentful that they have difficulty meeting their monthly expenses and resentful that they don’t have enough money to put toward savings, retirement funds, education funds or to put towards their big dreams and goals.

3. Mistake number three is that they struggle with not be able to increase their income.

4. Mistake number four is that they end up relying on their spouse to generate the monthly income because they don’t see themselves as being powerful money creators. They tend to see themselves more as money managers and so they rely on their partners to bring in the income difference. Eventually the main breadwinner feels resentful and this puts additional stress on the relationship.

5. Mistake number five is having a business that is more like a hobby. They experience inner conflict because while they are passionate about their business they’re not clear on how to generate serious income from it. They feel like they need to buckle up and get serious about their business or give it up for good.

6. Mistake number six is that they get stuck in perpetuating money problems because when they talk to their partner about money, they find themselves becoming reactive and frustrated because they feel like their partner isn’t supportive of their business, let alone supportive of them investing in growing their business. And they feel like their partner doesn’t take their business very seriously.

7. Mistake number seven is waking up in the middle of the night stressing about where the next months income is going to come from. This creates a huge drain on their ability to focus their creative energy on growing their business.
   Getting on the same page with your partner makes good financial sense and business sense.

The solution to these 7 money mistakes is to get your personal and business financial life in order. This approach can dramatically increase business income as well as improve your financial relationship with your partner.

You can learn more about how to overcome these 7 common money mistakes that entrepreneurial women make and turn your business and your financial life around in my “Easy and Effortless Millionaire Money Secrets” 4-part teleseminar series.

You’ll also learn my “Secure Cash Flow Money System” that I personally developed and designed that will allow you to take control of your income! Get more info and sign up for this financial-life changing teleseminar series here.

How to Budget: Priceless Budgeting Tips For Women Who Don’t ENJOY Budgeting Podcast

“Been there – done that, and it didn’t work.” This is a common response women have when it comes to budgeting. The problem is that it feels restrictive– like trying to stick to a diet. And no one wants to feel limited or restricted!

As soon as we tell ourselves that we’re going to be watching and restricting our spending it immediately brings up an inner desire to rebel. We want what we want when we want it!

Click below to listen to the podcast.

How to Budget: Priceless Budgeting Tips For Women Who Don’t ENJOY Budgeting

You can listen to the article here. 

 

"Been there – done that, and it didn’t work." This is a common response women have when it comes to budgeting. The problem is that it feels restrictive– like trying to stick to a diet. And no one wants to feel limited or restricted!

As soon as we tell ourselves that we’re going to be watching and restricting our spending it immediately brings up an inner desire to rebel. We want what we want when we want it!

And because of this we plunk down cash to buy something impulsively – only to discover that we’ve increased our suffering later because we don’t have enough left over to pay the monthly bills. Another big temptation is to resort to using a "good ole’ trusty credit card" – which inevitably results in us feeling anxious and overwhelmed when we open up the statement the following month and see how much our balance increased. We experience serious doubts about whether we’ll ever be able to make enough money to pay off our rising pile of debt.

Knowing how to successfully create a system that provides you with ample money to pay the bills and also gives you some freedom to have a little fun is imperative to getting your money under control – especially for women who don’t like budgeting.

To help you get started, here are 3 essential tips…

Tip #1: It is imperative that you have some FUN money! Many women mistakenly give themselves very little extra spending cash beyond their necessary monthly expenses. They do this either because they’re strapped too tight for cash, or because they are used to living extremely frugally.

I want to be completely honest and share that in the past I was guilty of doing this myself. I only ended up feeling more and more resentful and restricted when I ‘starved’ myself with being ultra frugal.

It is essential that you plan for some fun money each month. Sure, you want to be careful that you don’t blow it all at once. But you must have some fun with your money. Otherwise you’ll feel like all you ever do is work and that you don’t get to enjoy the fruits of your labor. I believe it is healthy to have the experience of money bringing you joy. Decide on an exact amount that you will give yourself each month to "blow" or have fun with so you can spend it without feeling guilty.

Tip #2: You must get a birds-eye view. The reason many women overspend and under-earn is that they don’t have a clear birds eye view of their current financial situation at any given moment. They walk around in a fog with some sort of hope that somehow their financial situation will work out.

Because they don’t have clarity around their actual expenses, their current spending and how much money they need to get through the month – they don’t know what their current shortage is (or surplus) and how much they need to make up the difference. It’s critical to have a system in place for maintaining a birds-eye view from moment to moment.

Tip #3: Believe it and you WILL eventually see it. Mastering your money takes a level of deep commitment. Most women say that they want to master their spending and make more money. But when push comes to shove they’re not willing to do the work that’s required to get them there.

You must be truly committed to turning your financial situation around. Otherwise, when money isn’t coming in, or when you’ve overspent you’ll be tempted to give up. I remember when we had over $40,000 of debt and there were times when I wanted to throw in the towel.

But I knew that we were going to do whatever it took to get ourselves out of our "financial mess." And we succeeded. And so can you. As Les Brown, the popular motivational speaker says, "You’ve got to be HUNGRY." You’ve got to be committed. If you believe it, then you will be willing to take action and NOT give up.

Combine these three tips and you will be well positioned for becoming a master of your money. With commitment, perseverance and the willingness to take the next steps and learn essential tools for helping you move forward you can and WILL succeed!

To get more tips make sure you sign up for my free call. It’s happening TONIGHT on Thursday, August 11th…

Complete Money Makeover: 3 BREAKTHROUGH STRATEGIES to Gain Control of Your Erratic Cash Flow, Reverse Under Earning, and Have More Money For the Things You Really Want TODAY! Click here to get more info and sign up now.

Personal budgeting: Tracking Spending, the Golden Ticket to Financial Freedom

I’ve noticed that one of the biggest financial challenges that many of my clients face is keeping track of where their money goes. Here’s what often happens: They receive their paycheck and deposit it in the bank, and then a few weeks later it’s somehow mysteriously disappeared. For all they know, it’s been consumed by the black hole in the financial universe. Personal budgeting can provide financial help to married female entrepreneurs. Read more

Personal Budgeting – How to Make it Work for YOU!

Personal Budgeting – Budgeting Tips So Your Budget Works For YOU!

Spending Plans are more effective than budgets in that they allow us to balance our desire to save more for the future (by investing in a secure retirement plan, an emergency savings fund, a down payment for a home and/or funds for a much needed vacation) with our desire to enjoy our lives now, in a way that supports our values and gives us freedom of choice.  A Spending Plan, typically made at the end of the month, involves creating guidelines and making intentional choices about where we’d like our money to go in the upcoming month.

I encourage all my couples’ clients to create a monthly spending plan so that they can plan in advance of each month exactly where they want their hard-earned money to go—and I want you to do the same.  But if creating a spending plan is a new process for you, it’s very important that you be patient with yourself and your partner.  In the first couple of months you might discover that you and/or your partner are not able to stick to your spending plan.  Perhaps you’ve even gotten into argument over it and now you’re ready to just ditch the whole thing. Don’t do this!  Read the 4 tips below so that you can make sure you’re taking all the right steps to creating an effective spending plan.

1. Give yourselves permission to NOT be perfect—just be committed and keep coming back! Chances are good that you won’t follow your spending plan perfectly during the first several months–that’s okay!  It took me and my husband many months before we were actually able to stick to our spending plan.  And our first spending plan took us FOREVER to create and agree on.  It felt like a very foreign process to us.  Be patient with yourselves and know that once you become familiar with the process, it won’t feel as awkward or take as long to create.

Know that it’s not all going to be “peaches and cream”—there will be some arguments and that’s okay! Getting into an argument over how much one of you spent doesn’t give you permission to give up and claim, “This isn’t working!”  It works—but you have to be willing to keep showing up even when you get frustrated.  Remember, your spending plan will work for you IF YOU WORK IT!

2. Use a Financial Freedom Tracking Book™ in conjunction with your spending plan. I’ve heard people complain that spending plans don’t work for them because they are “visual” people and they don’t have a clear sense of exactly where they’re “at” with their spending.  Here’s what you need to do:  Get a small notebook (4 x 6) and determine 3-5 categories that you have a tendency to overspend in.  Write in the category and the total amount you’ve budgeted for the month in that category.

For example, if you decide that you will spend $400 on groceries for the month—record the budgeted amount in your notebook.  Following each visit to the grocery store, record the date, how much you spent and the new subtotal.  Your entry might look something like this:

Grocery Budget $400                    $ Spent         New Subtotal

1-15-2010   Smiths                           $40               $360

1-20-2010   Albertsons                     $75               $285

You will need to save receipts and record your entries at the end of the day. You can keep your Financial Freedom Tracking Book™ on the kitchen table so both of you can easily access it. Keep a small bowl beside your notebook for receipts.  Decide which of you will do the tracking.  Just remember that both of you need to look at your book before you go shopping to see how much money you have available in your 3-5 spending categories.  Some common areas that people tend to overspend in are: clothing, personal expenses, recreation, dining out, groceries and children’s expenses.

3. Review and update your spending plan once a week–or, at the very least, every two weeks. Agree on who will update the spending plan each week so you can have an accurate picture of where you’re “at”. The spending plan should be written down a piece of paper and easy to read.

Keep your spending plan in the same place so both of you can see and refer to it throughout the week. You might consider posting it on your fridge or the kitchen table.

4. Review your spending history. If you are new to the spending plan process you will want to calculate your spending at the end of the month in your various categories to see how well (or poorly) you did. Review your spending with financial software like Quicken or Microsoft Money. Or if you don’t have financial software, just print off your bank statements online and determine how much you’ve spent in each of your spending categories.

In the beginning, my husband and I didn’t review our spending history at the end of each month.  We thought a spending plan was enough to keep us in check.  But when we finally did review our spending history we discovered that in one month we had actually overspent by $900—yikes!  Once we started tracking our spending history each month, we were able to cut back on our overspending.

Simple Action Steps You Can Take Now:

1. Buy a small notebook to use as your Financial Freedom Tracking Book™

2. Talk with your partner and determine which 3-5 categories you want to track in your notebook.  Record those categories along with the predetermined spending amount.  Make a commitment to save receipts and place in a bowl or container beside your tracking notebook at the end of each day. Decide if one or both of you will update the notebook each evening.

3. Decide which one of you will be responsible for updating your spending plan.

4. Decide who will run the numbers for your previous months’ spending so that you can calculate your spending history. Agree to buy Quicken or Microsoft Money, install it on your computer and give yourselves a few months to become familiar with it.

Budgeting Tips – The Simple Basics You Need to Know to Create a Budget

Many of us internally cringe or feel rebellious when we think about setting parameters on our spending.  Images flash in our minds of having to pinch pennies for the rest of our lives and do without things that bring us joy–like nice dinners out, new clothes or fun, exotic vacations.  We react this way because we assume that in order to limit our spending we have to force ourselves to adhere to a very strict budget.

Spending Plans are different than budgets in that they allow us to balance our desire to save more for the future (by investing in a secure retirement plan, an emergency savings fund, a down payment for a home and/or funds for a much needed vacation) with our desire to enjoy our lives now, in a way that supports our values and gives us freedom of choice.  A Spending Plan, typically made at the end of the month, involves creating guidelines and making intentional choices about where we’d like our money to go in the upcoming month.

1. Create a spending plan based on your spending history. Look at your spending for the previous month or the past couple of months by going through your bank statements, check registers and credit card statements.  HINT:  If you know you won’t take the time to gather past statements and to review your actual spending history you can make an educated guess at the amounts that you think you realistically spend in each category.  Then try to adhere to your new spending plan for a month.  Throughout the month add any bills/expenses that you forgot. Make adjustments to your spending categories at the end of the month – if you discover that you’re numbers weren’t realistic.

2. Divide your spending into these four broad categories: 1) fixed expenses, 2) variable expenses, 3) debt payments (don’t include your mortgage in debt payments–instead record it under your fixed expenses. You will, however, want to record your car loan under debt payments) and 4) savings.  You might not have any money going towards savings right now, but you’ll still want to retain this category to serve as a reminder of your savings goal.

3. Assign numbers to your spending plan based on your spending history, using your four broad categories. Itemize your individual expenses below each broad category.  For example, under the category of fixed expenses you’ll list: mortgage, health insurance, phone bill, car insurance, utilities, etc.  Record all your expenses on the left side of a piece of paper and on the right side list your income, your partner’s income and any income from other sources, and then get a total for all your income sources.

4. Make sure you work your numbers until your expenses equal your income so that your income minus your expenses equals zero. If you end up with an extra $200 after you’ve subtracted your expenses from your income, don’t just leave it as an extra $200.  Assign the $200 to a spending category like savings.  In order for your spending plan to really work you’ll need to refer to it once a week or at the very least, twice a month.  Mark out any expenses that have been paid and calculate how much money you have remaining to make sure you have enough money to make it through to the end of the month.  Your spending plan should have coffee stains on it and be well worn by the end of each month!

Simple Action Steps You Can Take Now:

1. Print off this article and put in on your refrigerator or tape it to the kitchen wall.

2. Ask your spouse in a very loving and kind way if he/she would be willing to set up a time to talk about creating a spending plan. Just know that they might feel a little defensive at first.  Tell them that you’re not out to control their spending but that you’d like to sit down and talk about how the two of you could achieve your financial goals together.

3. Determine a specific time and date to create a spending plan. Write this on your calendar. Remind your partner the day before so that it’s top of mind for both of you.

4. If your partner doesn’t want to do this – don’t let that deter you! Create a spending plan on your own and then show it to your partner and see what kind of tweaks and changes that they want to make – remember both of you have got to agree to the spending plan  – otherwise your partner won’t have the emotional “buy-in” to stick to the spending plan!

5. Collect your last month of credit card and bank statements and have these ready in advance of your spending plan conversation.  After you’ve completed these steps you’re ready to create your new spending plan with your partner!

How To Budget: Give Yourself Some Fun Money

Give yourself some fun money in your personal budgeting. When you’re trying to figure out how to budget for the family it is important to keep in mind that every couple should have their own “fun spending money” that they choose to track how they spend or not—the choice is up to you.  Of all the save money tips, this tip is one of the most frequently overlooked budgeting tips.  Having your own fun money will give you a sense of freedom, independence and flexibility.  You can choose to allocate your fun money at the beginning of each month by depositing or transferring it to your individual checking accounts.  Another option is to do this weekly instead of monthly so that you’re not as apt to spend your fun money all at once.  You can choose to spend your money or save it for an upcoming fun expense like a vacation or a big-ticket item.

How to Budget: Set Up a Fixed and Variable Checking Account

Set up a bank account for your fixed expenses and variable expenses. I actually learned this approach from one of my students shortly after I began teaching classes on money management for couples.  This is an approach that my husband and I use and it has been incredibly effective for us.

Set up two checking accounts at your bank:  one for your fixed monthly expenses for things like your mortgage, health insurance, phone bill, car insurance, debt payments that your paying on (car loans, student loans), utilities and your savings.  Set up the other checking account for your variable expenses: things like groceries, gasoline, dining out, recreation, clothing, medical expenses, household purchases and miscellaneous.

Refer to your spending plan to calculate how much money needs to go into your bank accounts each month.  Make it a priority to put money into your fixed checking account first and your variable checking account second.  By having two separate accounts for your fixed and variable expenses you’ll never spend money that was intended for a necessary living expense like your mortgage on a fun unnecessary expense like dining out.  This system also works well for self-employed professionals–all you do is transfer money into the appropriate fixed or variable bank account as it comes in.