“Never throw away anything that you can still use, and never spend more than you earn!”.

Here are a few things one should learn about personal finance:

1. Know your budget

Without knowing how much you spend every month and how much you have spent in the past; how can you look at planning your future? You don’t have to keep track of how much you are spending every single day. There are so many good apps that can help you keep track of where your money goes with just a few clicks. Make a monthly plan of how much you will spend in each category, based on your past spending.

2. Pay yourself first

It’s payday! Yeah! So, what do you do? Let’s buy some clothes, shoes and go out for dinner with friends!!! Yep…well, no! Before you start going off on a spending spree, decide what your goal is and set aside a predetermined amount. Once you have set your goal, move the money out of your current account. Then live off what’s left and forget about the rest!

3. Stay out of Debt

Debt is a bad habit, once you get into it, it’s hard to get out of it. So, Stay Out!

4. Never use credit cards

I see credit cards as a virus of the 21st century. Why would you spend money you don’t have to buy stuff you can’t afford?

There is never, ever a good reason to use credit cards, unless you repay them in full every month, and “use” them in clever ways to give you stuff back for free. Travel points rewards are a fantastic example of a clever way to use credit cards to your advantage. But always repay them in full!

5. Spend less than you earn

It doesn’t seem like a hard thing to learn, but I am always surprised when I see people in the office waiting for payday with trepidation not because they can’t wait to see their balance going up, but because they can’t pay the rent, or buy groceries, or pay their car loan. Never ever spend more than you earn.

6. Have your own emergency fund

What would happen if you lost your job tomorrow? What if you had an accident and couldn’t work for a few months? If you want to rest easy at night and not feel this financial pressure every day, make sure you set aside your own emergency fund.

7. Set goals

Saving for saving’s sake is boring! I’ve always been a good saver and seeing my account grow every month has always been a good enough reason to save, but it wasn’t until I started to set myself goals that I found a real purpose and a strong motivation.

8. Start investing

If you want to live the life of your dreams, investing your savings as soon as you have any will help you to get there much faster.