INDIANAPOLIS — From late payments to overdrawn bank accounts, there are some warning signs that we are pushing our money to its limits.
Cherie Lowe, the Queen of Free, shared her seven financial warning signs you should not ignore on 13Sunrise and in her blog.
- You don't have one central location for your bills
- You forgot how to log into your accounts online
- You don't know how much you have in the bank
- You don't know your monthly spending
- You can't cover the cost of an emergency
- You don't know how much you owe
- You have no goals for your money
If you have one or more of these warnings, Cherie shared how to get back on track.
Organize your bills in a basket or simple filing system and make sure they all land in the same place as soon as they arrive so you remember to pay them.
If you forget passwords, make a list on paper of all your accounts, then log into each of them and update the passwords. If you have to, save them in a safe place on another hard-copy document. Then use this information to regularly check on #3 on the list, and consider automatic bill payments to help with #1 and to track what you owe for #6.
Collect 30 days worth of receipts to see what you're spending each month, then budget accordingly.
You should have a rainy day fund of somewhere between $1,000 and $2,000, Cherie said.
For setting goals, Cherie said, "If you don’t have a roadmap, you’ll remain lost. Having some short term and long term goals will give you a reason to trim your budget and check in on a regular basis."
Watch Cherie's full Sunrise segement in the video player.