50+ Things Everyone Ought to Know About Their Money (And Hundreds of Questions to Ask Along the Way)

03. Aug, 2009 5 Comments

How well do you know your money situation? Here are 50+ things everyone ought to know about their money.

Net Worth

1. Total Assets

What are your total assets? What is the approximate value for your home? Your vehicle?

2. Total Debts

What are your total debts? Car loan, mortgage, personal loan, line of credit, credit cards, etc.

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Bank Account

3. Monthly Fees

What is the monthly fee for your bank account? Do you even have one? Is there a minimum deposited amount required to negate the fee?

4. Account Fees

What additional fees does your bank charge? Are there ATM limits, withdrawal limits, overdraft fees, etc?

5. Savings Interest Rate

What interest are you earning with your bank account? What’s your savings account interest rate? What’s your checking account interest rate?

6. Transfer Limit

Do you have a maximum withdrawal limit on your bank account? What is it? When does it reset (daily, weekly, monthly?)

See Also:

Budget

9. Total Monthly Income

What is your total monthly income? What is your family’s total monthly income? How much does it fluctuate? What is the minimum you will make in a month?

10. Total Monthly Expenses

What are your total monthly expenses? How much do they fluctuate? What is your minimum budget? What is your dream budget? Are there any monthly expenses you can reduce?

11. Percentage of Housing Costs

How much of your monthly budget is spent on housing? Are you comfortable with that percentage? Over the next 5 years, will that percentage go up or down?

12. Percentage of Transportation Costs

How much of your monthly budget is going towards transportation costs? Are you comfortable with that percentage? Over the next 5 years, will that percentage go up or down? What can you do to reduce that percentage today?

See Also:

Cash

7. How Much Cash You Have In Your Wallet

Do you carry cash in your wallet? Count the cash in your wallet, in your pocket, in your change drawer/jar/purse. Do you have other cash stored around your house? Do you know where it is? Do other people know where it is? Is there a piece of paper with locations & amounts in case of emergencies?

8. How Much Cash You Can Get Your Hands on in an Emergency

If something were to happen, how much cash can you get your hands on? Do you have an easily accessible bank account with cash you can withdraw? Do you have actual cash stored around your house?

See Also:

Automation/Bills

13. When Your Credit Card Bill Is Due

On what day do you receive your credit card statement? On what day is your credit card bill due? How long is between those two days? Are your credit cards paid off automatically or do you have to do a manual transfer? Do you do it through an online bank, by phone, by mail?

14. When Your Phone Bills Are Due

When do you receive your phone bill? When is your phone bill due? Are your phone bills paid automatically? Are they tied to a credit card, or a bank account?

15. When Your Rent/Mortgage Payment is Due

When do you pay rent? When is your mortgage payment due? Is the process automated?

16. When Your Utility Bills Are Due

When are your gas, electricity, or water bills due? Are they paid automatically? Are they paid through money transfer, credit card, or cheque?

See Also:

Emergency Fund

17. How Much You Need For Your Emergency Fund

What’s the worst case scenario? If you lost your job, how much money will you need to cover your expenses while you look for work? If you were to break your leg, how much cash do you need while you recover?

18. How Much You Have For Your Emergency Fund

Do you have an emergency fund? How big is it? How long will that last you?

19. How You are Going to Save For Your Emergency Fund

Do you have a plan to fund your emergency fund? Is it automatic?

20. When You Will Use Your Emergency Fund
During which circumstances will you allow yourself to touch your emergency fund? Loss of job? Loss of life? Medical emergency? Are these situations written down (and agreed upon)?

21. When You Will Not Use Your Emergency Fund

What does not qualify as an emergency? Car breakdown? Superbowl? Are they written down (and agreed upon)?

22. How You Will Replenish Your Emergency Fund Should It Be Used

If you are forced to use your emergency fund, how quickly can you replenish it?

See Also:

Credit Card

23. Interest Rate

What interest rate are you paying on your credit card balance? Is it currently a promotional rate? When will it change? What will it change to?

24. Grace Period Length

How long is your grace period (where you aren’t charged interest)? What will eliminate the grace period (missing a payment? holding a balance)? How long before you get the grace period back?

25. Terms & Conditions of Rewards

What type of rewards program do you have? Do they expire? How can you cash them in? Is there a minimum? A maximum?

26. Requirements for Additional Insurance

To take advantage of the additional insurance that your card may offer, what must you do? Pay for the entire purchase by credit card? What are the exceptions? What does it cover? What won’t it cover?

27. Requirements for Extended Warranty

What is required to benefit from an extended warranty that your card may off? Full purchase price? Must you hold a balance? Does it double the manufactures, or add a year?

Debt

28. How Much Credit Card Debt You Have

How many credit cards do you have? What balance do they have? What are their interest rates? When will they be paid off?

29. How Much Student Loan Debt You Have

Are they private or government assisted loans? What interest rate are they charging? What is the minimum payment? When will it be paid off?

30. How Much in Personal Loans You Have

Do you owe your parents any money? Friends? Relatives? Are they charging interest? How much? When are you expected to repay?

31. How Much in Credit Lines You Have

Do you have a line of credit through your bank? What interest rate is being charged? Is it secured against anything? What are the terms of repayment?

32. How Big Your Mortgage Is

Do you have a mortgage? How large is it? When will it be paid off? Are you able to make additional payments? What fees are associated with the mortgage? Is your home worth more or less than the value of the mortgage? What interest rate is your mortgage at? What does it cost to refinance your mortgage?

33. How Big Your Car Loan Is

Do you have a car loan? What are the terms of repayment? When will it be paid off? Is your car worth more or less than the value of the loan?

See Also:

Career

34. How Much You Are Getting Paid

What is your pay calculated on (salary, hourly, commission, etc)? Are your paychecks accurate?

35. What Your Benefits Are

What benefits does your company offer? What are their requirements? How much are you allowed to claim? What percentage are you allowed to claim?

36. What Your Pension/401k Options Are

What pension or 401k plan do they offer? What is it invested in? What transfer options are available if you are to leave the company?

See Also:

Taxes

37. What Tax Bracket You Are In

How much of your income do you actually get to keep? How close are you to the surrounding tax brackets?

38. How Much You Owe In Taxes

How much do you owe for taxes? Per paycheck? Per month? Per quarter? Per year? Are your taxes taken off automatically, or do you have to save to pay taxes?

39. How Much You Will Receive Back In Taxes

How much of your taxes will you get back in April? Should you change your withholdings to optimize your tax withholdings? Are you using taxes as a savings plan? What will you do with your tax return? Debt repayment? Invest in retirement?

40. When Taxes Are Due

Do you pay taxes yearly? Quarterly? Per paycheck?

41. How Much Tax Credit You Already Have

How much of a tax credit do you already have? What was it from? How much of a tax benefit do you already have from previous years? How many years will that tax credit last you? When will you start having to pay taxes (and not get them back)?

Retirement

42. Retirement Account Savings Percentage

What percentage of your income is going towards retirement? Are you comfortable with that percentage? Over the next 5 years, is that percentage going to go up or down? Are your retirement savings automated?

43. Retirement Investment Portfolio

What are your retirement savings invested in? Do you know? Are they invested in bonds, stocks, index funds, mutual funds, real estate, etc? Are you comfortable with your investment portfolio? Is it more or less risky than you need? Than you desire?

44. Retirement Investment Fees

What is it costing you to invest? Are there monthly, annual, or per transaction fees? Are you investing yourself or through a broker? What are your broker’s fees?

45. When You Can Retire

When are you going to be able to retire? Do you want to retire? What does retirement look like? How much money will you need?

See Also:

Insurance

46. Medical Insurance

Do you have medical insurance? How much does it cost? Do you pay monthly, quarterly, or yearly? What does it cover? What doesn’t it cover? Is payment automated?

47. Life Insurance

Do you have life insurance? How much does it cost? Who is the beneficerary? Do you pay monthly, quarterly, or yearly? What does it cover? What doesn’t it cover? Is payment automated?

48. House Insurance

Do you have home insurance? What is the deductible? How much does it cost? Are there cheaper options available? What does it cover? What doesn’t it cover? Do you pay monthly, quarterly, or yearly? Is payment automated?

49. Car Insurance

Do you have car insurance? What is the deductible? What does it cover? What doesn’t it cover? How much does it cost? Do you pay monthly, quarterly, or yearly? Is payment automated?

Future/Planned Spending

50. Children

Are you going to have children? How much will it cost?How many children are you going to have? Will it affect your transporation needs? Housing needs?

51. College Fund

Are you going to college? How much will it cost? Are you children going to go to college? Are you going to help them pay for college? Are you going to invest in a college fund, or set money aside for them?

52. Large Purchases

What additional large purchases are you going to need to tackle in the next few years? How are you planning on paying for them? Are you going to buy a house? Are you going to renovate? Are you going to buy a vehicle?

See Also:

What’d I miss? Anything else everyone ought to know about their money?

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5 Responses to “50+ Things Everyone Ought to Know About Their Money (And Hundreds of Questions to Ask Along the Way)”

  1. Paul @ FiscalGeek 03. Aug, 2009 at 3:38 pm

    These is a good thought provoking list Alan. I would add one at the top for me, What do you Spend your Money On? Take your 90 day transaction history from your bank and break that down into various categories. This will help inform a lot of your financial planning as well when you see that you spend 15% of your income on eating out for example.

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  2. Alexis 03. Aug, 2009 at 10:58 pm

    I am printing this list for my husband and I to go over ASAP. I think we have a pretty good grip on most of it, but a refresher course would be very helpful. As a military wife who juggles all the finances during long deployments, I would love to have concrete answers to all of these questions at hand. Thanks so much.

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  3. Kayla 04. Aug, 2009 at 8:37 pm

    Great list. I would like to add one more to the list. I recently found a website that talks about why budgets sometimes fail … when someone goes against their money personality. It seems to make a lot of sense and not something I’ve thought about before reading their site. They use the example of someone who is socially motivated and loves friends and how using a detail oriented spreadsheet won’t work for this type of person. They need a more social budgeting system like an online program with blogging. Makes sense right? And answers a lot of questions about why we fail at budgets. I definately think this is worth a #51 on the list and is something everyone should know about their money! Their site has kind of a funny name but it’s catchy. http://www.money-cocktail.com is the site and they look at someone’s money as being a mixture of income, savings, investments, debt, etc. and help people see that money is not just about the money but what motivates us to spend our money. Some of you might want to check them out. They also have a great "get out of debt" plan that is out of this world amazing! Every time I revisit their site, they’ve added more suggestions and more ideas.

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  4. Margaret 08. Aug, 2009 at 8:03 am

    I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don’t know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.

    Margaret

    http://grantfoundation.net

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  5. me in millions 26. Aug, 2009 at 1:50 pm

    Thank you for this thought provoking article. I hope you don’t mind, but I’m planning on going through the question posed in this post and answering them on my blog. I will of course give you credit for them and post a link to your blog and to this post. Please let me know if this is/isn’t okay.

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