Setting financial goals is an important step to lead a financially secure life. If you don’t work toward anything specific, you are likely to spend more, save less and find yourself behind where you would like to be. Setting goals can help you to stay focused and work hard towards specific achievements until you accomplish them.
Things can become a bit complicated when you set these fantastic goals only to find that these goals do not align with your budget and are therefore unaffordable. It isn’t uncommon for goals to feel daunting at first. For example, if your goal is to achieve financial independence, you might think that building an investment portfolio large enough to support your lifestyle won’t be possible any sooner than traditional retirement age. After running some projections and using compound interest calculators you may find this can happen much sooner than you think!
If you find that it will indeed take until traditional retirement age to reach FI, here we have listed what you can do if your financial goals are too expensive.
1. Review Your Budget
If you are unable to dedicate enough funds for your financial goals, you should review your budget first. Setting a budget is similar to setting financial goals in that you need to keep things realistic.
A budget in its simplest form is a list of your income and expenses. By having this written down it allows you to see exactly where all your money is going and possibly where you are overspending. By reviewing your budget on a consistent basis, you are able to identify the categories where you can cut down your discretionary expenses like entertainment, eating out, etc. Hopefully, it will help you to save more and make your financial goals more achievable.
2. Break Your Large Goals Into Pieces
An advisable first financial goal is to save an emergency fund. Financial experts suggest that your emergency fund be 3-6 months worth of monthly expenses composed of liquid assets.
Three to six months of expenses sitting in your savings account may seem unattainable. The fact is, you don’t need to fully fund your emergency fund in one month.
Start by saving a specific amount every month for your emergency fund and plan your budget accordingly. In any month, if you can save a bit more than what you usually do, stash it to the emergency fund and chalk it up as a win.
3. Start A Side Hustle
According to a 2019 Fortune report, 49% of people under age 35 in the United States have at least one side hustle. Starting a side hustle will allow you to create multiple streams of income, earn more income and make your financial goals more affordable.
Try to opt for a side hustle that fulfills your passion. This can be a win-win, earning extra income and also enjoying the time you are spending earning it. Some common side hustles include managing social media for small businesses, starting your own blog, teaching online, renting your extra rooms on Airbnb, etc.
4. Seek Professional Help
Do you have a goal of repaying debts? If so, it might seem unaffordable if you are having a huge amount of unsecured debt. The incessantly high-interest rates of unsecured debts like credit cards make it cumbersome to repay them. There are debt consolidation companies out there that may be able to help before things progress.
If you fail to repay, the creditors can sell off your debt to a collection agency and you may start receiving collection calls. Besides, they can file a lawsuit against you and if the judgment goes against you, they can garnish your wages too.
In that case, you can consider the option of filing bankruptcy. Filing bankruptcy is a bit complicated and it can take months to complete. So, it would be better to go through bankruptcy counseling by hiring an attorney who has knowledge of bankruptcy laws.
A fee-only financial advisor may be able to help you achieve your goals more efficiently as well.
5. Modify Your Goals
If you have reviewed your budget, broken your goals down into smaller pieces, started a side hustle and even sought out professional help and still can’t seem to achieve your goals it may be time to reconfigure.
Let’s say, you can save $6,000 per year. By stretching your budget and doing a side hustle, you can save a maximum of $9,000 per year. Your goal is to save $15,000 a year.
This is an example of an unachievable or unrealistic financial goal. By setting unrealistic goals, you may lose motivation and abandon pursuing your financial goals.
The bottom line is, rather than giving up if your financial goals seem unaffordable or unrealistic, try to look for effective ways to achieve them. Stay focused and remain patient. Great things take time and achieving important financial goals are no exception.
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