Get started

Get Started To get anything accomplished in our lives we must have a starting point. Once we get started we must continue the journey. I have noticed getting started can be extremely hard at times. When working with people and their finances everyone wants to have a monthly plan to get control of their money, but we can always find an excuse or something else to do instead of a budget. It can be the same in losing weight or even cleaning the yard. All of these tasks can look overwhelming before we start but we will never finish them if we don’t start. We know if we don’t start we will not finish, that’s obvious. But that still does not motivate us to start, so we have to be reminded. If you are doing a budget it can take about three months to get all of the kinks worked out. When we hear that we tend to want to not get started. Or we think we can’t do a budget until we get more money to work with. We must start where we are at with what we have. Doing a budget for the first time can be a little time consuming. Most of the time we don’t know how much we spend in certain areas, this is why it takes about three months to get a budget to flow. If you are married sit down with your spouse and go line by line and put in an amount for the areas that you will need to spend money on for the month. Don’t panic if you don’t have enough money to go in all of the item categories. Feel free to download a budget here for free. If you run out of steam the first time you sit down, don’t panic, just pick back up later and continue. After about three months you can do your budget in about 15 minutes. Now remember the next most important thing in this process is tracking what you actually spend. This can be a part that is hard to follow up on but it is vital to get your finances under control. If you don’t know how much you are spending you will all ways chase your expenses and guess how much you spend. I suggest you pick one day a week and enter all that you spend in your budget and that will let you know how much you have left in each category to spend each week. If you like you can save all of your receipts and go through them weekly. Remember to just get started! You will never finish if you never start. I will be doing a free budgeting 101 workshop this fall. Let me know if you are interested. Let me know if I can help! Tim West Go West Coaching

Health Insurance

Health Insurance: You will get it and like it! Health insurance is a great thing to have and is much needed because of the cost of health care. The only thing that grows faster than health care costs is the national debt. With recent legislation it looks like we will get taxed if we do not have a government approved plan. If your employer offers health insurance you are limited to what they offer unless you go at it on your own. I have had to provide my own health insurance for the last 8 years. When you pay for your own insurance you learn more about health insurance than you can imagine. I generally have to shop for it every year to keep my rates as low as possible. You have several options such as a HMO, Health maintenance organization; it is a prepaid health plan. As an HMO member, you pay a monthly premium. In exchange, the HMO provides comprehensive health care for you and your family, including doctors' visits, hospital stays, emergency care, surgery, laboratory (lab) tests, x-rays, and therapy. You also have a POS, POS: Point-of-Service Plans Many HMOs offer an indemnity-type option known as a Point-of-Service or "POS" health care plan. The primary care doctors in a POS plan usually make referrals to other providers in the health plan. But in a POS plan, members can refer themselves outside the plan and still get some coverage. If the doctor makes a referral out of the network, the health care plan pays all or most of the bill. If you refer yourself to a provider outside the network and the service is covered by the health plan, you will have to pay coinsurance. PPO: Preferred Provider Organizations The preferred provider organization, or "PPO", is a combination of traditional fee-for-service and an HMO. Like an HMO, there are a limited number of doctors and hospitals to choose from. When you use those providers (sometimes called "preferred providers", other times called "network providers"), most of your medical bills are covered. And I will cover one more an HSA; this is a health savings account. This is a tax sheltered high deductible plan. I would recommend this one if you do not go to the doctor a lot and you cover your routine trips to the doctor out of pocket. One advantage to this is that you can save your deductible in a tax sheltered savings account and use it on approved health care expenses. I will not recommend which one you need but I will give you a few tips for helping you decide. Determine how often you and your family go to the doctor for routine care, if you have young kids or go to the doctor a lot an HSA may not be best for you. HSA’s, on most of them, cover 100% after you meet the deductible. Now to save on your premium and co-insurance amount, increase the deductible. The whole idea in insurance is if you take on more risk, or pay more, you will not have to pay the insurance company as much money. In health insurance you have to deal with your maximum out of pocket expenses or in their lingo the stop loss. This is the maximum out of pocket you will pay. Like the 80/20 plan. They pay 80% you pay 20% maximum of your medical expenses. If you increase the 20% to 30% you premiums will be lower. So decide what you and your family needs. Pick an independent agent that has the heart of a teacher. Make sure you understand what you are buying. When it comes to insurance you have to shop it often, I suggest yearly on health. They are like cable companies; new customers get the best deals. The new health care law has yet to be figured out completely other than it’s a tax. People often ask; when should I implement insurance in my financial plan? I suggest ASAP. Having insurance shifts the financial risk from you to the insurance company. If you do not have proper insurance it can cause a huge financial burden or even bankruptcy. Email me any questions or comments you may have. Thanks for reading. Let me know if I can help! Tim West Go West Coaching