Importance of Financial Planning

This is a sponsored conversation for SheSpeaks on behalf of Prudential. All opinions are my own.

The number one thing I have noticed about becoming a parent - kids aren't cheap. Even before we started to plan our family, we considered the expenses. Would I be able to stay home? Would we have to pay for day care? How much debt did we need to pay off? Then they are babies and they need a lot of stuff! Diapers, bottles, blankets, cribs, pacifiers, and the list is a mile long. When they get a little older you think that the expenses will slow down, but you have to pay for school, extracurricular activities, and shoes every month because they just keep growing.

Financial Planning for a Family

Even if your child is like mine and goes to public school, there are expenses every week that you need to pay for. What about when they get older - a safe car, cell phone, college, weddings... I am all for making my children get a job and help with their own finances, but there is only so much that a minimum job can pay for.


Now that I am bringing in my own income, I wanted to save it as much as I could. Did you know that the average woman working full-time earns 79% of the income earned by men?1 This could be because of many issues: lower likelihood to negotiate salaries, time out of the workforce, or differences in pay.

Financial Planning for Education.

To make the income I am earning stretch longer, I have been considering investing. And here's the thing with investing - I'm scared. Turns out there are many women just like me. Women tend to not invest to the same degree as men.2 Women's discomfort with investing comes at a high cost for them: They are apt to delay investing, invest more in lower risk, lower return investments and are more likely to run out of money in retirement. But women outlive men by an average of 5-6 years.3

Financial Planning for a New Home.

Although I make a little income with my blog, my main job is mom, care taker, chef, and chauffer...home maker. I do so much on a daily basis without even thinking about it. On average, women in the U.S. spend 28 hours per week on household chores – 65 percent more than the average for men.4 That is uncompensated work and it does not figure into women’s financial planning. Prudential has created a tool called the “Value of all you do” that lets you very quickly quantify the value of all the household chores you do on a daily basis. What you would need to pay someone to do those for you. So you may be like I was and may feel you don't have enough time for financial planning.


This is a sponsored conversation for SheSpeaks on behalf of Prudential. All opinions are my own.


Sources:
1. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Historical Income Tables Table P-40: Women’s Earnings as a Percentage of Men’s Earnings by Race and Hispanic Origin, 2016
2. Source: http://fortune.com/2016/05/11/sallie-krawcheck- ellevest-launch;
3. Source: Prudential Retirement analysis; National Center for Health Statistics, Health, United States, 2015: With Special Feature on Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities. Hyattsville, MD. 2016
4. Source: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, October 2016, http://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54757

6 comments

  1. I always said if a woman got paid for everything they did everyday a man or woman couldn't afford us! I don't like it when I hear a man come home and say honey, I'm tired! I worked all day! Well we didn't sit on our butts all day! As a matter of fact, our job is 24/7! A lot of times, something always came up when I tried to save money. And with one income, there isn't enough to save or put away! A lot of Americans live paycheck to paycheck! That'll another great quality of a woman - they can make a dollar stretch so they have enough for the children, pets, etc. I think before a couple gets married, they should take a course in finance. I mean half of divorces are over money problems!! Very sad!

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  2. I once heard a statistic that if you have $10 in your pocket and no debt you have more "wealth" than some crazy percentage of the country. I know paying off loans is our #1 priority this year!

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  3. I very much agreed that reducing debt and being debt-free is the best for anyone. I don't think that too many of the credit card companies who are making $$$$ off people would agree!

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  4. I always pay close attention to my finances. I pay my bills when due, try to save as much as I can, and really limit my credit card spending. It is so important to always be on top. You never know what unforeseen thing can come up so you should always be prepared.

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  5. Having money common sense and planning ahead is huge. I too am a stay at home mom and do everything around the house, it's so worth it.Good tips here.

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♥,
Diana